In Japan

12 hour flight down, I am now in Japan. The flight was probably one of the longest I've been on. With little space, I sat in the middle of the of the plane in a middle seat. I spend most of the time watching the on demand movies that each seat has.

Upon landing I was relieved to have no problems with customs.

 From the airport we boarded a train to a capsule hotel in Tokyo. The capsule hotel required that we take off our shoes and store them in a locker before we were given room assignments. When they gave us our rooms we were given sandals to wear.




The rooms were very small but had room for one person to store their laggage. The room also had a spot for locking valuables as well as a small TV. My favorite part was the Japanese robes we were given for the public bathhouse. All in all the capsule provided a  great hideaway for jet lagged travelers who just needed a place to rest for the night.

The rooms were stacked one on top of the other with a latter leading to the top room.

The next day we woke up early around 7:00am Japan time. I slept most of the night but considering  we got in at 2:00am I still didn't have a lot of sleep. Nonetheless we journeyed into Tokyo station to get our rail passes.

While waiting for the train agency to process our passes, we went out into the city to see some of the sites. 

 Along the way, we met some activists who were getting people to sign petitions against the current nuclear policy in Japan. This man spoke decent English and called for us to act in "solidarity" with him against the nuclear energy through out the world. 

Along the way to the Imperial Palace we also stopped at public park

A statue of Saigo Takemori 

The wall of the imperial  palace

 The signs warned not to clap because it was a budhist shrine.. not Shinto

A fountain that brings healthy children

 
Next we visited the Imperial Palace. Although not picture but equally as interesting is a building that was Mac Arthur's wartime occupation headquarters. It was said that he could see the Emperor's house from his office, which given Mac Arthur's personality this was probably intentional.

 The entry to the Imperial palace used to have a large open space, but after a large demonstration on May Day, the Japanese government planted pine trees to keep people of the grass.

Two bridges of the Imperial Palace. Before WWII the Emperor come out from his palace on a white horse. This is where people were able to see him. 

Intimidating lion station. He has a partner station nearby. The open mouth symbolizes the "o" part of the "uhm" in Buddhist chants. His counter part has a closed mouth for "m" part. These two are common in the entry points to sacred spot in Japan.

This are charms you can burn in the shrines . Each one has a different meaning. 

This is memorial for the Earthquake of 19? and also the firebombing of Tokyo

bad ass picture of a samurai that died defending the Emperor

Our last stop was the Ginzo District  to shop for various things and get the feel of the city.

This shop was overwhelming.. but I got some good Christmas gifts

Protesting nuclear power on the anniversary of Fukushima 

Occupy wall-street protesters were also in attendence

                        

 After a long day. We get beer from the vending machine with all the change we collected during the day. Its very cheap and convient and surprising the these vending machines are in a lot of places.