Friday, July 21, 2006

Tokyo (again) and fireworks in Yokohama




Another day in Tokyo. Ueno Park is where a bunch of museums and the zoo are. Its nice. I'll go back to the museums on my own. Tracy didn't seem down when I said I'd probablly spend about 5 hours in the museum looking at things. So we went to Ginza.
Ginza is the rich shopping street. If you go on a Sunday, they close off the street to all cars. Chanel, Tiffany's, and a bunch of other shit I have no idea about was there. I don't claim to know a thing about fashion. I buy clothes from REI or the internet or Old Navy sales. I don't think I'll ever buy $300 jeans from Ginza, but at least I can cross it off my list of places to see now.

After Ginza, met up with some heads from my training in Okayama. Then we randomly ran into Latrice and her friend Temperance. We were all headed to see fireworks in Yokohama. Our group managed to stay together for the train ride, then we all lost each other in a sea of Asians. Ended up with Tracy, Latrice, and Temperance. Sorry Suwen, Margie, Branda, Andy, Andy's coworker, two random guys, and the group Latrice and Temperance met with. When I stepped over the police barrier, with a policeman shouting at me, I figured you would follow.

That reminds me. If you are white and in Japan, you can use many Gaijin powers. One I call "Gaijin Ignorance". Pretend you don't know any better, and you can do stupid shit to make your life easier. Like walking in the middle o the road, hopping police baricades, eating while you walk down the street (the Japanese don't do this I guess), etc...

Fireworks shows in Japan last like 2 hours and go really slow. Kinda lame. This one had advertisements for NTT (telephone company) every 2 minutes. Anyways, I want a Kimono. Everyone at festivals wears them. The male ones are kinda funky fresh. I saw some cheap ones for sale in Kawagoe. Like $10. You can easily spend $200 for a normal Kimono. "Real" ones are more like $5000. At the shopping malls. I don't even want to know what the real deal off somewhere serious would cost. Like at Ginza.

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