Tokyo Drifting 3: Fleeing Sumida

CameraZOOM-20120612123724889_orig_1_Salomon.jpg, a photo by gkhamilton on Flickr.

The Tokyo tokkyū limited express train is a splurge. Good thing I’m made out of Yen, right?


At last… I present the breathless (for me, anyway) final hours of last month’s quick trip to Tokyo. Will this live up to the melodramatic teaser ending from my previous Tokyo Drifting 2: Senso-ji Temple post? Let’s pretend it will.



A friend from the journey recommended that I seek a peaceful contrast to my previous evening of Tokyo nightlife craziness. Sumida Park fit the bill.

In about four hours, my flight home to Portland would depart from Narita airport. Being mindful of the time, I followed up my tour of Senso-ji Temple with a walk down to the Sumida River. The nature park that stretched alongside the river banks would be a relaxing place to unwind before beginning my train connections to the airport.



A young Japanese gal rode up to me on her bicycle as I gazed at the flowers growing along the footpaths of Sumida Park. She must have assumed I was interested in the bike-friendly aspects of the area. We walked over to the specialized bicycle tire grooves carved into the stairway of a nearby underpass, and she enthusiastically demonstrated for me the ways of a seasoned recreational bicycler.


At some point, it finally dawned on me how long I had been standing there, struggling to understand her. In less than 10 minutes, my train was scheduled to depart from Asakusa Station. The problem: Ever since I left my capsule/hostel that morning, I had been walking AWAY from the direction of the train station.

I abruptly excused myself and began to run as though my life (or at least my job back home at Delta Airlines) depended on it. The beautiful scenery of the park blurred past as I frantically sprinted through it for several minutes. No way would I catch that train.



I leaped down the stairs of Asakusa station, clutching my small backpack and gasping for air. There was still time to catch a number of local trains to my next stop, but I had blown my connections to Narita airport. Painfully resisting my budget backpacker traveling sensibilities, I slapped down the big Yen at the kippu jidō hanbaiki kiosk to purchase a premium express train ticket, direct to Narita Airport.

The tokkyū limited express train [photo at top] sped to Narita Airport in just under an hour, which put me back on schedule.


My friend Kevin, flying home on standby from the Philippines, was waiting at the airport gate when I checked in for the nearly full flight. His boarding priority dwarfed mine. Despite shrewdly (or foolishly) using one of my S-3 low priority seating requests I was assigned one of the last seats in the Business Elite cabin before the flight doors closed, with Kevin and I onboard.

After nearly 3 days overseas with virtually no sleep, I flew home from Tokyo in Delta's Business Elite cabin. Somehow the traditional Japanese meal course that I ordered on the flight home managed to be even better (Fresher ingredients from Japan? More irradiated?) than the one I ate on the flight over to Tokyo.

With a belly full of French caviar, crab, scallop quenelle, grilled chicken, cod roe, wasabi tofu, and marinated tuna… I slept.


Bonus pic:
On Kathy's birthday, Lena plays with the Japanese toy I bought for her in Tokyo’s Nakamise-dori street fair. I hope that Lena will come along with me for my next visit to Asia this year.


Lena can pick out her own souvenir toy next time!

Tokyo Drifting, Part 1

CameraZOOM-20120611215548260_Hagrid.jpg, a photo by gkhamilton on Flickr.

The 2,080 foot high Tokyo Skytree in Sumida, Japan’s tallest tower and the 2nd tallest structure in the world, was just opened to the public in May. The Azuma bridge stretches across the Sumida river in the foreground.

From last month’s Tokyo travelogue:


The late night scene is frenetically colorful here in Tokyo, even on a weeknight. I was out WAY too long last night, but no regrets! I’m finishing up this blog entry from the hallway outside my capsule bed in the Hostel Kawase Tokyo and Capsule. Checkout is any time now, so I’ll be brief. Check back soon for the pics that I’ll upload from the U.S. when I fly home [Photos added 7/3/12].


Here’s how it all began:


Anyone quick enough to catch my earlier “Sumo Pipe Dream” blog post (on another platform, before I took it down) knows about my trashed plans to catch the Sumo wrestling championships here in Tokyo a couple weeks back. Basically, I left church on that Sunday morning too late to catch my flight from Portland to Tokyo.

This time around, I took matters into my own hands. Immediately before I flew out yesterday morning, I worked late at Delta and then stayed awake until sunrise to preach at Aloha Church of God for Pastor Tim (on Sabbatical for the month of June). Since I planned the worship service, missing another flight due to a church service that ran into overtime… would’ve left me with no one to blame but myself. Clever, eh?

The nine hour flight to Tokyo in Delta’s Business Elite cabin would have been the perfect opportunity to make up for more than a week’s worth of extreme sleep deprivation… if only the food, service, and comfort weren’t so extravagant!


 I landed in Japan at Tokyo’s Narita airport/train station with nothing but a small backpack and my 7” Samsung Galaxy Tab containing a few Tokyo club listings that I had downloaded before my plane departed from Portland.


For the entirety of the 70 minute Keisei train ride from Narita to Tokyo, my face was buried in a couple of city maps that I had snagged at the airport. I’ve visited Tokyo a few times before, but this was the first time that I had made even the slightest effort to find my way around without asking for directions.


My plan of attack for the visit was mostly developed before I even made my first connection in Aoto, off of the Keisei Main Line. I ultimately hopped off the Oshiage Line at the Asakusa district… ...and checked in at the Hostel Kawase Tokyo and Capsule with a Fistful of Yen-- if you didn’t get that reference, then you are a much better person that I am.


Would I find any unsuspecting souls to join me on my quest for the best live music and dancing in Tokyo? Not yet. It was early evening, and my hostel was still a ghost town.

Stalling, I killed an hour or two roaming the streets of Asakusa.My first act was to get booted out of a poorly visible, deep underground restaurant [Photo removed] that I discovered off the main strip. Apparently, they only cater to the menacing looking, well dressed Yakuza gangster crowd. 


I kid. Please refrain from marking me for death.


 
The more mainstream Japanese diner Watami accepted me with open arms and served up a steaming dish of extra spicy goodness, by request. The only thing missing from the menu, or from most of the neighborhood for that matter, was a single word of English.


Back at the hostel, I ran into a couple of college guys from SoCal (whom shall remain faceless and nameless, for the sake of their relationships back in the States- I feel so dirty now). I convinced them that heading out beats hanging out. They were less enthusiastic about the Japanese reggae/funk band that I planned to see, so we compromised and started talking non-live venues. I whipped out my nightlife breakdown from the train ride into Tokyo, and we narrowed our options down to a few of the most popular clubs.

The nightlife dense Shibuya district was a straight shot from a nearby train station. The unmarked, well hidden club would have been nearly impossible to find without my directions and my friends’ GPS iDevice thingy. The floor was packed solid, though, with a diverse crowd bouncing along to beats from an allegedly internationally famous DJ with an unpronounceable stage name.

Much later, we all parted ways (with different, ahem, opinions about an appropriate ending to a non-single guy’s night out in Tokyo) way too late for me to catch the last train back to Asakusa. As usual, I improvised.

I have yet to see either of those guys return to their capsule beds this morning.