First I cut off zeir heads, zen I pull out zeir bones...

 So I promised an explanation of Golden Week earlier: it's a series of tubes--I mean holidays--including Greenery Day, Constitution Day, Showa Day, Children's Day, and perhaps some others I can't recall. This year we had Thursday and Monday through Wednesday off. For some reason, the university didn't give the students Friday off, even though many probably wouldn't show up just for that one day. It's pretty much the only vacation during the spring semester in Japan, and very busy, so it's important to make any necessary reservations for that week as soon as possible.

And on with our Tokyo adventure.

After our delicious breakfast at Starbucks, we went to visit a much less aromatic sight. The Tsukiji Fish Market is the largest wholesale fish market in Japan and in the world.
As such, it's incredibly busy, smelly, wet, and open to tourists for only certain hours of the day.


Don't get me wrong--it's a very interesting place to wander through, or rather, squeeze your way through the aisles, dodge all the bikes speeding through the larger passages, and try not to let forklifts run over you.
If you're ok with people chopping up sea creatures, and a few small tanks of bloody water, then probably the only thing that will terrify you is the heavy traffic in and outside of the warehouses.




Remember the song the chef sings in The Little Mermaid? Start there, and add in some Sweeney Todd gore.



Not that they're cruel to the fish and squids, etc.  As far as slaughter goes, decapitation is probably about as humane as it gets. It felt a little numbing watching it, after taking Marine Biology and such...although we did go on a fishing boat as a field trip for that class. Most of the students actually caught some fish too. I didn't feel much like partaking, even though I don't have a particular fondness for fish.

This thing looked prehistoric

In any case, maneuvering around Tsukiji kind of feels like playing Frogger. And if you ever go, be prepared for the workers and customers to give you dirty looks for being tourists and crowding their sky.

Or sea.

~~~

Some sights on the way to Ginza

 

les poissons, les poissons, hee hee hee haw haw haw...

You have discovered Tokyo: Gain 9,000 XP.

Why would I have a bit of writer's block now, of all times, when I have sooo many posts to write? I ask you.


So the night bus rolled into Tokyo an hour and a half earlier than scheduled, at 5 am Saturday morning. Tokyo was completely empty. It was empty even until 8 o'clock--long past when I'm used to seeing cities wake up. At home, the gears are already turning at 6 in the morning. While we were waiting for Margot and Sabrina (of France), the last two members of our party, the rest of us (representing France, Germany, Korea, and America) wandered down the street towards the Imperial Palace grounds. But only just across the bridge a little ways, then through a small, mostly concrete park, back towards the station.

A man was riding his bike through the park in the above photo (which you're not supposed to do), and I suppose he either didn't see the small gap/waterway in the concrete, or he thought the bike could go over it. Unfortunately, he and his bike fell into the water. He laughed it off a bit and got back up on the concrete, legs completely soaked, and rode off. It was kind of funny but also kind of sad; it was one of those laughs that was meant to hide his embarrassment.
Very Japanese. Not the kind of laugh where you're actually laughing at yourself...

Finally around 7 am, Starbucks opened, and we scrambled in for tea, coffee, and breakfast. Our group was pretty evenly split over the issue of whether tea or coffee was more delicious.

(Maxim, Momo-chan, So Rim, Thomas, Sun Young, and Elliot)

Not sure who looks more excited, Maxim or Elliot...