So yesterday I finally arrived after 11 hours of flying, sitting next to this huge Japanese guy so I cannot say it was that comfy. Getting through customs and getting my luggage back went quite smoothly(still with all the decoration intact!) , and afterwards it was time to pick up two things at the airport:
– JR train pass
– Sakurai mobile simcard.
The simcard was delivered to the post office at Narita airport (it’s where I landed) and not that hard to find. Same goes for the JR pass, when you’re heading towards the trains you’ll pass it.
There was a pretty big waiting line at the JR office, and the lady in front suggested that I should do some other things first since it would take an hour before it was my turn. Stubborn as I am I said it was okay and waited in line.
After 20 minutes (maybe Japanese hours are shorter?) I walked out with my train pass and headed towards Shibuya to visit my niece Anya!
Anya had suggested me that at Shibuya station I could take a taxi which would bring me right to her house, but being a true Dutch and it didn’t seem that far I started walking using Google maps.
When I entered the address in Maps, it gave me 3 possible options: so I went with the first one…
After walking for half an hour I arrived at my “destination”, but nowhere could I find some indication if I was at the correct place (I expected an English nameplate on a house, but it was nowhere to be found)
But, no worries! I still had Anya’s mobile number: “the number you have dialed is currently not in use”… Crap
Good thing I had my Internet working, so I mailed her, hoping see would see the email soon, and she did!
” Hi Marcel! Where are you? ”
” Uhm, I’m not sure, Google told me to go here. I’m in front of some hotel or something called “Breeze”…”
“Stay where you are and I’ll pick you up! ”
I was (somewhat) close though, it seemed I should’ve picked the second option in Google maps and it would’ve directed me to the correct house.
So yesterday I caught up with Anya, Chris (and Molly), even shortly saw her two, really shy, sons 😉 unloaded a few gifts for Anya and her family from my luggage (mostly Frysian and Sinterklaas related things) and afterwards we went to the Gonpachi restaurant.
Now the Gonpachi is a really great place, probably known best for its relation to the movie Kill Bill. (the set of the big fighting scene in Kill Bill was inspired by this restaurant).
The food was great, and we ordered a lot of great dishes!
After we stuffed ourselves we went back to Anya’s place riding our electric bikes
(sidenote: electric bikes are a true must have in Tokyo!)
After a good sleep I woke up this morning (luckily not jetlagged) , planned a few things more for my trip, and headed towards Shinagawa station to take the shinkansen to my next destination: Hiroshima!
Anya was really sweet and made my a small lunch for my 5 hour trip, it even included a beer since “all the business man drink that on the train in the morning” (according to Anya ;-))
So cheers!
Last time Syb and I also put a TLDR; at the end of our posts (Too Long, Didn’t Read) and I completely understand people hate to read pages of crap and just want a summary of what I did, so here it goes!
TLDR; Sat next to big Japanese guy in plane, headed towards Anya, got lost, got un-lost, had awesome dinner, drinking beer while headed for Hiroshima.
