Asakusa and Shibuya - June 23
Although we had extended our stay in Ikebukuro at the Sakura Hotel to two nights so that we could be there when the internet arrived, we decided it was time to move after that. We got up fairly early to do our laundry before checking out of the hotel. Our next target was Akihabara (秋葉原), the mecca of otaku culture, and we wanted a hotel reasonably close for the night. Most of the hotels near Akiba were out of our price range, and the best balance between price and location we could find was a ryokan (Japanese inn) in Asakusa (浅草).
Getting to Asakusa Station required a transfer onto the Tokyo Metro. Up to this point we had been able to use the JR Yamanote line for all of our travel needs, but was only a loop that hit the big areas in Tokyo. The Tokyo Metro takes care of more of the smaller stations. We spent a little time navigating the subway system, but eventually found ourselves in Asakusa.
We could immediately tell that Asakusa was not quite as urban as Ikebukuro. It had a more quaint feel to it, and right outside the station were a bunch of rickshaw drivers looking for customers for tours of the area. There was also a large open market a short distance from the station that we wandered through a few times. A bit of a change of pace, but certainly a cool area.
Our first line of business was finding our the ryokan, which turned out to be quite a task. The addressing system in Japan is very different from in the states, with blocks and buildings assigned numbers rather than naming streets. A typical Tokyo address gives the ward (区) name and a set of three numbers (like 1-2-3), which respectively refer to the chome (丁目), or the numbered sections of the ward, then the block number within the chome, and finally the building number within the block. To complicate things, block numbers often appear to be placed sporadically around the chome, with no guarantee that block 2 will be anywhere near block 1, and buildings within the block are numbered in order of construction rather than by location. This means that we needed to rely more on area maps that showed block numbers and/or Google maps on one of our phones.
Needless to say, we wandered Asakusa for a bit before winding up at the hotel. It was a bit of a neat experience, as the back alleys we wandered through didn't feel touristy at all. I remember taking a short break to get some sunscreen on and lauging to myself, "where the hell have we gotten ourselves off to". When we made it to the hotel, I tried to make the reservation in Japanese before giving up and asking if they could speak English. The woman behind the counter went and got her husband who spoke it well enough and we were told to come back in a few hours when our room would be ready.
In our earlier wanderings we had noticed a pagoda sticking out above some of the rooftops and decided to check it out. When we got there, we realized that it was a part of Sensou-ji, a magnificent temple that also happened to be on my list of shrines to visit. We all got fortunes inside the temple, after a donation of 100 yen. There is a table inside with a wooden box full of sticks and a hole in the top big enough for just one of them. You shake the box a bit and until one comes out and read the number on the tip of the stick. On the wall by the table are a bunch of drawers with numbers matching the sticks, which each hold a different fortune. Our fortunes ran the full gamut, with Tim grabbing "best fortune", Brian getting "good fortune", myself managing a "regular fortune", and Kirt cursed with a "bad fortune". Tim's "best fortune" became a running joke for the trip, with any good happenings immediately attributed to "best fortune".
Brian was a bit weary from the wandering thus far, and he decided to nap in the hotel while the rest of us went for Karaoke. The guy behind the counter was clearly struggling with his English but he managed well enough and we got a room. It was fortuitous that they spoke English at that particular Karaoke place, as we ended up going for Karaoke many more times on the trip and they were always the places at which I encountered the poorest English skills. Luckily we figured things out in Asakusa and I was able to use that experience to smooth over my poor Japanese in subsequent trips. It was Kirt's first time doing Karaoke, and he really got a kick out of it. The selection of English songs was decent, and I even tried a few in Japanese. I was pretty happy with my ability to keep up with the lyrics for the most part, and Kirt and Tim seemed surprised that I could read well enough to do so.
That night, we decided to head over to Shibuya (渋谷) to see the sights. We took a pictures of some of the big landmarks: the 109 building, the Hachiko statue, and the Scramble Crossing. We spent a good amount of time on the crossing, a massive all-way street crossing that is always full of people due to its proximity to Shibuya Station. There was a Starbucks with windows overlooking the crossing in one of the nearby buildings, so we snagged a seat there and took turns taking pictures of each other while we struck a pose in the middle of the crossing.
While wandering around looking for a place to eat dinner, a certain yakiniku place caught our eye. We were looking at the menu posted outside when someone approached us offering a coupon to another yakiniku place down the street. Amused by such poaching, we obliged. Yakiniku is similar to Korean BBQ in that you have a grill at the table and order small cuts of various seasoned meats which you then cook to your liking. Although we had a little trouble with the grill flaming up, it was a great meal.
After dinner we headed back to the hotel for the night.