Crystal and Erik in Japan: 8/31/08

Play Ball

Marie and Tokio on the way to Seibu Dome to see the Seibu Lions beat the Orix BlueWaves
Saturday, Aug. 16

We had great seats behind home plate.

The cheerleaders and lion mascots (in fairness both the male and female lion were represented) doing the Japanese Macarena. I write "Japanese" because it was not the Macarena.

I don't think this guy likes being on the big screen in outfield.

We all got balloons. Everyone was waiting in anticipation of the end of the 7th inning when we could release our balloons and watch them fly.

The 7th inning lasted WAY too long and as everyone waited they continued to blow up their balloons more and more and... BANG! We all jumped (and laughed) every time a balloon popped. If anyone was shot no one would ever have know the difference.

We had a great time and the Lions came back and won in extra innings. We got to eat yakitori (chicken kabobs) and omuraisu (omelet stuffed with chicken rice and covered with gravy) while watching the game.

Shinjuku

We spent three days in Tokyo for our 10th anniversary. This is a side street right outside of Shinjuku Station. It was crowded everywhere we went in Tokyo.

This city would be an A.D.D. person's dream. Large screen tvs playing, cars and people rushing about, neon lights, restaurants galore, crosswalks chirping (to let you know when to cross), Cameron Diaz dancing with an umbrella on a big screen (cell phone ad), several different languages being spoken, trains going by...we loved it!

This is Shinjuku Staion. An average of 3.6 million people used this station PER DAY in 2007 and it has over 200 exits.

This building looked cool at night. You can see that the train from Shinjuku Station goes right by it.

I now know of 2 Krispy Kremes in Japan. This one was very close to our hotel. The sign says "35 minute wait." We saw the wait as high as 50 minutes. We wouldn't wait five minutes for Krispy Kreme in the U.S.

Obviously, we are not in the U.S. anymore and a donut from Krispy Kreme is worth the wait. We had a grapefruit filling donut that was really good. Much better than Mister Donuts, but not quite up to Dunkin Donuts level.

Here's our New Sunroute hotel room in Shinjuku. Erik was flat against the wall when he took this picture. I tried to get out of the way, but still managed to be in the picture! It was not a planned shot, although it looks it. There were pajamas folded neatly on the bed and every amenity you would need except for a change of clothes.

Hamariku Garden

Hamarikyu Garden

We (Erik, Marie, and I) took a 45 minute boat ride along the Sumida River.

Erik and I love sushi. At kaiten sushi the sushi is on a conveyor belt.

Sushi chefs stand in the middle of the U-shaped conveyor belt and prepare the food.

If you are easily offended, don't look too closely at the wording on this girl's dress. I wonder how much it costs? Anyway, we see English like this on clothing more often than we'd like.

While we're on the topic of interesting use of English...I thought this was funny. I hate when people ride loads. Maybe I should put this sign on my fish tank. Please very stop it now!

Somehow, with all the fashion displays and shops in Harajuku we only came home with this Nudy Boy picture. Who had the camera? Not me!

Sony Building

This is the Sony Building in the Ginza area. I "borrowed" this picture because I didn't have a good one of the outside of the building.

I took a picture of a picture of us at the Sony Center in the Ginza area. The center showed off its lcd tvs by displaying aquarium fish. It felt just like walking through a real aquarium.

The Sony Rolly amused this little girl. It's basically a dancing MP3 player. Here's a link to see what it does: http://jp.youtube.com/watch?v=2ITLzs9k4j4 Deepest apologies if you don't like Ricky Martin.

Kids lined up to design their own turtle and add a personal message. After you picked out the colors, your turtle would swim by on the screens and then show the message you typed.

Of course, I got in line too. Like my turtle? I don't know why it put my name at the top, though.

View of a Ginza street corner from a sandwich shop. Oh, and Marie.

For our anniversary dinner we decided to eat at a yakiniku place. The meat was so good. The business guys in the background are sitting on the floor, but we chose a table.We also steered clear of anything that resembled innards.

We were able to go to the top floor of this office building and get a 360 degree view of the city for free. The 3 pictures below are shots from there.