Hey! Shanelle here! Guess where I went this past weekend! It’s the major city that everyone knows, the capital of Japan. If you guessed Tokyo, then you’re absolutely right! Last week, we had a long weekend – 4 whole days – so my friends and I decided to take that opportunity and spend some time in Tokyo! Although it may sound strange, I didn’t think I would’ve been able to travel to Tokyo during my time here in Japan. While Japan is significantly smaller in width when compared to the US, its length is close to America’s length. This means that in order for me to travel to Tokyo (i.e. central Japan) from Kansai (i.e. southern Japan), I would need to take the shinkansen (i.e. bullet train) for more than 3 hours! Once I discovered the amount of time it would take and the price to go there and back, I realized that a short weekend trip of 2 days would not be worth it; therefore, I denounced the thought of going to Tokyo. However, when I heard that we were getting a 4-day long weekend from school, I saw an opportunity to revisit the Tokyo idea, and I took it. So today, I would like to share about my thoughts and experiences when I travelled to Japan’s capital!
While in Tokyo I visited many of the tourist areas. For example, I went to Shibuya 109, a large shopping mall, Shibuya crossing, the busiest pedestrian crossing in the world, and Harajuku, the cutesy fashion district. I thoroughly enjoyed my time in these areas; however, my favorite places during this trip was the Tsukiji fish market and the Tokyo Skytree. The Tsukiji fish market is a food market that opens to the public from about 10am to 2pm six days a week. In the early morning, fish fresh from the ocean are sold and used by the vendors in the area to make seafood dishes to sell to their customers. They have just about any kind of seafood that you could think of – eel, whole squids, baby octopuses, sea urchins, sushi, fried seafood – you name it, they have it. I ate a lot of different dishes while I was there, and I loved every single one – I ate some of the best foods I had in Japan right there! As for the Tokyo Skytree, I absolutely loved it! I was able to witness the bustling city of Tokyo at night when I went there. The view was breathtaking! If you aren’t afraid of heights and enjoy overlooking the city, I would highly recommend you go visit there!
Something I noticed when I arrived in Tokyo that I would like to note is the difference between Kansai and Tokyo. The Kansai area in which I live is mostly residential. This means that the vast majority of people are Japanese; the only foreigners in the area are the students that go to my school. Therefore, when we went to Tokyo, we were pleasantly surprised to find that there were quite a few foreigners roaming the streets. In addition to this, the amount of people in the areas we went to was on an entirely different scale from back home in Kansai. As I said, we live in a residential area, so there isn’t much people, and I’ve lived there for so long that I just assumed the rest of Japan was the same. However, being thrust into the great sea of people that is Tokyo opened my eyes. Japan is a very diverse place, so I can’t assume that everywhere in the country will resemble the area that I’m living in right now.
Going to all of these new places and experiencing such differences while in Tokyo are things I will never forget. I had such an amazing time when I went to Tokyo; however, now that I’m back in Kansai, I feel at home. I’m not much of a city person, so while I did enjoy my time there, I think I prefer the quiet area of Kansai better. Nonetheless, Japan is such a big place, and I hope to explore more of it while I’m here!