A Few Days in Tokyo!

This is one of my favorite photos taken at gaijin park.

On Martin Luther King weekend we headed to the beautiful New Sanno Hotel with the kids. One of my New Year's resolutions was that we assertively explore Japan, even though it is very hard to get around. So we decided to explore mid-town Tokyo and the surrounding areas. Yes, we were ready and everyone was going to be happy doing it, (Berni this was the time that I was talking about).

We arrived and had a family room the first night, needed to switch to a king suite the second night and move back to a family room the third night. No problem with room switching, I was going to be optimistic, what's a little moving around.

We explored the area once we arrived and found that the bagel shop was now a chocolatier. We will miss the delicious bagels, but we will all take chocolate over bagels any day.

We bought delicious bread from the bread shop, test drove a Lamborghini at the dealership, just kidding. Why anybody would buy a Lamborghini in Japan when 40mph is about the fastest you can go, maybe it is just an accessory for some mid-life crisis dudes.

We went back to the hotel and checked in to our room, took the kids swimming and dined at the Wellington, the food was amazing, but it was a lot of food. We finished the evening with chocolate truffles. Of course what is a vacation without a few hands of Phase 10. I take the 5th on who won.

That evening we bought a Fromer's Japan, maps of Tokyo and a very detailed Japanese Dictionary. I was determined to find some kid friendly activities in Tokyo. Well we discovered that the Meiju Shrine was an hour away by train, pretty much everything was an hour away by train, including Disneyland, plus if you did not buy your entrance tickets to Disney before hand you may have to buy your tickets and wait outside the gate until people exit, if it is a busy day. It was Saturday so we decided to sidebar this. After 2 hours of looking through Fromar's we found nothing that was kid friendly with the exception of a large park. We decided to walk to Roppongi, eat lunch at Hard Rock Cafe, walk to the American Embassy, do some shopping at Jane's Pearls (good deals), do some more shopping. Go to the park, swimming and dinner in the room for the kids and then a romantic dinner at the Teppanyaki Restaurant in the Hotel. This was the plan grasshopper. For those of you living in Japan you know that one must be flexible.

We were out for about an hour and Anika and Zander started fighting about everything, who was going to be in the front of the stroller, etc... John and I put ourselves in a mental place far, far away, so did Lexi. They eventually fell asleep at 11:00 in the morning, not a good sign. We were on our way to visit our American Embassy, how exciting is that kids:) John and I were looking forward to it, Lexi was on the fence. We were almost there and then encountered a "roadblock" Our map showed that the street clearly went all the way to the embassy, but failed to show the 10,000 steps that needed climbing, surely there must be something for strollers. Nope! " That's okay, we'll just go back to the last light, cross the street and walk up the other side." Miss Optimistic stated. BTW you couldn't just cross, because there were subways and barriers, etc.....

Hardrock Cafe burgers around $25-$27.

Well no problem, let's go eat. I have never been to a Hard Rock and I was looking forward to a juicy American hamburger. For weeks we had been looking forward to American hamburgers and fries. We got to Hard Rock and it was empty, at 12:00, strange. They had the menu posted outside with pictures of delicious hamburgers and steaks. Wait a minute! does that show 1850 yen for a plain hamburger, that can't be. Yes, it was true, if we wanted our delicious, juicy, American, hamburger we would pay the price, the price of approximately$25-$27, for a hamburger. Wow, I hope it came with fries. Even if we had the income of Bill Gates, I would not pay that for a hamburger, it is the point. We headed to TGI Friday's where we had dined before and knew it was somewhat reasonable. I had half of a grilled chicken salad, not my fattening hamburger that I was looking forward to, oh well. We had a nice lunch.

It was melt down time after lunch (can you see it in Zander's eyes?) so we bypassed Jane's Pearl's and any other shopping for that matter, purely for the sake of our sanity and those surrounding us.

A $43 flower basket of pansies.

We found our park which was by the German Embassy, sniff, sniff, how we miss Germany. The park was beautiful with a lake and ducks and plenty of playground equipment to keep any 2, 3 and 10 year old occupied. I named the park "Gaijin Park", gaijin meaning foreigner in Kanji, that is what the Japanese call us. We were in the embassy area so we had children and parents from all over the world around us, it was a nice experience. Afterwards we treated the kids to some ice cream and lo and behold, there was a haunchen man, aka chicken man, prevalent in Germany. Our jaws dropped at the price of a roasted chicken, $27.00, anyone???? The chickens in Germany were about $6.00. BTW these were not Jurassic chickens, just small, normal everyday chickens, they didn't have gold rings on their feet. I also took a picture of the flowers for sale. I don't want to sound like a miser, but I am just trying to point out the cost of living difference, which is definitely not made up by the COLA placed in our paycheck.

Above the $27 rotisserie chicken and a $7 potato. Anika and Lexi enjoying there ice cream.

Our experience in Japan has been very interesting and we wouldn't trade our experiences and our stay here for the world, well, maybe Germany. Through my blogs I am trying to convey what it's like here, reality. The Japanese people are the kindest, nicest, giving people I have ever come across. Doors are opened by staff when you enter a department store and no matter which store you go to, whether it is the dollar store or a high end department store you will always be greeted by EVERY employee, even if they are stocking the shelf. Customer service is key in Japan. On the flip side most day trips turn into 12-17 hours long, traffic is horrible and the roadways are incompatible with the size of the population in Japan.

A view from our hotel room of the Tokyo Tower at night. The Tower from Roppongi.