You get two days in one blog post today. I was excited that my cold was just a little 24 hour one so we've been having fun ever since.
Day 2 in Tokyo:
After a hearty hotel breakfast, we went to a grocery store down the street to check things out and see what this one is like. It's always interesting to visit a grocery store when you are traveling someplace new. This one had the most imported products that Misty had ever seen in a grocery store. It was a little out of the norm in her book. It was set up kind of a lot like Trader Joe's. After the market, we went to a little park. This park had a very large pond, or maybe it was a small lake...who really knows? The old men were fishing along one edge.
The turtles were swimming as happy as can be and the dads were teaching their sons how to fish. Here's a new little fisherman now:
Afterwards, we hopped an afternoon bus tour. Misty and I decided it would be a good way of seeing a lot of things in a small amount of time and a lot easier with two kids than trying to read the map and navigate the streets while pushing an umbrella stroller and holding the hand of a three-year-old. Our starting point was the World Trade Center Observatory. It was a nice panoramic view of Tokyo from 152 meters high. It was a similar experience to taking in the view on the top of the Empire State Building in NYC but without the lines. Here is a view of the Tokyo Tower behind us, Davis and Evie's favorite site in Tokyo.
Our next stop was to get on a boat for a cruise up the Sumida River. Here is our cruise boat:
When we disembarked from our cruise, the tour guide pointed out the buildings in the photo below:
The one on the left was made to look like a glass of beer. The one on the right, if I'm remembering correctly was a flame of passion. As we were walking up the street we saw some in traditional clothing, although I think this was the only lady I saw wearing stilettos.
We also saw rickshaws along the streets in this neighborhood, but we passed on the ride.
Next, our tour guide pointed out Tokyo's oldest bar.
I was beginning to wonder if the only sites we'd be seeing today were for drinking, but that thought was quickly disproved when we approached a religious site next, the Asakusa Kannon Temple area. Here's our photo in front of the main gate:
This is a Buddhist temple. Mai, our tour guide, informed us of a few of the differences between Buddhist temples and Shinto shrines, the two major religions in Japan. Buddhist temples have images of their gods, like Buddha, and Shinto shrines do not because they believe their gods are spirits and so they don't create images of the spirits. Mai told us that many people practice both Buddhism and Shinto in their homes. They practice Shinto, but Shinto beliefs are that you only have one life to live and be happy so it is a good back up to also practice Buddhism which believes in multiple afterlives. If your life isn't happy and good, you can always hope that when you are reincarnated, the next life will be better for you. Here is Deiter in front of the temple.
Between the main gate and the middle gate that leads to the temple, there is the Nakamise shopping street containing all sorts of little shops for clothes, accessories, artwork, snacks and souvenirs.
Here are a few of the cold treats on the menu of this snack stand:
Yes, we're in another Asian country that loves red bean desserts. I decided to pass on these tempting treats. Unfortunately, we didn't get as much time as we wanted to do all the things we wanted to in this area, but what can you do? (Like my grandma always says.)
Next, we went to the Imperial Palace. Only a quarter of the palace property is open to the public, the East Gardens. They only open the doors to the palace twice a year, in January and December, when the emperor addresses all those who enter the palace. We were able to see the watchtowers of the palace.
But Evie was more excited about the ants on the ground than she was about the tower.
Evie made a new friend on our bus tour. They were making funny faces to each other as they walked down the street...so cute!
We got off our tour at Ginza, a big shopping district in Tokyo, similar to 5th Ave in NYC.
We walked a few blocks and found a small shopping mall with a restroom for our potty training three-year-old (who did a great job all day) and stumbled upon some of these:
Yes, the squatty potty can be found in Japan too. In China, they have a star rating system for toilets (up to five stars), but I didn't see any such rating system here. Fortunately their was one western toilet, which is preferred for a potty training three-year-old.
We walked a little further to a nice little restaurant for some tempura seafood and veggies, sob noodles and miso soup. Davis is practicing his good manners by slurping up his noodles (the sign of really liking the meal).
Evie drank up every last drop of her miso soup.
The kids did a pretty good job for not having a nap all day. They were sleepy bears after dinner, so we decided to bypass the shopping (most of it was out of our price range anyway) and take the subway back to our hotel. The irony is that the kids got their second wind after a bath. So even though they were put to bed at 8:00, they didn't fall asleep until around 10:00 that night.
Day 3:
We went to Davis and Evie's favorite place, Tokyo Tower. We got off the subway and made our way down the street. It was so fun to watch their excitement grow every time the tower was spotted between buildings on our approach.
The lines to the elevators of the observatory were a little longer at this place.
Tokyo Tower is like the Eiffel Tower of the city, same design, only steel instead of iron. I took this photo from the main observatory at 150 meters high:
I took the photo in the direction that Mt. Fuji would be if it wasn't so cloudy and smoggy. Misty has only seen the mountain twice in the two years that they've lived in Japan. She climbed to the top of Mt. Fuji this month and even then, when she was climbing it, she couldn't see much of the mountain through the smog and clouds.
We headed back to the base in the afternoon because the kids had VBS on Monday. I'm staying at Dennis and Misty's apartment on the naval base in Yokosuka. It's all very official in order to stay here. I needed to have a visitor's pass with photo ID issued by the office, so we had to get there before they closed in the evening. Fortunately, traffic wasn't bad and we made it in plenty of time. I can't be anywhere on base without Misty and you have to show your ID everywhere you might want to go on base. I'd show you what my pass looks like, but I'm thinking the Navy wouldn't be down with that. These boys run a tight ship, even at the hotel we stayed at in Tokyo, we needed to show identification every time we entered the place.
Once we got the visitor's pass business accomplished, we left base to go out to dinner in the city of Yokosuka. I went with some udon noodles this time around. Yum! Afterwards, we picked up an assortment of treats for dessert. We got Evie a red bean ice cream sandwich. I tried a bite and I can honestly say I don't care for red bean ice cream. I decided to try the pastries instead.
In this photo are a few pastries I plan to eat (not in one sitting). Some red bean paste filled rolls, a curry doughnut, an apple and cream filled doughnut, and a mango rice pastry...kind of like mochi, but not quite.
Ya, you did a double take when I said curry doughnut. It tastes like it sounds. Here's a photo of the filling:
I'll be honest, I liked it for a savory treat. Tomorrow is my last full day in Japan; I can't believe my trip is so quickly coming to an end!
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