April 18 and 19: Tokyo Days 3 and 4

Note: I highly recommend you read my previous two posts about my adventures in Tokyo, as some of the context and references in the post below may be lost on you if you haven't.)

Yes, my traveling companions, Rachel and Roxanne, and I received yet another 9 a.m. intercom announcement about the commencement of fire alarm system testing, but having been out until God knows when the night before, I managed to fall back to sleep for an hour or two. Despite our best intentions to get up and get moving so we could enjoy more of what Tokyo had to offer, we did not leave the hotel room until noon, when we went to the hotel sandwich shop for "brunch." After filling our bellies, we kicked off what would turn out to be 10 hours of walking. And walking. And more walking.

Our first stop was the Imperial Palace. I should have done some reading before we went, because I was expecting to be able to tour the palace, much like the numerous shrines and castles that dot the Japanese landscape. But once we arrived (by subway, and then a lot of walking through the palace's outer gardens) I realized that the emperor and his family still resided there and there would be no tours of any imperial buildings, much less the palace. In fact, ordinary citizens are only allowed within the gates of the palace once a year on January 2, when the emperor appears on a palace balcony and blesses the crowd. The American in me bristles at the haughty treatment of the citizens who support the royal lifestyle, but, then again, I wouldn't want millions of people traipsing through my home, either. I can barely keep my house clean as it is with three males in residence.

So, we made do with a tour of the East Gardens and a photo opp at the gates of the palace. As we arrived at one of two gates to the East Garden area of the grounds (the entire palace grounds are more than a square mile in the heart of Tokyo) one man was feeding the swans in the moat... and the swans were having to compete with the carp and catfish for the bits of bread. It was actually quite funny to watch.

 At the front of the gate was a map of the Imperial Palace grounds, but most of it was in Japanese, so it was difficult to decipher. We ended up just wandering around "encountering" things.

Across the street from the gate was this ad wall. Tokyo has but in its bid to be the host of the 2020 Olympics (this is the year my oldest graduates from high school!) and promotional materials are displayed all over the city.

 Once inside the outer gates, there is one piece of the original gate on display, described as a stylized dolphin. Most of the palace grounds had been destroyed by World War II bombings, so only fragments, like this one, are left of the original structures. Actually, much of Japan is like this. Very seldom will you see a centuries-old structure. Most have been destroyed in wars, fires, earthquakes, tsunamis and other man-made and natural disasters.

There were about three other gates to get through before we actually got to see the beauty of the East Gardens. While cherry blossom season had ended the week before, there were still plenty of plants and trees in bloom and it was just beautiful. We were also lucky in that the weather was sunny and warm.

A decorative lantern at one of the entrances to the gardens.

The building behind me is the Tea Pavilion.

Once you get deeper in to the palace grounds, which is much like a city central park, you will find the original foundation of the Tenshudai donjon (a donjon equivalent in Europe was known as the "keep" or tower), which was built, and subsequently destroyed, by fire a few decades later, all in the 1600's. It was never rebuilt.

View from the top of the donjon foundation on to the park and skyline.

 After walking around the palace gardens, it was time to make our way to the Imperial Palace front gates. To get there, you had to exit the grounds entirely and then walk a third of the way around the grounds to the front gate of the palace itself. Of course, our view of the Imperial Palace was seriously limited, but here is what I was able to get.

At this point, Roxanne (on the right) dubbed us "Team Oreo," so I was too busy laughing to get the hair out of my face or consider displaying a peace sign.

Across from the Imperial Palace gate is another part of the park with a large, tall statue of a samurai, which I thought was interesting.

Then we were off to see Harajuku, where the oddly-fashioned young tend to gather. We took the subway a few stops away and got off, walking to the main street where "oddballs" can be found. It was a Thursday,  and relatively early in the evening, so there weren't too many people to truly gawk at, but we did manage to find a few things of interest:

After eating a very-late-lunch-pretty-much-dinner at a knock-off English pub called Hub Harajuku, we headed off to find the "dirty" district of Tokyo, Shinjuku, in search of used women's underwear dispensed in vending machines (apparently this is a trend in Japan and we wanted a photo of a machine.) While we did not find any dirty underwear machines, here is what we did find...

Lots of bright lights....

Available men...

And price sheets for the available men...

Hotels to take the available men...

And we also found lots of little tiny bars all smashed in to a square block with narrow alley ways. It was dark, so none of the photos came out that would do the scene justice, but imagine a series of short back alleys with narrow doorways in buildings two or three stories high. Inside the open doorways, you could peek in and find a bar with about seven stools, a completely full wall of alcohol choices and single bar tender, either male or female. There had to have been at least 50 of these bars in the small area. I am not sure what they story is behind these true "holes in the wall," but I would love to know.

We then decided to head home... but we had some trouble finding a train or subway station that would get us there. After walking around for about an hour trying to locate one, we found a train, but took it a stop in the wrong direction before we realized our mistake. We finally made it back to Hiro-o around 10:30 p.m. Fortunately a Thai food place, Shangri-la, was open until 2 a.m., so we were able to get a late night meal to recharge us from our 10 hours of walking.

A Thai vegetable plate appetizer. I have no idea why I had been expecting carrot and celery sticks with Ranch dressing...

 After another (relatively) late night, we headed back to the hotel for our last sleep in Tokyo. Oddly enough, even though it was scheduled, we did not get a 9 a.m. fire alarm system announcement Friday morning. It was a good thing I was woken up by my roommates' packing because I hadn't set my alarm, planning to get up when I heard the broken-English announcement.

Since we didn't need to checkout of our hotel room until noon, and our plane didn't leave until after 3 p.m., we headed out to the Hiro-o district one more time for some last-minute souvenir shopping and an American-inspired breakfast of champions.

There was this gorgeous arrangement of fresh flowers in the lobby of The New Sanno Hotel as we gathered to leave. I just had to get a photo.

We said goodbye to Roxanne who was heading back to the States and was taking a shuttle bus to catch her flight out of the Narita airport. We took a taxi to one of the main subway stations, and then jumped on an almost-direct line to Haneda airport (it only had three stops in between the station and the airport, instead of the 15 normal ones), and arrived with plenty of time to grab a chair massage and lunch before we had to board.

Our flight landed in Iwakuni on time at 5 p.m., and Rodney was there to pick us up.... and it took me four entire days to recover enough so I didn't feel groggy and unmotivated. A clear indication that I am getting old....

April 17: Tokyo Day 2

 Those of you who know my family know that both of my boys were born during the Month of the Military Child. I did not plan this, but sometimes life is humorously coincidental. Xan celebrated his 7th birthday on April 7 and Will's birthday is April 17. He turned 11. This is the first birthday I have missed, but with parties, cakes, trips to Sasebo and presents all nbeing taken care of earlier in the month (and the fact that Rodney has missed a couple of birthdays over the years) I refused to feel guilty. I called Will on his birthday, texted him and posted to his Facebook account. All birthday bases were covered. Time to have fun with the girls...

As I alluded to in my previous post (I recommend you read it before moving on to this one... some of the context may be lost) I ended with telling you that we were woken up on Day 2 by The New Sanno's test of the fire alarm system. When we checked in, the hotel was kind enough to leave a note in our room explaining that this would happen at 9 a.m. EVERY MORNING WE WERE GOING TO BE STAYING THERE, because of required tests, but that still wasn't much fun when it actually happened. Luckily, it wasn't a shrieking fire alarm bell or anything like that. It was an intercom announcement made by a Japanese man in stilted English letting us know that testing was commencing.

My traveling companions, my friend Rachel, and her sister Roxanne, enjoy shopping. I inherited my love for shopping from my Grandma Ginia, which means I do not particularly care for shopping, I get in to the store, get what I want, and get back out. A shopping "spree" in my life takes no more than a couple of hours and in that time I have visted at least six different stores. I did not get the shopping gene. But, from the start, I told Rachel that I would do whatever they wanted to do... this was their trip and I was tagging along to enjoy the experience. I had to stomp down my kicking and screaming Type A protester inside my brain, but once I put her back in her cell with a gag, I went back to being a follower enjoying the experience.

After eating breakfast in one of the hotel's restaurants, I put on my bright green backpack the kids gave me for Christmas and followed my traveling companions out the door for a day of shopping. First stop: Tokyo Skytree. Tokyo Tower used to be the tallest thing in Japan until Tokyo Skytree was completed in 2011.

To enjoy a meal in the top of Skytree - or even to enjoy the view from the top of Skytree - you have to have a reservation, which should be booked well in advance. We did not have a reservation, so we remained outside to enjoy the Skytree and then headed inside, out of the blustery winds of the day, in to the shopping mall. There were some high-end stores and plenty of tourist shops. Hello Kitty, samurai, Skytree memorabilia, postcards and candy were in abundance. I got Will a samurai helmet key chain I thought was cool from the shop pictured below. Unfortunately, he wanted the headphones I had gotten his brother. You win some, you lose some...

I thought this was funny... I'm not sure if it is Rodeo as in Rodeo (ro-day-oh) Drive in California, or rodeo clowns, like the bull bait people. If it is the latter, the designer got his/her L's and R's mixed up, which often happens when the Japanese try to spell in English. The R and L sounds in Japanese are very similar. Either way, I snapped a picture for my collection of Janglish I find.

After shopping much of the morning, I was getting hungry. We were all a little tired of noodles and rice, so an "American" meal was sounding pretty good. We managed to find one of the two Hard Rock Cafes located in Tokyo and took a taxi from Skytree to the Uyeno train station, where the little sister of the two Hard Rocks was located. The main Hard Rock Cafe is in Roppongi, which is the party district of Tokyo... but more on that in a moment.

A guitar from one of my all-time favorite bands, Aerosmith.

This was the first hamburger and milkshake I had had in months because  1) I live in Japan, 2) I am not a fan of McDonalds' 3) I've lost 50 pounds on the South Beach Diet and none of the menu items pictured above are on the menu. Except the veggies, of course. Yes, it tasted fabulous.

 After lunch was more shopping. We found a MAC counter, which I was excited to see. I know, I rarely wear makeup, but it has been a tradition of mine since living in California that I go to MAC for a makeover for the Marine Corps Ball in November, and buy some new makeup for the year. This year, being in Iwakuni, I wasn't able to partake in my annual tradition. Rachel and Roxanne had planned to go "party" in Roppongi later that night and they convinced me to stay at MAC and get made up while they went shopping at the Gap. Gee, twist my arm... OK, I'll do it. Anything to avoid the Gap.

While there were a few hiccups due to a language barrier, the Japanese MAC girl and I managed to make me look good and not like a Rodeo Crown. Fortunately, be both knew basic colors in each others' languages (more aka, less pinku... arigato), and pointing and gesturing went a long way. And I got some new makeup for the year.

By this time it was about 7 p.m.... time to head back to the hotel and get gussied up for "clubbing." Now, I married young, so by the time I was old enough to really go clubbing (I started school early) I had already graduated from college, had the start of a career, a husband and a mortgage. And the "clubbing" scene in Yuma, Ariz., consisted of two bars, one of which made Geraldo Rivera's top 20 places to catch a disease. I do my best to avoid disease, so my "clubbing" opportunities were sorely lacking. I do not "club," but I do like margaritas and dancing... and, grudgingly I'll admit, I don't mind wearing a dress or skirt two or three times a year. The Marine Corps Ball is always one occasion... this clubbing trip to Roppongi is the other one for this year. I'll reserve the third one in case I have to go to a wedding.

So, I had some margaritas (the hotel exchange is well-stocked with beer, wine and liquor, like any good military outpost should be) and we got ready to go out. This is me ready to go out:

Now, mind you, this is a Wednesday night. Not really a "party" night, but we were limited on time and energy. Well, I was limited on energy. Heels, skirts, makeup, walking, shopping... these are all things I rarely actively choose to do and the combination was wearing on me. I medicated with Patron, shoved my cash and ID in to my bra (I did not want to have to look after a purse) and headed out with my cohorts. We had a drink in the hotel bar to kick the evening off and then requested a taxi from the front desk. Roppongi, here we come!

With the help via FaceTime of Roxanne's friend who was once stationed in Japan, we found El Cafe Latino, a bar that served margaritas... and had amateur salsa dance lessons on Wednesday nights. I was able to enjoy a margarita AND people watch. Good times.

But, soon, salsa wasn't enough for my cohorts, so it was off to find a dance club... fortunately there was a place just around the corner...Greenland. Which should have been called the Jungle Room. Now, being the Type-A non-clubber that I am, I was posting our whereabouts on Facebook, not just to share my experience with my closest friends and acquaintances, but to also leave a digital trail of breadcrumbs in case the three of us went missing. And, also, so I could remember the names of the places we went so I could blog about them later. :)

Here are a few photos I managed to take....

The ladies-only seating area. I wonder if this is to reduce groping in clubs...

No dancing. Hopefully that wasn't the rule in the entire club. If it was, we broke the rule.

Fake foliage collecting dust was all over the ceiling and walls of the place, and the TVs had interesting music videos.

At this point, I was no longer in a condition to take photos. In fact, I just remember that my Type A protester in my brain managed to remove her gag and started to whine that she wanted to go home and get out of the heels I was wearing. So, I vaguely recall hailing a cab, yelling at Rachel and Roxanne to get in, and getting back to the hotel, but I have no idea what time all that happened. We all crashed... until the fire alarm announcement the next morning at 9 a.m....