After an extra hour of rest at Iga Ueno, I got started on my trip to Tokyo. The ryoken staff was nice enough to drive me to the train station, dropping some rice off at their other hotel before bringing me there. I got on the train to the Iga Ueno transfer at around 8 AM. Tokyo is about an hour, maybe two, away as the crow flies. However, I had to go back and forth, going from transfer to transfer before getting on a Shinkansen at Kyoto. In the end, I arrived in Tokyo Street station at just about 2 PM.
From there, I had another train change to make, then a confusing walk to the hotel. After getting lost, a friendly Japanese businessman with great English skills helped me out. A major executive at the local pharma company, he said that it took him 3 years to learn English, an easy language in his estimation, at the age of 57 no less! He called the hotel and helped me sort out my directions with them. Seems I was at the wrong side of the Tokyo bank when I took my turn. I got lost yet AGAIN on my way there. Taking shelter from the sudden squall that sprung up, a few people from inside the office building came out for a smoke, and the traffic cop who was writing tickets out front came under the same overhang I was. With a few conversations in broken Japanese, I discerned that I was exactly one block too far south, and my hotel was literally a block and a half away. Tokyo is confusing to say the least!
After spending some time settling into my really swank hotel room, I decided to head out on the town. I stopped at a nearby sushi place for dinner, snapping some pictures on my way, of which only a few turned out. Then, after discussing the locations of Internet cafes with the local sushi chefs, I decided to go to Akihabara, the electronics district.
Akihabara is glows like a florescent lightmakers convention, and has an incredible number and variety of electronics stores, all with their own hawkers out front. There are also a HUGE number of people. I spent a bit of time in a local arcade, playing Virtual-ON with some Japanese kids (who roundly beat me), before exploring all of the electronics stores I could. Supposedly, you can bargain with the sales people, but I really need to see it done in Japanese before I try. Definitely a place I'm heading back to.
Akihabara also had a few of this shop below, although this one had the best spelling by far.
