We spent less time in Tokyo than
a lot of first time visitors probably do. This was largely because we know we
like to get outside the cities and so allocated our time in Japan accordingly.
Our first afternoon and evening
in Tokyo was spent visiting the Imperial Palace, a birthday dinner and drinks
and a trip to the electric district, Akihabara. It was a very mixed night! I
was just thinking about how Akihabara was less odd than I expected when we
entered a café for dessert. It was a fan café for social phenomenon AKB48- named after Akihabara: a 148 member strong Japanese idol girl group. The idea behind the group is that they have their own theatre and you can meet the celebrities at "handshake" events. They are apparently one of the highest earning performers in Japan.
At the cafe, the menu advertised the favourites of each singer, their music videos played on
numerous screens and then there was the merchandise. It was a super sweet and
unique birthday cake and Rob organised a great night.
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| Imperial Palace Gardens |
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| Fan Cafe: not a fan of the coffee |
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| But a big fan of my birthday cake! |
My actual birthday coincided
with a trip to Disneyland (actually Rob’s Christmas present!). For some reason
the theme at the park for all of 2015 is Easter and bunnies abounded. Apart from the typical
rides (very similar to Californian Disney) we amused ourselves by spotting the
costumes and matching clothes worn by a high percentage of patrons. If you
think wearing matching clothes is common in other areas of Asia, Tokyo
Disneyland takes this to a whole new level!
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| Me and just two of the matchies |
By the end of the day Rob and I were so sad we didn’t match we bought Mickey and Minnie hats…just kidding.
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| Trying before not buying |
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| A magical place! |
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| Impounded |
We kept ourselves going (we walked almost 23,000 steps that day) on Mickey shaped foods and other snacks. Popcorn (chilli, salted and caramel) is very big at Tokyo Disney. Kids and adults wander around with Disney themed popcorn containers around their neck, ready to fill up for continuous munching. It was good but I most enjoyed a Mickey ice-cream sandwich.
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| Mickey ice-cream sandwich |
Most of the rides we took were worth the wait. Splash Mountain had the longest wait time of 3 hours (!) but we opted to ride as singles so cut it down to 20 minutes. Lucky we did, as both of us picked it as our favourite ride. Many of the amusements were less thrilling but the effects and costumes were intricate and top notch, for example the Pirates of the Caribbean and the "It's a Small World" ride. I thoroughly enjoyed watching the iterations of Rob as we floated around the "small" world:
I had read that a lot of the narratives of rides were in Japanese and was surprised that for the most part, that not understanding did not reduce our enjoyment much. The parades were impressive, especially the evening parade which we enjoyed from a cafe with our Mickey burgers.
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| Dream lights night parade |
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| The Cheshire Cat |
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| Your wish is my command |
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| Toy Story |
The highlights of our third day
in Tokyo included watching a parade, enjoying some unique performances at a street festival and just generally getting a feel for Japan. We had set out to the Sony building to see some of their latest tech but this turned out to be less eventful than the scenes on the streets outside. We finished off the night with a view of Tokyo from the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building.Tokyo: I think we will visit you again!
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| School band in a parade |
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| Just one unique street act we caught |
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| Children's street art activity with masking tape |
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| They love their food models over here..and do them well |
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| Tokyo at night |
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