This will be our last full day in Tokyo and we are both saddened by this. We are not ready to go home! We feel very comfortable making our way around Tokyo and know there are many things we didn't have time to see.
We head to the Harajuku area. Here there is a little street called Takeshita where the youth like to shop. Tiny shops with pop culture items, fashion accessories and clothes. I'm surprised at the number of places selling cosmetic contact lenses -- colored ones as well as ones with little pictures like Hello Kitty! We stumble onto another Forever 21 and she finds more clothes to buy. I think she's found her new favorite store. We don't have one close to us at home, it's about 10 miles away and not an area we normally shop, but I guess that will need to change.
Next we head into Yoyogi park. This park has just reopened after being closed due to mosquitoes carrying dengue fever. Like Central Park in New York, it is a very large park that is normally full of activity and events. It's very woodsy and feels very remote.
It's late afternoon and things are winding down as we head to the Meiji Shrine. This shrine was built to honor the first Emperor of modern Japan. It was build in 1920, destroyed in WWII and rebuilt. We see many little kids in traditional clothes. They look amazing and some of them are posing while tourists take photos. There are papers and pens out to write your wish or prayer or what you are thankful for, so we take time to do this and put it in the wooden box. This shrine has huge displays around it of flower arrangements and other goods which I suspect are offerings.
The tween wants to shop more so we head back to Takeshita street. It is still very busy. We buy candy in the Daiso dollar store and accessories in the $3 Paris Kids accessory store. I enjoy the people watching. We stop for a snack and have a "bubble tea" which is basically large chocolate tapioca balls in the bottom of a milk tea drink. They are really good. We also have a crepe filled with whipped cream and bananas. Both of these items seem to be quite popular. It's a great night and other than our one rainy day we have experienced very mild weather in Tokyo. Most of the time we are in short sleeves and barely need a hoodie when the sun goes down. The days are grey -- they seem to start out sunny with blue skies as we wake and look out of our hotel room window, but as the morning wears on the haze or the clouds roll in and there is little sun -- I often don't even need my sunglasses and I wear them all the time at home.
We head to Shinjuku to walk around a bit and see the lights. We pass through Shinjuku station, which is the busiest transportation hub in the world! More than 3 million people per day pass through here. The array of signs on the ceiling is just dizzying and the amount of people walking quickly through there on a Sunday evening is amazing. This is the station we will depart from to go to the airport. I decide to buy our train ticket in advance and I also asked for advice on Tripadvisor and was given instructions written in Japanese to show to our taxi driver tomorrow. There is no way I want to be wandering in this maze of underground tunnels at this huge, complex station dragging luggage behind us.
I think Shinjuku is what people think of when they think of Tokyo -- the hustle and bustle of people and all the lights. There are restaurants and karaoke places and shops all over. We soak it all in, enjoying our last night in Tokyo.
Next we head to the Tokyo Metropolitan Government building so that we can see the night views of the city. Admission is free and it gives us a nice view of the sprawling metropolis that is Tokyo. We can even see the Ferris Wheel we rode on Odiaba.
We decide that our last dinner should be at 7-11. Japan has less than half the population of the US, but nearly twice as many 7-11 stores. And 7-11 food is good! It's considered to be deli quality and the Japanese often grab lunch or dinner here. I had read that people don't walk around eating, and we found that to be true 98% of the time, but the few times we did see people walking around eating, they were always eating these little triangle things we saw at 7-11, so we figured we needed to try them. We bought 2, one that was very similar to the Trader Joe's Japanese fried rice -- we both liked that one. The other one was just rice wrapped in seaweed with a bit of fish inside. I thought it was good.
Time to pack up and think about heading home. Thankfully I had brought a collapsible duffel bag that we'll put our clothes in and save one rolling suitcase to put all of our purchases in and carry on the plane. This plan has worked out really well. We tried to keep our souvenir shopping under control, buying small and easily packed items.
During our travels we have found over 11 flavors of Kit Kats! The Japanese like Kit Kats because it sounds like Kitto Katsu - which is similar to 'good luck' and translates to "you'll surely win". Parents often give Kit Kats to their students before exams. It was kind of like a scavenger hunt for us, seeing which flavors we could find. The bags of candy were about $3 -- it was the special boxes that were expensive, about $9 for a box. The flavors we found were: Rum Raisin, Cheesecake, Citrus, Almond, Strawberry, Green Tea, Tea, Purple Sweet Potato, Pumpkin, another Green Tea, and Red Bean. I can honestly say I'm not a fan of some of these exotic flavors. No surprise there. Tea and Red Bean were pretty good. But really, just give me chocolate Kit Kats.
