onegai shimas

Since I gave you a Hong Kong soundtrack, here's my Tokyo soundtrack, since you'll need something to get you through this long mother post.

(I love Japanese bikes so much)

My friend Lissa, who studied abroad in Japan for a while, wrote this in an email to me right before we went on our trip: "The only way I can describe Japan is like this: Think of the opposite of what you're culturally used to, then push and pinch and mold that notion into something completely unrecognizable. And then it's not even anything like that." And, well, that's how I'd describe it to anyone who asked. It was definitely clean and modern and amazing, but completely foreign. Hong Kong and Bangkok had spoiled us by having a population of pretty good English speakers that we could communicate with, but in Tokyo we got blank stares 99% of the time we asked a question. This was only really a problem on our first night (the rest of the time it was just funny), when I was starving and we wanted to get dinner, and we went to an udon shop and we just pointed at things we thought we wanted, even though we weren't sure what they were. Robbie ended up turning this into a game when we'd get pastries for breakfast from the bakery by our metro stop, and he'd pick one item he was sure about, and one "mystery" item. (One time it turned out to be a whole sweet potato, disguised as a roll of some sort.) Oh, and don't even get me started on the maze that is the Tokyo metro system. In hindsight, those experiences were actually really funny (I look at pictures I took of the baffling metro map and just laugh), but at the time I was super stressed out and just wanted to sit in a corner and cry. I have a TON of sympathy now for people who come to the US and have no idea what is going on because they don't speak English. Bless those people.

Anyway, we had a very short stay in Tokyo, which was too bad (again, more reasons to make a return trip!), but we got a lot done considering our only full day there (Valentine's Day) was freezing and rainy. On the night we arrived, we really only had time to hang out in Shibuya, where we encountered the world's busiest intersection (I think? All intersections in Tokyo seemed to be the world's busiest to me) and my dream store Tokyu Hands. I'd go back to Tokyo just to shop there for a day. We also darted in and out of various stores when we were too cold to keep walking and just enjoyed listening to the shopgirls stand in doorways and drone on in unhumanly high-pitched voices. So entertaining. I don't even know what they were saying, though I did catch the one Japanese word I know ("onegai shimas") in there somewhere. If you've hung out in Tokyo before then you probably know what I mean?

Moving on.

On the rainy and freezing day, we went to the Imperial Palace to check out the gardens, which was like the number one recommended place from the people we talked to. Unfortunately, you can probably imagine what a beautiful garden in February looks like. (It was beautiful in its own way.) Then the rain started coming down harder, so we took off on the metro to Ginza, which is a part of town close to the waterfront, where we sought out sushi. This was actually one of my favorite parts. We got there a little later than we planned and we were worried that all the shops would be closed, but there was this guy in a chef's hat standing outside the lone open shop that we saw, motioning excitedly for us to come in. Again, none of us had any idea what the other was saying. I was a little nervous because this place had a conveyor belt with sushi on it, but the chef was making everything fresh and handing it to us after we pointed at what we wanted on the conveyor belt. I really don't love fish normally (hence that giant, disgusting California roll above), but I actually had to fight Robbie for pieces of his sashimi. It was. So. Good. (Of course it was—it was probably alive about five minutes beforehand.) You are probably wondering why someone who doesn't like fish goes out for sushi, but you know what? I'll try anything once. Also, I really enjoyed how the chef kept saying "Salmon! Flame!" and laughing heartily while passing another plate of sushi to me. I had to eat it.

Moving on, again.

In Ginza we continued to walk around the shops and hung out in the Sony showroom (for Robbie) and at Sanrio World (for me). It's the little things, you know? We then left Ginza for promises of tempura and Muji (we may or may not have visited four different Muji stores in Tokyo? And one in Hong Kong?) in Shinjuku, metroed to Harajuku for crepes (it's a thing, I promise), and walked towards Shibuya while window-shopping at Issey Miyake and Comme des Garçons.

The next day, we had the morning to visit Senso-ji temple before we had to hop on a train to the airport.

Bye bye, Asia. See you next time.

hong kong garden

Can you guess which song was in my head during our entire stay in Hong Kong?

Our second day in Hong Kong was pretty great too. The weather was a lot nicer with sunshine and 65 degrees (though the locals were still bundled up in scarves and North Face jackets?), so we took advantage and spent our time outdoors. There is a pretty sweet bird garden where old people (mostly men) bring their birds and hang out. Kind of like a car show, but with tiny songbirds instead. It was very cute to see everyone nerding out over their cages and bird accessories.

Next to the bird garden is a beautiful flower market—block after block of (cheap!) fresh flowers. I wish I could have brought all of them home with me.

Nearby is the goldfish market. What a WEIRD place. Just store after store of exotic fish and turtles and whatnot for literally pennies sometimes. Robbie couldn't handle it for too long because the overwhelming fishy pet store smell was just too much. But the colors were pretty.

We took the MTR back to our neighborhood to eat some more dim sum (what, you don't have dim sum for all three meals?) and catch the light show at Victoria Harbour. Pretty to look at, even though I didn't understand any of the Cantonese narration.

Seriously, we missed SO much stuff in Hong Kong (like Macau, the Giant Buddha on Lantau Island, HK Disneyland [just kidding] [kind of?], etc.), but that way we have a reason to return!

"i think we may have stumbled upon chinatown!"

Let me tell you—I was shocked, SHOCKED, that I liked Hong Kong as much as I did. Everyone said I'd like it, and they were right. I can't say that I've ever been really into Chinese culture (that sounds bad no matter how I word it), but Hong Kong! It's like China but with all the comforts of the western world. I kept my expectations incredibly low, and I was very pleasantly surprised. It's colorful, interesting, and CLEAN. To wit:

(This is the Occupy Hong Kong encampment. I know Occupy DC outlasted most (or all?) Occupy movements in the US but this one takes the cake.)

Our first day was spent exploring Hong Kong island. We stayed in a hotel on the Kowloon side of the city (across the harbor from HKI) so it was nice to get away from the excitement of the shopping in the TST (short for Tsim Sha Tsui, the swanky shopping district where our hotel was). Our trip started on the Star Ferry, which has been around for like a hundred years? A scenic (and cheap) way to enjoy the views on the way over. We took a bus up to The Peak, where we enjoyed a foggy view of the cityscape. There is a tram that goes up and down as well, but we didn't realize that our bus wasn't going to take us to the tram—it took us straight to the top. But it ended up being a good thing because it was 1) cheaper, 2) not as crowded, and 3) we got to see amazing views of the cities on the other side of The Peak. Fun fact: the world's most expensive house is nestled somewhere over on that side. So.

After The Peak, we wandered around Hollywood Road, which is supposed to be a great place to find antiques. We found that it was instead a great place to find Communist-era knick knacks and really cool vintage clothes (way out of our price range). Still, I totally recommend walking along the road, and being careful not to miss the side streets with all the small shops—there were some fun affordable shops and just really great things to look at, like the I Can Haz Cheezburger? cat in real life. It's also very hilly, so you might opt to take the outdoor escalator (yes) to get around if your feet get tired.

The end of the road brought us to a Man Mo Temple (apparently there is more than one), where we were still confused about what exactly was going on, but got a great whiff of incense and crowds of people. Actually, the incense was super cool—it is made in coils that burn for about a week after they are lit (you can see in the picture that some coils are huge while others are about to burn out). We finished our day on the island walking around Statue Square, where you can get a good view of the famous buildings in the area—like the Bank of China building, designed by I.M. Pei. Since all the banks are in that area, we weren't exactly surprised to find the Occupy encampment down there.

Other notable activities—lots of dim sum, shopping (needed to replace tennis shoes that were lost by baggage handlers [??]), and strolling around the Temple Street night market in Kowloon, where I was asked at least 500 times if I wanted a Rolex (and where Robbie made the Chinatown comment).

More HK soon!