Tokyo, Day Two.
Today was a good day. But by the end of the day, Laurence was both in pain and very fatigued.
We both slept relatively well, and although I woke quite a few times, my cold, cough,and congestion was much better, and I had a much better night of it. Laurence started the morning out feeling good, and we set out to eat breakfast at the same small restaurant as yesterday. We walked and walked, and walked some more, but never could find that place… seemed as though it had vanished off the face of the earth, although in reality we found it by luck yesterday and had no such luck today, although we tried to retrace our steps. Finally,we gave up and ate elsewhere, as by now that fatigue was beginning to creep in on Laurence. He really is not doing so well, although sitting for a while and eating something definitely recharges him, for a while at least.
Then we headed for a hop on/hop off bus tour, which worked well for me in Mexico City. It worked well today, and particularly for Laurence, who needed to rest, and we got to see quite a bit more of the city. But, by the end of the day, I have to say, Tokyo is no Mexico City.
We first got off in the Akihabara district, which is the one of the centers of the anime, Pokémon, and manga culture, with many, many stores dedicated to selling related products, figurines, construction kits, toys, video games, comics, and related products. It is perhaps the district best known as the hub of the “otaku culture” in Tokyo, involving a devoted interest to anime, manga, and the like. There also themed cafes based on the culture, although none were obvious from street level. The area us also a center for electronics. It is a very vibrant and busy area, and definitely very different from Asakusa, where we’re staying, and more like the other areas of the city we saw today, which seem big city.
I enjoyed walking around and going into some of the stores, but after a while it reminded me of what used to the electronics district in NY, filled with specialty shops and lots of stores and outlets, big and small, selling what were then cheap electronics, camera, and watches.
It didn’t take too much walking for Laurence to become very fatigued and feeling increasing pain, and we had to find somewhere to sit and eat. That picked him once again, and revived we continued with our bus journey… but I worry about Laurence taking a fall when he gets tired like this.
We got off the bus a couple of stops later in an upscale area, filled with high end stores, like those you’d find on 5th avenue in NY, and on the edge of the downtown Marunouchi business district, filled with ultra modern high rise buildings, of the kind associated with the Tokyo skyline. Quite a contrast from the Asakusa district, and very much like the fairly recently developed Canary Wharf area in London.
We got off here to walk to the Imperial Palace, where the Emperor resides, and built on the site of the former Edo Castle. The palace sits in a green zone outside of the boundaries of the massive and sleek skyscrapers, surrounded by a broad moat.
As we approached, we could see some of the lovely buildings within, but as we reached the gates we realized not only was that as far as you can get, but that was about all you could see. I guess there are some limited tours, but otherwise it’s really not available to even see, hidden behind the gates and in the wooded land and hills that surround the palace. I was disappointed.
But by now the walking about was proving too much for Laurence, who was feeling exhausted and worn. We decided to get back to the bus and stay on it for the duration of the journey, and experience the city that way, and that sounded good to him. Poor guy, and of course he’s not only feeling bad physically and worried about what’s going on, but worried about what might lie ahead for him.
By now, my cold seemed to have all but vanished. Not completely, but mostly, and for the first time I was feeling almost back to normal. By the end of the day, I was at 95% of normal.
We changed bus routes here to visit a different part of this huge city of about 14 million people in the city proper (37 million in the greater Tokyo area), and passed the Tokyo Tower, which used to be the primary tower for radio and television transmission and the tallest building in Tokyo when it was built in 1958. It is red and white, and a slightly taller replica of the Eiffel Tower, and a sight to behold. It has an observation deck with no doubt great views of the city, but getting off to visit was too much for Laurence at this point, and that was also true for the nearby Zōjō-ji Temple and some small but lovely looking parks in the area I would like to have otherwise visited. Frankly, Laurence’s well-being is the number one concern at this point.
The bus took us over the Tokyo Bay, connecting to the Pacific, and we traveled over the Rainbow Bridge, a large suspension bridge connecting central Tokyo to Odaiba, the waterfront district. It was difficult to take photos from the bus, and pretty windy on top of the open deck bus traveling across the bridge, and I almost lost my hat when I stood to take a photo, which got blown off my head but happily captured by a passenger at the very back of the bus.
The waterfront area, and the surrounding major highway loops, was not something either of us had associated with Tokyo. It’s a huge area, with several large cruise ships moored in the bay.
But by now, Tokyo was looking to us like any other large city, mostly functional and nondescript, other than certain areas associated with aspects of Tokyo life. But, I guess that’s the nature of most big (and small)) cities (although I didn’t feel that was about my recent trip to Mexico City).
As we neared our final bus stop to retake our original red route bus line, which would return us to Asakusa, we learned there were no more buses running on that route at this time. So we instead jumped on the subway, and now feeling like seasoned Tokyo subway travelers figured out how to get back to Asakusa and easily negotiated the ticket purchase (that felt good), and took the short ride back. Interestingly, almost everybody seated (and most people standing) were on their phones. Signs of our contemporary culture. Me too, using my phone to take photos of people using their phones.
We got back to Taito Ryokan around 6, and Laurence, in pain and exhausted, went right to sleep, it turned out for the night. Me, I worked on my blog in the common area downstairs, and came back up around 9 to see if Laurence was awake and either wanted to go out to eat or have me bring him something. He was awake, but barely, and wanted neither, wanting instead to go back to sleep, which he did. In fact, he slept pretty much all through the night. He needs the rest. I headed out around 9, and found somewhere to eat. I wanted to go back to the same place where we had eaten the night before but among the million eateries around here, I couldn’t find that one, and instead picked a local small joint and enjoyed another bowl of pork and ramen. I got back to the Ryokan around 11, and hit the sack, pretty much cold-free, finally. I could hear Laurence sleeping deeply, and quickly fell asleep myself.
Tomorrow, we’ll see, but I’m wondering if we have to cut this trip short and get Laurence back to Toronto. We’ll see in the morning, as we have just one more day before before leaving Tokyo and getting back on the road, backpacks on, which is bound to make things more difficult for him.