Day 15 Still More Shopping Left in Us

Shopping, Food, and the Ginza

We started off by walking the short distance into the Ginza area where there is fabulous shopping. In Japan department stores are real shopping havens. They have the best designers and fabulous service. In addition, usually the basement is a food court selling the priciest and finest food Japan has to offer. Everything from fresh fruit, lots of sweets, meats, prepared food, imported food, etc. It is fun to just walk through.

There was also an Apple Store I visited. Courtney and Ferris were leaving at 11:30 for the airport so we decided to hustle on back to give them a double wave (Both hands waive at the same time – very Japanese). We went to lots of stores in the Ginza area. It is We saw them off then went to the Hotel to meet a friend of our Aunt Pearl. Aunt Pearl lives in Santa Barbara and had taught English to Kimiyo. She is a professor who is married to a doctor. They live in Tokyo, but spent a summer in SB. Kimiyo feels like Pearl is like a grandmother to her daughter. Kimiyo had arranged for lunch at the Conrad Hotel which is near the hotel we are staying at. It is a very elegant hotel and the Japanese dinning room had a spectacular view from the 28th floor. It was a very good visit, we really enjoyed our time with her. We hope to reciprocate when she returns to California.

From there we took the subway to the Blue and White Store. On a previous visit I had them make a shirt for me that I really like. In Japan it is sometimes hard for me to find shirts that fit. I found one at B&W, I was lucky.

We then eventually returned to the hotel in preparation for dinner. We went back for a third time to Kiraku. But this time we ate at another restaurant they have that is 2 doors away. It was very good, it specializes in Sushi and Tempura. We traveled this time both by Subway. We can even do it after 3 bowls of sake. We are getting pretty good at navigating the Tokyo Subway System. We are ready to leave for home, yet we have one more day to maximize. Maybe we can have some new adventures.

The view is from the dinning room at the Conrad Hotel. The pictures on the subway show two characteristics. The woman next to Cathy fell asleep on Cathy’s shoulder during the ride. It is very common experience for people to doze off on the subway, they work so hard. The two guys are text messaging on the subway. The Japanese communications infrastructure is far better than in America. You are not allowed to talk on cell phone in the subway, but you can text message and everyone has their cell phone and is doing it. The Japanese do not have cell phone cases attached to their belts. They place the cell phone in their pocket and each cell phone has a string with ornaments attached to it that they grab to pull the phone out of their pocket. Everywhere you go in Japan they are selling the stings.