tokyo: day 6

you're not allowed to talk on the phone while on a train. it's almost always completely quiet and people either do non-vocal things on their phones or sleep.

we went to ueno park where there are a lot of museums. we went to a couple, but their names escape me. one wasn't very impressive, but was free. the other was maybe the tokyo museum of western art, which was ok. this big sphere was outside of the free one.


yep, a kimono.

i was surprised to see, not the adult movie theater, but the poster on the marquis showing full on breasts. they are more open with sexuality than i thought.

i can't figure out why these wooden contraptions are on the backs of the scooters. i would like to assume they are for carrying food, but i just don't know.

market area next to ueno station.

pachinko...japanese gambling.

it would be impossible for me to go in one of these, as the music/noise coming from the machines was deafening loud even on the street and people just sit in them and chain smoke all day.

found a lucha libre mask in ueno.

when we got in that night, his host mother was practicing her biwa. i asked if she would play for me and she did. it was a 10 minute piece that she was rehearsing for a performance that involved singing and playing. i didn't have enough memory on my camera or i would have recorded it. also she wouldn't let me take a photo because she wasn't wearing any makeup.

she's the one on the right in the bottom photo. you know you like photos of photos. the top right is their family name i believe. i'm not really sure why she wrote it.

tokyo: day 5

view of the machida suburbs from the second floor of the house.

the kids in japan wear some awesome school uniforms. almost all of the elementary age ones wear yellow hats.

this middle schooler was representing to the fullest.

we were getting ready to go to mount fuji, when mike and julia realized they had their departure date wrong and their plane left in an hour and a half. it's a two hour drive. the host father said "there's no way you'll make it if you take the bus. i'll drive." they made it in time. what a fantastic guy.

jeremy and i now had the day free to do as we wanted. we decided to go to sengakuji temple. it is the location of the '47 ronin' graveyard. the story goes something like this: two lords got in a fight. the attacker was sentenced to commit seppuku, the ritualistic suicide. (usually both would be sentenced, i'm not sure why only one was in this situation.) a year and a half later the 47 samurai followers of the lord that had to commit seppuku, succeeded in avenging their lord and killing the other. they carried his severed head to sengakuji, where they were sentenced to commit seppuku.

this is the leader of the 47 ronin.


sengakuji temple.




there were a lot of graves that we didn't have access to, as it was after hours.



i believe this was the lord's grave.

this was an elevated area. the bulk of the ronin are underneath this as far as i know.




tokyo tower again.

thursday night. 10:30 pm. standing room only.

tokyo: day 4

stayed in the machida suburbs this day. the host father said he was going to take us to a park close by and we ended up at the squirrel zoo. yeah, it was pretty damn rad.






for some reason this squirrel house reminds me of chris johnson.

i was a little weary when this guy jumped on me because he definitely has the zombie in him.



then there are the smaller cages that you can't walk around in.



we did end up at the park.













these coi were huge. way bigger than i expected. there are dark brown/grey ones, orange ones and white ones. the lighter ones are the most valued.



the sign said that this was an edo era house. the edo period lasted the majority of the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries.

it was nice seeing the way nature was taking back over here.







this night we stayed in and made tacos for the host family to say thanks.