Day 4: The Night is Not Fool

I had the most fun this day.

Circadian rhythm all thrown out of whack, I'd been waking up at 6 am every day. So I got an early start and walked around Asakusa, feeling completely recovered and - having met my English and French floormates the day before - with new energy. I ran a couple of errands and took a bunch of photos, seeing as it was a beautiful morning.

the abundance of flowers in tokyo and my hostel from the outside

equally abundant are the super convenient vending machines and (as i've mentioned) cats

I decided to visit the temple in Asakusa - the Sensoji Temple.

In reading the descriptions of the sculptures and shrines, I noticed how many of them

were reconstructed after the originals had been destroyed in the war. Another thing

that struck me was the extreme contrast in environment -- one minute you're dodging

traffic through a busy Tokyo street and the next you're witnessing a Buddhist prayer

ceremony in an Edo-period temple. Japan is incredible.

I had made lunch plans for later that day with the wonderful Jason Cody Douglass

who is studying in Japan with Yale University. Since I don't have a phone, we were

forced to rely on thorough planning and being on time: rendezvous at Hachiko at

13:00. It worked! And for those of you who don't know the story of Hachiko (I'm

assuming it's most of you), I highly, highly recommend reading all about it. I provided

the link, so I'm really expecting you to. Jason was allowed to flex his Japanese by ordering

for me at the restaurant - sushi over rice with soba noodles. NOM.

After that, I had planned another rendezvous at Hachiko with Yusef and his

travel buddy, Euan. Our agenda? Simply to wander around Shibuya and Harajuku,

visit Meiji-jingu and watch the night unfold...

we ran into a people's park! that was about to be purchased by Nike (though not

without a fight).

Meiji-jingu was really impressive. Once again, I was struck dumb by the extreme

contrast in environment - Harajuku one minute, surrounded by tall, tall trees the

next.

crepes in Harajuku (not gonna lie, I think the ones I make are the boss dogs).

merry fuckin' xmas bitch // 'juku lifeeee

and then we went into this shop/rooftop bar called the (brace yourselves)

Tokyo Hipster's Club. The photo above features a Bukowski candle and a Sam

Shepard collection. The photo next to it features glasses once full of sparkling wine

which we enjoyed over good conversation and general pretension.

But it's totally cool because we went to a ramen place afterwards! It was really unique

in that you picked the ingredients you wanted in your soup and they'd make it for you.

The guy behind the counter was a world traveler himself and spoke English quite well so

we struck up conversation.

After paying our bill, saying our "arigato's" and bowing out, we stepped back out into the

rainy Tokyo streets. We decided to go to Yusef and Euan's go-to hangout in Shibuya called

the Rhythm Cafe where they served good drinks, had a neat atmosphere and a hefty Grace

Jones album collection tacked up on their walls.

Having had a decent amount to drink, our next activity needed to be karaoke! What would

a trip to Asia be without a karaoke bar? And an overpriced one at that. Regardless, I had

fun being a mic-hog and whatnot. I picked all of the horrible pop songs that are undeniably

fun to sing and the men picked the cool stuff.

At one point, one of us looked at the time and remembered that there was a last train back

to Asakusa that I needed to catch. The night ended with the three of us tumbling through

Shibuya station and me apologizing for not having the time for a goodbye hug.

I caught the train and caught my breath. Good night, good night!

A day later, as I was leaving Tokyo for good, I saw a guy with a t-shirt that read, "The Night

is Not Fool." I thought, "Oh! Appropriate blog title!"