Pandas and cosplayers in Tokyo

Yet another day has come to its end.
Today was specially hot in my opinion and I think I remember the weather forecast talking something about 30+ degrees Celsius?

I woke up at 8 after a pretty annoying night. There were some new guests arriving to my room at night time apparently and the first thing they do is hit the F*cking light switch turning the room into a blazing, bright, HELL! Not only did they do that once, but on twice during the night!
Oh well live and let live. Forgive and forget etc.

Famous five-storied pagoda of Ueno

I took a quick shower before heading downstairs to eat the breakfast at the hostel. I then uploaded the video of yesterday and made myself ready to leave for the Ueno Zoo.
I took the Ginza-Line from Asakusa to Ueno and walked 5 minutes from the station to the Ueno Park where the entrance was for the zoo.


The first thing I went to see was the Panda, which is Ueno zoos pride and joy. It was very big and very cute. The line was pretty long but I was quite early so it wasn't yet at its worst.

I then spent a good while there at the zoo looking at all the animals like the elephants, tigers, hippos, ice bears etc.
It was so hot outside that I had to take a break for a longer while since I was so exhausted.

Harajuku from the heights 

After the visit I left for Harajuku to see the famous cosplayers and the Meiji-shrine and to go and window shop a little. I then came back around 18 and decided to stay at the hostel for one more night since my plans changed a bit.

Tomorrow I will leave for Osaka and there I'll be staying at a Couch surfers hose. Really looking forward my Osaka trip. I will also now start to use my JR-Pass, so unlimited JR traveling for me.

Harajuku

Meji-Shrine 

Traveling for a long time really is adventurous and spontaneous changes may appear. For example I decided to come back to Tokyo on the 27th of July to see the Sumida river fireworks that are one of the most famous firework events of Japan.
Thanks to Ako it is possible so thank you! :)


Cheers and thanks for reading!
Robert

Live in Japan and the crazy shit I do!

Greetings!
Today was once again a day to be written down in history as I went to the Nagisa music festival in Tokyo. The music they play there is mainly techno, house and other club music.

I woke up at 9 and took a shower and went down to eat some breakfast and to book myself in for one more night at the hostel. Why one
more night? Since it is so conveniet!
So after 3 breads and 4 cups of coffee I left towards Nippori station to meet Ako [fellow couch surfer] and her sister there. We were all going to the music festival together.
We arrived there around 12.00 and there were allot of people around at that time, most of them drinking and wasted.
We then headed for the gates were we went through the security check up. It was super quick and we were all soon inside enjoying ourselves to the max.

Transvestite 

There were a lot of stages there and we wondered around many of them and danced a LOT! It was so much fun and there was a lot of people.
It was in a way comic to me since there were a lot of hippie~ish people there, though there is nothing wrong with being one either, but it just struck me as funny.

The sun was burning bright and hot on the sky. The temperature was around 28 degrees Celsius according to the weather forecast.

So imagine if you can : A hot day, a festival that starts at 12 with everybody already drunk, a lot of dancing, techno and similar music playing here and there. What else can it be but awesome and weird!
Oh and there were a lot of parents whit their children there also. Yeah don't know how to feel about that since the security was really good and the people behaved so good even though drunk as anything.

Why stress? 

Oh, and a funny thing happened!

Yakuza 

I had a encounter whith a YAKUZA member. For those who don't know what the Yakuza is I shall enlighten you a bit. IT'S THE FRICKING JAPANESE MAFIA. Hahahah
I took a picture whit him and chatted a bit whit him since he did not seem dangerous.
Yeah so that kind of thing happened.

I had really fun and handled myself pretty well and didn't drink too much. So in conclusion it was a fun day.

Ps. I was so hungry when the event ended that I just had to eat something. I had not eat anything else during that day but the 3 pieces of toast in the morning and 2 onigiri [rice balls].
So I went to the chain store that sold rice bowls etc. called Sukiya. I had the s.k. "mega" pork rice bowl. That really sank in fast and made me so satisfied ! hahaha. A perfect end for a perfect day.

Cheers
Robert

The hangover diaries + Live gig at the Tokyo dome city hall !

Sorry guys but today's post is going to be short  and so will also be the daily video (as if you watch them to the end right, hahaha).

So woke up a couple of times today in the morning and immediately hit on the snooze button. It wasn't because I was feeling sick or bad or anything but simply tired as hell. Yesterday had taken quite the toll on me and so I decided that since today I had only planned to go to a live gig, I'd just sleep longer.

After I had woke up for the final time I then went down to try and upload my video and to write my blog.
Well the internet was acting up so that's why the daily video was late today, sorry about that, though it is not my fault.

I then went and took a shower and went to the Paku Paku near our hostel. Paku Paku is a store that sells Bentos, packed lunches, and I bought one with a lot of rice, beef and pasta (for some reason there was also pasta, but hey what the hell). These places are really good when on a budget and the food is made daily so it is better, MUCH better than some crappy pre-made micro crap you usually get in Europa. Everything cost only 250 YEN !!!!! THAT IS 2 dollars 50 cents ! ! ! In euros it's around 2 euro ! My god it was cheap and good food.

AKGF!

I noticed that I started to have a little headache when I went to get the boxed lunch, so yup, hangover time baby! But it soon passed after I had eaten and drank a bit of water.

OK so the afternoon went pretty much past on the computer since I had no plans before the Asian Kung-Fu Generations gig in Tokyo Dome City Hall.

I took the metro there and had a bit trouble to find the correct building at first but I asked around and found it.
There was a lot of people! The bands who played before AKGF didn't really interest me so I pretty much sat outside in the corridor (with many others) after extending my courtesy by listening to the first band a bit.

When it was their time to play I rushed in and got a got spot and I really enjoyed the atmosphere there.  Everyone were super into it and though the stadium/live culture here in Japan is a bit different than in the rest of the world, I really enjoyed it from my part also.

The place was packed ! 

I then got myself safely back to my hostel to update some stuff.

Thanks for reading !
Cheers
Robert

Tsukiji, Shibuya, Harajuku; The drunken mans ballad

Tsukiji Fish market

Today I was the day when I was to leave from Ronris house to go to the Sakura Hostel in Asakusa.
It truly is a convenient location for a hostel since it has great conections to the other popular sightseeing spots and it's only a 5 minutes walk from the Asakusa kaminarimon.

So anyhow, I left early at 8.50 a.m. towards Asakusa to leave my luggage in a coin locker at the Asakusa station so that I could go meet Ako, another Couch surffer who offered to show me around.
We met at the Asakusa station and left for Tsukiji Fish market. The auctions for the fish are usually held at 4-5 a.m. but we didn't go there for that reason, we just went there to see the fish market in it self since it was actually her first time.
The smell of fish was strong when we arrived inside the gates. It's a huge place with many sellers and many products to sell. There was eel, octopus, crayfish etc. etc. And the amazing part was that most of the products where still alive when they sold them !

Kabuki theater 

It was a amazing site to see how they still squirmed in their buckets. I could also see one of the sellers take apart a eel.

We then continued to walk around the area and the shopping arcades nearby. I bought myself a little rock-salt set. It consisted of three small rocks of salt and a sort of grater to break it down.
It is full of minerals and generally healthier according to the seller, whether to believe it or not I do not know.

We then headed for Shibuya to see a bit around there. Shibuya is known for it's crossing path that goes all zig zag and is always crowded.
We went to some stores and I end up buying a calligraphy pen and a note book, boring I know.

While we walked around an instrument store hit my eye. I then immediately exclaimed " LETS. GO. THERE.".
I looked around at the guitars and tested a Boss guitar pedal just to have an excuse to play the guitar for a while.
It was amazing, simple but true.

We then headed towards Harajuku and Shinjuku by foot. We didn't really do anything in particular there, just walked and watched the people who had many particular tastes in clothing and fashion
It was a pretty sight because the sun had already started to set and had painted the sky with a purpleish color.

Harajuku station

I highly recommend to visit all of these above mentioned places when in Japan since they all have a unique atmosphere to them,

So as it was getting close to the evening we were both getting a bit hungry so we headed out to eat and to drink.
We drank pretty  much and had a good time. Ako is such a fun person !
We stayed so late that when I arrived at Ueno station with the Jr train , the subways were not operating anymore  so I had to take the cab which you should  avoid using at daytime since the traffic is so awful but now that it was night so it was ok.

I got home safely and saw the empty face of the Asakusa shopping arcade and temple area.

Cheers
Robert

Shinjiku and the rainy day blues

I woke today very early, as early as 7.30. This day passed so slow even though I had fun meeting my friend Kosuke after such a long time. 

Why you might wonder, it's simple, it was raining the whole day through and got only a little better by the evening.Yup it just confirms the fact that it's summer here in Japan.

After I had woke up and took a shower I went to meet my friend Kosuke at the metro station near the National Diet Building and the National Diet Library, he had some errands he had to run by there.
So we met there and went to the library to eat something but before I could enter I had to register myself there through a form and through passport identification since it is a very important library. 

We soon left the library after eating since there was nothing we wanted to see there. We had some thoughts of where to go on such a day and just ended up at Shinjuku to go to the observatory at a government building. There were a lot of tourists going there since it is free and there is usually a good view from there. 

But when we went it was a bit foggy outside so you could not see so far but it didn't matter since we could see the big buildings still. 

We then wandered around the station a bit and went to a Starbucks for a coffee. I had a vanilla latte to quench my caffeine needs for the day. 

We chatted a bit about this and that and about the live gig I am going to go and see on Friday, really looking forward to that. Kosuke had been so kind as to buy me the tickets in Japan and to give them to me when I saw him.
We will still meet and I'll even stay at his house this upcoming Saturday and Sunday.

We then both left for the JR Shinjuku station to both part our ways. He went home to meet up some other friends he had made plans with. He had come to give me the ticket all the way to Tokyo and even made some time to hang out with me even though he was busy. 

I went back to Asakusa and killed some time there by looking around some shopping malls and arcades.

I ate a delicious custard manju (bun) and bought a pair of shorts and a shirt that were on sale.

I then returned to Oobukuro and quickly popped by the super market to get me some instant noodles since I wasn't in the mood to go to a restaurant and eat. 

I then spent my evening playing guitar and browsing the internet. 

So to summarize, it was a bit boring today. Tomorrow I'll try to lively it up a bit ! 

Cheers!

Robert

To gaze from heights on human ants

Tokyo Sky Tree, 634 m high

Today I overslept again as typical of me, but it didn't bother me. I calmly washed my face and got ready to get out.

I walked the same road to the station again and there boarded the train, this time I had to change it twice. I hate train changes since you have to stay scarp during the ride so that you don't miss your stop. Especially here since god knows where you might end up :)

After arriving to the Tokyo Sky Tree stop I got out.  The building is enormous, gigantic! I didn't go to the tower it self since it costs so much and I had already decided to go to Tokyo tower also.
So I ate at the McDonald's there since I was already so hungry. I had left at 12  o'clock from Oobukuro.

So I then walked a bit around the area to go to the Sumida park. It was raining a bit but nothing I couldn't handle even without a umbrella.

The scenery was very peaceful even though we are inside such a hectic town as Tokyo.
I walked all the way to Asakusa, which really isn't so far from the sky tree. I then took the subway towards Ueno to take the JR Yamanote Line towards Tokyo station so that I could go see the Imperial palace gardens and the surrounding buildings of Tokyo station

Tokyo Station

After arrived at Tokyo Station I went around the Marunoichi buildings and looked around for a while before turning back to the station to head towards the park.

As I walked towards the park I realized bit by bit how HUGE the damn place was. I mean the garden area just stretched on an on. It was very beautiful even though  it was pretty plain.

At the Imperial palace gardens

I strolled around and was noticed by some other foreigners, they waved at me from a far, I waived back just to be kind. They appeared to be from some other Asian country but it doesn't really mater. Later they came to just say hi to me. I believe that they might have mistaken me for some kind of celebrity :) hahah

I then left for the station after taking some pictures, it was a really good idea to go there. I was fully satisfied.

I took the train from Tokyo and changed to the metro to get to the Tokyo tower. There was a couple of changes also from one metro to the other.

View from Tokyo Tower

I had visited Tokyo towers one and a half year a go when I first came to Japan in December. It felt so nostalgic.

Tokyo Tower, 333 m high

I went to the observatory there which is a lot cheaper than the one in Tokyo Sky tree. So if you are on a budget and still want to see the view of Tokyo from a high place, this is one of many good cheaper spots to do so.

The sights were great, I could see so far! I just love that Tokyo has so many places to go to and so many things to do. The elevator was super fast, it took only 30 seconds or so to get to the observatory.
I had to depressurize my ears a couple of times during the short ride.

Chicken tikka 

When I finally agreed to leave I found a Indian curry house and ate there some chicken tikka with a garlic naan. It tasted so good, I just love ethnic foods so much.

I then took the metro back towards Asakusa to get back to Oobukuro.
A funny thing happened at the Asakusa station when I was buying the ticket, a Japanese older man came and ask me if I was lost or needed any help since I was trying to read the time table. After telling him that I was just wondering when and which train I should take he lit up with joy since I talked Japanese and was heading the same way as he, though his stop was before mine. We rode the same train together and had a pleasant chat about this and that. He had worked for a export company and had retired once but then returned there to be the guard there. He seemed really like a very nice and kind person, I was so glad that he had helped me.

When we got back Ronri (my host) was about to eat. Since I had already eaten he ate alone but we ate some Japanese sweets and drank some tea together.
I'll upload the daily video to YouTube before going to sleep.

Cheers
Robert

From the footsteps of divinity to the one and only Electric hell!

The Asakusa kaminari mon

Today has been a long day, a really long day, but it's been filled with amazement and wonder.
I woke up and took a shower and started making my preparations to get out. Now that I am Couch surfing it is not always easy to just leave since I am currently a bit farther from the immediate center of Tokyo. As you know Tokyo is one of the worlds biggest capitals so you might have an idea of what I'm talking about.
Anyway I took a train from Oobukuro station towards Asakusa. I asked a kind old lady for the right train and she was very kind to give me detailed information.

Asakusa station is pretty small and very near the sightseeing spots so it was super easy to find there, plus i have been before so it goes without saying that it was easy.
The Kaminari-mon, what the first gate towards the asakusa shrine? is called, was surrounded by a lot of people since Asakusa is not only a popular tourist spot for tourists but also for Japanese people.
I strolled around the shopping arcade and bought some sweet bean paste filled pastries ( Manjuu). They were delicious !

The temple is very big and beautiful and has a lot of history built in it so if you ever come to Tokyo, this is a must see, among my top 10 sights in Tokyo !

The weather was pretty hot but it doesn't bother me anymore now that I have been already a week here but of course i have to drink a lot of water to stay hydrated.
I ventured on through the vast grounds of Asakusa shrine and had to stop to eat in the middle.
I found a small ramen shop tucked between two bigger shops so that it was almost invisible to by passers, but I noticed it and they even appeared to have a English menu which helps a lot since the orders were made by machines and the ticket given to the shopkeeper.
I just had a regular soy based ramen soup and some roasted pork on top but man oh man was it good, I mean wow. Let's not forget that it was also cheap and filled me up so I was ecstatic. It costed only 500 yen.

Maid

After eating I finished my round of the Asakusa area and took the metro to Ueno to take the train towards Akihabara, the famous, ever so glorious, electric town as it's being called. Electric hell would fit it better, but in a good meaning since it is just so big and somehow is just so overshooting in a way that you just come back time after time again.

I filmed allot and went to different places, small alleys and big buildings etc. just to see the diversity of what we call Akihabara.
As of course expected there were the cute Maid cled girls beckoning bypassers to come to their Maid cafe to be pampered as "Masters".

Some goods you can find at Akihabara

Not kidding, that's actually what they call you when you get there, the Japanese word is "goshujiinsama" which means simply "master" as in "the master of the house" etc.
Well I didn't go since I have gone before and I got the Idea of what kind of a place the Maid cafes generally are. If you want to know more you can check out my previous blog posts from a year ago.

After doing some shopping in Akihabara I took the train towards Ueno station to go and scan those parts. They have a really beautiful park, zoo and  a lot of museums there . I only went to see some temples and shopping districts but not the zoo or the Tokyo metropolitan museum.
Still it was amazing so If you have a chance to go there, Go and take some food or snacks with you and have a little picnic. There are some convenience stores nearby so you could easily find those if you wanted.

Ueno park

Next I started to head back home to Ronri (my host) because today we are going to a Onsen, A hot spring bath and we will also eat there. So I jumped to the train and headed towards Asakusa at first and from there I had to ask which train goes to Oobukuro. But the attendant gave me the wrong information since the train was a express train that I took and it would jump over Oobukuro station . But I soon noticed it and changed trains at the next station.



*Later*
We went to the onsen by train and bus but it's still inside Tokyo. The great thing is that it really is a Onsen, so the water is coming from under the ground from a hot spring.
The water is a bit cola colored but still the bath outside was great, and afterwards I went to a salt sauna and regular sauna, and of course I took many baths in the different "pools".

I had a strawberry milk after the bath

Afterwards we ate at the Onsen, I had a fried chicken set with rise and miso soup etc. It was great, so the evening was really enjoyable.
Tomorrow it's time for more sightseeing !

Thanks for reading!

 Robert

Bye Bye Toyama, Hello Tokyo !

So hi guys!
Today I woke a bit later than yesterday since I felt a bit tired. I woke around 10 or so and went downstairs to make everything in order since we had been drinking and so on.

After a while I made some food for my self and uploaded a couple of photos and wrote my backlog.
Yoshimi san came back home around 1 p.m. and I had to get ready to leave for Tokyo.
She was so kind to follow me to the tracks and see me of on my trip towards Tokyo, I'll miss her and her family and friends !
They were all so nice to me and were such a interesting bunch of people.

I had to change trains once and I was a bit nervous since I had only 5 minutes time to change trains and there was a lot of people who were getting of at that station.
But everything went fine and I was soon of towards Tokyo on the Shinkansen, bullet train.
It costed 12000 yen one way to Tokyo and took about 4 hours to get to Tokyo.  I will start using my JR pass when I go to Osaka on the 1st of July.

But basically after I arrived to Tokyo I went straight to Asakusa to meet my host. Here's the hook though, I had informed him at morning that I would be late for our meeting and I had not received any answer from him so I was nervous.
But there he was, he had sent me apparently E-mail and I had not noticed at all but there he was !
I felt so relieved!
From there we took the train to his the station near his house and I left my stuff there. We went shopping after a while since both of us hadn't eaten yet and it was already 9 p.m. so we bought some ingredients to make Curry.
It took quite long before we ate but it was worth the wait! Ronry is a really good cook.

Today was kind of a "boring day" and yet it wasn't but TOMORROW, oh just you wait !


Cheers
Robert

Backlog extravaganza

The couple of few days have been filled with so much fun that I hardly even had time to post anything, sorry about that.

Well I left Nagoya in the morning of 21st (Friday) and took the highway buss strait to Toyama. We stopped only a couple of times and I had my delicious Bento, boxed Japanese lunch, in the bus.

The Daibutsu in the background 

When I finally arrived I had to find my host, Yoshimi, somewhere there. I had informed her with a text message that I was at Toyama station so she started to come there from Takaoka where she had been waiting. There had been a little misunderstanding but no biggies, we managed to find each other so all is well.

Yoshimi was hosting at the same time a English/Italian couch surfer so he came also with her t pick me up.
We then went to take a little rest at Yoshimis house before the evenings party. Yes PARTY!!!
Oh and we also went to see the Takaoka Daibutsu, big Buddha.
It was so amazing since as we were there, the kind lady monk came and offered to show me how to ring the large bell. So that we did, gladly ! It was an amazing experience.

Afterwards we went back to Yoshimis house where we talked for a while and drank coffee and then we left for the Party with Yoshimi, her daughter, daughters friend and there were already a lot of people at the party location which was a popular Izakaya.
It was SO GREAT !!!! We feasted on traditional as well as foreign influenced Japanese food and drank beers, sake, whisky, you name it!

We got pretty hammered I'll admit but nothing that we could not handle.
We then drove back to her house and had an "after party". We had bought some beers at the convenience store and sat down to drink and chat. I think I had stayed up until 4 a.m. until i went to sleep.

At the park

Next day I woke up at 11 a.m. feeling just fine, haha, so no hangover for me.
It was a really sunny day so I wish I had remembered to take my sunglasses with me when I wen to Kanazawa.

Yoshimi drove me to the Takaoka station where I took the train to Kanazawa to meet Yoshimis friend there who was going to show me around a bit in Kanazawa.

We went to a park and ate at a really good Italian style restaurant. I ordered the amazing eggplant pasta set, I mean, god it was good.

After finishing eating I got the unique chance to go and see inside a old Japanese house. I will underline it is not a local sightseeing spot, it's not open for public, just a house but it was a really old wooden one.

The old resident of this house had just passed away last year and her daughter was taking care of the house and she showed us around.

The old house

It was her fathers house and her father had lots of old stuff she was organizing. She had also donated to some museums already some of the stuff since her father had a habit of not throwing away things. So there was a lot of interesting things to see and learn about the life in Japan long a go and how it changed.

The most amazing thing was that I received a small sake set from her, since she wanted to get rid of the overflow of stuff at the house. But wait it gets better, the porcelain was Kutani yaki.

some old matchboxes 

For those who don't know what it is (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kutani_ware) check out this link, but in short they are really well known around here and are apparently pretty valuable, and they gave them to me for free! It was just such a kind thing to do.

Anyways, we checked around a lot of stuff and then we left with Yoshimis friend to go to the Kenroku-en park and the Kanazawa castle grounds, we did not visit the castle though.
The park is one of the most famous parks in Japan out of three, and I could totally see why. It was so amazingly beautiful, and would be perfect place for a picnic or just having a hot cup of tea in the shadow.

Outside of the Kanazawa castle 

I am so in love with these Japanese gardens! They ooze with beauty and if it just had been spring or fall it would have been even more amazing since those times there are the cherry or plum blossoms in the trees.

After that we quickly took a stroll through the Kanazawa castle grounds. It was cool but it is a shame that it was still under renovation in some parts. But still very beautiful.

We then started to slowly return to Takaoka, but this time I got a lift to Takaoka where I was to meet Rikako, Yoshimis daughter.
Together we went shopping for some food and when we came back I made some Finnish food, macaroni casserole. It turned out good so I was relieved.

I then waited alone at the house for a couple hours to get some company from Yoshimis friends, since she was away attending to some business somewhere and is coming back today (23.6.).

So yes we sat and drank some beers and had fun chatting and listening to music.

Today I'll go to Tokyo and I'll do my best to keep everything on schedule, If there is ANYTHING you would like me to film or blog about leave a comment down below or go to my YouTube channel and leave a comment there ( http://www.youtube.com/user/TravelersPOV ) Also check out my DAILY videos!

Cheers
Robert