Circling the Tokyo

Another not that photo heavy shot but at least few. Today I was to meet with Japanese for little bit of chatting and walking around. Before that I however went to buy breakfast at local 7-eleven convenient store(which btw are as name says CONVENIENT!). Something new happened this time as after doing shopping I was presented with box and told to pick one card. Some sort of lottery. First time this happened. Got this for the effort:

 Left is bread with some sort of stuffing inside. Right is the one I got. Not quite sure what it is but my best guess from trying to decipher text is some sort of medicine if your stomach upsets you.

Haha. Well freebie so no big deal. The chat in Japanese when I was presented with the box and when I verified what I was supposed to do was however best part of the thing :D

Arriving to the station I had this very, very strong of deja-vu as if I had been here for this before. After meeting with person I was supposed to meet and we walked away I realized why. I HAD been here before. Maybe not exact same station but very close as we walked past a climb I vividly could remember(that had been funny occasion. Person I had met that day got lost as well! "ah it was not here, that way!" she had said turning 180 degrees. Seems even Japanese get lost in Tokyo at times! :D).

Hahaha. Funny this coming to same part of town in similar business. Life is funny sometimes.

Anyway we started walking toward Ueno and came across temple she walks past often enough.

 We lucked in as we got to temple as shichi-go-san festivals were going on. That is Japanese tradition when girls(she explained) celebrate their 3rd(san) and 7th(shicchi) birthdays and boys their 5th(go). So there was at least one boy and couple girls(mostly 7 year olds to my eyes). Everybody wearing traditional clothes. Girls looked like princesses in their kimonos. Would have been wonderful pictures but I don't have habit of taking photos of strangers kids.

 (though there's one very slightly visible on above photo but not very good one)

Next we came across antique store and boy oh boy oh boy I was sooooooo tempted to buy something as all the stuff was so excelent work. Only two things stopped me: a) how to get these fraqile stuff to Finland intact b) price. Even very tiny sake cup was like 8000 yen or so. Big yunomi(big teacup) that I would sooooo have loved to own was more like 2000 euros. Pheeeeeeeeeeeew!

Was very nice to watch though I was somewhat nervous as the walking areas in that small store were narrow so with that expensive fraqile stuff I was like "be careful, be careful, BE CAREFUL!!!!!". Did not want to trip down and break more stuff than I could hope to seriously pay in 10 years...

This is the bloody expensive cup.

 Hard to see from the photo but that detailing was INCREDIBLY detailed.

After this we went to sushi restaurant. Very busy restaurant. We got lucky and got chairs right away. After we had sat in there started to actually form up long line outside the restaurant. Very noisy restaurant which is also common in Japanese restaurants as staff were shouting greetings and what not. Very good sushi as well. No wonder it was so popular! Didn't remember to take photos of all the sushi(nor miso soup which btw was honestly best miso soup I have eaten. I'm not big fan of miso soup but this was very good).

 Only photo I remembered to take.

After this she had to head home so we parted our ways. I proceeded toward Ueno station as I had shop I wanted to try to find and locating guide started at the Ueno station. But seems my info was outdated as shop wasn't there. And I'm 100% sure I FOUND the right place though. There's only one ameyoko central building and I positively found it. Was after seriously crowded side street. Funny thing those. There's lots of these small side streets which are INCREDIBLY packed and have lots of small stores of different food items(here's ramen, there's the sushi, there's ice cream, and over there water melon slices. Every store specializing on one item type), souvenirs etc. Always interesting to walk through one though progress is never, ever faster than a crawl.

Walking toward Ueno park I noticed there was some sort of festival going on though so my route to the store wasn't as straight as it could have been. Lots of temporar selling points and there was bunch of old women and men(and one younger men) in traditional clothes dancing.

Above is short video of first dance that I took.

 Some shots of the area and trees there.

With Ueno shop search failing I then proceeded for more shopping on Akihabara, mekka of nerds as it's known :D Technically speaking I probably am ideal target group for the Akihabara but nevertheless it's not my favourite places. Too much bright lights, too noisy and way too crowded. Well at least I luckboxed and last issue was actually solved as streets cars drive were completely void of cars and instead people walked there. Yey! So it was not at all crowded though there was as usual people to level of nuttiness.

Couple shots from the akihabara.

 With this I headed toward home dropping by at the Harajuku and walking there to Shibuya(starting to get a daily habit) and past Yoyogi park that had been reopened. Though clock was 5PM and it was getting late I made quick stroll over there.

Bought these takoyakis from vendor nearby. Ah this was rather nostalgic. 2nd day in Japan for me ever I came to Yoyogi park and bought takoyakis at the almost exact spot(hell for all I know he could have been same vendor!). This is how you eat takoakis. Fresh! He had actually started to make next round just as I came so I got to see takoyaki vendor at his work cooking them.

Mmmmm. Tasty!

There was festival going on. Too bad photo didn't work out(my phone camera isn't good for darkness plus maybe didn't brace myself properly).

Getting home I went for nearby ramen restaurant for dinner and got myself salt-ramen(I suppose that's named so because it had meat slices in it) plus bottle of sake(so if my text appears bit weird I blame the sake!).

Tomorrow is going to be climb to Mount Tsukuba so maybe more photos coming than lately again ;)