I twiddled my thumbs somewhat successfully in the capsule until it was time for us to catch the very crowded (and quiet!) morning train from Narita airport to central Tokyo. We nabbed breakfast at 7-Eleven (my most favorite international convenience store chain, for it has saved me from utter starvation and sorrow multiple times over) before joining a bike tour of Tokyo with Soshi as our guide. Japanese cities are very bicycle friendly, and we enjoyed sightseeing throughout Tokyo’s main and side streets.

Everything was going along swimmingly until we biked through the lovely Hibiya Park and Jess was enamored with the Japanese maples and grey herons. By the time I looked up from the heron, the entire bicycle group was gone. Nancy and I frantically pedaled through the park to no avail. After a phone call and a new meeting point, our guide Soshi came back to fetch us, appearing relieved to have his bicycles returned, if not to have avoided an increased headcount of tourists lost on his watch.

After vegan ramen with our new bike tour friends, we managed to drag our jet-lagged bodies back to the capsule hotel for a 4pm power nap (late afternoon naps are always a mistake) before a very inefficient planning session of the next day’s itinerary. Brains don’t work well at 3 am at home or abroad, it seems. 

I braved the rain on Sabbath morning to join the English-speaking service at Tokyo International Adventist Church. I was welcomed warmly, a lovely contrast to my cold, damp feet. After a group lunch, I joined Nancy in an upstairs cafe to watch pedestrians wrestle their umbrellas against the wind and rain, feeling minimal guilt at doing so as we had also suffered our own broken umbrella insult earlier that day.

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Saturday evening was spent squashing our food with our feet and struggling to eat it with chopsticks. ☺️

We met Makaso and Duc for a lesson in making udon noodles and tamagoyaki, a Japanese rolled omelet, near Asakusa – which for the learned traveler is NOT the same as the across-town Akasaka, though Nancy and I didn’t figure that out until day 3 of 3. Udon is traditionally kneaded by foot, so we placed our dough in plastic bags and got to stepping. We then took turns cracking eggs (one of us cracked the egg onto the table) and mixing them with salt, sugar, miso paste, and green onions before pouring the mixture into a rectangular pan in thin layers, rolling the omelet using chopsticks and a lot of grunting and grimacing. A few “chants” of ichi, ni, san on each side to square it up before removing it to a plate (with chopsticks again! I’ll be thankful to return to my spatula at home) to enjoy our appetizer. 

Poor Makaso was kept running by our inept attempts at tempura-battering vegetables, managing the deep frying of shrimp (I cannot lift a shrimp with chopsticks, no I cannot), and boiling our rolled and sliced udon noodles of various thicknesses and lengths. We finally slurped our udon Japanese style (with chopsticks) before being sent on our way with gifts of calligraphy by a master calligrapher.

Bellies full and eyelids heavy, we crashed for the night, dreaming of rainy days and noodles. 

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Our third and final day in Tokyo started with a stroll to the New Otani Hotel to bask in their gardens before heading to the Shibuya shopping district for some souvenir shopping. I survived a visit to the Nintendo store and the Mega Don Quijote discount shop – heaven forbid you bend down to look at a lower shelf, or you might be trampled – and then delighted in a visit to the Hands department store: seven stories of every consumer item you can imagine. Floors dedicated to stationery, luggage, kitchen supplies, botanicals, crafts, scrapbooking, sewing… there was even a pet store. I don’t like shopping, but I sure liked Hands. If you get a gift from me, it was likely purchased at Hands. 

We dropped off our purchases at the capsule hotel (a clandestine locker drop during off-hours – don’t tell) and headed into the fray of the Sanja festival in Asakusa, an annual Senso-ji temple celebration involving clans of happi-clad worshippers hefting shrines on their shoulders and bouncing them through the streets with shouts and clapping.

Finding a pickle on a stick and some deep-fried cheese wrappers helped quell my fight-or-flight prey response just enough to avoid darting into traffic. We finally escaped to a riverside park to await sunset and a view of Tokyo at night from the SkyTower, an ear-popping elevator ride to 350 meters and a 360 degree view of the metropolis. Keeping with the theme of tall things, we took a detour to visit the indulgently-lit Tokyo Tower on our way back to Akasaka (not Asakusa).

Thanks for having us, Tokyo!