Shivering in Shinjuku

Thursday 15th April

Today was chilly with light rain for most of the day. We started the day with a visit to the Nijubashi Bridge at the Imperial Palace, which is what we intended to do yesterday before our feet said 'no!' There weren't too many tourists around this morning. Who'd be silly enough to go sightseeing on a cold and rainy day? We managed to take a few photos using the "1,2,3, drop the umbrella out of the shot, click" method.

After the bridge, we made our way to Yoyogi, the site of the 1964 Tokyo Olympic Games. The accommodation for the athletes later became a Youth Hostel. When John visited Tokyo in 1976, he stayed at the Hostel, so today's visit was a walk down memory lane. I'm not going to mention the memories on a public blog, but it sounds like he had a good time!

Our next stop was Shinjuku. Wow, what an experience!! Wall to wall people, cars, buildings, noise and activity. We came across yet another wedding couple and they were happy to have their photo taken. The bride must have been frozen, but she was still smiling. Ain't love grand! We also saw a few interesting signs around the place, including one above a shop which said "If only I could fly through the cosmos like a moon pilot". We had no idea what they were selling (illicit drugs, maybe?). One of the best things we did in Shinjuku was to buy a scarf and pair of gloves each. We'll be needing some extra warmth when we visit Hokkaido, as my penfriend Toshi tells me it's even colder than usual in Hokkaido at the moment. We were delighted to find, just a street back from the modern, noisy hustle and bustle, a quaint little old-fashioned narrow alley with tiny little food shops. We met a man who spoke no English, but he was obviously trying to tell us something. I picked up "tabetai" (want to eat) and "unagi" (eel) and there was one other word, "kimo" which I had to look up in my Japanese/English dictionary. Yep, you guessed it - it means liver! We managed to give him the slip and found another little food shop which had a delicious-looking pot of something bubbling away at the entrance. The staff gave us a menu in English which was both good and bad. Good because we could choose what we wanted to eat, but bad because we discovered that the pot of delicious-looking stuff was listed on the menu as "stewed guts". Hmm, I don't think so! We had a few skewers of chicken and vegetables and some rice and left the stewed guts for other customers.

After an enjoyable afternoon of poking around in Shinjuku, we made our way back to the hotel, sharing our train carriage with a lady in a kimono, who was busy with her mobile phone like most of the other young women on the train. On the walk back to the hotel we stopped off at a lovely little bakery for some snacks. Yum, no eel livers here! We spent the rest of the evening checking out train timetables and hotels for the rest of the trip, so now all accomodation is booked until we head for home. We're looking forward to our Hokkaido trip, and will catch up on the rest of the Tokyo highlights when we get back to Tokyo next week.