REWIND: May 22, Tokyo

Here are some of the blogs not posted because of the lack of internet access.

Today was our first day in Tokyo. This has been a life dream of mine. I have ALWAYS wanted to come here so this is a little bit surreal. I will never forget my first moments stepping off the train. The station was so busy and we headed down the stairs and like something out of a movie, these little Japanese people started coming out of the wall on the stairs! They were station workers that were cleaning, but it was crazy, they just popped out of the wall! Tokyo was already exciting and I had been there for less than 10 seconds.

We met up with Annalise's friend Sarah - who has turned out to be the biggest blessing ever. She is a student from the US studying at one of the universities in Tokyo for a semester and she is going to be our guide this weekend. In case you didn't know, its not easy to just get around the biggest city in the world when you have no idea where to go or what to see, so we are so grateful for Sarah!

We got in at around 6 o'clock. It was about a 3 hour train ride. First things first, we got some food then headed to our hotel to drop off our bags. It was about a 15 minute ride on the train. There are many train lines around Tokyo that we would have no idea how to navigate without Sarah. Dr. Velikova reserved us a traditional "Japanese style room" which is a straw floor and 6 mats! 6 of us slept in there and Aaron and Brenda slept in a separate room with one bed...Hilarious. So after we dropped our stuff off it was time to explore Tokyo!!

We stopped by Sarah's school and met up with a few of her school friends, one from Australia, one from Chicago and a local dude named Masa born and raised in Tokyo. He spoke Japenglish or Ingrish and was a lot of fun. They took us to the capitol building which has an observatory at the top. It was incredible seeing Tokyo from the top. It makes any American city just look miniature. We are used to seeing a row of skyscrapers and being like, "Wow thats a big city!" Tokyo - clusters of skyscrapers in all directions and endless metropolis.

After that it was getting dark and the city was starting to light up! Tokyo is so crazy because its like everywhere you go looks like Times Square! Huge LCD screens, neon lights, enormous intersections - EVERYWHERE! We headed to Shibuya which really gets hoppin at night. Words don't do this city justice. I could write so much about it. There are so many lights it is just insane. People everywhere. There is a redlight district in Shibuya so you get all kinds of characters...

Crazy thing you see here: Hosts and Maids. There are girls dressed like the traditional French maids. They target the "Otakus" (Japanese nerds that do nothing but sit at their computer all day) and call them master and everything and serve them for a fee. They aren't prostitutes. They have made buildings where they will take the men and they just serve them, make them food...it's REALLY weird. And on the other hand, there are Hosts. Hosts are men with crazy hair and ridiculous outfits usually consisting mainly of black. The hosts will stand around on the street and talk to girls and if the girl wants them he will follow her around and compliment her and help her shop and just be really nice to her or whatever... strange.

Shibuya is crazy. We ate at a Ramen place and I ordered this stir fry off the menu. It was really good but I had no idea what the meat was in it. I later found out it was liver... Guess I like liver! Not what I probably would have ordered but I would eat it again for sure. the group wanted to go to a NomiHorai bar - all you can drink for an hour... so they did that while Taylor, Gabrielle and I sat at a table and remained sober. After that we walked around Shibuya and Brenda threw a fit that no one wanted to go dancing at this club that had about 4 people in it LOL. This was all just incredible for me and I was trying to take it all in. Everywhere you look there are arcades, karaoke, crazy lit up stores, every building has neon and displays going up and down it with characters flying.

We got back to the room at around 1. Everyone wants to go to the Tokyo fish market tomorrow, its the worlds biggest fish market. The plan is to wake up at 5. I agreed to it, but I mean, come on, I know that is NOT going to happen. I know how these things work...