Tasmania to Tokyo – Tokyo – Day 69 can be found here.
One downside of planning a trip almost a year in advance – there are times when you are genuinely surprised to discover what you booked.
Like this morning – when we checked the agenda to see that our Context Travel Tokyo Pop Culture Tour for Kids includes visits to the Pokemon store, capsule shops, arcade and the Animate Building. Oh, and maybe a pet café – time permitting.
There are perhaps some second thoughts at this point, as we have already visited capsule shops and arcades. But it can’t all be temples and torii – so off we go.
We attempt to escape the buffet orbit by returning to Coffee Kan this morning – except it’s closed:
We check Google Maps, and it doesn’t open until 10 am. What kind of coffee shop doesn’t open til 10 am? Especially one that heavily advertises pancakes?
So it’s another buffet breakfast for us this morning. We have officially been won over by the convenience factor, the range of foods available, and the anti-scurvy potential of bottomless strawberries. But who are we kidding, it’s the eggs and sausages that keep us coming back for more:
The tour is in the Ikebukuru district, which is something of a hike – almost a 40 minute cab ride. This is perhaps the one instance where we would have been better taking the subway. But we didn’t, so no use crying over extra cab fare.
We’d been texting our guide Nadia for a few weeks as we’d discussed various pet café options. The animal welfare records of many of them are suspect, so we prioritize those without nocturnal animals and those with an established track record of treating their animals properly.
We arrive 10 minutes early, and Nadia is already waiting for us. But she has some terrible news – a woman was tragically stabbed to death in the Pokemon store of the Sunshine Building the night before. She asks that we consider visiting a different toy store.
We immediately agree, grateful that we were not present when this horrible crime took place. We later find out the police are still on the scene so that was definitely off the table and that it was a murder-suicide by her former-partner and current stalker. Such a senseless act of violence.
We do our best to carry on with the tour, and Nadia directs us to a shop that is absolutely rama-jammed with toys and candy.
The adults are particularly keen on the novel Kit Kat flavours
It’s hard to imagine any shop having more than this. It’s quite enough for our needs, and the kids really enjoy getting the chance to pick up some exotic treats:
From here, we head further upstairs to where we can find the toys:
One of the challenges with manga and anime is that some of it can be quite explicit, so we’re grateful to have a guide here – I’m not sure we would have felt comfortable heading into these shops, and we certainly wouldn’t have climbed up to the fourth or fifth floor in pursuit of a particular kind of toy or candy.
We also find some kanji keychains with our kids names on them. Our son seems to translate “blessings from soil from a long time” while our daughter’s is “blessings from soil but you have to hold a dagger for a long time.” We pick these up, as well as some new stuffies.
Sadly, the line of stuffies that features cats being eaten by sea creatures is not among those selected
From here we head through the Ikebukuru district:
Until we reach the capsule store and arcade.
Again, this is another spot where we would not have ventured inside without a guide. The bottom floor is filled with Gachapon machines and claw games – the kids focus on the guaranteed-win of the Gachapon as opposed to the highly speculative claw games, thankfully.
Even though the adults are morbidly curious to find out what would happen if we won a giant ball filled with candy:
Then up to the arcade.
It’s fascinating to see some uniquely Japanese games like this drumming simulator:
And some Japanese takes on classic games, like a multi-puck version of air hockey:
Meanwhile, Nadia notes that the pressures on kids in Japan are similar to those faced by kids in South Korea. Many will study for 10 to 12 hours, then have a brief respite at an arcade before going to bed and doing it all over again.
From here we head to the Animate building, which is full of comic books and manga.
This is where we were most concerned about running into inappropriate material for the kids but again Nadia is steering us in the right direction. (In truth, most of the Ikebukuru district has family friendly material. Nadia explains that in recent years this area has been reclaimed by women and teens and the middle-aged men with questionable interests have been shunted over a few blocks).
Photo Credit: Animate Japan
We notice that many Japanese students seem to wear their uniform even when not in school. Nadia notes that many have extra-curricular activities where they are still required to wear their uniform, and it’s also an easy option for when they aren’t sure what to wear. (It would also limit the extent to which peers might judge their clothing, too.)
There’s little here in the way of English material at the Animate Building, but our daughter picks up a copy of one of the Spy Family books as a souvenir – and to enjoy the art.
It’s also a fun place to go people watching, as there is a great deal of cosplay amongst the customers – when fans dress up like their favourite characters.
We’re just about at the end of the two-hour tour, but Nadia kindly walks us over to the Mocha Cat Café. Unfortunately, our daughter is too young to go inside – so we head out to lunch at a nearby ramen shop:
It’s good, but not as good as our meal at Kyushu Jangara.
We then head to the Dog Café Rio:
Photo Credit: Dog Cafe Rio
The café essentially functions as a place where dogs can be socialized, and then eventually adopted out once they are older.
You can buy a package, or you can be charged in 10 minute increments. We don’t have long to stay if we hope to make it out to the Meiji Jingu Shinto shrine later today, so we opt for the a la carte option as well as a small snack bowl of roasted chicken, banana chips, and some sort of paste.
Today’s dog roster:
We are immediately swarmed with puppies:
Eventually we figure out an orderly system in which to feed and pet these adorable doggos:
You aren’t allowed to pick up the dogs, but it’s okay if they climb onto your lap of their own accord.
Dogs with food allergies are marked with a yellow bandana, while the ones on a diet are marked with a red bandana:
“I resemble that remark…”
Time passes quickly. One last pat for this adorable shiba inu:
And then we head out. Now that we’ve been to this year, we would feel perfectly comfortable doing this on our own – but so glad that we had a guide for this initial foray.
We walk through the mostly-pedestrian area to a busier road and page another taxi.
For those interested, I’d like to document the process on the Go app – once you enter your pick-up point and intended destination you are given a choice of vehicles:
We are given a complimentary upgrade to a premium van, though that means we have to wait a while before it picks us up:
And the side:
Plenty of room inside:
And lots of legroom too:
There are many different access points for Meiji Jingu, so our driver asks which one we would prefer. Our son has done some research, and asks for the one with the main torii.
Unfortunately, traffic has slowed to a crawl – so it takes a while to get out there.
But we are dropped at exactly the right place.
Some words of wisdom from the official Meiji Jingu website:
“Meiji Jingu is one of the Shinto shrines in Japan, with the vast land of the forest (70 hectares), located in the middle of the megacity, Tokyo. Once you step into this precinct, you will forget that you are in the hustle bustle city, and will find Japanese traditional scene amidst greenery nature. It was established in 1920, to commemorate the virtue of Emperor Meiji and Empress Shoken who took the initiative to make a foundation of modernized Japan.”
We see sake barrels stacked outside as we saw at Sumiyoshi Taisha in Osaka:
The forest is particularly stunning – lush and towering overtop the pathway.
We follow the pathway toward the shrine, spotting more torii as we go:
And soon the buildings come into view:
It’s a beautiful place – a true oasis in the heart of Tokyo, once you disentangle yourself from the crowds:
There are also prayers and wishes hung with care from locals and visitors alike:
Photography is not permitted for those who are actively praying or making offering, so we just take a moment to take it all in.
Then we continue on our way:
We don’t have a tremendous amount of time – the visit is short, but sweet.
And soon we’re paging another taxi. We put in the call shortly before we leave the park in the hope that we won’t wait as long – and of course there is one immediately available and we dash to catch up.
This driver – Takashi – is excellent, and he has phenomenal English. We chat about our journey from Sydney through to Tokyo, and he recommends we consider visiting Toyama and Kanazawa for seafood during a subsequent trip.
We get Takashi’s card before we leave. I don’t think he’d want us to post his information publicly, but please reach out if you’d like his e-mail address. He is available for driving tours and I suspect would also be available for airport pickups.
Back up to the hotel where I finally get some photos of my own:
But not many, as I prefer not to photograph people without their permission – particularly within a semi-private space like a hotel lobby.
We’ve actually made it back to the room faster than expected, which gives us a few minutes to catch our breath before we head out to Teppanyaki Takumi for dinner.
A big thank you to the mesm concierge for arranging this – we had attempted to make the booking online, but they would not allow online bookings for groups of four. Mesm handled all the arrangements then e-mailed us the next day with our confirmation.
For those not familiar with it, teppanyaki restaurants cook high quality meats like lobster and wagyu beef on a large, flat-iron grill called a teppan. The chefs typically cook directly in front of the guests, and it can involve fast-paced theatrics – but not always.
There is also a teppanyaki restaurant at the mesm as well, but reviews were mixed so we opted for Teppanyaki Takumi at the Intercontinental instead.
We spent quite a bit of time staring at the menu trying to figure out what to order – eventually we decide to order a la carte so that we can try all four different types of beef –loin, tenderloin, Miyazaki, and Kobe.
Going clockwise from the upper left – tenderloin, loin, Miyazaki, and Kobe
This particular Miyazaki is a special type of beef specifically prepared for Teppanyaki Takumi.
My wife and I also start with a yuzu fizz, while the kids have some sort of fizzy strawberry beverage:
The chef carefully seasons the steak and serves it up in small pieces. There’s limited theatre compared to some of the teppanyaki restaurants I visited when I was younger, but the focus here is understandably on the exceptional quality of the beef.
There are also a range of toppings including sesame paste, a soy jelly and – I think – a garlic paste. The seasons including regular salt, green tea, and ginger. Lastly, there is a tray with soy and wasabi.
We sample each of the meats in turn – the wagyu-style beef is excellent, but ultimately we like the loin and tenderloin most of all.
We also split two orders of fried rice. The chef uses the juices from the steak to fry up the rice – along with spring onions. Even the non-rice-eaters amongst us eat every last bite.
We started with 400 grams of steak between the four of us, but that isn’t quite enough – so we order another round of the loin and the tenderloin.
At that point we are nicely full, but not stuffed.
The total dinner cost for all four of us works out to roughly USD$700, which includes a mandatory 15% service charge. It’s not cheap, but worth it for a truly delicious meal and a memorable experience.
From here we once more return to the Coffee Kan shop to pick up some ice cream – just vanilla this time.
And the adults pick up one last bottle of wine to take back to the room so we can enjoy this fantastic view:
Mesm has a lounge on the 25th floor, and we never even made it there. Maybe next time.
We don’t want to stay up too late tonight, as we have a busy day tomorrow – we will be bidding jaa ne* to Tokyo and boarding the bullet train (shinkansen) to Kyoto.
*As I learned by sitting too close to the Japanese language classes on the Silver Moon, sayonara implies you will never see someone again.