Wandering Jim: Tokyo Skytree

I'm gonna start this off by saying it is 4:30am, I still haven't gotten my sleep pattern fixed. I did manage to stay awake until 8pm last night, went to sleep and woke back up at 2 am. Did the same thing yesterday but managed to go back to sleep at 4am, today I am going to stay up then take a nap this afternoon and see if that works to trick myself into a decent sleep cycle. My goal is to go to bed about 11pm tonight. Nice thing is this gives me some time when there is nothing to do to work on this for you guys.

Well as I said in the video, went to Tokyo Skytree yesterday, the Skytree is the second tallest structure in the world at 2080 feet. The complex around the base houses shops restaurants and other entertainment venues. However that is all secondary (and probably how they are paying for the thing), in reality, it's a big broadcast tower that Tokyo had to build because the old one, Tokyo Tower, was becoming blocked by newer taller buildings. Basically it's a giant TV atenna.

Good thing I predetermined I was not going to bother with going to the top because when I got there my oldest fear kicked right in, there is one thing I fear above all other things and upon reaching the base of the tower I realized this fear had not gone away. I stood there staring and couldn't believe, my worst fear had come back to haunt me. It wasn't heights, I'm ok with that, this was much worse, JAPANESE TOUR GROUPS! Suddenly I felt like I was wearing Lederhosen and all I could smell was chicken, I ran screaming from the platform and went in search of a beer, the only known cure for this.

Of course it got worse, I headed to the World Museum of Beer on the 7th floor. I really haven't been anyplace to have a good beer since I got there so I was looking forward to a decent brew. Then I spotted this at the entrance.

Looks kinda familiar

Yup someone had taken the old Bavarian Inn motif and stuck it smack daub in the middle of Tokyo, the girls wore similar dresses and everything. The good news is there was no fried chicken, but the sausages and lederhosen were in abundance and they had hokey Bavarian videos on the big screen, luckily they were pumping 80's pop music in the background so I could avert my eyes and it was fine. I had a very nice IPA from Pikes brewing out of Seattle Washington, however that one beer cost me the equivalent of $14.00 U.S. When I saw the prices I almost didn't order, but I had waited in line for 30 minutes for this beer, so I said "what the heck, I'm on frickin vacation anyway." This takes us to the next part of my visit to Skytree.

EVERYTHING WAS OUTLANDISHLY EXPENSIVE, except for lunch, that was ok. I walked around the 7 stories of retail and shops in the giant mall and saw lots of neat stuff, but was amazed at some of the pricing. Up to now things haven't been too bad, but I hadn't really gone shopping for consumer goods. Found a chopstick store, just what I wanted since I wanted some new ones and promised Emily I would find here a nice set. I found a set of 2 piece ones for myself I liked, dug out my notebook and managed to mangle "ikura desu ka?" (how much is this?) the young man flipped them over and pointed what I thought was a serial number on the back, 3150 yen, which comes to. . . $30.72 for two pieces of wood, didn't even have a case with them. After that I looked at some stuff for Phoebe but pretty much decided that I was now looking not shopping. I'm going to try to hunt down an old style Japanese "shopping street" later in the week and see if I can do better. Also going to look at the grocery store when I go today.

I mentioned lunch was reasonably priced, also I mentioned tour groups, well these two things made for my first really Japanese meal. I've been so preoccupied with getting around and the language barrier that I haven't really been eating like I planned, been snacking a lot, ate at McDonalds and in my room from the 7-11. But I was hungry and there were dozens of Japanese food shops so I decided to grab some Udon, which is thick chewy noodles (I wanted ramen but the line was too long). Got in line, the place had a picture menu so I could point and grunt. Got my udon and grabbed some tempura shrimp and a piece of fish that looked interesting. Now how unbelievably crowded this place was came into play, I was basically in a food court and I walked around for 15 minutes and could not find an open seat, finally propped my tray on a ledge and ate standing up. Tempura was excellent and the udon was fine, I've had better and worse before. But I had to eat standing up with people jostling me the whole time. I ended up not finishing my noodles only because I was full. Cost wise it ran me about $6.50.

Here's a couple more pics from yesterday.