Tokyo-Tuesday, April 1, 2025

At 6:30 AM, the alarm went off, and we got ready. The best part of the room was the toilet, equipped with an automatic lid that opens upon entering the room, a heated seat, and various electronic buttons for flushing, jets, bidet functions, etc. I found it fascinating and very useful. The bathroom was quite cold due to the lack of heating, but it warms up after showering. At 7:30 AM, we went for breakfast. There was a lot of fish, miso and vegetable soup, tofu, meat, scrambled eggs (quite runny), and rice. There were also croissants and white bread, but hardly any fruit, only a little orange. However, you would be well-fed. The coffee was good as well. At 8:30 AM, we were picked up by our tour guide. The weather was very bad—4° Celsius and pouring rain. We took our tour bus to the Meiji Shrine. Our tour guide, Kayoko, first explained how the numerous vending machines work. You can find these every 100 meters in Tokyo, offering all sorts of hot and cold drinks at a low price. We then walked through the beautiful park to the shrine and received an introduction to the Shinto religion. Emperor Meiji died in 1912, and his wife in 1914. After their deaths, the shrine was built in their honor in the popular architectural style nagare-zukuri (流造) on a plot of land that was initially granted to General Katō Kiyomasa (1562–1611) and later became a secondary residence of Ii Naosuke, who served as chancellor to the Tokugawa. The construction was praised at its opening as “the finest crafted Shinto monument ever erected. Photography is not allowed inside the shrine. A ceremony was taking place where young recruits of a Japanese company were being introduced. It was all interesting to observe, but it was terribly cold, and after about an hour, we headed back to the bus. We continued to the Shinjuku district, which is a major administrative and commercial area. Here we visited the city hall, including the observation deck on the 45th floor. Unfortunately, the view was mediocre due to the bad weather. Nevertheless, there was much to see in the tourist shop. After about an hour, we moved on to the Asakusa Canon Temple, a Buddhist sanctuary. Despite the bad weather, many tourists were present, especially many young ladies dressed in kimonos taking photographs. It looked very stylish, but with the jet streams from their 'train' on their feet, which were completely soaked, I didn't find it very responsible for their health. After the visit, we had about an hour of free time, during which Anne and I strolled through the many shops and found a small ramen shop, where we were greeted very kindly and got a table on the first floor. We ordered 2 portions of ramen each, based on the pictures on the menu, received free water, and shortly thereafter, two steaming bowls of delicious soup were placed before us, which we enjoyed very much. Everything only cost us 11€ together. Really very cheap.

Then it was back to the bus and we drove to the Ginza district, where we visited a luxury department store with an exquisite food department in the basement level. It was also very busy here, but it looked truly fantastic. The Japanese are indeed packaging artists. We also noticed the relatively high number of staff, which wouldn't be so common where we come from.

Then we went to the Imperial Palace, but we were only allowed to see the outer grounds. Unfortunately, access to the palace was denied to us. Then back to the hotel, where we all arrived frozen around 5:30 PM.

At 7:00 PM, we met in the lobby and walked about 10 minutes to an Izakaya (Japanese pub). There we received a very generous Japanese tapas menu consisting of salad, three kinds of raw fish, schnitzel, sausages, chicken skewers, rice, snacks, and a wok dish with pork belly, poultry, vegetables, and broth, which was cooked at the table for about 15 minutes, served with various sauces, soy, teriyaki, bread, beer, and sake. Everything was very delicious but also too much and meat-heavy. The izakaya was very lively, especially with Japanese men from the offices celebrating in suits and getting louder as time went on. After about 2.5 hours, we returned to the hotel, full and satisfied. Anne and I were still tired from the journey and all the sightseeing and went to sleep.