Here are more pictures of my Tokyo experience from Friday and Saturday.
Mitsukoshi is a popular department store headquartered in Tokyo. At 10 am there was a long line of shoppers waiting for it to open .. and then they were warmly welcomed by the assistants are the door opened. I love the characters in the window. ‘Life is a gift’ says the slogan that goes with the pictures.This display is in the WAKO Main Building, that houses a Seiko watch store among others. I ogled a US$2,000 Seiko Astron, a titanium watch with two dials : one for one’s home time zone, and another that syncs with GPS to the time zone that one has traveled to. Perfect for me, right? I resisted since I already have um, 4 Seiko watches.Wow .. nice roof on this square koban (police box) building. Private ownership of guns is not allowed in Japan (imagine that!). The police do have guns, but don’t wear them, as a rule.This is in Yodobashi Akiba, surely the world’s largest and fanciest electronics and appliances store. The shop assistant is getting two half scale Star Wars characters – Darth Vader and a Stormtrooper – ready for display. Each goes for about US$170.Godzilla lives large in the Japanese monster imagination and the store offers many more varieties of creatures that are similar. Or maybe this is a modern-day Godzilla.Don’t rush ! The gate is closing and the train begs the passenger to stop and wait for the next train. This is late at night, so not a lot of people around, but early Friday night I was in the fullest train EVER, one of those where we were pushed in like sardines. You cannot move your arms. Luckily my destination was just two stops away. ‘Excuse me, excuse me’, I said politely, and people spilled out of the train to let me out.Tokyo Station’s 5½-year renovation was completed in 2012, in time for its 100 year anniversary in 2014. The station suffered heavy damage in World War II. This is the restored ceiling of one of the two domes in the station.And here is the old main entrance. There is a much bigger modern entrance with an enormous white canopy and large JR Tokyo Station lettering on the opposite side of the building.This is a new elevated and automated metro line (three years old), so the train has no driver. I am on the way to Odaiba (お台場), a large artificial island in Tokyo Bay. The bridge is the Rainbow Bridge.And look! The Statue of Liberty* with the Rainbow Bridge now in the background. *A replica, of course.
2 Replies to “Saturday/ shopping & sightseeing in Tokyo”
Have a great trip, Willem! And a Merry Christmas & a Happy New Year! May there be many more to come. Best wishes, Dale
hi Dale !
Thanks for the Christmas and New Year’s wishes! I hope all of you in Washington State have a Merry Christmas and a great start to the New Year as well. warm regards, Willem
Have a great trip, Willem! And a Merry Christmas & a Happy New Year! May there be many more to come. Best wishes, Dale
hi Dale !
Thanks for the Christmas and New Year’s wishes! I hope all of you in Washington State have a Merry Christmas and a great start to the New Year as well. warm regards, Willem