As I type this I am breezing by central Japan at a comfy 171mph in seat 14E of the Nozomi Superexpress 155 bound for Shin-Osaka. (Well ok I finished the rest of it like two weeks later sitting on my bed…)

After work on Friday, June 20th, in the pouring rain, I hailed a cab and had it take me to Shin-Osaka station, the only place in Osaka that you can catch the Shinkansen. The Nozomi superexpress #38 was leaving at 5:37pm, giving me just enough time to pick up a bento box dinner and a drink. While I’ve gotten a bit sick of eating the traditional bentos every day for lunch at work, being able to eat one while sitting on the Shinkansen going 200mph and watching the city/countryside fly by you just makes it seem less dull. Because it was 5pm on a Friday night I had purchased a reserved seat ticket because 1) I wanted a window seat and 2) I didn’t want to have to fight with people to even get a seat at all in the unreserved car. (Typically, of the 11-15 cars per train, three are unreserved and the rest are reserved cars. Unreserved seats are a few dollars cheaper, but when it is rush hour on a Friday night, sometimes people are forced to stand up in the aisles of the train, and that really doesn’t seem like its very enjoyable.)

For the next two and a half hours or so, I had a lot of fun just sitting in my seat looking out the window at the scenery. Sadly it was pretty much pouring between Osaka and Nagoya, and then towards Tokyo it was rather gray and overcast. I also was not able to see Mt. Fuji this time, which on a clear day can be seen if you are sitting on the left side of the train. My bento was quite decent but I wish I had brought some kind of dessert with me; perhaps I’ll remember next time. I think this was my first time on the superexpress, and I was amazed at how fast it went between each station. From Shin-Osaka station to Kyoto, only 15 minutes. Kyoto to Nagoya was only 30, a trip that normally takes four times that even on a normal rapid train. Nagoya to Shin-Yokohama was the most impressive however. There were no stops made in between, and it took us about 1.5 hours to make the trip. Taking the local trains would have taken more than 5 hours to go the same distance-I know because I’ve done it like that twice. The Shinkansen are so fast, smooth, on time, it really makes me sad that I can’t ride trains like this (or any trains really) in the US.

Two and a half hours later I was walking through Tokyo station on the way to the Yamanote line for Shinjuku, where I’d be meeting my friend Brian. He didn’t have a cell phone so coordinating our meeting place was a little difficult, but in the end I wandered around long enough until I found a bank of payphones with Brian in mid-dial. After meeting up we walked a ways into Shinjuku and found a cafe for a quick snack and conversation before jumping back onto a train and heading outside of the city to where Brian was living and working. It took about 40 minutes on the train, and another 20 walking to arrive at his apartment. He also lives in a 1K, but his furniture is a lot nicer, he actually has carpet (!), and his main room is larger than mine. His bathroom is pretty tiny in comparison though: shower, tub, toilet and sink are all crammed into a space the size of my tub/shower room. Then again I think its a huge waste to have an entire room just for a toilet like my apartment. We drank some “Hawaii Blue” Pepsi and chatted before going to sleep.

The next morning we were able to drag ourselves out of bed, get showered and dressed, and back to Shinkjuku station by 1pm to meet one of my professors for lunch. She was in Tokyo for the month working on her book and in general just enjoying some vacation time. She took us to a soba restaurant that she knew was good, and I had cold soba for the first time ever. It was actually very good, especially accompanied by tempura-ed (is tempura also a verb?) summer vegetables. I can’t wait to try and make some myself either here or when I get back to the US.

When lunch was over Brian and I hustled our bustles over to Akihabara where we (I, mostly) had planned to meet some people to wander around and shop, and later to go to an all-you-can-eat Israeli restaurant where we would then be meeting even more people. I didn’t actually know any of them beforehand, but they were either members of, or friends of the members, an online forum that has something like 110,000 members right now. Of the people affiliated with the site that live in Japan, most of them live in Tokyo, and as such tend to get together at least once a month in a big group to usually go to an all-you-can-eat place and later go to clubs or to karaoke or wherever else and just have fun. From here on in this post I will refer to them as goons, as that is what they (we?) affectionately go by.

So Brian and I went to meet up with the goons in Akihabara. One of the first things we saw after leaving Akihabara station was this:

After the June 8 stabbings right in the center of Akihabara, a large makeshift memorial was constructed on the street corner near where it happened. This one is not the original, as that one had become too large and was starting to block the sidewalk. Many people left bottles of tea or flowers as offerings, and someone even went so far as leaving a gift melon. While Akihabara has pretty much returned to normal, I could still feel a tense atmosphere hanging in the area.

Moving on, we spent the next several hours hitting up some arcades, going to various and sundry shops for computers or anime goods, and eventually parted ways from the goons who were going to a friend’s apartment to take a break before heading to dinner. Brian and I continued to wander the area for another hour or so until it started to rain. By this point it was 5pm-ish and we returned to Akihabara station to meet up with the goons from before, as well as a bunch more people. We hopped on the Yamanote line and transfered at Ikebukuro and then went a few more stops. A few hundred feet down an alley near the station led us to the restaurant. Many pitchers of beer and servings of hummus and pita bread were consumed by all. Here is a picture of everyone post-meal:

By the time we were done eating, it had started to rain even harder. Several of us decided to go to Shibuya for all-you-can-drink karaoke. I think it was probably the most expensive karaoke place that I’ve ever been to. In the end it came out to 3000yen per person for an hour and a half! When we left, it was already past 1am, which meant that Brian and I were now stuck in Tokyo until morning. Trains everywhere in Japan stop running at an unbelievably early time, even in central Tokyo. The last train from Shinjuku to get to Brian’s apartment leaves before midnight, so to even get to that we would have had to leave eating and karaoke no later than 11pm. So the choice is, stop everything and leave at 11pm, or stay up all night and go home at 6am when the trains start running again? Well, you can see what we decided to do….

The only problem then becomes, what the heck do you do in downtown Tokyo at 2-5am when everything is closed? Well, first we went to a game center, but that closed about 20 minutes after we got there. Naturally it was completely pouring by this point, so we walked to a nearby hotel that had a club in the basement. Not really being partial to clubs, or $30 cover charges, myself, Brian, and another guy (named Jay) at in the hotel lobby for a few hours and just chatted. By 4:30am, Brian was already out, and I was surprised to still be awake. The rain had stopped and the three of us decided to walk towards the train station and find some breakfast somewhere. The only thing that seemed open was a McDonald’s, and the disappointing thing was that they weren’t even serving breakfast yet! McNuggets at 5am. Jay decided to live life on the edge and bought the Japanese-only “Mega Tamago”, tamago meaning egg. It was a Big Mac with three burger patties and an egg on it. It looked disgusting and reportedly tasted as such. Brian seems to be morally opposed to McDonald’s and only had an iced coffee.

The trains had started to run again by the time we were finished eating. Jay parted ways with us, and Brian and I spent the 1 hour ride back half asleep. It was still pouring in Hon Atsugi when we arrived, so we wisely decided to take a taxi back to his apartment, where we promptly went to sleep.

To get to the Ghibli Museum by 4pm (for which I had two tickets), we got up and dressed and out of Hon Atsugi by 3pm. It was STILL pouring by that time, and since I had a suitcase in tow, we called a cab to bring us back to the station. A quick stop a Mister Donut for some breakfast/lunch, and we were back on the train. This was my third trip to the Ghibli Museum, Brian’s first, and nothing had really changed there. The short film they were showing was the same one I saw when I went with Nick in December of 2005. The gift shop was really disappointing this time though. Perhaps not so for my wallet, however.

Nothing too exciting happened following our museum visit. I was reunited with my suitcase (which had been stored in a locker), had a quick meal at the Tokyo Soup Company (which was still there three years after I first ate there), and boarded a train for Tokyo station where I then boarded the Shinkansen and started writing this post!

And now some pictures:

View of Akihabara

A view of the busiest pedestrian crossing in the world, just outside Shibuya station, at 8pm and 1am:

More Shibuya:

Lovely stained glass window inside the Ghibli museum. Every window in the museum is like this, with gorgeous designs inspired from their films. You aren’t allowed to take pictures but I couldn’t resist:

Bonus picture of Brian and I from my EEE PC webcam: