Fake plastic love

Published on Sun 30 Aug 2009

Been back for a few days now, and I finally feel ok. I started feeling ill on Tuesday and spent the last night of the holiday, and most of the time since, shivering, sweating, trying to be asleep, having weird hallucinations about building shrines, listening to TalkSport go on and on about Eduardo diving, and coughing up an entire rainbow of phlegm. Well, not the blues onwards I guess, but it's still been quite impressive. It got so I could tell what colour it would be by what it felt like in my mouth. I wonder if that's a skill that will be useful in the future.

So, on my second day there we went to this big old shrine called Senso-Ji near the capsule hotel,

then had some pretty nice ramen and incredibly nice gyoza (way better than I've ever had here, and it was just some cheap little chain place) before finding a cool Japanese style(ish) hotel in Ueno.

I'm not sure how traditional the doors were

We then had our first of many, many games of this drum thing, which knackers my arms. Though Guitar Hero knackers my arms - I just get too tense I think.

Then we went to Sunshine City (everything there is something town, or something city or something world - maybe something land), a shopping mall place with a big tower (Sunshine 60, because it has 60 floors and in Sunshine City) and a planetarium and aquarium that we went to.

The planetarium was good, though I fell asleep a few times, and the commentary was a very shrill Japanese lady, despite claiming in the credits to have been Liam Neeson. The aquarium was even better - it was more of a zoo and aquarium than an aquarium - they had these things, which Dan maintains were capybara, but I'm really not so sure - seemed a bit spindly and small to me

as welll as guinea pigs, armadillos, pelicans, a couple of lemurs, and some sealions who did a show. I'm sure I must have seen a sealion show before but I don't clearly remember. They're quite clever

The aquarium was odd - all dark, but everyone was given a torch to shine at the animals. I wonder if they minded. I think it would irritate me. They had seahorses. I'm sure I must have seen seahorses before but I don't clearly remember. They were as big as my mental image of them, even though I'm sure someone had told me they were tiny

These chaps were glowing red all on their own

None of my other photos really came out because it was too dark.

After that we went out for a bit in Asakusa then Ueno.

The next day I undertook my main mission for the holiday, having a McDonalds. That takes the number of countries I've had McDonalds in to 15 I think, if you separate out the UK (Australia, America, Canada, Czech Republic, England, France, Germany, Holland, Ireland, Japan, Morroco, Spain, Scotland, Sweden, Wales) then we went for a walk in Ueno Park, which is very pretty, but it was really incredibly hot.

Thankfully they have people selling snowcones which they make by chipping flakes off a huge block of ice.

There was a massive lake with millions of carp and terrapins, and the occasional duck, as well as swan pedaloes (we nearly got one, but it was too hot). Carp are weird looking, and, for fish, seem to spend a lot of time out of the water.

Then we got this crazy looking river bus to Odaiba

which is a bit of reclaimed land attached to the main bit of Tokyo with a big bridge.

They have a Statue of Liberty,

and a copy of that big arch in Paris

We wandered round for a bit then my guide book told us to go in this ridiculous shopping mall that looked like a warehouse from the outside, but inside turned out to be a copy of an ancient Italian town, complete with statues and fountains, and pizza restaurants (with plastic model pizzas). I laughed for quite a long time. What made them do it? Who had the idea? And then why call it "Venusfort"?

Out the other side of Venusfort, through a car showroom, was a massive Hello Kitty big wheel - so we had a go on that.

Then we had some more arcade fun (I very, very nearly dislocated my shoulder trying to hit a baseball, Dan had a go on a dog walking game, we did some more drumming) before I dragged Dan off to see the full size gundam that they've put in the park. We couldn't get round the front of it, and my photo didn't come out cos it was night and too far away, but it was pretty big. You wouldn't want to meet one down a (big) dark alley.

When we got back to Ueno we went for yakiniku (you grill your own food on a barbecue in the middle of your table) which was one of the best meals of the week, but ordering plates of raw meat was a bit weird. You'd think the plastic models that they have outside would show what it looked like cooked.