I was happy to undertake this trip to Japan for Pervasive. The one other instructor who could have opted to take it preferred to stay home and spend Labor Day with his family in Roundrock, and in any case he doesn't like to travel long distances. So I got it, and this will be my first trip to Japan since the R&R trip I took there from Korea in 1970 and the stopover I made there on my way home in 1971. I can only imagine that things have changed a great deal; I was actually surprised by how much they seemed the same.
Flight to Japan and Arrival at Narita Airport
My flight to Japan was a pleasant one, even though I was in coach. I had my laptop and my seat power adapter, so I could use the computer throughout the 13-hour flight. I left just after noontime, with Fred taking me to the airport, and I arrived just after 3PM, Tokyo time. Even on this flight, I carried only my duffel bag and computer case, and so when we landed, I hung my computer bag from my shoulder, carried my duffel in one hand and held my little digital camera in my other hand to record my arrival.
The walk down the concourse to the main terminal building was not nearly as far as I thought it would be, and I reached the stairs down to the customs area in fairly short order. I made a movie while descending the stairs into the customs area, and you can have a look at it with the player at right. The area was huge- much bigger than the customs area in Dallas. But that stands to reason, since a great number of international travelers come through Narita and undoubtedly stop in Japan for a time. The customs area here seemed more like New York City.
But there was a huge difference between how customs is handled here as opposed to anywhere else I have been, and you may be able to understand that difference if you use the player at left to watch the movie I made while waiting in the customs queue. As I pan around, you can see that there is only one single customs line; the line is controlled much like at an amusement park. This ensures that everyone moves through as quickly as possible, and a problem at one customs station does not hold up all the people in that line. You'll notice another difference, too, that being the very courteous, bi-lingual "greeter" who directs the next person in the queue to the next available customs officer. I was pretty impressed as I watched him switch between English, Japanese and one other language I couldn't identify just by looking at the next person in line. I thought the system was great, and my total time in the customs hall was less than 20 minutes.
The customs area exit doors let you out directly into the
main airport concourse-
very convenient. It was pretty easy to find the ticket desk for the various ground transportation options. My contact at the Park Royal Hotel had given me very good instructions on which bus to get a ticket for, and I did that pretty quickly. Then I made a movie of the airport concourse (which you can watch with the player at right) before heading outside to wait for the bus.
Once I got to the bus loading area (watch the movie at left), I only had to wait about twenty minutes for the next airport bus. Again, Japanese apparently are big on giving directions, because not only was there a ground representative for the bus, who took luggage and ensured that it was on the right bus, but each bus (as I remember from Korea) had a hostess who actually welcomed you aboard the bus and rode with it downtown. (That's about all she did- no meals or drinks- but that is a heck of a lot more than any US bus line would offer). The bus itself was quite nice- more like a tour bus than anything else- and the ride into town was swift (about 40 minutes, if I recall correctly).
The bus was moving so rapidly that I didn't think pictures out the window would really turn out well, so all I took were movies on the way into town. As it turned out, they were pretty plain, but you might want to use the links below to view them in any case:
Leaving the Airport
Reaching the City Outskirts
Coming into the Central City
As I had been told, the terminal for the airport bus was right next to the Royal Park Hotel- just south of it and partially covered by an expressway. So, even though it was drizzling lightly when we arrived, I didn't have to walk out in the open. (I found out later that there is actually an underground passage from the terminal to the hotel, but that didn't matter because the hotel was literally right next door.)
Before we get into too much detail, you might be interested in orienting yourself to Central Tokyo so that you will have some idea of where things are- beginning with the Park Royal Hotel.
First of all, Narita Airport is about thirty miles or so east of Tokyo near the town of Narita, and to get into the city, the bus heads basically due west. Just across (to the west) of one of the small rivers that divide up the city is the airport bus terminal and the Park Royal Hotel. This aerial view is about eight miles side-to-side, so you can see that the Hotel was only a couple of miles from both the Imperial Palace (a location I have visited before), the offices of AG-TECH (the company where I will be doing the training) and the Ginza (that very upscale shopping and entertainment district which I have also visited before). Tokyo Tower is about four miles away, southwest of the hotel. The commercial center of the city is west of the Imperial Palace and Tokyo Tower another few miles- just outside the aerial view used here.
I'll repeat this aerial view on later pages when I think it might help you (and me) chart my trips around the city.
Now, at the right, I have zoomed in to provide an aerial view showing the Park Royal Hotel and the area of the city north of it. This particular aerial view is about a half-mile square; that major street running east-west north of the hotel was just about six blocks away.
In the last section on this page, I'll talk about my first walk around the neighborhood near the hotel; the area I am talking about is north of that major street and extends out of the picture on the north and east. I didn't think that an aerial view of that part of the neighborhood would be particularly interesting for you; it all looks the same on Google Maps, and it would be impossible for me to more than generalize about where the restaurants or shops that I visited were located. The one place I WAS able to locate, and have marked on this aerial view, is the noodle shop where I had dinner that night.
While you are looking at this aerial view, note the buildings that I have circled; you will see them in a couple of the pictures that I took from my room at the hotel, but when I was there, in 2004, the buildings were under construction, giving you some idea of when the satellite image was taken. (You will be able to deduce that the view from my window was towards the neighborhood pictured here.)
I am going to show you the pictures I took here at the hotel a bit out of order. In fact, I waited until I had gotten to my room and got settled in before I took any pictures of the lobby, but when I walked in the front doors of the hotel, I was immediately impressed with the
lovely three‑storey lobby.
The lobby area of the hotel was, I thought, quite opulent (but then so was the price for the room, which set a record that will probably not be exceeded by me for the rest of my life, especially given that I am thinking about retiring sometime this fall, which will mean no more company-paid travel: $300/night). Opulent enough, in fact, that I could certainly justify taking a movie of the lobby; use the player at left to see if you agree.
My room was fairly small, but I have come to expect that in center city hotels all over the world; I had an even smaller room last time I was in New York city. But it was certainly more than adequate. there was a
comfortable bed,
with bedside controls for the lights and television (not much good, although there was precisely one English-language station- CNN). And the little
desk area
was fine for my computer. (I have already turned it on to the place I left off on the plane working on some new course materials for Pervasive.)
The afternoon was kind of yucky- overcast and drizzly- so the first pictures I took from the windows aren't all that great. Here is the
view northwest
and here is the
view northeast.
Remember the buildings I circled on the aerial view? Well, here you can see them still under construction.
Finally, before I left the room to go exploring and get something to eat, I did make one movie of the view from my room, and you can watch it with the player at right.
Exploring the Neighborhood and Getting Some Dinner
Although I'd been up for about 24 hours so far, I didn't want to go to sleep at 5 in the evening, but get back onto some sort of schedule, and that's why I decided to head out for a long walk and some dinner. When I went out the front door of the hotel, I turned northwest and headed up the tree-lined street to the major intersection that you can see in the aerial view. There, I stopped to make a movie of all four corners and all four directions, and you can watch that movie with the player at left.
I turned off the main street and headed into the rabbit warren of side streets; these were the really interesting places as I remember from wandering around Seoul and Tokyo over thirty years ago. Right away, I was greeted from a reminder of my last trip here, a reminder that has been the subject of anecdotes that I've told through the years since my last visit. I came across a little neighborhood restaurant, and, right out front was its
menu showcase.
The showcase is full of plastic replicas of the dishes served inside, and from my last visit here, I know that the artists who fashion those plastic replicas work from examples of the actual dishes- endeavoring to make the fake dish look EXACTLY like the dish they are copying. It is something of an art, and firms that can provide good plastic replicas are in high demand. For example, if the dish the artist was copying had three pieces of pork floating in the soup, you can be CERTAIN that the plastic replica will have exactly those three pieces of pork in exactly the right positions.
There are stories told of this process, and I read a magazine article about it some years after my last visit. In that article, one of the most amusing stories was that when new cooks come into these establishments, they are often given the plastic replicas and told to copy them in exact detail when they actually prepare the dish! Talk about life imitating art!
Just down the street from this little restaurant, I stopped to buy a "shrimp stick" (at least that's what the little menu called it in English) from a small vendor stand. It turned out to be a few small shrimp battered and deep fried. It was really quite good. And just across the street from that was a florist shop, with its flowers and plants still out on display for the evening shoppers to pick from. I took a few pictures of some of the colorful plants because I thought that Fred might like to see them, and I have put thumbnails for these pictures below. You can see the full-size images by clicking on the thumbnails:
(Click on Thumbnails to View)
I wandered around quite a bit more, and found myself eventually back in the side streets quite close to the hotel. There, I came across one of the ubiquitous noodle shops that dot the neighborhoods, and the
menu outside
(these very small noodle shops usually don't bother with showcases) looked so inviting (and the prices so reasonable) that I went on in. The noodle shop had a
very small interior
that was clean and neat, so I took a table in the corner. When the hostess came around, I ordered (by pointing to a picture on the little menu) a pork and noodle dish and some ice water. The dish came quickly, and I had almost finished it when one of the other patrons, noticing my little camera and my obvious foreign visage, asked me if I should like him to take a picture. He did, and you can see the result at left.
I wandered around a bit more, stopping at a convenience store for a soda and dessert, and then headed back to the hotel, where an hour later I finally got to bed.
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