32 hours rockin' the biggest city in the world

Man this weekend was amazing!  I am so glad that I decided to go at the last minute (I had backed out of the plan and, up until Friday night, was going to let the boys go it alone).  Adam, not being much for drinking or clubs, decided that instead of going up after work on Saturday, he would just meet us there Sunday.  The plan was for him to contact Greg on his phone.  This is until Greg's girlfriend got sick and he decided to stay home.  We ended up making a plan to meet at the West exit of Shinjuku Station at 1215.  A girl that Adam met the other night who lives in Chiba (a friend of David's, the newest teacher at Unitas) was going to be meeting him, and us, there at same time.  I gave Adam Ayami's mobile phone's email address (but for some reason, not her phone number) in case anything changed as I was going to be meeting up with Ayami on Sunday as well.

I met Lance at his house at around 12pm Saturday and we met up with Joel at 1215 at Kofu station.  We arrived in Shinjuku at around 2pm after a 1 1/2 hour limited express train ride.  We paid 5500 yen for a round trip LE train ticket which also included all travel on the JR line trains for the two days we were in Tokyo.  It was a pretty good deal as we used the JR trains a LOT!

I got about 12 minutes of sleep myself before we were on our way again.

As soon as we arrived we headed to Harajuku/Shibuya to get something to eat.  I got some takeout from a chic little vegan restaurant called the Brown Rice Cafe while Lance and Joel got some fast food crap.  We wandered around Shibuya for a long time checking out the 7 story Tower Records shop and a few other cool boutiques before heading back to Shinjuku Station to put our stuff in a locker preparing for our night on the town.  By then it was dark and we headed to the Tokyo Metrolpolitan Goverment Office where we had a view of the city lights from the 45th floor.  Very cool!

After the TMG we headed to Ginza to look at some of the lights close up.  Ginza is a big shopping district that resembles time square with its huge screen ads and commercial buildings.  We mostly wandered and took flashy pictures as our main goal was finding some energy drinks to help us make the most of our time at the clubs.  We found some energy drinks and some large, inexpensive, and very strong alcoholic drinks as well.  (200 yen for a tall can of 7% sho chu and juice).  In Japan it is legal to drink on the streets so this is exactly what we did stopping into another 7/11 whenever we needed a refill.

From Ginza my idea to hop on a random train and see where it takes us was quashed so instead we took the subway to Roppongi, the night club district.  This part of town also has almost as many gaijins as Japanese.  We wandered up and down the street with our redbull and sho chu trying to find a club with as many levels as possibles.  Finally some Italian guys told us to go to a club called Vanilla.  It looked pretty swank and although it was 1000 yen to get in, we got three drinks free.  It was super crowded and there wasn't much of a dance floor.  The music wasn't very good either so after we had used up all of our drink tickets, we rolled out to find a better gig.

We ended up at a night club called Gaspanic which was awesome.  It was not very big at all and pretty packed but the music was good and the dance floor was pumping.  (I know that is such a cheesy term to use but it was!)  We stayed there until around 3:30 or 4 when we went got some snacks and talked about how we were going to get to the capsule hotel.  For some reason it was decided that we would walk even though we weren't sure of the way and it looked sort of far on the map.

At around 6am we realized that somehow we had walked all the way back to Ginza and the capsule hotel was around 45 minutes in the opposite direction.  We decided that it wouldn't be worth it to pay the 4500 yen to stay in the capsule for only a few hours.  We decided to check out the nearby fish market that is supposed to be a very interesting place to go, but only if you are up early enough, and then head to a Manga (style of Japanese comicbooks) cafe where you can pay a few hundred an hour to sleep in a recliner, read, chill, or surf online.

In attempting to direct us to the fish market, I again got us lost and we meandered quite a bit until we finally hit the deserted stalls.  Thinking we were up too early even for the fisherman, we waited for about 30 minutes before some other gaijins came up to us and told us that the market was closed on Sundays.

We decided to head back to Shinjuku, pick up our stuff, and head to a Manga cafe for a few hours of rest.  We finally found the Manga cafe outside the East exit of Shinjuku Station only to learn that we were not allowed to sleep there at that time.  Apparently sleeping is only permitted between 10pm and 7am.  I guess because this is the slow time for an internet cafe.

Our hopes of some rest dashed we decided to head down to the basement of the MacDonalds down the street and just relax for a bit.  It seems we weren't the only ones with that idea.  There were about 20 people who had obviously enjoyed a similar night of drinking and then passed out at this particular MacDonald's basement.

We discussed the option of us getting a love hotel for a few hours and crashing on the floor.  These hotels, usually around 4000 yen for the room (no matter how many people are staying in it), are mostly used to give couples a bit of privacy, away from the house they probably share with their inlaws and relatives, where they can "show their love."  For this reason the rooms are rented hourly and usually have wacky fantasy themes.  We decided that as a group of two boys and a girl we might get some funny looks when asking where we could find one of these and again resolved that sleep was for the weak.

The boys slept with their heads on the dirty Micky Ds tables for about 45 minutes while I got cleaned up a bit in the broken sink in the bathroom that was full of vomit and read the guide book some more (where I discovered that the Tsukiji fish market is closed on Sundays).  I got about 12 minutes of sleep myself before they woke up and we were on our way again.

It had gotten very cold rainy while we were crashed out but we decided that the best way to get some energy was to get up and get moving (and also to have another can of red bull).  So, at around 9am we decided to head to Asakusa and check out the markets and shrine before we had to be back to meet Adam at the west exit of Shinjuku Station at 1210pm.

It was a long ride out there and the guys were really not impressed with Asakusa's charm.  I love Asakusa and think it has a total Japanese flavour.  I had some more kibidango and chuckled again at the big pooh and then we took the long ride back to Shinjuku again.

We just wandered around outside the station exploring some of the shops, etc. for about 20 minutes.  It then took us about 20 minutes to find the JR station again but we were there just at the time we were to meet up with Adam, Megumi, and Ayami.  Megumi arrived at around 1210.  Ayami a little later.  And Adam, not at all.

Since Adam didn't have a cell phone and we had no way to get in contact with him, we all took turns scouting out every other JR station exit and around the outside of the station for the next hour.  We finally had him paged to the West exit and shortly after Ayami received an email on her phone from him saying that he had been at the west exit for over an hour and where were we.  He had borrowed a passing gaijin's phone to send the email and we still had no way of contacting him.  We had to call the guy whose phone he had borrowed and ask for more details about where Adam was when he last saw him.  After another 20-30 minutes of searching, we finally found Adam.  Somehow he had made his way to the West exit of one of the subway lines in a distant corner of the station.  I'm still not sure how he did this because in order to get out of the JR train part of the station he must have gone past us lined up at the gates at some point.

With the crisis averted, Ayami and I broke off from the group and headed to Starbucks where I got a new mug to replace the one Lance had bought the night before, entrusted to me, and never saw again.  The group headed to Akihabara (Electric City--the electronics megamart district).

After Starbucks Ayami and I headed back the Brown Rice Cafe where I tried out another main dish and several more desserts (see review) before heading back to Shinjuku and finally back to Kofu.

I am liking Tokyo more and more now that I am getting more comfortable finding my way around.  I think that I should try to convince some people to go party in Tokyo at least once a month.  We can take the train out after work, party all night, and catch the train back in the  morning or early afternoon.

By the way, I have finally gotten myself a thicker bed (rather than my 2 inch swag--no more bruised hips!!) and a proper comforter.  The bed is pretty cheap but as thick as a double futon (ie a futon with a firm lower mattress and a soft upper mattress, which is how futons are here), firm, and I can fold it into a little couch when I'm not sleeping so it takes up very little space.  It is really comfy as both a bed and a couch and I think that when I finally go to sleep tonight, it will be the best night sleep of my life!!