Tokyo Imperial Palace, Sadaharu Aoki
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Having slept our full the night before, we got up early and headed back out to Excelsior Caffé around 7:30am. This cafe has quickly become our favorite spot for morning coffee during our stay in Tokyo. This time my wife got her Tiramisu coffee. I stuck with my trusty latte. We also got a bacon and egg sandwich served hot (or hotto as the Japanese say it), and a cold コッパ & ボローニヤ (Coppa and bologna sausage) sandwich.
We learned that this cafe has two more floors above, one of which is a smoking room.
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The Imperial Palace East Gardens
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The plan for the morning was to visit the Kōkyo Higashi Gyoen (皇居東御苑, Hoàng Cư Đông Ngự Viên) close to Tokyo Station. We followed Ōtemachi (Ōte Street) to it. The gardens were the only place in the Imperial Palace opened to the public, and it's free, but they gave each of you a wooden token which you had to hand back on the way out. This must be the way to keep track of how many people entered and exited the gardens. So don't think about camping there overnight.
There are 2 gardens: Honmaru to the west, and Nimaru to the east. Honmaru is anchored by 2 huge lawns, while Nimaru main attraction is a pond and an intimate garden.
Highlights of the visit include:
- They planted a lot of very deliciously fragrant Osmanthus Fragrans var. anrantiacus (Tea/Fragrant/Sweet Olive) , which in Japanese is キンモクセイ (金木犀, モクセイ科), and Chinese is 木樨 (Mộc Tê, hoa gọi là Quế Hoa). We were very lucky to go at this time since they flower in late summer into autumn.
- The grove of bamboos in Honmaru, containing 13 varieties
- The majestic pine trees (松, matsu, Tùng) planted throughout the grounds like solemn eternal guards
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| Exiting the gardens, we walked south across vast lawns and avenues that form the Plaza, watching tour buses dumping loads of Chinese as well as Japanese tourists at the gate. It's here that we realized how important the use of matsu is to the Japanese landscape, as important as the use of maples(椛, もみじ, Phong) bamboos (たけ) and moss. In the lawns of the Kōkyo-gaien (Imperial outer gardens, Hoàng Cư Ngoại Viên), the carefully pruned kuro-matsu standing in various poses, and on this overcast day around noon, the dimly defined shadows were cast straight down creating a dignified and surreal scene. I tried to captured this depth in this picture. These kuro-matsu (Pinus Thunbergii, black pine) are the king of garden trees for their masculine form.
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Past the Plaza, we reached the much-photographed Nijū bashi (二重橋, Nhị Trùng Kiều, doubled bridges). This name came from the fact that there are 2 bridges that you must cross to reach the inner keep of the Imperial Palace. The first one is a stone bridge (Ishi-bashi) that is featured dominantly in postcards. At the end of the bridge is San-Sei-mon (Palace main gate). After this gate, the path makes a 180 curve bringing you to the 2nd bridge, a steel bridge (tetsu-bashi). This bridge used to be made of wood. At the other side of this bridge, on the left side, is the Fushimi turret, the white building also visible in most Nijubashi postcards. Looking closely at this Nijū bashi picture, can you make out the steel railings of the 2nd bridge?
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East of the Imperial Palace, and south of the Tokyo Station, was the Marunouchi shopping area. Along the north-south axis was a very atmospheric brick-paved shopping street called Marunouchi-nakadōri. We walked the whole length of the street, starting from the north at Gyoko-dōri Avenue.
The areas of Otemachi, Marunouchi and Yurakucho were dotted with cow figures of the Cow Parade Tokyo Marunouchi 2008, which ran from Sept 5 through Oct 19. The cows were decorated by local students and artists and were displayed on the streets for a month long, then auctioned off. Here is a map of the locations of the cows. We got a picture of a Cosmetic cow and a cow named AI･EREGANSUSUTA (login required to view these 2 photos).
Finally we arrived at Sadaharu Aoki French bakery on the street level of the Shin-Kokusai building, and went in for lunch. They sold a varieties of sweets such as macarons, cakes, chocolate-dipped orange slices etc. We bought some to sample later, and a gift box for BH-san. You can read more on their website.
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Ginza's Itocia department store
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Taking JR Yamanote train line from Tokyo 1 stop south got us to Yurakucho station, from there we stepped into Ginza. Right outside the station was the Tokyo Kotsu Kaikan. We went shopping in there, bought some beautiful scarves, checking out the regional products offered in these small speciality shops, then head 1 block south to Itocia. We got into its Food Plaza, checking out the place, then wandered into its Marui building.
Marui houses 8 floors of shopping, and boy did my wife have a good time there. From floor to floor, I tailed along until we reached the 3rd floor, when I saw a hall way with sofa chairs and lounge chairs. Too happy not having to follow my wife around, I just waited for her to finish that floor, then we moved to the next floor where I seeked out the lounge again and just hung out there waiting. Women's fashion ends at the 5th Floor (6th to 8th are Men's) and I was more than happy to move out of Marui.
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Failed attempt to walk from Shinbashi station towards Tsukiji
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After Itocia, since we were only 1 station north of Shimbashi by JR, we decided to see if we could walk from Shimbashi station to the Tsukiji Fish Market, which we planned to go early Thursday morning.
Getting to Tsukiji the easiest way is by Oedo subway line which emerges right outside the market gate. But since we had only the JR Pass, we wanted to see how far and how hard it was to try walking there, as someone claimed it's a 15 minutes walk. I had some serious doubt when looking at the map. The way there is not straight, involving navigating some tricky curves.
And of course we failed. The furthest we got was to Shiodome on the pedestrian bridge next to Shiodome City Center. Even with the help of a compass and a map, the gray city sky seemed threatened rain at any time and we didn't want to get soaked. Thus we turned back, decided to buy the subway all-day passes instead.
And indeed it started raining around 5pm. We went home, took a bath and some rest, then headed out to Omoide Yokocho again for some more yakitori experience. This time we tried meat: skewered chicken liver, heart, skins, and chewy tendons.
It started raining again, so we retired early. We stopped by the convenience store by the hotel and got some more water. This store has a rack of magazines on the left side, lined up against a big glass window, and we're always amused when passing by, looking in and always saw a row of young men in black suites, standing face out towards the window, reading manga magazines, and you felt like standing in front of a fishbowl looking in, with the inhabitants innocently immersed in their own world, unaware that they were being observed. The effect was even more astounding at dusk or at night, when you're wrapped in darkness and the fishbowl was lighted up. I regretted that I didn't take a picture of it, as it's so part of Tokyo life, so if you happened to pass by there, please please take a picture and send to us by commenting on any entry in our blog.
It rained throughout the night into the early hours of the next day.
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