Tuesday in Tokyo

On Tuesday morning we decided to join one of the many free walking tours available in Japan.  While setting our itinerary for this trip, we came across many groups that offer free walking tours in many of the popular tourist locations in Japan. Some of them are actually one on one custom tours which you coordinate with the guide as to the time of the tour and the location you wish to visit, and your only financial obligation is to pay for their transportation, lunch and admission costs, if any. Others are set tours with a set meeting point and are available to all who show up. They are all run by volunteers and at the end of the tour, you are free to reward them with a tip or gratuity.  This morning (Wednesday), we have one of the personalized custom tours where we are the only participants. The guide has arranged to meet us at our apartment. We will report on that one tomorrow. But yesterday we took one of the set tours. It was a 2 hour walking tour of the Imperial Palace Gardens and we were to meet at 10AM at Tokyo Station in the centre of town.

 We are using a number of apps to help us navigate around town on the subway system. We have tried a few and have now settled on one where you input your beginning location and your destination station and it gives you the choice of fastest route and cheapest route.  There are a few subway stations within a ten minute walk of our apartment. The trip to Tokyo station took about 25 minutes and required one change of trains in the middle.  A few words about subway travel in Tokyo. 

• Subways are spotlessly clean. 
• Although a number of our trips in the first day were on packed cars, subway riders are almost eerily quiet. 
• Riding the escalator is very orderly with those standing, all in a straight line on the left, and those walking using the open right lane. 
  
• There are posters, some cartoon like, around the subway which highlight various rules of travel.
• Actual talking on a cell phone is extremely rare and if you manage to see someone doing it, it is inevitably with their hand covering their mouth and they are whispering rather than talking out loud.
• Every station has one station employee, dressed immaculately in a uniform complete with crisp white shirt and tie, who can speak English and who is pleased to answer your questions with a smile and a bow.
• Stations can be huge, stretching for a few blocks, and they have multiple exits which take you underground to your closest destination above ground. So when planning your trip, it is good to know where you want to go and the station employee will happily tell you which exit to take. 

And so, our first experiences, especially with the assistance of the apps, have been stress free and quite easy to navigate.

 

We arrived at Tokyo Station and as advertised, there were two women wearing kimonos who were holding the Tokyo Free Walking Tour flag. We were the first to show up and it was 9:45 AM. But by 10 AM there were about 20 of us.

 

The leaders (now three of them) told us that Tokyo Station is one of the oldest stations in Japan, opened in 1914. It is also the busiest station in Tokyo in numbers of trains passing thru per day (3000) and the third busiest in terms of number of passengers (500,000). 

Tokyo Station at night 

 

The busieststation, Shinjuku, has an average of 3,500,000 passengers per day, making it the busiest station in the world! 

That is more people in one station per day than the total population of the City of Toronto.

Tokyo station was almost totally destroyed by B29 Bombers in WWII and it has since been rebuilt and modernized. It is possible to walk totally underground to 5 other stations with a distance of over 2 Kms. 

 

We walked a short distance from the station to the outer gates and moat of the Imperial Palace. The palace is built on the site of the former Edo Castle whose former residents, the shoguns, were hereditary military rulers of the country from 1192 to 1867. The palace now houses the Emperor of Japan and his family. It is a ceremonial position and is passed down from father to son. 

The palace, which cannot be visited, is surrounded by enormous gardens smack in the centre of the city. The size of the gardens is about one third the size of Central Park and is free to the public. Surrounding the gardens is the original fortified defensive wall complete with moat, guard towers and bridges. Upkeep of the gardens is the work of a large staff of people, but volunteers who wish to commit a minimum of 5 days can assist and their reward is a "wave" from the Emperor and his wife. 

 

There are many pine trees on the grounds and this symbolizes longevity as the leaves of a pine tree stay on the tree forever and do not fall off the tree in autumn.  Although the large open area in the centre of the garden was still straw coloured (it turns green in a month or so), we were fortunate to see the beginnings of the famous Japanese Cherry Blossom season and the blooming of the apricot trees as well in a number of locations in the garden. 

 There were also beautiful traditional Japanese Gardens complete with giant koi goldfish in reflecting ponds and despite the overcast grey skies, the view was breathtaking and a true "Kodak moment"!

At corners of the outer wall were strategic guard towers to ensure that the palace and the castle before it were safe from any intruders or enemies.

 

When we completed the tour, it was now past noon and we went to a local Starbucks store to warm up and to eat our lunch. It was filled with office workers from the surrounding office buildings. As on the subway, they were all neatly dressed, and the noise level in even this casual meeting place was muted with people talking in low tones. We noticed on a number of instances, how people would motion to a friend or business colleague to come closer, as he had something to say and would not speak loudly across the table or the room. 

As we were about 100 metres walk to the National Museum of Modern Art and because it was still quite chilly, we decided that an hour or two indoors would be a smart thing to do and so we were off to the Museum. 

We headed back to the apartment for a bit of a rest (hopefully getting rid of the rest of our minor jet lag) and then were off to dinner at Chabad Tokyo. 

Tokyo Chabad is housed in a low rise narrow building with the shul in the basement, a newly opened restaurant called Chana's Place and a social hall on the main floor, one floor which is rented out and the top levels for the Rabbi and his wife. The restaurant consists of about three small tables and the kitchen area which is the domain of Chef Kyle, originally from Australia. 

Fran with two men facing each other thru the window

There is a limited menu and Chef Kyle will prepare a totally authentic Japanese meal for you on order with notice of 24 to 48 hours. 

There was a couple just leaving and there were three other diners during the time we were there, two locals and one person who used to be local but who now lives in Australia and commutes back to Japan for business. 

We ordered the daily soup and an order of shashimi grade tuna steak with spicy salsa and a side of veggies. It was very good and cooked to just past medium rare. The other diners were all having the chicken dinner and they were very pleased. 

We ended up staying there for quite a while having a lively conversation with two of the other diners and with the chef. Before this job, chef Kyle only knew about Judaism from studying comparative religion in school. He has been at Chabad for quite a few years and he is the person with whom we reserved our Shabbat meals. We quickly met Rabbi Mendi who popped his head in to say hello. 

We now headed back to the apartment for some well deserved sleep, hopefully longer than our first night in Tokyo.

More to come, all the best

Fran and David