Tokyo

Nightlights A huge computer store

We have spent about a week around the greater Tokyo area catching up with a few friends and seeing the sights. Have had a couple of expeditions into the city centre and so far have managed to avoid the large crowds. There are 28 million people living in the mteropolitan area and of course it`s the largest city in the world.


Yesterday was cold and wet so we decided to go to the science museum - we needed to take a commuter train, then the subway and then another urban transport system to reach the museum in the Tokyo port area. with our previous experiences of large metro systems it didn`t take long to figure out the Tokyo transportation system even though there are many maps written in Kanji and the station staff do not always speak English.

Spent a couple of days with Tara Carr (Te Puke) and Daniel Hight (New Plymouth), a couple of ex Nova English language teachers from NZ. Nova was the largest English language teaching organisation here in Japan and it went bust a couple of weeks ago. It had over 400,00 students on its books and thousands of teachers. This photo of Tara, Daniel and Lil was taken in the Yokohama port area. They were great tour guides and helped us navigate around the city. They are off to sunny Thailand for a short holiday before returning to NZ.

We also stayed with Yoshi, Chihiro and daughter Akiho about 40 minutes from the city centre. Chihiro came to NZ in 1989 with Seishin Junior High and was a student on a homestay programme I ran. She also came to NZ in 2005 on a working holiday and I found her a job at a kiwifruit packhouse (Satara-Washer Rd) in Te Puke.

We made an expedition to see Mount Fuji but unfortunately the mountain was in cloud but we did get up above the treeline near station seven with views of the snowfield near the summit. Yoshi couldn`t come with us so we brought him back a Mount Fuji cake instead.



We ate the traditional 'hotoh' in Fuji. It is a vegetable soup with a miso-based broth served with white wheat noodles in a huge cast iron bowl. Perfect for autunm weather.

The leaves have begun to change to various shades of red and the locals are out and about to visit the lakes and parks.

The crowds on the streets are a sea of black. The business men wear black suits and the fashion bunnies love to wear black as well. When a man wears a white tie with a black suit he is going to a wedding and he wears a black tie to go to a funeral.

Even on a Saturday or Sunday we can see the secondary school kids wearing their uniforms as they go to their various sport and music clubs.