Crossing Tokyo

Our first order of business in Japan is to figure out the public transportation system. We are staying in an older section of Northern Tokyo called Asakusa (a-sa-ku-sa). It's really cool, but some of the things we want to see are about an hour away on the other side of town.



There are lots of subway lines in Tokyo, but the kicker is that they are all run by different private companies, and connecting to another train sometimes means going back outside and walking a block or two.

Instead of having a flat rate for each trip, you are charged at the end of your ride as you exit the system. On top of that, each company has different prices. It's easier than it sounds, because we buy Passmo cards that can be used on all of them. Also, every gate has a "guard" - they help us find the platform every time.

The other task of the guards is to open up the turnstile when your card gets jammed. Mark can't understand why I think this is so funny, but I think it looks exactly like an old xerox machine, where you had to fish your jammed paper out from between the rolls.



We change trains twice to get to Tokyo station so that we can buy tickets for tomorrow's trip to Kyoto on the superfast "Shinkansen". After we get the tickets, we wander around the station, which is filled with cool shops and cooler teenagers all changing trains.



The JR Yamanote line is essentially the Beltway of Tokyo - it's an elevated train that circles the center of town.



We ride it to the Shinjuku station for our first taste of fashionable Tokyo. We're trying to find a branch of "Kinokuniya" - the Japanese bookstore that we've grown to love in NYC (41st & 6th ave). Of course, we know most of the books here will be in Japanese (it is Japan, after all) but we understand they also have an English floor.

The alleys of Shinjuku don't look that different from the usual market culture in Asia, till we start to notice the store names, like, for example, Barneys New York.

Here's a group of locals waiting at the back entrance of Studio Alta - a giant in the world of Japanese TV:



Soon, an SUV with tinted windows pulls up, the crowd screams and the security thugs wave us away.



It's not all glitz in Shinjuku, though, as we visit our first 100-yen shop on the same street - kind of like our dollar stores, since 100 yen equal about $1.25 in USD.



Maggie picks out some false eyelashes for friends back home, and finds a new variety of M&M's - orange, anyone?



We finally reach Kinokuniya, where the kids spend an hour or two blissed out in the manga section and we wind up with a small stack of manga that we probably could have gotten at the Borders in Meriden Mall -- though, as Karma points out, they are a little bit cheaper here!

We also get her a copy of "Alice in Wonderland", since that's on her summer reading list...and Kobi gets the first volume of "How to Train a Dragon." Mark gets a book called "100 questions to ask the Japanese", I get a Lonely Planet phrase book to help me explain "gluten-free" to waiters who don't speak English, Tenzin chooses a Conn Iggulden paperback...you get the picture. Anyone care to guess why our luggage keeps getting heavier?



Our long train ride home is broken up by a change at Ueno station, and while we are trying to find our connecting platform somewhere in the neighborhood, we come across a Uniqlo - which unlike its Soho branch (which has 3 stories of stuff) is about as big Vecchitto's. (A plug here for Uniqlo - which is kind of like the Gap was 20 years ago - basic, fun & cheap clothes. In Japan, it's everywhere, but in NYC, it's on W. Broadway b-twn Prince & Spring)



In the adjoining alley, we admire the efficient use of the space beneath the elevated train. There's a whole market here, nestled under the tracks, and you don't even notice the train is there. (Just think of all the highway underpasses in downtown Middletown that could be made livelier with this idea - like Union Street and River Road!)



At first glance, I don't think anything of the unusual number of gumball-type machines we've been seeing around town.



But when I take a closer look, I realize that the Japanese have elevated the sale of these trinkets to an art form. There is an infinite variety of things they will put in a little plastic canister and sell for 200 yen, like these classical busts that are also fridge magnets. How clever!



We somehow arrive at a station that is far, far north of where I thought we'd be, but we take advantage of the mishap to visit the Senshoji temple, and then walk the 20 blocks or so back to the hostel.




Here's our hostel in the daylight. Sweet, sweet K's House!