I am not going to be the first to tell you that consumerism is BIG in Japan. And here we are, in Ginza, a well-known shopping district in Tokyo. It’s like Oxford Street in London, but with more designer labels. Also the streets are not as crowded, possibly because pavements in Japan are much wider. They live in small apartments, but streets are wide (like in Paris). We are here not for shopping though, just browsing and window shopping. After all, this is not why we are here. Plus the pound is weak ;)

There isn’t much to say here. You need to see it. Another highlight from our second day in Tokyo – the views from the Tokyo Tower (one of the few megapolis’ observation points). And they are spectacular! I hope these pictures will do some justice. The tower itself is 332 meter high, located in Roppongi District and actually draws design inspiration from Eiffel Tower. And it’s red. Kind of orange red.

We spent quite some time there, admiring the view (hence on the photos the city is lit so differently) – we were not in a rush, taking tons of pictures, having a cup of coffee in the cafe on the lower deck (the tower has two)… The scale of the city… it’s just crazy.

After a rather filling breakfast we went for a walk in Kachidoki. We did not have a certain plan at the point, just wanted to wander around for a bit. Also, there we could see Tokyo bay and the Rainbow bridge. Interesting thing about Tokyo (and well, Japan) is that you see all those skyscrapers and modern steel and glass buildings and then you will find standing next to them some old and obscure, barely on it’s last leg, hut, just like in ‘Up’ animation. Or a restaurant. And that’s quite picturesque. And cute :)

The vending machine culture in Japan is huge. You could probably live out of them, and would not definitely die of thirst :) For they are everywhere, even in dormitory districts, always within a short walk reach. We did not buy food from them, but cans with hot coffee – that was very handy! A not very strong taste though. And what’s the deal with Tommy Lee Jones? :) He must be very popular there, since his face is on many vending machines and spotted on some wall banners :)

Next to Tsukiji market lies Hamarikyu Gardens – a public park with a big pond, a pleasantly green and calm place in the midst of concrete. It is famous for its 300 year old pine-tree which is taken a great care of (not the one in the picture though) and for it’s tea house where US President Grant and Emperor Meiji met.

Right, time to head back to Tsukiji market area for some lunch. So many small market like places crammed into each other.. hard to make a choice. Or.. rather easy, since food everywhere taste so delicious. Cheap and no thrill. Salmon sashimi and minced tuna on a bowl of rice. The most melting tune I ever had. Sooooo good! (And yes, to get to that place I hijacked one of their market carts :)

It’s 5 in the morning and I am lying fully awake. Good morning jet lag! Right, we gotta do something. And I’ve just got brilliant idea – it’s a perfect time to go and visit world famous Tsukiji, Tokyo Central Wholesale Market. It might not sound so, but Tsukiji market is the place to see when if are in Tokyo.

We arrived in about an hour or so and yes, it is exactly what I thought it would be. What you read in those tourist guides is true. Massive selection of all kind of fish and sea creatures (no blue whales or dolphins were spotted though). Very lively, very busy, and absolutely buzzing! Again – clean and tidy. And, just like was promised – no fishy smell! At all. Overall – quite overwhelming :)

We saw quite a few tourists there, apart from us, with their DSLR cameras, both Asian and Western – after all, it is an iconic place. I must admit, I was admiring the patience of market workers. I tried my best not to get in someone’s way, for people are at work there (not like us), but inevitably you will, when you keep trying to get a nice close up shot. But I was never told off or anything. I mean, not all of them looked very happy to see me, but they were never rude or unfriendly, just focused on their everyday job.

We were a bit too late to see the tuna auctions, but you have to be really early to be catch it. Besides, there is only a limited number of passes got issued for tourists to access the auction area. So you either have to stay in the hotel close to the market or you’ll have to get a cab, since there is no public transport yet. And I thought to myself: “Naah… too much hassle”. But we got to see how those huge tuna carcasses get carved and prepared for the shops and restaurants. You can also see below.

What you see below is the typical form of transportation at the market – quite funky looking carts. The drivers are skillful but you have to watch out, or you might get run over, for they move around very fast in those not particularly wide passages. They are also quite characters :) There must be some comedy movie made before with those carts, I am sure.

So after walking around, exploring and taking pictures we were ready for sushi breakfast :) Awesome. Awwww, I will miss it.

So here we are, after 10 hour flight and 2890 km covered, finally landed. That was definitely the shortest day in my life :) But we made it!

Narita Airport does not seem that busy at all – must be the slow time of the year. Got through the customs and hopped on the express train to Tokyo. Comfy reclining seats and wifi. It’s not free though. Oh, never mind…

Ah hour ride and are arriving in the capital of the far-away land. What we see through the window is a lot of tall apartment blocks built very densely and rather close to the train tracks. That’s a sign of a megapolis. And this is a Central Station, as busy as Victoria in the rush hour, but more complicated architecturally.

Tokyo metro

Buying the first metro tickets from the machine is not overly complicated, but rather intimidating, especially when English instructions are not that obvious. And knowing there are other people queuing behind you is also not helping. But we got through that.

We got ourselves the cheapest tickets – ¥160 each. Typical single trip on metro in Tokyo costs ¥160-190, and if your trip is more expensive than your ticket, you can always pay the difference at the exit. So always have some change with you.

The first impression inside the carriage: extremely clean and tidy. Wider cars than in London – more people can get in. No graffiti. No greasy handles or dirty sits. And no people sitting with their feet on the seat. Loving it!

The Tokyo metro map is comparable to the London one, and all stations have their name written in both Japanese and English. Even better – all station are numbered, which is great to keep track of where you are and how many more stops till you change or alight. That was extremely helpful. What’s not that great about Tokyo metro though is an often lack of escalators, and when you are with your travel cases against the long stairs, that’s not fun at all. Another Tokyo metro ‘feature’ is the large number of exits at the stations (it reaches whooping 200 at Shinjuku station, with around 4 million people entering and exiting the station every day). That is crazy!

So is it busy? Yes, it is. Though coming from London helps, as you are quite used to the rivers of rushing people.

Our first hotel was located in the North East of Tokyo, 10 minute walk from the Minova station. We’ve checked in, left our luggage and went for a walk around the area. To be honest that day I felt utterly unexcited. After a long flight and about 20 something hours without sleep I was pretty tired. No matter how much I tried, I couldn’t get asleep on the plane. And the weather on the day we arrived was wet, bleak and gloomy. The landscape around the area we stayed in was also rather unimaginative and definitely not something you would go across the world to see… So there I am standing on the bank or Arakawa River, it’s drizzling, I am wet and cold (and hungry), looking at the typical big city scenery coloured in gray and brown and thinking to myself: “What am I doing here?”

(Of course, after that there was another day and the sun was shining and I felt refreshed and curios about was around me and the city was bright and vibrant, and it was all enjoyable :)

Our first meal in Japan

There a lot of places where you can eat in Tokyo (well, just like in any other city in Japan). A lot. Literally around every corner there is one or two restaurants. In the end, it’s a big nation to be fed. Most of the restaurants in Japan specialize in just one type of food. So you go to have sushi in one place, noodles in other, tempura in yet another restaurant (of course the choice of food is not limited to these options, far from that. And as an ardent sushi lover, I was very determined to try as much of Japanese cuisine as possible. After all, food was one of the reason we came to Japan :)

The language can be a real barrier in the restaurants, but fear not – in most places there is some kind of English menu plus quite often menus have pictures of what you are about to get. And even better: most restaurants use their windows to display the plastic version of food and dishes they serve, rather closely resembling what is served inside. And they also usually have a price tag on it. Which is very convenient. See one of those display on the photo below. That was the actual place we went for our dinner in Asakusa. What I went for was a typical Japanese meal – a bowl of white rice with raw fish topping. And a glass of sweet plum wine. That was delicious (and made my first tired night much more bearable :)

Generally, food in Tokyo is cheaper than in London (even though the pound exchange rate is quite terrible). And much fresher. I mean it is always fresh. We’ve paid around ¥ 4000 for our dinner.

After we nourished our tired bodies we continued browsing the Asakusa market, which led us straight to the Sensō-ji temple, which looked rather beautiful at night. I took few pictures, but was struggling with my gorilla pod and the rain just wouldn’t stop, so we headed back to our hotel. A traditional very hot bath tub was very welcome to relax the body and prepare us for the next day.

A few words about our hotel

Apart from our commitment to eat in traditional restaurants while we are in Japan, we were also determined to stay in ryokans, traditional Japanese inns. And the first our place was a modern variation of ryokan. Hotels in Japan are not cheap, but we did want more privacy than in hostels (which should be considerably cheaper).

It was a modern hotel with a traditional flavor. The room was rather small, just 4 tatami (literally), a small folding table and a small tv inside a built in wardrobe. You leave your shoes outside the room and wear slippers when walking around in the hotel. A common toilet and showers plus a hot bathtub. Though all areas are in common use, everything is immaculately clean. Soap, shower gel and even tooth brushes are provided. And no curfew. It definitely lacked the atmosphere of a traditional ryokan, but for ¥18000 for 2 nights it was a nice deal.

Japan was never on the list of my most imminent destinations. Probably because it felt so far-far away. And it is pretty far anyway. Plus the cultural barrier made it even more distant place. But I always knew I would go there some day. And then something clicked and I thought, We should just go.

Finnair sale made it easier to make the decision – £500 for a return ticket. I though that qualified for ‘not bad at all’. But that was in February and we opted for the foliage season in November. Again, that felt so far away… but you know how times flies ;)

So there we are, November 15th, and we are having breakfast before going to Heathrow. It’s a sunny and quiet morning. Actually a bit too quiet. For some reason, not that many planes flying by our windows, and that’s quite unusual. But enjoyable.

When we arrived at the airport then we realised why it was so quiet – because of the fog most of the flights were delayed. That included our transfer flight to Helsinki. Oh, that’s a drawback, especially because we have only an hour between flight. Long story short – we arrived in Helsinki too late and missed the flight.

Not a good start. Luckily, both flights were with the same company (and this is exactly what you should be considering when booking tickets), and we are put on the next flight. Unfortunately it’s only on the next day, same time. Some people are put on a sooner through to Shanghai, but it’s quite a way off, we rather stay till tomorrow.

Finnair handled it all very professionally. We are put in on of their chain hotel, 20 minutes shuttle bus drive from the airport, dinner and breakfast included, plus free wifi and a sauna with a pool. Yes, it’s Finland, baby!

So we were missing the whole day of the trip – not great, but I kept thinking, “What good shall come out of this?” Ok, we are going to see the city tomorrow, but that wouldn’t quite do it. And then we got acquainted with Miko, a Japanese woman who was flying back home to Osaka and was sharing our unfortunate course of events.

So we were sticking together while were stuck in Helsinki and eventually got ourselves invited to visit Osaka to see see her when in Japan. The invitation was gladly accepted :)

So, a day in Helsinki… Immaculately clean an shiny airport and the hotel (putting England to great great shame), so clean is the city itself , but honestly… it does not have much to offer – the sightseeing was done in just about a couple of hours. Even Helsinki design museum was somehow a disappointment – the Russian tsars’ exhibition that on was actually taking more space in the 2 storey building than the other exhibits, and we were hoping to see more examples of the Scandinavian design there. Oh well…

So there you have it, some postcards from Helsinki below, including Helsinki Lutheran Cathedral and the interior of Uspensky cathedral. Also some Russian-like ‘matryoshkas’ form the local gift shop. And for us… it’s the time to fly to far-far-away land.

Ok, this must be the creepiest addition to my the Bioshock collection, and the lady-splicer does not look that healthy or wholesome, but then… it’s all part of the Rapture’s story and its tragedy, so I thought ‘Why not?’. Now they have got their rightful place on the herself among the others. And I now have more chances to be misunderstood by other people :)

P.S. A Big Daddy toy in the hand of Eleanor Lamb, you should agree, is a really nice touch.

In the last month or two I have acquired the whole three new Big Daddy figurines. What can I say? They keep releasing them and I just can’t help myself but to keep buying them. But they are awesome.

Bouncer and Elite Bouncer

The Bouncer Big Daddy – the most iconic fixture in Bioshock. The toy feels really massive, though somehow still in proportion to the others. Same excellent build quality with tons of details. The Elite Bouncer is not that different from his brother (from another mother): just another type of drill, some sort of shield on the front and is painted differently. They both look really bad-ass, especially together. Love them!

Rosie

And then the Rosie arrived, another little sisters’ protector-defender from the city of Rapture. To be honest I wasn’t quite sure about this one, I thought it might look too conventional, but it turned out to be virtually as cool as the other Big Daddies. He is the one (it’s him, right? not her) without the drill, but rather with both hands and a rivet gun.

So who’s left? The Rumbler (which seems to be quite similar to the Rosie) and the Lancer, a version of Deco-Rosie from Minerva’s Den. He is the one I am very much after. I hope we’ll see him in the not-too-distant future.