Thursday, April 19 - Osaka/Tokyo-Odaiba

The building in the back is the Fuji TV building. Pretty cool.

Today was full of disappointments and surprises. First thing, we took the bullet train back to Tokyo, which was pretty uneventful. Our hotel staff was very kind and allowed us to go ahead and make use of our room when we got in around noon.

Then we headed out to Odaiba, a man-made island with lots of business areas, malls, and quirks. You have to take the monorail to get there, which was a pretty ride since the monorail has very large windows and pretty much did a 270 around the water area before going over the Rainbow Bridge.

I don't remember what this building is, but I do remember that this picture is for Dale.

We began our adventure at the Panasonic Building. They had all sorts of hands-on displays featuring their latest projects and developments. On the second floor, there were even more hands-on displays, this time explaining principles of science. It was pretty cool. That area, as well as the adjoining Nintendo area, were overrun by a group of students on a field trip.

The photo-op in the Panasonic Building

Then we walked around the business parks, ran into a crazy wedding village, and made it across "The Great Bridge of Dream." Along the way, Mark picked up a can of Orange Fanta, hoping it would be of the European style. He was disappointed to find that it tasted pretty American.

I would love to work in the middle section of this building.

Then we headed to Toyota MegaWeb. The first building had current Toyota car models on display, where we had learned that you could test drive a car for 300 yen. Upon arrival we were disappointed to find that an international drivers license was required. There was also a showroom displaying cool inventions and upcoming technology. Unfortunately it was closed and we have no idea why. However, their historic building was pretty cool. It showcased all sorts of old car models, and not just Toyotas. We enjoyed this area, even though we don't know much about cars.

I think this was a truck that Rachael once dreamed of owning

Mark pretending like he thinks cars are cool.

Then we went into Leisureland, an insanely large arcade area, similar to Dave & Busters without the food. But much bigger. They had a ninja/illusion area which we really wanted to try out, but no one was around it and the only instructions were in Japanese. Bummer. Following that we walked through a bunch of huge malls. Three, I believe. There were lots of weird areas in these malls. One mall had a takoyaki museum, with takoyaki toys, a brief history, and about six takoyaki restaurants. Mark and I gave it a try, and it was pretty delicious! (Takoyaki are balls of octopus and other goodness that are breaded and fried in special pans.)

Yeah, this was part of a mall.

It's takoyaki time!

Another mall had Hello Kitty World in it. There was so much pink in that store and there were many large Hello Kitty displays you could take pictures with. One display was wedding-esque and blew out bubbles periodically. Mark and I spent a good chunk of time in this store since there were lovely pink sofas to rest on, so it was a good and much-needed break for our feet!

Being happy at the Happy Tree!

If Mark had written this post, he would have put a caption here that would make you roll your eyes.

Our final mall had an area that we had been looking forward to all day: a ramen food court. There were about ten different ramen restaurants, featuring ramen from different regions of the world. Mark's ramen had corn, bean sprouts, a slice of pork, and a large pat of butter on top, making the broth extremely rich. Mine featured thinly sliced beef and onions, and the broth was much spicier than I expected. They were both delicious and left us stuffed.

Following dinner, we walked along the waterfront, got some pics with their wannabe Statue of Liberty, and headed toward the boat station where we were planning to take a boat cruise back to the main island. Unfortunately, the ticket office was closed and we were bummed. Instead we took the monorail/subway back to our tiny hotel room. It was around 7 when we got back. We considered going out again but decided against it and got some ice cream at the Family Mart next door instead. And we were content being lame.

Wrong country?

View of Tokyo from Odaiba