Japan trip report, with pics

[BretWeir]

Harajuku and Yoyogi Park

Back with a few more pics. One of the most fun (and strangest) days we had in Tokyo was when we visited Harajuku, the city's teenage fashion mecca and the center of the "cosplay" (costume play) subculture.

This is the entrance to Takeshita Dori, a pedestrian street lined with teenage clothes shops.



Some of the shop names were pretty hilarious, like these:





One of the more jarring things was how pretty blatantly sexual stuff was juxtaposed with super-cutesy "Hello Kitty"-type stuff. For example, these two places were about half a block apart, and seemed to draw a lot of the same clientele.





Harajuku borders Yoyogi Park, one of the bigger parks in Tokyo and home of the Meiji Shrine. Here's a "curb your dog" sign we found in the park with an interesting English translation:



Yoyogi is the place where, every Sunday afternoon, the cosplay kids -- teenagers who dress up like maids, schoolgirls, manga characters, etc. -- gather to show off their costumes. There were a couple dozen kids in the main gathering area, and they were more than happy to pose for pictures.







This was one of the freakier costumes; the guy in back was holding the bandaged guy's wrists and moving him around like a marionette.



And here's Mrs. Weir posing with some cosplay chicks.



Yoyogi is also where the rockabilly guys hang out on the weekends. These are a bunch of guys from their 20s to their 50s who basically dress up like 50s rockers, complete with leather jackets and huge pompadour hairdos, and dance to JPop-ified versions of oldies. In a stroke of incredible luck, the day we visited was "National Japan Rockabilly Day" (so said the posters up around the park) and they were out in force.







There were maybe 40 guys, some girls in poodle skirts



and one awesome candy apple red 1951 Cadillac, property of the Tokyo Rockabilly Club.



We then headed down the main drag of Yoyogi Park, which is where unsigned bands and other novelty acts perform and hope to be discovered.

These guys were my favorite. They had a real Flight of the Conchords vibe, complete with homemade promo poster. Only they were singing in Japanese, not New Zealandish.





There was also a breakdancing troupe called "Rhythm Sneakers":



and a guy doing tai chi-type moves with a samurai sword:



And when we headed back to the hotel that evening, we were greeted by this view of Mt. Fuji from the 49th floor window:

[JereLock]

Nice!!! I now want to marry a japanese chick [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[M2d]

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Nice!!! I now want to marry a japanese chick [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

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thanks Bret. because 2p2 didn't have enough of a rice paddy fever epidemic [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

was the guy/girl with the horsehead walking around takeshita dori while you were there? how was the weather during your visit? it was 90 degrees with 90% humidity when I was there and they were still wearing all the costumes and get-ups. I was half shaking my head at the insanity and half admiring their commitment to their style.

[BretWeir]

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was the guy/girl with the horsehead walking around takeshita dori while you were there? how was the weather during your visit? it was 90 degrees with 90% humidity when I was there and they were still wearing all the costumes and get-ups. I was half shaking my head at the insanity and half admiring their commitment to their style.

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Didn't see the horse head guy, but it wouldn't have surprised me at all.

We were in Japan during what was apparently the worst heat wave in 50 years. It was 95+ degrees and humid every day. The costume kids seemed totally unfazed.

Kyoto was even hotter, at least in the city proper (which is down in a valley). On the way to Kyoto, we spent a couple of days at a hot springs resort in the mountains and I tried out the hot spring baths. While it was really soothing, I think it screwed up my body chemistry because for the next three days, I was sweating nonstop -- even when we were inside with air conditioning. I'm sure the Japanese appreciated having a big, sweaty white guy with a towel around his neck traipsing around their shrines sucking down beer and Pocari Sweat (basically, the Japanese version of Gatorade) in order to keep hydrated. I was really tempted just to wear my yukata around the town, which I saw a couple of Japanese guys doing.

One nice touch was at the Sanjusangendo temple, which put out an enormous block of ice at the entrance that you could use to cool your hands.

[Kintamayama]

The trip report just keeps getting better and better.

Question:
I'm going to Japan myself next week and I was curious what kind of camera you used for these great pics. My own camera is dying and I was thinking about upgrading before I go.

[Syberduh]

That's increadibly awesome that you could see Mt. Fuji from your hotel room. I was in Tokyo in early August and it was too hazy to see it from the observation floor of the Tokyo Metro Government building.

As for Japan on the cheap, I traveled for 4 weeks in Japan (one week rent free on the floor of a friend's apartment) this August. All told I spent somewhere around US $4,000 including travel (~$900 for roundtrip airfare into Tokyo, ~$600 for three weeks worth of JR pass - so subtraction would show that I spent ~ $2,500 on room, food and entertainment). I stayed in nothing but youth hostels and didn't eat anywhere fancy, but I wasn't being super careful with money when I was there. I probably could have taken $500+ off the price if I ate only the cheapest available food (mostly noodles and processed crap from the grocery store) and drank no booze.

If you're used to staying in youth hostels for $10 a night or less, then you will have to budget 2x or 3x that amount for Japan - that's the most common complaint that I heard from other hostel customers in Japan.

I would totally recommend the JR Pass unless you were planning to spend the entirety of your trip in Tokyo. It easily payed for itself - probably 2 or 3 times over. If you're in the USA getting one is a simple matter (just go here and click on the JR pass link), but if you're already in Asia it may be more difficult. You can't buy the JR pass once you get to Japan, though there are some more limited options that may be available.

The Japanese are as a rule very courteous and will often go out of their way to help you out if you're lost or something like that. Just smile and say "arigato" a lot. Casual conversation is more difficult to come by.

"Sumimasen" is probably your most useful word in Japan. It's a catch-all meaning "excuse me" (both as in "excuse me for bumping into you" and "excuse me, do you know the time?"). The phrase "Sumimasen, wakarimasen" - roughly "Sorry, I don't understand," is very useful if someone is trying to speak to you in Japanese.

[BretWeir]

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Question:
I'm going to Japan myself next week and I was curious what kind of camera you used for these great pics. My own camera is dying and I was thinking about upgrading before I go.

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It's a Sony Cybershot DSC-W200. We got it just before the trip, so I was kind of figuring out all the features on the fly. I've been very happy with it, though it's a little pricey and you can probably get something very comparable for less. We bought three of the largest available memory cards and filled them all up.

[BretWeir]

Great advice. I probably said "sumimasen" 500 times over the course of two weeks.

Our hotel was pretty much across the street from the Tokyo Metro Building, and this was the only day we were able to see Fuji from it. We couldn't even see it from Lake Ashi in Hakone due to the haze.

[7ontheline]

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One of the more jarring things was how pretty blatantly sexual stuff was juxtaposed with super-cutesy "Hello Kitty"-type stuff.

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In that vein, here's a picture from Tokyo (I think Shinjuku) from when I visited there. It was a strip/sex club of some sort named "Peach Paradise." The picture pretty much speaks for itself, I think.