Gillian was back from Kyoto yesterday, so we met for a meal last night. Shes staying Ueno now, we wandered most of the way around it before stumbling across a traditional Japanese place with an English menu on the next block from her hotel. The food was really good and the staff talkative and helpful…I will be going back there, if I can find it again.
Today, we met in Ueno again (after my dragging her suitcase all across Tokyo, I really must stop doing that for people, it really tires out my arms), and walked along under the railway line to Akihabara.
We just did the quick tour, since I don’t think shes particularly into the electronics, but we covered most of the territory. I bought a Zaurus, an MI-P1A, which looks like a predecessor to the MI-E1, for 1500Yen (~8quid). Its probably not very good, but it’ll be worth a play.
Then we headed to Tokyo tower, where we distrubed by the mascot appearing to be a large pink banana in dungarees (well, we think it was a banana?). Despite this we went in and up to the main observation platform. From there the view across Tokyo is quite impressive, though you are still looking up at some of the buildings. While we were there it turned from daylight through dusk to darkness, with the city lighting up around us. This meant it was worth more than the usual wander around pinpointing the places you’ve been in the last week or two.
Moving down to catch the lift back to solid earth we found a synthpop band setting up for a gig of sorts. Very strange concept, but it seems the done thing to hold concerts at the tops of tall buildings here. We stop for a coffee in the hope they’ll be playing but they seemed to be forever setting up.
Back to the ground, or at least the building under the tower, where we take a look at the bizarre art museum but don’t find the holographics exhibit until its too late.
We’ve got an hour or two to kill before its time to eat again so we head off looking for some of the interesting buildings that we spotted from the tower. The first is a Budist meeting house of some kind, though its closed so noone is meeting there at the time. Further along we pass a Russian restaurant, but we’re not hungry yet (so I take a card so I can find the place another time), find outselves in infrastructure territory again, where freeways meet with a subway station underneath.
Following one of the freeways back to Roppongi we head down one of the backroads to find some food, we find a place that does a whole load of different things loosely based around a mexican theme but a bit more Japanese than most texmex places.
Looping around further we hit the back entrance to Roppongi Hills – the fountain appeared less volatile today – there were two people standing on it discussing something.
We spot some large inflatable red and white blobs and decide that we should investigate….they’re advertising a display at the art museum at the top of the Roppongi Hills tower, so we head up yet another tall building. 52 floors this time. The tour takes you most of the way around the observation deck at the top of the building, then into the art museum. Which is full of modern art, with the usual mixture of rubbish and inspired installations. The one I liked best was a ‘swap of bees’, a darkened, mirrored room with a whole bunch of coloured lights dangling from wires on the ceiling. As you walked around you would hit the wires and the ‘bees’ would move, everyone seemed to be really cautious about moving around in there – we saw a couple walk into one of the mirrored walls too, which was quite funny – surely the whole point is to be moving around making the lights move too.
There were a few other installations with video and sound feedback mechanisms where you’d stand in the middle of the room and a projector would show a distorted image of you on the wall, etc. I love art like this, not that I understand it really but that doesn’t seem to matter, I know what I like.
And now I’m home. Tomorrow we meet Kiko-chan to go to Odaiba.
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