Day 42 (December 30, 2012)- Memoirs Of A Hairy, Bearded, Six-Foot Geisha

At first I wasn't sure that we were all going to survive our first night in Tokyo, but luckily we managed to sleep through the night thanks to the wonders of alcohol coupled with extreme travel fatigue .  Despite the fact that I was forced to spoon with Peter (naturally I was little spoon) the four of us managed to get a decent enough sleep.  As my brother would not be arriving until later that evening, Colleen, Peter, my mother, and I decided to head into the heart of the city to take in some of the attractions on our own.  Sadly, we were staying about an hour outside of the main core of the city, as the hotel room prices were astronomically high as we were visiting over the week of New Year's which just so happens to be the biggest holiday of the year for the Japanese.  To stay in a hotel as far out as we were was costing over $130 a night for a room, while most of the available rooms in the heart of the city would cost at least four times as much.

As mentioned in my previous blog, the Japanese people are quite orderly and polite, although I definitely noticed that they have a penchant for passing out drunk on the subway.  On our way into the city we happened to be parked next to a young man with only one shoe on.  Our main source of entertainment over the course of our one hour commute into the city was watching this heavily intoxicated man slip in and out of consciousness while looking around for his shoe.  Eventually, he gave up and decided to exit the train with only one shoe on.  No one else seemed to pay the man any attention, so I can only assume that Japanese people are fully accepting of citizens who only wear one fifty percent of their footwear.

After our lengthy train ride into the city we were eager to get out and explore Tokyo's number one tourist destination: the famed Imperial Gardens.  There was just one problem: it was closed.  This would become a common theme for us throughout our trip in Japan, as many attractions are closed down over the holiday period.  Instead, we were forced to walk around the outside of the grounds in the pouring rain and take pictures with all of the other tourists who apparently didn't get the memo that the grounds were off limits for the week.

While our campaign to be tourists didn't get off to the hottest start, luckily for us we had a chance encounter with a Japanese National Tourist Organization office as we were trying to escape the constant rain outside.  After stumbling upon the office, we were invited in by some lovely ladies and the next thing the four of us knew we were being given the royal treatment.  We were all dressed up in kimonos, taught how to draw traditional Japanese calligraphy and given origami lessons.  I must say, nothing looks better than four of the whitest people on earth wearing kimonos over the Western clothes.  I must give kudos to the JNTO employees, as they were extremely helpful and patient with us and all of the activities were free!

With our new tote bags full of origami and calligraphy (they wouldn't let us take the kimonos with us) we stumbled back out into the cold and miserable Tokyo weather in search of our next destination: the Godzilla statue.  Using my trusty tourist map, I was determined to find this statue, although my travel mates did not seem as eager.  After a few twists and turns, we eventually located the statue, and much to my chagrin, it was not the fearsome Eiffel Tower sized piece of architecture I thought it would be.  In fact, most garden gnomes would have put it to shame.  Shit happens.  Snap a picture and move on.

Seeing as how my statue hunt in the rain was an epic fail, I took a step back and let the others decide where to go.  Peter instantly led us to the Sony Building, which can only be described as a shrine to well, all things Sony!  There seemed to be an endless number of floors all displaying and selling the latest gadgets and gizmos from Sony.  In fact, at one point I think Peter (major fucking techy nerd!) may have even obtained an erection while trying out some futuristic 3D television.  Once Peter got all of his sexual frustration out in the form of ogling electronics, we headed out for some window shopping in the famous Ginza district.  Sadly, Colleen and my mother could only dream of owning such things as Gucci and Prada.  Either that or we could just wait a week until we were in Thailand and buy the knock-offs for 1/100th of the price.  Instead of high end designer stuff we instead settled on purchasing some wares at the Hello Kitty Store.  Yes, there are numerous stores in Japan dedicated to Hello Kitty and they sell everything you could possibly imagine.  In true Japanese fashion our key purchase was a pair of chop sticks that I'm sure will never get used!

Back at the hotel that night, the four of us proceeded to guess how long it would take Kiel to find the hotel, as he would be arriving from Toronto on his own that day to meet us.  Given that it had taken us almost four hours the day before, my money was on him taking longer than that.  Well, the Boy Wonder eventually strolled in around midnight (seven hours after he was supposed to have landed) although he claimed that he had flight delays.  In addition to this, he had been out partying the night before he left and had forgotten to get the name of the hotel off of us.  So he just made his way to the subway stop and started looking around.  Impressive,  so we'll just call it a tie in the "who took longer to find the hotel contest". 

Well, with our fifth wheel now here, there was only one thing left to determine...which of us poor saps was going to be sleeping on the floor that night! My guess was me. 

~Brentski~