Jetlagged

It's almost 4 am here. I was laying on the futon for the past hour unable to sleep. I give up.

Yesterday was amazing. We did so much and yet we barely scratched the surface of Tokyo. It's huge city. My mind reels at the size. I am going to try and remember as much as possible. It's going to be hard since we took so much in.

We woke up around 6 am yesterday and strolled to a place called Coffee Colorado. We found it on the map the ryokan lady gave us. Colorado sounds like home and you all know what a coffee addict I am. Michael did a good job of finding it. I am not sure how he did it since the streets here don't make any sense at all. They vary from wide boulevards to winding tiny walkways. The small ones seem to be unnamed and I can't figure out the numbering system. A friend of ours once described Tokyo as being similar to the innards of a watch- a very apt description.

Coffee Colorado was a nice little place. We picked out what we wanted by pointing at a menu picture of what looked like French toast. It turned out to be cinnamon toast with a side of salad that included corn and a dressing that tasted like soy mayonnaise. Ordering and paying included a lot of head nodding and pointing, a theme that was to continue throughout our day.

Back on the streets- vending machines are everywhere. There are a lot for a drink called Boss. Tommy Lee Jones' face is on these machines and it says "The Boss is the Boss of the All." We've also seen ads with Scarlet Johannsen hawking coffee, Posh Spice advertising perfume, and Cameron Diaz selling cellphones.

We took a train to Harajuku. We figured out we could flash our JR passes at the men staffing the gates and get through to the station. Harajuku is a place that is very popular with the Japanese teenagers. They have all kinds of stores selling the latest fashions. The stores have names like "Rudeness" or "Snoberry." (Did they mean snow berry? Snobbery?) We went into a place that was called Chicago that sold authentic vintage American clothes. This is where all your thrift store clothes end up. It was a trip to see Miller High Life suspenders being sold for 30000 yen. Native American clothes and jewelry is very hip here right now and all the men seem to be wearing their hair like 80's metal bands. There was so much Engrish everywhere.

Let me tell you- Tokyo citizens are an extremely fashionable bunch. They are not fashionable in the way New Yorkers are subtle and chic. Tokyoians (is that a word?!) are stylish in the creative, clever way.

We visited the Meiji shrine. It was very beautiful and we were lucky to see a Japanese wedding. After that, we ate lunch at a Mexican place in Harujuku. It was very good but also strange. It was Mexican but also tasted and looked very Japanese.

Next we took a train to Shinjuku and wandered about Tokyo's largest commuter train station. Then we visited Shibuya crossing- Japan's most traveled intersection. Imagine hundreds (maybe thousands?) of people crossing during the light change all at once. This led to us a district that seemed like New York's Time Square but way bigger and crazier. I think it was this point that I really began to freak out on how huge this city is. Just when I think I've seen something amazing, Tokyo shocks me even more half an hour later.

We wandered into some game and pachinko parlors. The pachinko parlors... oh god. I don't even know what to say. I think we're going to try and take a video to explain them. Hmmm. They kind of reminded me of slot machines at casinos but more extreme. Imagine that sort of scenario but with way more color, songs playing at 10,000 bpm, and Japanese people with buckets of little steel balls. I thought I was going to pass out from the insanity.

I know I keep saying that Tokyo is extreme, but I really mean it. It's such an over the top place.

I should probably finish up this blog so we can get to the fish market, but I just want to say one more thing. Almost everything in Japan seems to be personified. The bus stops have pictures of smiling buses with feet. The cigarettes on the no smoking signs are frowning. EVERYTHING IS A GUY. IT'S CRAZY.