Sunday, December 04, 2005
Sunday in Tokyo
Sunday was free of either meetings or travel, so we trudged around Tokyo on a rainy December day. The hotel offered a blitzkrieg tour of the high points -- six stops in three hours -- but the geography was such that we assumed we would spend most of the time on the bus, hustled from site to site. Instead, we took the train from Shinjuku, where we are staying, to Asakusa, which is the site of a bunch of "very famous" temples and no end of shopping (main temple right).
Motivated by the rain, unsteeped as we were in Japanese history, we managed to get through our tour of the temple grounds in less than half an hour, which is just fine since I had seen them once before, in the summer of 1984. Our haste did not deter me from posing in front of these two Buddhas, one conferring wisdom, and the other compassion. I like to think that I am richly endowed in both traits (there was no evident "humility Buddha").
The approach to the Asakusa temples is a very long gauntlet of stalls selling food and souvenirs of all varieties. It was choked with people, but crowds in Japan are far more tolerable than, say, at a Giants game. People very courteously tilt their umbrellas away from you as you pass them (this bit of Edo shigusa -- meaning the "subtle gestures of Tokyo" -- is even explained in PSAs run by the Japan Ad Council in English-language newspapers) and, obviously, nobody is belching brats and brews in your face. 
The shops themselves had everything you might imagine, including yummy afternoon snacks, little Buddhas, t-shirts, fans, chopsticks and anything else that you might imagine. Except snowglobes, which apparently are not a Japanese thing. One is forced to wonder, though, why the souvenir sellers of Asakusa haven't figured out that Americans buy them in great numbers.
Anyone who has travelled to Asia has seen examples of English-language logo attire that might have benefited from expert intervention. Japan has less of it than most places, but the cap at right is enough to make you wonder what the world thinks of Canadians. Yes, it really does say "Master Lifestyle, Canada, RockyClub, Naturalism." Of course, we don't know whether the word "Master" is an honorific or a verb, so we can't know whether the person wearing the hat is "Master Lifestyle" or is exhorting Canada to master lifestyle.
And, finally, if you are in a post office -- which you may be since they seem to have the only ATMs that handle your American networked debit card -- don't miss the comemorative stamps. Specifically, the super hero stamps.
2 Comments:
By 
Cassandra, at
Mon Dec 05, 05:19:00 AM:
I thought Tokyo was a hoot when we were there. I've always hoped we'd get a chance to take the kids (well, actually they're grown) back there - I know my oldest son would love it. We spent most of our time up at Fuji so I didn't get to see much of the city but really enjoyed the brief time we did spend there.
By 
, at
Thu Nov 06, 07:11:00 AM:
We specialize in laptop battery,laptop AC adapters. All our products are brand new, with the excellent service from our laptop battery of customer service team.
the most convenient and cheap replacement battery online shop in uk. We specialize in laptop batteries,laptop AC adapters.
All our laptop AC adapters are brand new, with the excellent service from our customer service team.
the most convenient and cheap battery online shop in uk.
