Day 6, continued

Now where were we...

Day 6, continued

After we left Chiharu, Ayako offered to show us some of the sights. First stop, Meiji shrine. We got off the train at the Harajuku exit and made the trek to the shrine's entrance. Harajuku is kind of like, well, like nothing I've ever seen. You get a bunch of teenagers dressed up like anime characters all hoping to have their pictures taken by complete strangers and you have a party. Quite the hippy vibe going. And look! Free hugs!



Next was the shrine, a Shinto shrine dedicated to the memory of Emperor Meiji, the first emperor to embrace some western culture. This was really nice. First, it's in a huge park next to Harajuku and makes you feel like you aren't in a big city. Second, it's clean, quiet, and serene. There are even walls of wine and sake casks near the entrance. After some confusion of whether or not it was OK to take photos, we step outside and presto, we're in the middle of someone's wedding. This definitely was a treat to see. Normally I wouldn't have taken a photo but everyone else was and hey, you decide to get married in a public place and you're going to have tourists taking pictures, I'm sorry! One of my favorite pictures from this trip is the close up of the smiling bride. It makes me happy!














After the shrine, Ayako took us on a walk through Harajuku, though along a street that was full of nice shops and no costumes :(. It was a beautiful neighborhood and had a lot of fancy imported cars. Lots of money around, I'm sure. There was this really sweet building (I think it was a prada or dior store or something) that I wanted to take a picture of but had these secret service looking dudes guarding the perimeter and I would have felt weird whipping out the camera. Oh well. We walked on and found the Tokyo Blue Note. I think Diane Schuur (sp?) was singing. We decided against it.



Lots of walking = hungry and weary travelers. My dad and I big farewell to Ayako and went back to Shinigawa for dinner. I decided I didn't want to sit around my last night in Tokyo so I called Ayako and we met at Shibuya crossing for some drinks. This was a blast. We went to the top of the building with the biggest tv (the one on the right with the starbucks) and drank Tan-Taka-Tan and beer until 1AM (I almost missed my train!) This Tan-Taka-Tan stuff is great. It's a kind of Shochu, a Japanese vodka type drink, and it pisses me off that I can't find it here! Damn it all!!



I had a really good time seeing friends in Tokyo. Ayako was especially helpful and made our trip a lot better. Thank you!!! Got to bed around 2:15AM and had to be up at 5:45 to make our flight to China. Time to say goodbye to Japan! I'll leave you with the short summation I wrote about Japan in my travel log:

Tokyo - I loved it. Like New York on crack. It was nice to have friends show me around. A lot of it was like the US but the things that were different (trains, service) I liked better. I want to go back already!