Hungry in Tokyo
Michela Fiorido [Sports Bureau Chief]
Shibuya – One of the most popular parts of Tokyo, this is the main shopping district. There are tons of people, lots of cool shops, and lots of life. There are so many things to look at that you don’t even know what to do with yourself. It’s a complete sensory overload, but is something that everyone should experience firsthand.
Clubbing in Tokyo – I have never seen so many clubs in one place, every block of signage is a club and there’s usually one or two on each floor all the way up buildings to the top levels. In one hour of clubbing in Tokyo in the famous Roppongi district, I entered an oxygen-bar club, a reggae club, a “gaspanic” club where they supposedly fill the air with laughing gas, several karaoke clubs, a graffiti themed club, several mysterious “massage parlours” (accidentally, it’s not like I can read Japanese!), several strip clubs (accidental again, I swear!), business-like clubs were I was grotesquely out of place, and many many others. It was pretty fun because, since I can’t read Japanese, every door to these clubs that I knocked on was a wild shot in the dark. Sometimes you got a normal fun club, other times a naked Japanese girl wearing a Sailor Moon Mask would open the door, I suppose it’s just the luck of the draw…
Fake Food – So I really could not have lasted a day longer in Tokyo as I would of died of starvation. Sure there’s the sushi and sashimi which is amazing, however it’s also super expensive so I had to opt for cheaper meals. About 99 per cent of the places to eat in Tokyo had fake food on display in the window. Every dish on their menu was displayed and for some reason I found it repulsive. Sometimes they would cook the dishes and have them on display, festering throughout the whole day. You can even buy fake food from stores. They don’t really have grocery stores or anything there either. At one point I calculated that I hadn’t eaten in 32 hours. I just couldn’t. Except for the sushi, I found the food to be really over-processed… like this weird hot dog preserved in a vending machine that comes out hot and has a drizzle of fake cheese squiggled on it. At one point I found a place that sold donuts and got really excited because I could finally eat. I bit into the sugar-coated donut and wretched as, to my dismay, there was a black bean mixure inside. Who puts black beans in a donut? Tokyoites, I suppose.
SARS Masks – My dad and I tried to blend in with the purchase of our very own SARS masks. In Tokyo it’s apparently the cool thing to do. I really don’t know why many people in Tokyo still opt to wear them, wasn’t the epidemic over quite some time ago? It’s not like they do much anyways, it’s pretty much just a filter. They probably do more harm than good in that you’re breathing in the same stale air all the time. In Tokyo they even have colourful decorated masks, name brand masks, and mask carrying cases… I’m telling you it’s big business.
Sensoji Temple – One of the major temples in Tokyo and in all of Japan. It was fun to see the Buddha statues, the cherry blossoms, and the temple itself.