Hamamatsuchō (浜松町)
Well, for an 8am flight the alarm gets set for ... a time starting with 4?! That's far more recognisable as a time to go to bed than from bed. But to be fair, it actually went pretty smooth. Arrived at the shuttle roughly when we wanted to, the shuttle waited so that some other people join us but still took us there in plenty of time, and the queue for checking in the luggage consisted of some lost people blocking the path that we walked around.
I was previously not a big fan of the 777-300ER that we landed on, having had some fairly cramped flights on them before. But JAL keeps up their reputation with definitely above standard room and after stacking all my pillows and blankets to the ceiling and then sitting on them, my bum even still had some life left in it after the flight. Being a day flight, I didn't really sleep. (Which, given the short sleep before the flight is really hitting the me that's trying to write this blog.) And before we knew it and after some "Are we there yet" yammering, we did indeed make it. Hello again Japan!
Plan for today was simple, get to Japan, make it to the hotel. Everything else was a bonus. And it all ... just worked. Our previous plans of booking a hotel close to one of the lines directly from the airport worked. The trains came so frequently that we actually did not get on the train already at the station when we got to the platform, since the next one (as an express) would actually get us to our goal faster. And the 500m walk after was very welcome after all the plane sitting time.
So some brief exploration joined the menu. The above came from the tradition of walking towards the noise on the basis that there must be a party at the other end. Since the person with the megaphone spoke in Japanese, I had no idea what they were all cheering about, but there seemed to be a lot of excitement regardless.
What Hamamatucho did not have on offer was a gaming arcade. So, almost 10pm on a Sunday night, I swung myself on the train to Akihabara and found my game. Luckily I accidentally stumbled on my game card a few days ago, packed it, and it instantly picked up my account. I even managed to get a new high score on a song I played last year. Yay!
Trying to leave the arcade again proved a little harder though. Not because I couldn't rip myself away from the game. But because Tokyo was here to remind me that, contrary to information from my usual home city, rain is wet! And not merely damp. It rained so much the rain was even pouring down the (outdoor but only) staircase of the gaming arcade. And guess who's umbrella is nicely tucked away, safely in a cupboard, securely in the city of merely damp rain ...
This wet thing became super relevant as well when I discovered that me having left the window of my room open to try and cool it down a bit, did nothing for the temperature, but plenty for the wetness of the area directly by the window. And while I do have a window, the view today is not exactly to die for. But we keep with tradition! There was ice cream.