Tokyo - Geek Culture Day

We slept in today, letting David get some rest for his cold.  We left the hotel at about 10am and walked a few blocks to Nakamise-dori in front of Senso-ji temple to do some souvenir shopping.  Paul made a quick stop at Hanayashiki Amusement Park, which is right next to the temple, and rode Japan's oldest roller coaster.

David and the Senso-ji pagoda

Roller coaster at Hanayashiki

If I had a dollar for every cute thing I've seen in Japan...

 Afterward, we hopped the subway to Ginza to check out the Imperial Palace Grounds and the Tokyo International Forum.  Most of the Imperial Palace and grounds are closed to the public.  The part we were able to see was mostly made of grassy areas, gravel and a few moats.  The International Forum is used as a convention center and has a very modern looking interior.  We grabbed a quick lunch of curry katsu in Ginza.

Hibiya Park in Ginza

Skyscrapers over the imperial palace moat

View of one of the palace buildings

Inside of the Tokyo International Forum

With lunch out of the way, and considering it was such a beautiful clear day, we decided to head to Roppongi to go to the top of the Roppongi Mori Tower. The tower has a sky deck and modern art museum as well as an exhibition space at the top.  We were in luck today!  The exhibition was based on the 25th anniversary of the video game Dragon Quest, one of David and Paul's favorites.  There were lots of cute replicas of the game's monsters, as well as a live show, a bar that served themed foods and a nice gift shop.

David with Shinjuku district in the background

Tokyo

Hazy view, but that's Yokohama in the background!

Inside the Dragon Quest exhibit. We were only allowed to take pictures at these monster displays

Look out!

Speak softly and carry a big stick.

On top of  that, the art museum in the tower was doing an exhibition on city planning in Japan.  David was 2 for 2 on this accidental trip!  The museum explained the development of the metabolism concept of Japanese planning.  The concept employs megastructures of concrete to redevelop areas with a sense of permanence.  David wasn't a fan.

After visiting Roppongi, we went to Shibuya to see the famous crossing.  All car traffic is stopped at once and people are allowed to cross in all directions and diagonally at the same time.  The visual effect is very impressive.  It was fun to just cross a few times and feel engulfed in a wave of humanity.  We stopped in at the 2nd floor Starbucks at the intersection (the busiest in the world) to get a better view and to people watch for a bit.

Shibuya Crossing

To keep the video game theme going, we decided to visit the Akihabara district.  This area used to be well known for electronics...things like toasters, televisions, computers, and cameras.  Nowadays it's more known for manga, anime, video games and everything geek in Tokyo.  There are dozens of shops and arcades here that all sell similar wares, almost exclusively in Japanese, so it can be a challenge to find anything interesting.  We did managed to find "Super Potato," which has three floors selling old video games and video game paraphernalia.  David picked up an original copy of Final Fantasy and Final Fantasy IV (both in Japanese) as keepsakes. We also saw an extremely rare copy of Yoshi's Cookie. According to an article on wired.com, only 500 were ever produced, and it was included with the purchase of a cooking appliance. The price was an astonishing 198,000 yen, which at the current exchange rate is over $2600!

One expensive video game!

By now it was well after dark and we were hungry.  We went back to our hostel in Asakusa to drop off some souvenirs and then headed off to dinner at a well regarded Japanese beer bar called Bakushu Club Popeye.  This place was small and crammed, but had a huge selection of mostly Japanese beers on draft.  Paul tried a delicious Japanese barleywine, and a great Japanese weizen, among others. The couple sitting next to us decided to try out their English and struck up a little conversation with us.  We had to use some drawing on the back of a receipt to explain our trip to them!  They were both very nice and wished us well and a quick return to Japan in the future.

Three types of sausage (including house-made hop-infused sausage) with IPA