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Over the last few days I’ve revisited a few districts, Shibuya and Akihabara, and had a great time catching up with my sister. Being in Tokyo for a week has been an amazing experience. Here are a few of my favorite things about Tokyo:

Akihabara was much more fun the second time around. My brother-in-law watches [...]

I love seeing a familiar face that looks like mine! :) I sat for about an hour at the Asahi Beer Tower (a very visible tower on the Tokyo skyline, as the “froth” on top of the building is nicknamed the golden turd) before my sister came up the escalator. She and her husband [...]

We left on the 6:21 train to Tokyo this morning, which put us in Tokyo by 7:30 am. After dropping our bags at the hotel, we walked around the outside of the Imperial Palace (a small scale Himeji Castle), before heading to Akihabara, techy shopping center of Tokyo. Nerd central! We wandered through shops and [...]

If I could skip one town from my trip so far it would be Hakone. It’s too touristy. I guess I would be more positive if Mt Fuji would have been visible today. Oh well, I took pictures of postcards instead. ;) Although the modes of transportation available with the Hakone pass are pretty cool: [...]

I woke up at 6am this morning. I love getting up early and walking around a new city. It’s so fun watching the city wake up; seeing people on their way to work, and shops opening. Not speaking the language also makes it more peaceful because words don’t register, so everything is just background [...]

Stranger Danger Rule #1: Don’t talk to strangers.
Stranger Danger Rule #2: Don’t accept candy from strangers.
Stranger Danger Rule #3: Don’t let strangers take your picture.
Well, all bets are off in Hiroshima. The town is disarmingly safe I guess. So safe that while my roomie and I were just sitting peacefully in the park, we [...]

Today was one of my favorite days so far. This morning, we took the train to Himeji to see the castle. We were told it’s the most visited castle in Japan, but thankfully it’s spring, so it wasn’t very crowded. I read in my guidebook that you can rent bicycles for free at [...]

After another day of temple roaming in Kyoto, we decided to go geisha spotting in the Gion district. We saw one almost immediately and then didn’t see any more, for the rest of the evening. I’m glad I saw ‘Memoirs of Geisha’ before coming to Japan. It made visiting the Gion District more interesting. After [...]

I love Japanese vending machines. This morning I had hot coffee, yes, hot coffee, straight out of a vending machine. And it wasn’t one of those stick the cup in and push the button kind either. It came in a can, and it was hot. In Kyoto I even found a vending machine that [...]

We arrived in Kyoto at noon, and promptly went in search of lunch. After the monastery food, I was set on pizza. Thankfully, Kyoto station is a mall and a station, so there were endless food choices that gave me a break from the culinary wonders of Japan.
The afternoon was spent visiting several temples and [...]