July 8th, 2008 - Made it! (photos courtesy Marissa Doessinger)

So, here we are in Japan. Wow.

The best thing about Japan is everything. Everything is clean and orderly. The people are all polite and kind. On almost every corner you can find a vending machine with contents varying from beverages to tobacco. Even convenience store food is delicious here, and you we can eat a good, nutritious meal completely consisting of food from the nearby Seven Eleven.

In our area there are also all sorts of different restaurants. My favorite place so far is Himalaya Curry, a restaurant specializing in, you guessed it, Himalayan style curry. The food there is way too delicious to be put into words. There are so many choices for food and so little time.

So far, the city of Tokyo varies from that of an American city so little that you don’t really notice much of a difference. The Japanese street signs are the only constant reminder that we really aren’t in America anymore.

WATAKUSHI WA KAWAII NEKO SAMA DESU.

July 12th, 2008 - So Much to Do

Tokyo is huge. I mean, like, really huge, Everywhere you go you’re always surrounded by a crowd of 10-90+ people. If you’re somehow not in a crowd of people, you’re probably not going the right way. The city of Tokyo is marvellously efficient at handling its large number of inhabitants, however. I’ve been here 2 weeks and I’ve never once had to stand in line for anything but the trains and pretty much everything at Disneyland.

A prime example of this is the neighborhood of Shibuya. You can’t see the ground in Shibuya, only more and more people. You step off the train or bus and suddenly, people are everywhere. Hundreds of people. It’s like a crazy dream. In Harajuku, the sea of people consists mainly of gothic lolitas, sweet lolitas, classic lolitas, punk lolitas, decora-kei, Johnny’s-kei, visual-kei, A-boys, B-boys, and the occasional tourist group.

The city itself doesn’t seem all that large. You can get from one section of the main districts to another on the opposite side in one easy thirty minute train ride. The train system in Tokyo makes any public transportation in America look really silly. The trains are magical, as well. There are vending machines in front of each of the stations that give you a magical card (either a “Pasmo” or a “Suica,” depending on which vending machine you pick) and once the card is in your wallet, there’s this magical system in which you simply tap your wallet against the magical pad of win and pass through the beautiful gate of hope and joy onto the train platform. In all seriousness, it’s a really cool system and makes travelling throughout Tokyo super quick and easy. Tokyo is pretty magical like that. Nothing gets old. I could probably stay here for a year and never be bored.

July 15th, 2008 - Japanese Books and Manga!

Suddenly, books! Japanese books are awesome. The manga section in any local bookstore compared to the manga here is like cardboard box compared to a palace. One is obviously roughly a thousand billion times better. The bookstores here are huge, beautiful, and filled with nothing but really cool stories along with the odd awkward comic about a girl who becomes magical, wears sailor suits, and hits bears over the head with sticks. Those are the comics that no one really acknowledges exist.

There is a comic for everyone here. And if you can’t find one, you need to look harder. The one you want is probably just on another floor of the building. But hey! If you buy the wrong one, you’re only short about $4, as opposed to $10-12 in the US. The floors of most large bookstore chains here are arranged with a few floors for text based books, and then they start to delve into the “manga” section. The comics for boys are on a different floor from the comics for men, and then there are separate floors for girly comics too. Even the fan comics in Japan are better. There are stores in Akihabara (aka: the super awesome nerd district) that sell nothing but self-published comics made by fans for fans. These comics, or doujinshis are arranged by series, so browsing through doujinshi for a popular series can be painstakingly difficult. The whole manga style is an inherent part of the Japanese culture and can be seen everywhere from billboard signs to special toilet paper made only for super fans.

July 20th, 2008 - A Visit to an Onsen

Today, a group of us took a trip to a traditional onsen, or Japanese bathhouse.

The onsen was an incredible, unique experience. You enter through the huge, automatic double doors and immediately take your shoes off. You’re given a shoe locker, and from there you proceed to the front desk. At the front desk, you are given a key to your locker. The key has a small barcode on it and hangs on a bracelet. We’ll get to that later. You then proceed to the next desk and choose your yukata, or traditional Japanese summer kimono. After you get your yukata, you head into the dressing room and find your locker. You remove all of your clothing, except your underwear, before you put the yukata on. Don’t worry, though, if your panties are embarassingly ratty, there’s a vending machine in the changing room where you can pick out some pretty, lacy panties.

Stepping into the main room of the onsen is like stepping into a Japanese themed carnival. There are games, food stands, ice cream stands, a few more games, and a couple of fancy restaurants. Now, you might be thinking, “How do you pay for this? You left your wallet in the lockers, right?” Well, inside the onsen you pay for everything by scanning the barcode on the key.

The baths themselves were amazing. You had to step into another changing room and remove your yukata and your undergarments. Then you step into the main room and, wash before getting in one of the many different baths. There is a salt bath, bubble bath, an outdoor bath, a soap (maybe. We weren’t sure about that one) bath, and a cold bath. There was also a sauna at the corner of the bath room.

All in all, it was a really, really awesome excursion. The ice cream was good, too. Yum.