Night flight to Japan – great! Lou watches Georgia Rule and then starts Fracture. Ieuan listens to music and tries to listen to the New Zealander sitting next door who speaks far too quietly, he’s off to Japan on business (cattle or something). Had our special meals – Indian veggie food for Ieuan & Fruit platter for Lou.
Arrive at 7am – big queues for immigration etc and we wait ages for our bags. Get a coffee in starbucks (it takes a good 5 minutes before they understand that Lou wants a hot water, which doesn’t bode well for the language barrier concerns we have!) We go and swap our Japan rail pass vouchers for an actual pass, which involved more queueing and more waiting, then get the train to our hotel after Tourist Info art very helpful and give us a map of the hotel and local area along with specific directions of which trains to get. We later learn that this level of helpfulness is the norm in Japan.
Waiting for the train, we notice that all the seats swivel round to face the direction of travel – quite a strange sight on the empty train! Once on the train, the ticket checking guard pauses to turn and bow to each carriage as he leaves it – another indication of the Japanese politeness.
Get to the hotel – is nice enough, and wait a couple of hours (using the internet) to check in. Ieuan befriends an Irish chap, who seems to be on a random trip to Japan and tells us about a great place to go, which he can’t remember the name of – great!
Lou gets a surprise when she uses the toilet, to find a heated seat, musical flush, and various other automatic bells and whistles attached to the loo, along with an automatic flush when you first sit on it! We find a similar version in our porta-cabin like toilet in the room (much to Ieuan’s concern), which is entered through a foot high step up and is completely encased in plastic – a bit like a caravan toilet. The bath is about 4 feet deep and 2 feet long. Go to sleep for a few hours.
Take the tube to Shinjuku to explore. Ieuan is told off by the subway guards for not having sufficient funds on his ticket, despite buying the appropriate ticket according to the machine! Buy a map and look in HMV – not much signage etc is in English so is going to be harder work here than most places we have been! We go and look for a thai restaurant called Bann Thai, which is recommended by our guidebook, and takes a good hour and some help from a concierge before we start to understand the Japanese address system and locate it tucked away down a small street and up several floors. Get huge curries which aren’t great, then head home, buying some Panky chocolate on the way for desert!
Arrive at 7am – big queues for immigration etc and we wait ages for our bags. Get a coffee in starbucks (it takes a good 5 minutes before they understand that Lou wants a hot water, which doesn’t bode well for the language barrier concerns we have!) We go and swap our Japan rail pass vouchers for an actual pass, which involved more queueing and more waiting, then get the train to our hotel after Tourist Info art very helpful and give us a map of the hotel and local area along with specific directions of which trains to get. We later learn that this level of helpfulness is the norm in Japan.
Waiting for the train, we notice that all the seats swivel round to face the direction of travel – quite a strange sight on the empty train! Once on the train, the ticket checking guard pauses to turn and bow to each carriage as he leaves it – another indication of the Japanese politeness.
Get to the hotel – is nice enough, and wait a couple of hours (using the internet) to check in. Ieuan befriends an Irish chap, who seems to be on a random trip to Japan and tells us about a great place to go, which he can’t remember the name of – great!
Lou gets a surprise when she uses the toilet, to find a heated seat, musical flush, and various other automatic bells and whistles attached to the loo, along with an automatic flush when you first sit on it! We find a similar version in our porta-cabin like toilet in the room (much to Ieuan’s concern), which is entered through a foot high step up and is completely encased in plastic – a bit like a caravan toilet. The bath is about 4 feet deep and 2 feet long. Go to sleep for a few hours.
Take the tube to Shinjuku to explore. Ieuan is told off by the subway guards for not having sufficient funds on his ticket, despite buying the appropriate ticket according to the machine! Buy a map and look in HMV – not much signage etc is in English so is going to be harder work here than most places we have been! We go and look for a thai restaurant called Bann Thai, which is recommended by our guidebook, and takes a good hour and some help from a concierge before we start to understand the Japanese address system and locate it tucked away down a small street and up several floors. Get huge curries which aren’t great, then head home, buying some Panky chocolate on the way for desert!
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