Tokyo Central Station

Shinjuku is the center of all my activities.

Hello again.

Today is another journal of the things I experienced in Tokyo. Slowly I get used to it so I can breath the fresh air deeply and not as quick as possible.

It all begins with waking up. At 6:30. And at 7:15 going downstairs to catch some free brekkies. You can eat breakfast until 9:00 but if the hotel café runs out of bread then there will be no more brekkies. So, get down early if you need a bite!

My guidebook says that a lot of facilities open around 9:00 to 10:00 so I had more than enough time to plan my days after eating. First things first I need a good city map. The ones you get with a guidebook aren’t that good most of the time. And it is much smaller than my 500 pages book.

The main Tourist Information Center is in Shinjuku but I wanted do save Shinjuku for a later day on my journey. So I decided for the area around the Central Station of Tokyo. There is a TIC as well.

My guidebook has lots of information, but the maps are not organized. I knew I had to go south. That I got lost and walked several hundreds of meters too much I will keep quit at that point of story. Since I saw a bit more of Tokyo that way.

It was a lot easier to find my directions afterwards.

Tokyo International Forum. There was a small TIC where I got my citymaps. In german too.

The main attraction in the Marunouchi districtis without a doubt the imperial palace and the East-Garden opened for the public. Not on mondays and fridays. orz

This means I have to come back on another day because the imperial garden ist a must see on my list.

Putting that aside there where still many possibilitys to take some beautiful pictures. Maybe even japanese people do not know that the garden is closed on monday and friday? Otherwise I can’t explain why so many people where visiting.

A Kusunoki-Masashige statue.

Two pics of the “mini” park.

To enter the imperial palace you have to cross two bridges. This bridges are closed for the public.

It is really fascinating how well traditionel and new harmonize in Japan.

There was a nice fountain too.

At least the cherry blossoms at the entrance to the east side of the imperial garden can be visited everyday.

What you probably won’t notice is, that the left arm of this sign is waving. It was a bit strange to see this kind of sign because until that time I only saw people with lightswords doing this job showing the cards where to drive. They even go onto the street to block them so that a construction vehicle can drive in or out of the contrsuction site without any problems.

After I finished the palace area it was time to hunt some food.

Not far away from the station I found some good stuff and I ordered a big bowl of curry udon for only 1050 Yen. The bowl was that big and filling that I really had to fight to eat all up.

カレ－うどん. This was my first lunch I ever ordered in Japan.

A big advantage in Japan is that you always get water or green tea with each order. For free. Thats the kind of service they do in Japan.

After the waitress explained that there was a bib for me I smiled in my inner and thought I won’t need this. I am not a baby anymore! But after I finished I thanked my luck for helping me out and all the spatter flew off in different directions.

At the end I got a my first japanese point-card. Sadly I probably won’t get another point.

Tokyo is a really clean city. Surprisingly because 12 million people live in this city. Well, this signs probably help a lot. Whole Tokyo is a smmoking prohibited area. Well, there are special places for smoking people too. Just like in the train stations in Germany but in this case for a whole city. I am impressed and think it is a really good idea.

At 15:00 I went for a stroll around town since the NHK Broadcasting Musuem was too far away and closing at 16:30. And I don’t want to use trains all the time but explore the area of the day by foot.

So I decided to search for the Pokemon Center Tokyo in Nihonbashi. That kind of place isn’t mentioned in any guide and I had to search the whole district but I still haven’t found it. Luckily now I have the chance to use google maps.

I need to go back to this area at another day so it wasn’t that much of a tragedy. But my feet aren’t that happy. The kill me right now.

I still don’t know what to do tommorow. I will decide after breakfast.

You can see more pictures over here. I will only choose a small bunch of pictures that I integrate in the text. For the next days I think I will choose less pictures. There where a lot this time.