the tall blond guy goes to japanthe tall blond guy goes to japan
I did not expect this.
As the shinkansen was pulling into Tokyo station, I actually felt as if I were returning home after a long journey. I greeted buildings and landmarks like old friends: the KDD building! Saito Coffee! That ugly building with the hat near my work! I'd spent a month there, and it feelt like I was coming home when I returned after a week. The familliarity of the sights was a comfort after being in completely new places almost every single day for a week. I know this city! I've been here before! There are certain parts of this city that I know very well. I can show new people around this city! I've written thousands of bytes about this city! This is as close to "home" as I've seen in many days and that feeling of homecoming was quite a suprise.
I zipped through Tokyo station like an old expert (after all- I'd been there three or four times before...). I even stopped to help a couple of lost-looking French tourists (in French, no less!). I checked my bags in a locker and bought a ticket to Akihabara. Time to spend some money!
Okay, now that I'm well on my way home, and this entry will probably be sent from Vancouver, I can tell you all that I've been carrying about a million yen around in my pocket this whole time. Since cheques don't exist here, I was paid off by the Yomiuri in CASH. I spent 30 minutes talking to a nice woman at Citibank who patiently explained to me that there's really very little they could do for me. So, taking my fortune into my own hands, I did the traveller's equivilant of stuffing it under my mattress. It's been in my pocket the whole time.
I have to remind you, gentle reader, that a million yen is not as much as it sounds. It's around $10,000 or so. Still lots of money to be carting around Japan, but not as much as, say, a million dollars (but then again, more than a million pesos... but I digress).
The temptation to go and blow the whole wad has alwyas been there- I've never been in possession of so muhc liquid currency at once before. It all came to a head today.
Okay, this is not an impulse buy. I've had a number of weeks to think about what to buy. Also, I owe some fancy electronics to my friend Mike, with whom I'm in the middle of a trade of sorts.
So I bought two things in Akihabara: a little Sony IC voice recorder. This is a little tiny dodad that fits in the palm of your hand and records things. That's all. But it's tiny. Very tiny.
The other thing I got (and it's way cool) is a "video-ball". It's about the size of a basketball, and it's got a lens on one side and some buttons on a base of sorts. You can attach a screen to it, and watch moving images on the little 7" screen (itself very sugoi), or detach the screen, and the video ball projects onto a screen. Mmmmm nice!
After Akihabara, I had lunch at the traditional hangout of some of the Yomiuri workers. To get there, the logical way would be to take the train to Tokyo Station and walk a bit. Instead, I got off one stop early at Kanda Station. I made it a point to walk the same old route that I did every day to get to work from the hotel. Looked at all the familliar things for the last time, noted some of the changes that happened in the past week (a whole new building appeared!), and had some coffee in a place I'd always been meaning to try, but never got around to. It all felt so familliar and automatic.
I had some more time to kill, so on impulse, I stopped at get my shoes shined. The old man worked for about 20 minutes to get all the grime I'd picked up in Japan shined right off my shoes. Symbolic, in a way. I'm leaving with a clean slate (and wow! These shoes have never been this shiney! I'm afraid to use them for anything now!).