Wednesday, September 12, 2007

Tokyo, Part 4


Pretty much everything is cooler in Japan, like when you order a drink in a cafe, it's like a pineapple soda mint sorbet thing , or a green tea float, one of many different floats entitled 'Float Party'.



Or if you go to a store it's called Backwoods and the whole building is encased in branches and it only sells different types of thread. (I didn't go in this one but I'm sure it was something like that.)


Check out my friend Amy's blog. I'm in the pic of the day: http://amyvcooper.com/blog/

Sunday, September 09, 2007

Tokyo, Part 3






So I mentioned we stayed in 2 hotels, right? Well for the last night of our trip we stayed at the Park Hyatt in Tokyo. This place is rather pricey which is why we only stayed one night. But I can tell you it was totally worth it. I hate saying this, but it's the hotel in Lost In Translation. That gives you a point of reference. You can picture the pool and the gym at least. The rest of the hotel is amazing. You're treated like royalty. There is a person that greets you when you get out of the cab and somehow they already knew our name. They take you up to the 41st floor to check in. You are given 'Tiffany' keychains. We stayed one floor up from the lobby. We were a little concerned that maybe the room would not live up to all the hype, that maybe the hotel would be gorgeous but a little tiny room. No way. There was a bed you could swim in, 40" flatscreens with great cable stations that played the Simpsons and The Outsiders. There was an amazing view of Tokyo. The gigantic bathtub filled in minutes with luxurious bubbles courtesy of the Aesop products, the flatscreen in the bathroom playing relaxing nature scenes. And the toilet actually had a dryer on it. It's official! Rich people don't even have to wipe their own asses. We had dinner from the famous Delicatessan located in the hotel. But the big splurge was room service breakfast which cost about $75. Worth every penny. I felt like Linsey Lohan as the guy came in with his white gloves to set up the table. I didn't want to leave this paradise as we were handed bottles of Park Hyatt Water in case we got thirsty on our trip to the airport.

Sunday, September 02, 2007

Tokyo, Part 2


Tokyo is packed. Like New York x10. But somehow the place is spotless. There are no trashcans yet no litter. The people here are obsessed with cleanliness. Even when you eat at a really cheap fast food place they give you a wet napkin to clean your hands. And forget about the bathrooms, the bathrooms here are amazing. I only encountered one bathroom that wasn't sparkling clean yet it was cleaner than the bathrooms at Saks. And this was at a fast food place in the middle of one of the busiest areas in Tokyo. Basically all the toilets have all these buttons that clean every part of your bottom region. Not just a bidet but a spray that cleans you after you do a 2. These toilet controls are located on the walls next to the toilet mostly. Apparently there are two types of flushes but I'm not sure what the difference is. Ann(my friend that's been there for 2 months) says she had to leave without flushing a couple of times cause she just couldn't figure out which button to push.

Tokyo, Japan Part 1




So I've been in Tokyo for the past week. As soon as we got there we met up with some friends Ann and Stradton who are teaching in a little town about 4 hours out of Japan. They have been there about 2 months and were able to show us some new things to do. We ate at a Korean place where you cook your own meat. They also showed us how to eat at a place where you order everything at a machine outside and give the tickets to the people inside and they give you the food. This was a good, cheap and easy way to eat. We stayed in two different hotels, first off the B Roppongi in the Roppongi district which is kinda the sleazy part but still very clean and safe. Which is weird because the first night we were there we ran into Curtis Sliwa founder of Guardian Angels with some of his Japanese counterparts. He said Roppongi can get a little rough on the weekends.