Most weekends I like to go to Tokyo to spend time with my girlfriend, or hand out with friends, but last Sunday I ended up having most of the day to myself, so I thought I'd share some of the details here.
I began my day by riding my bike to Tokyo Station where I caught the Chuo Line train to Shinjuku. I needed to go to Shinjuku because I had bought a camera lens the week before and found it to be defective. I wanted to return it, or exchange it for something similar.
The Chuo Train was quite busy for a Sunday, full of shoppers, housewives, old people visiting friends and relatives, businessmen stuck working on Sunday, and a few school students in uniform who were either stuck taking extra classes or attending club activities.
Shinjuku Station was no less crowded than Tokyo Station. Shinjuku is full of shops and stores (and the red-light district), the interior to the station was more or less wall-to-wall people. I headed toward the west exit, which is on the side of the station where the camera shop was.
I had no problem returning the lens, the shop owner gave me a full refund, which I used to buy another lens and a couple accessories. I also bought a few rolls of film and 2 packages of film developer. I had hoped to take a few pictures around Shinjuku, but there is little there that I haven't photographed before, so I decided to catch the Yamanote train to Shibuya.
Coming back to Shinjuku Station I listened to a speech being delivered by one of the Japanese Nationalist groups. These guys are radical nationalist types who believe that the Emperor is the Divine Ruler of Japan, and that Japan was right to bomb Pearl Harbor, etc. etc. The speech giver was a young man standing on top of a van yelling through a megaphone while other members of the organization stood in formation below, wearing blue jump-suit uniforms with the Japanese flag on the left arm, and the German swastika on the other. I paused to watch for a moment, and as I did, an older businessman walked up to the uniformed men and began screaming at them. He spit at them a few times, and called them stupid. The nearby police watched, but let him yell and spit, probably hoping that one of the nationalists would do something arrest-worthy. But nothing happened, the businessman walked away, yelling curses over his shoulder as he did.
My GF then called and said she could meet me in Shibuya later in the afternoon. She wanted to have yaki-niku at the Kyu-kaku restaurant located there. Since I had a couple hours to burn before we were to meet, I decided to stop in Harajuku. I left the demonstration, entered the station, and got on the train.
Harajuku was a mess of place, too many foreigners were there. Some were young foreigners dressed in costumes, looking as out-of-place as palm trees on the North Pole. The rest of the foreigners were all camera wielding uber-tourists. I felt rather uncomfortable and foolish to be around them, so I headed toward Yoyogi Park. Unfortunately, the park was crowded as well, and the bright sun made it unlikely that I would be able to get any good pictures there anyway.
I decided instead to walk the rest of the way to Shibuya, which was 15 minutes away by foot.
Shibuya was also super-crowded. I made it over the crossing to Shibuya Station, and headed to Hachiko. Unfortunately, Hachiko is located next to the designated smoking area, which is designed to hold about 20 people. Since there were more than 100 people smoking, most of them overflowed around the statue, there was more smoke there than one might find at a forest fire. Nevertheless, many people stopped to pose in front of the statue of Hachi to get their pictures taken on cameras and cell phones.
I left Hachiko, looking for a less smelly place. Nearby I came across a couple of street performers dressed up in yukatas and makeup. One sang and waved a flag while the other accompanied him on guitar. They were actually quite good, so I stopped to listen for awhile. Their act ended too soon, and they handed out fliers giving the time and place of their next performance.
There was a bus stop with an empty bench nearby, I got a drink from a vending machine, and sat down to relax my feet. As I sat, I watched the various people passing by. Most were young people who were out shopping or meeting friends, the rest were a mix of tourists, married people, and workers commuting to and from the station.
My GF called and said she was waiting at Hachiko, so I went back and found here. We walked to the restaurant and had a good meal of yaki-niku, rice, and a spicy soup. The cost of the meal was about $50, not too bad considering how good the food was, and how much we ate.
Afterward, we headed to the Seibu Department Store were my GF wanted to pick up some nylons and look at shoes. I stopped at the Prada store to look at men's shoes and see if they had anything new (I seem to collect them, I already have 12 or so pair of Prada shoes), but they didn't.
After shopping for a couple hours, we decided to head back home. We got the Yamanote train and took the long way around toward Tokyo Station, where I had to pick up my bike. By then it was dark, and the streets were starting to become more quiet. The only crowds were in front of the highway bus stops, carrying the weekend visitors back home to other parts of Japan.
Idiot Nationalist demonstration
Idiot camera-wielding foreign tourists
Hachiko
Designated smoking area overflows...
Street Performers
Shibuya Crossing
