Friday, December 21, 2007

Odaiba

One of the other things that was recommended to me was to take a bus tour of Tokyo from a company called Hato Bus. I know these tours always promise more than they deliver, but there were two things about the tours that appealed to me. One was the chance to listen to an english speaker describing some of the sights. As I mentioned, a few of my co-workers speak english very well, but unfortunately I did most of my work with speakers who are learning the language at a rapid rate, but are still relative novices. The second thing that appealed to me was that I'd pretty much seen everything their tours offered of interest except for one particular one which offered views of the Tokyo Bay area, which I hadn't ventured toward.

So after a few hours of work in the morning, I headed out to Hamamatsucho Bus Terminal for the 1:40 PM tour. It wasn't too expensive, 3,500 Yen or about $30, so I paid and waited for the trip to begin. As 1:40 approached I still hadnt seen any other touristy looking people, so I went to look for the #6 bus. A man came up to me and asked if I was on the Tokyo Seaside Tour. After confirming this, he told me that since it was off-season and mid-week, I was the only person who had signed up for the tour. So it was just me and him.

Nakagawa-san was probably in his mid to late fifties and walked slowly. I couldnt tell if he had a limp or not. We had an entire 50+ person bus to ourselves. I mentioned that this seemed kind of wasteful and that we could probably take the tour in a car if he wanted to. He explained to me that they don't make any money if they don't fill the bus. Anyway, I just appreciated, at this point, that he didn't cancel my trip, though it certainly would have saved us a few awkward moments. We waited for the boat. He sat at his table and I walked around taking pictures of anything that might seem interesting. On the trip, he sat inside, while I sat outside enjoying the view and trying to communicate with the Korean tourists on the boat.

Odaiba itself is a man-made island in the Tokyo Bay. It's actually pretty cool, designed almost as a future city, with interesting architecutre (that will probably look very dated very soon), a showroom for new Sony products, and the National Museum of Emerging Science and Innovation, all of which were part of the tour. Nakagawa-san waited patiently as I looked at Sony products (true convergence is upon us - the TV and the PC are now one and the same). We walked through the mall together. I suspect that this is a great way to kill time on a 50 person tour, but I wasn't really interesting in checking out the GAP or Banana Republic. This was one of our more awkward moments. Teenagers ran through the mall, shopping and chatting, while Nakagawa-san and I tried to make conversation. Yikes.

Apparently France gave Tokyo a miniature version of the Statue of Liberty in 2000, and they've got it set at the entrance to the island. Pretty jarring to see, actually. We took a driverless train with tires and electric current passed through via metal conductors attatched to it's sides (pretty cool actually) to the Museum where again, he read his book and I walked around for an hour and half or so. This wasnt a bad way to spend a little time. It would have been better if I were a child/teen or understood Japanese, but many of the concepts (robotics, environmental conservation, aerospace, deep sea drilling) are conveyed just as easily with pictures. Nakagawa-san and I finally hopped back onto our luxury bus and were driven back to the bus terminal. We thanked each other and finally parted ways.

I went back to one of my favorite Yakitori places for dinner. Chicken on a stick, served atop a green salad, with a pint of Hoppy White beer. Not bad. Saturday Night Fever was playing on one of the television sets and one of the Japanese cooks was doing a little dancing of his own. I had to smile.

Finally, one of my co-workers volunteered to take me out for a beer at 8 PM, so he met me at my hotel and we grabbed a subway ride across town. After one pint, we realized that it just wasn't working. We'd exhausted our ability to speak to each other rather quickly, but that was OK, I really appreciated his effort. I have to say, yesterday was a day straight out of Lost in Translation. My flight leaves tonight at 6:30 and I get back to New York an hour earlier, at 5:30. I'm going to try to spend a few hours at a nearby park this morning, but the weather doesnt look like it wants to co-operate. Hopefully the rain can hold off for a few more hours.

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