May 25, 2014 - Odaiba

Odaiba

I'm going to see the giant Gundam! I met them at Tokyo Station. They were a little late. Yuki must have been job hunting today. This was the first time I met Hisami.. The girls have never seen the or heard about the Gundam series. They also had never been to the Gundam Park. They told me that they watched other anime just not Gundam. I told them that the series has been around since the late 1970's or 1980's. Then, we went to the arcade. I won Hisami a stuffed animal called Mumin!

Sunday Funday

After lunch we went to Odiba to go to the National Museum of Emerging Science and Innovation. We had a free pass to go. I'm glad we went here because they had a lot of cool new technology. Also they had life problems that could be solved mathematically to see if it could happen or not. My favorite thing I saw was the globe they had hanging in the from entrance. When you go to this museum, you will learn a lot of information about astronauts, surgeons, underwater nuclear detectors, and the innovation of Japan's technology. When we left this museum we went to see the Gundam Wing statue. This Gundam was huge, it was a real life size transformer. In the same are they had a replica of the Statue of Liberty. I haven't even been to New York yet to see the original one. They had a mall in this area as well so I brought a few more gifts. In the mall they had this Powerade game you can play and win a prize so I did this and received a water bottle and a key lanyard.

 

The Best Spring Rolls EVERRRR

May 23: Friday was my first free day of my second week in Tokyo. I had a late start this morning because I wanted to sleep in for a few hours longer than I normally would on a school night. When I finally woke up I had a list of places I wanted to see for the day. I knew I wanted to go to the aquarium since I never been before back home. The closest aquarium is in Atlanta which is a three hour drive from Nashville. Needless to say I wasn't able to go because of time constraints and getting lost in Tokyo. I didn't want the entire day to be wasted so I decided to get something to eat at a Taiwanese restaurant located in the subway station. The spring rolls are sooo good especially dipped in a special in house sauce. Definitely, recommend this restaurant to anyone that visits Tokyo.After dinner, Olivia and I decided to go to Shibuya to see what all the talk was about Shibuya night life. Shibuya was filled with a lot of parties, lounges, and karaoke spots. I had soo much fun dancing and singing the night away. Young Japanese people love to listen to Beyonce, Taylor Swifts, Justin Timberlake, and several other Pop and Rock artists.  

Spring Rolls with special sweet and sour sauce 

Friday Free Day

It's Friday and it is a free day today so I got the chance to catch up on some rest. I got a chance now to go visit the city I been wanting to go to which is Akihabara. The city is known for its anime so my classmate and I set out to explore the area of the popular anime city. Upon arriving there we both saw our professor Dr.V and his friend Biff walking around. They helped guide us to the most popular strip known for anime and when we got there that's exactly what we saw. I saw some if my old anime cartoons I use to watch like Dragon Ball Z.  I looked at several figures of my old anime show and it was really something to see. I enjoyed being in the city and in the country where all the old anime shows i watched originated from. 

                                                Character (Broly) from Dragon Ball Z Anime

Company Visit to Sony!

Today is going to be an exciting day because we are visiting the Sony Headquarters. I owned a lot of Sony products before but the most famous one I have is the companies PlayStation 3. When arriving at Sony and entering into the lobby we saw many Sony entertainment products on display and were escorted to an exclusive show room. We were divided into separate groups by class and had our guides leading us to the show room. The escort presented to us some of Sony’s new 3D cameras they use for broadcasting games or shows. The visuals were amazing and when you had the 3D glasses on, it looked as though you could step out of the TV. The next display was there entertainment TV. The TV was better than high definition they called it there 4x and it was quite awesome. The TV picture was so clear you could see pretty much everything in full detail. The next display was there Spider-Man movie display which consisted of the actual costumes used for the three Spider-Man movies and the Amazing Spider-Man 2 movie as well. The most exciting exhibit to me next was the new PlayStation 4. It was better than I thought with a pad on the controller that did virtual effects on the screen. This was an exciting experience to see everything I viewed in that show room and one i will never forget. 

Company Visit to Swan

Today I was able to visit the company Swan in Tokyo Japan and learn how they market, operations and its goals. Swan is specializes in bakery items and was established by Yamata holdings. The uniqueness about the company Swan was how they helped the disabled. I learned that the spirit of Swan is that they combine the non-disable and the disable to cooperate together in their work environment. Swan is also driven to help disable people be independent. Compared to Japan itself, Swan helps more disable people than other companies in Japan.  Swan also compared to the index of the stock market is actually on the same path, which shows that having disable workers is just as efficient as having only non-disable workers.

Recently Swan was just bought out by Ben & Jerry ice cream which was a success story from the Swan Company. Swan Company has a cookie that Ben & Jerry use in there ice cream only in Japan. Swan Company was an interesting company and I really enjoyed how they combine the non-disable and the disable to cooperate with one another. I also enjoyed the ice cream they gave us Coffee Blast from Ben & Jerry's that is only in Japan.

                                                              Coffee Blast Ice cream

Sumo!

Today was an early day to wake up because we were on our way to pick up our Sumo tournament tickets. This was going to be my first sumo match I've ever watched live in person and I was pretty excited but still sleepy too.Before the sumo tournament later that afternoon some of my classmates and I headed towards the museum  that showed us the history of Tokyo. The museum was pretty informative, we got to see the early living conditions in early Japan and also some of the older toys they use to play with. After the museum the group and I headed to the Sumo tournament. When arriving we saw several sumo wrestlers and some of them we could take pictures with! Once we got inside I saw my first sumo match and it was great. I saw the rituals they do before they wrestle then was able to watch a serious of matches where the sumo's went at it. The Sumo tournament was an experience that I will never forget and was pretty enjoyable to watch.

                                                     
                                                            Picture from the Museum

                                                                     Sumo Tournament

Trip Around Tokyo with Student Partners

    Today in Japan I was going to be meeting up with my student partners. Dai and Go have planned for us to visit the Sky Tree which is one of the tallest building in Tokyo and the Gundam wing statue since I like anime. The trip started with me fining my way to Asakusabashi station at 11 am and it was difficult to find. I arrived there shortly after 11am and Dai was there waiting on me but Go wasn't there. Dai told me that Go was going to meet us at the Sky Tree so him and I walked towards the train line to head to our destination.
    
    As we arrived at the Sky Tree; inside we passed by many dessert restaurants. Dai decided to stop by one of them and buy me a dessert that is popular in Japan. The dessert was similar to a snow cone but with a scoop of ice cream and was in a bowl not a cone. Dai said that when it's hot outside like it was this is what Japanese eat and even at the beach. I selected strawberry and to my surprise I liked it better than the snow cone because as the ice melted the strawberry syrup was at the bottom so it was like juice.  While we were eating Go happen to arrive and we were on our way to go into the sky tree. We got our tickets for the second highest level you could go and were on our way. Once up in the Sky Tree you could see all of Tokyo. Tokyo was bigger than what I thought and seemed to stretch all the way to the ocean. After the visit at Sky Tree we headed to the popular (for those that watch anime)  Gundam Wing statue. The statue was big and very nice and it actually had smoke coming out of it. It was definitely something worth seeing and I appreciate Dai and Go taking me to see it. It was a good experience seeing something as a kid I grew up watching.  

                                                          Dia (left) and Go (right)

                                                           Dessert at Restaurants

                                                            From inside the Sky Tree

                                                               Gundam Wing Statue

May 23, 2014 - Culture Shock Hits

Culture Shock Hits

The day started off decently. I laid around until about noon then decided to grab lunch. I wanted some more sushi. I walked around Asakusa for at least 45 minutes and a found a place. I really didn't want a lot just enough to tide me over. I was kind of forced to get the lunch special. I about lost my lunch when I got to the fish eggs. Not because of the taste, but it was more the texture. It was just overwhelming! I have had better sushi. This was not it. 

After that, the day went downhill from there. I missed a stop on the subway and was I didn't know where I was in relation to the Ueno Zoo. I grabbed a map. I had to go back a station but I still didn't know where I was for a minute or two. I was trying to meet up with my roommates but that wasn't happening. I couldn't update them because both our SIM cards don't work with our phones. We can only communicate when there's wi-fi. 

I made the best of the zoo. I went back to the hostel, checked my messages and decided to see Akihabara. The anime stores were good. I had questions about some of the figurines I saw. I didn't understand the purpose for some. 

My breaking point came when I was trying to find the Robot Restaurant. I could have sworn it was in Akihabara! I walked around for many blocks, looking for any type of touristy place. There was no free wi-fi anywhere. I caved and headed back to the train station. I sought the information building but they spoke very little English. I told him what I was looking for and he grabbed a map. He circled 3 places. I knew this was not correct. I left even more frustrated.

A glimmer of hope came when I saw a Metro bus pull up. Those buses have free wi-fi. I was going to catch a signal and find the place. The only problem is that the buses kept leaving. I finally saw a bus that pulled up to the station and stayed. I moved right next to the bus. I had a great signal according to my phone. STILL NO CONNECTION. I went back to the hostel defeated, wishing I was back home with internet on my phone.

Before you go out, plan your routes, get the necessary maps and give yourself extra time to reduce your stress!

May 24, 2014 - Kamakura

Kamakura

I couldn't have a lazy day today because I'm meeting Narumi and Yuki in Kamakura. I used my JR pass with no issues. When I finally got to the station, I waited for them but I didn't see Narumi or Yuki. After twenty minutes, I decided to go to the other exit and there they were with smiling faces. As we walked the streets, we talked, laughed, ate, and snapped pictures. We saw a few shrines. At the first shrine, we gave an offering and said a prayer. The second shrine, we saw the Great Buddha statue. The last shrine, we washed money for good luck. We had a great time! I know we will all have a good night's sleep from all that walking!

Free day Saturday

Today was a great day exploring Tokyo by myself. I was supposed to hang out with my buddies from Chuo University, but one of the girls got sick on the way to meet me at the hostel. I was looking forward to hanging with them today. This didn't stop me from going out and doing things though. I went into a random restaurant for lunch. The food was actually good. When I got done eating lunch I sent some post cards back to the states to my family and friends. I did a lot of walking today and it was hot out. Then I headed to Ueno Zoo. There was a lot of energetic kids running wild in the zoo. They had a lot of animals, but it seemed like their cages were small. Everything in Japan is actually smaller. My favorite animal I seen was the crocodile.