I’ve just returned from an amazing adventure in Asia, visiting Japan, Korea, and China over a three week period. Japan has been at the top of my list of places to visit so it was great to actually be able to make the trip over to this part of the world. I spent two weeks in Japan, a few days each in Seoul, Korea and Beijing, China. Over the next few posts, I’ll be outlining my itinerary with explanations of what exactly I experienced and thought of the cultural exposure in each of these countries. As I started my vacation in Japan, this is where I’ll begin.
Japan
I flew into Tokyo from Toronto and was amazed by the flight with the differences I saw compared to other flights I’ve been on. I noticed most of the Japanese on the flight had removed their shoes which were neatly tucked away under the seats in front of them and were then wearing house slippers for the majority of the flight. They were quiet and there wasn’t a lot of movement either during the entire 13 hour flight. It was great and I managed to sleep for half the flight.
Tokyo was lovely and wasn’t nearly as busy as I was expecting it to be. The hotel I was staying, Hotel Sunroute Higashi Shinjuku, was located in Koreatown which was a 20 minutes walk from Shinjuku Station. It’s a central hotel and was super easy to get to from the airport which was 1.5 hours away by public transit. I had purchased a Japan Rail Pass prior to arriving which I began using immediately after exchanging the voucher at the airport and got me right to the Shinjuku Station. I, then, hopped onto the subway to get to the hotel. The hotel room was small which is what I expected it to be and it was super clean as is the city. My first meal was at a Korean restaurant near the hotel and I also explored the neighbourhood including a 100 yen store (similar to dollar stores in North America).
During the five days I spent in Tokyo, I did all the typically touristy spots in the city. These included the following:
National Kabuki Theatre
- As the subway system was super confusing at first, I decided to do the hop-on hop-off bus tour in Tokyo to see where everything was on my first day. This was the day I explored the Tsukiji Fish Market and had a sushi lunch and found the Kabucki Theatre and checked the schedule in case I decided to see one while I was in Tokyo. I did all the routes that were offered and got a good general overview of the city and saw where things were.
Tsukiji Fish Market
Sculpture Museum
- Exploring Shibuya to check out the street crossings and shop in biggest Tokyu Hands store (a lifestyle and craft store).
Department Store Shopping
A temple / shrine, one of many in Tokyo
- Explore Harajuku and take pictures with the Harajuku girls.
Harajuku Girls
- Sumo wrestling and a fan expo convention. This was the most interesting thing I’ve ever experienced. I enjoyed watching the wrestling but the fan expo was great way to people watch. I loved all the costumes I saw that the Japanese were dressed in. It was also an interesting experience to be the only noticeable foreigner, the rest of the attendees were Japanese people (not sure if all were locals, or if some were visiting from within Japan or from overseas).
Sumo Wrestling
Cherry Blossoms
- I did a really good walk that I found on the Frommer’s website, Walking Tour 4 which had me starting at Tennoji Temple and ending at Nezu Temple. I loved this walking tour and it was an interesting part of town and I wasn’t expecting the end of the tour to be so beautiful. I even took a unplanned break in a craft beer bar – I needed to use a washroom and happened to walk into this bar and ended up staying for a beer. I’m not sure if I should be calling this place a bar as it seemed to be more of a family place as there were a few mothers with their children. The children were playing a small area that was set up with a teepee and some toys/books. It definitely wasn’t a restaurant as no one was having actual meals but mostly snacks to go with their beer or drink. Overall, this was such a pleasant walk and experience. I stopped into one sculpture museum which was the only artsy thing I checked out the entire time I was in Japan.
Tokyo Nightlife, near Shinjuku Station
- I initially planned to a day trip out to Aomori to see the cherry blossoms as the predictions had the flowers blooming shortly after my arrival in Japan. I had read many times prior to leaving home and upon arriving in Japan that the blossoms predictions are just predictions and may not necessarily occur on the date noted by Japan’s meteorological society. So instead of spending four hours each way on a train to Aomori, I decided to forgo this experience (had seen some cherry blossoms in Tokyo) and did a half day trip to Yokohama. I had read that Yokohama had the largest Chinatown in Japan. The Chinatown wasn’t what I expected it to be. I was thinking it was similar to what we see in North America where the Chinese actual use the chinatowns and that it would actually be busy with locals. It was a very commercialized / touristy version of a Chinatown. Mostly Japanese (locals and tourists) were walking through the neighbourhood. Some Chinese tourists were in the neighbourhood as well but no local Chinese people were shopping there like I’ve seen here in Toronto’s Chinatown.
Japanese Bakery
Tokyo was such a clean city and was a great experience. I felt I did the majority of the tourist spots but wish I could have stayed longer as I think it has a lot of neighbourhoods to explore and experience. The subways were very busy all day long. Prices seemed to be reasonable and not as expensive as I was expecting. I mostly ate at Japanese restaurants (finding places that seemed to be busy with Japanese people) with my breakfasts being my only western meal. I often was at Starbucks for breakfast and found it pricey with a tall regular brewed coffee costing almost $5 Canadian (it was the same price as a tall cappuccino or latte). The upside with getting coffee at Starbucks is that you can return to any Starbucks on the same day and buy the same drink for 100 yen (almost equivalent to $1 Canadian) as long as you keep the receipt as it’s needed in order to get the 100 yen drink.
