I lost some momentum writing about our trip to Japan after the first two posts when life and work got busy, but appreciate those of you who diplomatically asked if there was more coming. Pardon the pause, I'm hoping to wrap this up in a few more posts soon!
On the third day of the trip we were still adjusting from travel and the time zone change, but were starting to get our bearings. We started a load of laundry in the hotel, which was a total upgrade from laundry experiences in U.S. hotels: you could monitor the location of empty machines (and time left on occupied machines) from your hotel room TV, the machines were all-in-one wash/dry so no having to move clothes around in between, they included detergent in the cost of the wash and it was automatically piped in, and had a self-service passcode to lock the machine until you could retrieve your items.
After breakfast, we took a train to the Tsukiji Outer Market area and browsed the stalls, full of interesting food and other wares. People waited in long lines to get just the cut of meat or seafood they needed.
Then, it was time to start making lunch! In one of the nondescript buildings in the market we took an elevator up to a private kitchen classroom:
We learned about the cuisine of the Okinawa region, which is known among other things for being a blue zone, where people tend to live longer than in the rest of the world. Studies and data have attributed this to their plant-based diet, active outdoor lifestyle and strong social networks (IRL!). We got to experience at least one part of that as we made tofu from scratch, sliced and diced various vegetables, and worked it all in to a beautiful stir-fry.
The chefs made sure the young people in our group were an integral part of the meal prep, which was great.
Yum! After the meal was over we headed back to the hotel to regroup, and then our family headed back out on our own to Akihabara, the "electric town" or "nerd district" known for its tourist-optimized presentation of electronics, games, arcades, anime culture and more.
It was super busy and an overwhelming assault on the senses. It was one of those moments where I could feel how much my normal existence is geared toward the relative quiet of small town living; there were probably more people wandering those few blocks at that hour than live in my city as a whole at home, and there were a million flashing, beeping, whirling, shiny things to look at with every step.
I think I would have loved it as a teenager and could have spent hours playing video games and wandering in and out of the various Radio Shack-like storefronts imagining what kind of high-tech-music-movie-assistant-android-robot thing I could create from parts, but as an adult I was just happy to see it, survive it, and move on. 🙂
But just when I thought maybe the density and intensity of the Tokyo experience might be wearing on me, that evening we had what was one of my favorite experiences from the whole trip, a visit to the teamLabs Borderless digital art display. It was unlike anything I've seen before, one of those artistic and spiritual experiences where I felt something inside me shifting a few steps toward hope and life. As we took in each new "room" I was alternating between stunned silence, tears and giddy laughter with my daughter. It was a tightly orchestrated presentation of sight, sound, movement, smell (yes, almost every room had its own programmed olfactory experience) and touch, and it was just incredible.
Tired from a long day and knowing we were headed to a new town the next, we decided to take a hired ride back to the hotel instead of navigate the walking and subway rides needed. In preparation for such a situation I'd already downloaded the Go app and created an account, so it was as easy as Lyft or Uber to get picked up, and we were back in no time.
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