Where do you start? Tokyo does not encompass all of the nation, so I could not give an opinion as to the pros and cons of living in some small town along the coast of the Sea of Japan. If I limit myself to just the city, then I can state that it is one of my favourite places to be. It is not all peaches and cream as there are aspects of the society that are not to my liking, but there are many that are very much so. I dread the day of having to deal with customer service back in Calgary. Gives me cold sweats just thinking about it. Tokyo has just the right amount of "Japan" and "West" to make living here convenient and fun. I want of little from the material world back home except a comfortable place to live (see my description regarding residing in a shoebox apartment for more). In addition, I have access to many things that I cannot dream of getting once we return to Canada. On the top of that list be being able to visit many, many places by foot or by using a public transit system that is actually fast, cheap and dependable within a city that is interesting by day and fascinating by night.
In many ways, it will be difficult to leave all this.
However, that is pretty generic stuff to you, dear readers, as it does not go into any detail. It would also be a bit pointless for me to simply have blog post after blog post yammering about one tourist locale or another. You have told me that you want an impression of the more mundane aspects of day to day living. So, to that end I will take you on a small trip through the neighbourhood. Now, it is definitely not a tourist area so it will not be exciting in that respect. It should, however, give you an idea as to what it looks like here and, thus, some concept of the sights that greet us daily. I leave the sounds and smells to your imagination.
All were taken on a quick outing one coolish afternoon in February. My intent was to stick within a five minute walk of our place in order to provide as accurate an idea of what is "normal" for us as possible. Camera in hand, I spared no boring shot since limiting myself to just unique images would be to twist reality somewhat.
So, here we go...remember, I am staying within a five minute walking radius of home.
Pictures 1 and 2 - Corner of Yamate Dori and Waseda Dori
We are standing on the street corner about a minutes walk from the apartment. Doesn't look too exotic now does it? I wanted to give you an idea about our access to some familiar touches of home. We live in a neighbourhood called Kamiochiai. Now, "kami" is a Shinto spirit or perhaps the spirit of the dead whereas "ochiai" means a meeting place. The corner of Yamate Dori (street) and Waseda Dori is certainly a meeting place as both are pretty major routes, in particular the former which will run for many miles north and south through the western part of Tokyo. The small Waseda Dori meanders along like a old cattle path, which it may well have been at one time. Who knows? Not me. The McDonalds is pretty much like any such place anywhere. One of their burgers tastes like it came from Calgary. The Dennys is a different animal all together. Don't be looking for a Grand Slam here. The menu is more directed to the Japanese palate. Yep, that is a 7-11. In fact, I passed three others on my walk today and many other different convenience stores. The locals call them "combini" and they are pretty much like ours back home. No hoagies or six-day old hotdogs, but perhaps steamed buns and winter stews. Combinis are ubiquitous sights during a stroll through most any neighbourhood that I have been in. The low structure in the foreground is the entrance to one of our subway stations.
Pictures 3 and 4 - Corner of Yamate Dori and Waseda Dori
Heading south along Yamate Dori, I turned and took a few shots of the businesses fronting Waseda Dori. The business with the yellow sign is a gyudon (beef bowl) restaurant; one representative of many such chains that are almost as common as combinis. This is a cheap meal option for many a Tokyoite. Normally there will be a machine just inside the entrance. It is a ticket dispensing device with a button for every item on the menu. Plunk in your money, select your item then take the ticket to the waiting server. You are eating in less than five minutes. The other picture is of a restaurant on the other side of Waseda Dori from the gyuden and I thought you would like to see the signs. Just a little reminder that we are in Japan. Oh, the bike area is large and has an attendant. Bike riding is common on the sidewalks, so you have to have your head on a swivel at times. Also, some parents fit two child seats on them for a seemingly hazardous family outing.
Pictures 5 and 6 - Yamate Dori Subway Station
Further south along Yamate Dori, past several apartments, restaurants and a car dealership is an entrance to another subway station. In this case, the Higashi-nakano (East Nakano) station on the Oedo Line. The subway in Tokyo is not one unified system. Rather, many different companies run many different lines which snake their way throughout the area, meeting at stations. In fact, Higashi-nakano is home to two such companies operating three different lines. Confused? It can be rather perplexing, but not really in the smaller stations like this one. Many lines can be identified with a romanized character in addition to being colour-coded and each station along the line has a number. In the case of this station, the sign clearly tells us that it is pink E21. There is no other pink E21 station in the network. The sign also shows you that English can be found in the system at least on major signs. The exits are also uniquely marked, in this case "A2". There are no less than three stations within five minutes of the apartment, which house at least five different lines. The trains often run about five minutes apart. Seriously! Talk about convenient. The rounded building is the station itself across Yamate Dori.
Picture 7 - Ginza (Yamate Dori entrance)
We have reached the limit of my five minute walking radius south along Yamate Dori and are about to head back northwest. Instead of retracing our steps, we can take the Ginza back. No, not that Ginza. Our Ginza is a narrow, twisting street filled with restaurants, markets, etc. All that twisting and electrical wires makes it look a lot more like Asia now, doesn't it? It is not uncommon for these shopping streets to have an archway like this one to make it stand out. The Ginza will meander back to Waseda Dori, but west from where we started our walk. This little street is one of our favourites in the neighbourhood as it has atmosphere and also several shops that we go to. Just to my left is the second McDonalds in the area plus a KFC. Yah!
Pictures 8 and 9 - Ginza Shops
As mentioned, there are many different shops and restaurants that line our Ginza. I will show you a select few to give you an idea of the place. Here is a vegetable market not too far from where we entered the street. It is tiny, but when something is in season it can often be best to pick it up here. Shops such as these are common in all residential neighbourhoods that I have been in. It is hard to make out, but there is a large can there that is cooking the best sweet potatoes you can imagine. If you are interested in something larger, further up is the "Life" store which is two floors of clothing and the basement grocery store which is about the size of a small Safeway. There are two such sized grocery stores along our walk and another two that are about the 1/4 the size of a Safeway. Lots of options.
Picture 10 - Ginza Pharmacy
I included this picture of a pharmacy along the Ginza as it nicely illustrates the idea of an open-air store. Yep, this is just a regular pharmacy like back home except that the access is on the street. Now, this feels like Asia to me as I have encountered similar scenes in India. I am so used to this idea by now that I do not find it odd in the least, but I wonder if folks back home might? Maybe not. There are probably a half dozen pharmacies along our walk. Maybe more. Most are indoors.
Pictures 11, 12 and 13 - Ginza Restaurants
I hope this is not boring you, but I am trying to capture some of common aspects in the neighbourhood (and within the city to be honest). Here we have three very common sights for restaurants. I have not counted the number of places to eat along the Ginza, but I would guess that there are 20. In our walk we will pass upwards of 50. I would bet that if you walked down every nook and cranny within five minutes of the apartment you would approach close to 80. No kidding. Remember that small apartment with the equally small kitchen we live in? Now imagine cooking and eating in it all the time. Ugh...no thanks! These restaurants cater to cravings to leave the house as well as the very active "outdoor" aspect to living in the city, by which I mean folks here get out and about as pedestrians much more than back home. The working men and women coming home late can easily stop by such a place and gobble down a dinner. Which is why the areas around most stations have particularly dense collections of these places. The sight of an outdoor menu with pictures is extremely normal. If a place wants to kick it up a notch, they can use plastic food displays found in the other picture. There is an entire industry dedicated to making plastic food displays. Many places specialize in the type of food offered; in the plastic display case we can see that it is a tonkatsu restaurant (pork cutlet). The place with the red lanterns is a little further along the street and, again, typical. The colour of the lanterns here tells us that it is an izakaya or pub/restaurant. In my humble opinion, the Japanese take food very seriously. Very.
Picture 14 - Ginza (Waseda Dori entrance)
Hey, we made it through the meandering Ginza and have now reached where it intersects with Waseda Dori west of where the latter meets Yamate Dori. In essence, Yamate Dori runs north/south, Waseda Dori runs east/west and the Ginza connects the two by running northwest/southeast. More geography than you wanted I am sure. There is a little bakery at the corner here, one of two standalone bakeries on our walk. We will turn left (west) from here and walk a few minutes along Waseda Dori as there are some cool things to see. I have to be careful to not go beyond a five minutes radius from our place, but I should be OK.
Pictures 15 to 20 - Waseda Dori Temples
Remember that we are in Kamiochiai and that "kami" is a Shinto spirit (for lack of a better term)? Also, "ochiai" is a meeting place? Well, the neighbourhood has plenty such spirit meeting places and Waseda Dori has several temples lining it. At certain times of the day we can faintly hear the temple bells from the apartment, which is rather cool. Now, I must admit that I am not sure if these are all Shinto, Buddhist or some combination. Not being a spiritual man, I have only a passing interest. What I am interested in, though, is the architecture and grounds of these places. The first picture is taken across Waseda Dori and marks the limit of my westward trek. Afterwards, I crossed the street so as to give you better pictures of the buildings and headed back east. There were three or four such places along this stretch of road. I like the sloped roofs and the detailing. Not to mention the tree pruning. That last shot is of an open-air drain spout that I thought was nifty.
Picture 21 - Waseda Dori Police Station
This is for my police friends out there. This is the local police .... station is too grand a term. I would instead say police post. Japanese society is one where order, or perhaps fear of disorder, is paramount. One way to help preserve that order is by having police presence within neighbourhoods and this is our local unit's HQ. It is not an uncommon sight to see see several officers on their white bicycles on patrol. I try to remember to say hello to them as I wonder if folks say "hello" to each other around here. They seem to appreciate it anyway. Oh, I do not want to make it sound like this is a police state. It is certainly not that. It is just different. Actually, I kind of like the idea of community policing as it breaks down the barriers between the public and its police force which I think would be a good lesson for back home to be honest. I would not like the feeling of being monitored mind you nor, given the history of the country, its potential for abuse here. Anyway, they are friendly and have been helpful to us of several occasions as we need directions from time to time. Note the recruiting poster. The fire station further along the street has a similar one.
Well, that is a pretty long post. I think I will split this up into two. So in the next post we will continue our walk from this point. We will turn north into the bowels of the neighbourhood and then circle back to near where we started. Until then....
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