JAPAN – Tokyo – 10th to 16th November 2019

We landed in Tokyo and loved it immediately. The people are so polite, respectful and considerate. They bow to each other and us. Whether they are workmen, cleaners, train drivers, people in a lift, in a shop etc. And there’s no pushing and shoving like in China. Cars stop in the road before you even put your foot on a zebra crossing as apposed to driving across them, even when its the pedestrians turn to walk across at lights! Their manners here on the roads in general are amazing. They form an orderly queue for everything and stand back from crossings and train doors etc. Everywhere is clean and tidy and it just has a good feel about it.

We’ve seen lots of men in suites everywhere, even in the evenings on trains and along the streets. I said to Glen what long hours they must work. Glen said they are out for the evening straight from work and he was right. We’ve seen lots of business men in cafes and restaurants either on their own, or in groups enjoying a night out, obviously having had enjoyed a ‘Sake’ or two! They can’t spend much time at home! 

The traditional Japanese restaurants, shops and little hotels have curtain-like fabric that hangs in front of doorways. They are called Noren apparently. 

Glen said it’s to stop people looking inside as they might see men with women they are not supposed to be with! Lol! Apparently they were originally there to ‘keep out the sun, or wind and dust’. Because of the length of most of them I think they are just for decoration now, they wouldn’t stop much wind or dust coming in. What they need for that are the polythene ones in China that hang to the floor and are magnetic to keep them sealed. lol! 

As I sit here making sense of my many notes that I’ve written since we arrived twelve days ago, I just want to say that we think Japan is wonderful so far and any negative observations I may write are done so reluctantly. For instance, I’m sure the people who race past us on their pushbikes as we walk along the pavement, without ringing their bells, are lovely polite Japanese people who urgently need the toilet or are late for a hospital appointment or something as equally important!

We are loving the way the Japanese are so thoughtful and technically advanced when it comes to the toilets. The thoughtfulness is evident by the amount of spare toilet rolls they put in each cubicle!

Also, the seats are heated! I’ve already spoken about the hi-tech toilets we came across in China when we went to see the Pandas in Chengdu, well they are even better here. There are the ‘washing’ facilities as previously mentioned but also a deodorising button, a ‘music’ button which plays a flushing sound at a variety of volumes, or a waterfall/ Amazonian rainforest kind of sound. All by waving your hand! Some toilet’s lights come on as you walk in, the seat raises automatically and a light in the actual toilet basin comes on to Illuminate the ‘event’. On the top of some of the cisterns there is a tap and a wash hand basin. As you wash your hands the used water goes in to the cistern ready to be re-used when the toilet flushes! Excellent idea! Instead of paper toilet seat covers they have a sanitising gel to use to wipe the seat clean. So, as you might imagine going to the toilet can take up a lot of time lol! Especially when I take photos too! 

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Along with the soy sauce, some sort of vinegar, chilli powder mix and sesame oil, there is a powered condiment that smells and looks just like the food we used to feed the goldfish with when I was a child! 

Some dishes come with fine flakes of something on top. They move like they are alive! They put me in mind (at best) of those little cellophane fish you put in the palm of your hand to so say tell your fortune. Do you know what I mean? They used to come In Christmas crackers when we were children. As they heat up in your hand they start to curl up and twist and move, much like the thin flakes they put on top of the food here, it’s disconcerting! I thought (hoped) it was some sort of vegetable or smoked bacon maybe but I’ve just found out that it’s flaked smoked fish! They are called Bonito flakes, or ‘dancing flakes’ as they move with the heat. They are also known as katsuo-bushi or katsuobushi in Japanese cuisine. 

We’ve seen the longest, the shortest, the widest and the narrowest zebra crossings here. The most impressive was the famous Shibuya scramble crossing of course.

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Luckily I had my selfie stick and so I could get an aerial photo. #littlewhitelie #stockshot

As we visited shrines here we noticed lots of families with children dressed in traditional kimonos. The parents were in very smart outfits. It looked like more than just a normal day out. We tried to speak to them to find out if there was a special reason they were there, but we didn’t find anyone who could speak English, other than one lady who said “5 and 7”. We assumed she meant it was a birthday outing but to be sure we googled it up! 

“Shichi-Go-San is a traditional rite of passage and festival day in Japan for three and seven-year-old girls and five-year-old boys, held annually on November 15 to celebrate the growth and well-being of young children. As it is not a national holiday, it is generally observed on the nearest weekend or throughout November. It is a ceremony presenting the children to Ujigami, the Shinto guardian god of good health.” 

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A massive tori gate along the forested approach to Meiji Shrine

Our first hotel was in the Akasaka area, not too far from the Emperor’s Palace. We walked there one day and noticed a long queue in the park area. There was a sign to say that although you can’t pay to visit the grounds of the Palace, twice a day they allow 300 people to go in free of charge ‘first come, first served’ We joined the end of the queue which was just before the next tour was due and to our surprise we managed to secure a place. 

Feeling the fear (big time!) and doing it anyway! This spur of the moment trip to the top of Tokyo Tower was the most anxious I have felt in years but the view was fantastic!

250 meters up and just a ‘wafer’ thin piece of glass between us and the ground! (Wink)

This little fella chatted to us while we waited to go down in the lift. He did help with my nerves lol! There were a group of young guys waiting with us and what they didn’t realise was that the robot was obviously listening to their conversation (about where they planned to go that evening!) and was repeating what they said lol!

Our second hotel was in the Asakusa area of Tokyo near the Sensoji Temple.

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We could also see the Tokyo Sky Tower across the bridge from the hotel. 

Glen wanted to visit the oldest part of Tokyo so we went to Yanaka. The area of Tokyo called Yanaka is famously one of the most quaint and aged parts of the city. It was spared the bombings during the WWII and survived the Great Kanto Earthquake and Fire of 1923. 

We inadvertently walked through the cemetery which is famous, for amongst other things, the blossoms in spring apparently. The graves have ‘sticks’ which are called Sotoba.

Having had a wonderful time in Tokyo we left on our first Japanese bullet train bound for Osaka.

The drivers and staff wear white gloves, smart uniforms and hats. It’s like a well performed ritual when the train arrives and leaves the station. Even the cleaning of the train is performed like a military exercise. There is a lot of bowing to each other and passengers, counting and pointing, which is precisely the same each time.

Sorry for the photo quality below but these are screen grabs from our video.

We’ve read that this Japanese-innovated industrial safety method known as pointing-and-calling is a system that reduces workplace errors by up to 85 percent. That’s comforting to know seeing as they were speeding along at 306km an hour on our journey!

The ‘ritual’ is known in Japanese as shisa kanko, pointing-and-calling works on the principle of associating tasks with physical movements and vocalisations to prevent errors by “raising the consciousness levels of workers”—according to the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health, Japan.

As the train pulls out of the station one of the immaculately dressed men leans out of the window at a jaunty angle holding on to the peak of his hat, all the way down the platform until the train leaves the station. It sort of put me in mind of the Queen waving regally from her carriage.

We got our first sight of the magnificent Mount Fuji. We will never forget it.