Tokyo1
We weren’t in Tokyo very long : day 1 was like, land at 5:30pm, then hotel, then food at an izakaya - where honestly Morgan almost fell asleep then back to the hotel and in bed at 9ish.
Then on day 2 we were still kind of wonky due to our babyish susceptibility to jet lag. We are truly lightweights, and get cranky and tired and just want to sit around at a sunny little park by the Meguro river and watch middle-schoolers get up to harmless mischief.
Which eventually we actually did, but that was after our excursion to a new JR station: Takanawa Gateway Station designed by Kengo Kuma. What I didn’t know about was the decadent opulence of Takanawa Gateway City. Folks, it’s so over the top. I mean, of course we LOVED it. Because we love the constant juxtapositions in Tokyo. Constant change but still entrenched in tradition. This, but also, that. We got obsessed with trying to find the rooftop garden that Bruce had heard about in the LinkPillar 1 North (love this weird name; I mean, we had no idea it was called that at the time. All we knew was we wanted to get to the garden on the roof, which ended up having an even better name…) We tried navigating elevators and escalators but we could not figure out how to get to the 28th floor. We looked at maps and signs and you know what? Sometimes these things can be too “design-y”! After a half an hour we finally found the correct elevator by walking back in through the front door. Simple.
The odd thing about the Luftbaum is that when you walk in there is this immediate warmth and humidity of a tropical garden and then a really intense decibel blast of modern choral Christmas music. It was actually strangely jarring and became increasingly unpleasant! Did not love! But the view of Tokyo was quite beautiful? We actually were driven out by the music. Maybe they don’t want the people that drip with money that hang out there to stay too long in the beautiful garden? Because then they’re not buying stuff at Diptyque on the 5th floor? Or eating at Wolfgang’s Steakhouse? Anyway, it’s a whole vibe.
Bruce and I had fun riding the robot tour of the plaza, which embarrassed Morgan but he still took a video:
After being driven from the Luftbaum by Christmas music, we eventually headed back to Osaki station and wandered around until our internal clocks told us we needed to rest and so we watched that gang of 12 year olds meet up after school on their Razors and climb trees and eat ice-treats and generally give us hope for humans in this world.
Nagasaki next!
Of course, this newsletter is not coming out real time - but I will try and keep it to a 3 day delay max! Stay tuned…
Arigatou gozaimasu ありがとうございます
An upsetting cultural note: I had never heard of butsukari otoko before this trip. Probably because it had never happened to me before; but then it did happen to me twice in one day in Tokyo. Was I not paying attention? Maybe. Was it deliberate? For sure. A girl can tell. The second time it happened, it was a true and deliberate shoulder check. They don’t look at you, they just continue walking as if nothing happened. In retrospect, and upon a lot of reflection, (this is my 3rd time in Japan and I have never had anything like this happen before) I wonder if there is a correlation between the pervasive current vibe of acting on your disdain, in whatever way: trolling, lashing out in the comments section, parading with your bros down the street in your khakis and polos and this: like, this is how men in Japan are releasing their pent up (at women).
Comments
Nothing yet. Say the first thing.
Sign in to join the conversation.