Ginza.  Or, Mike meets the Tokyo subway.
I was dead tired from the long travel day on Friday, so I slept in late this morning.  I set the alarm for 8:30, but when it went off I reset it to 9:30, and then I still didn’t really get out of bed until probably 10:30.  I spent that hour reviewing the fantastic emails that Dave sent me describing places to see and things to do while in Tokyo.  After some deliberation, I decided to tackle Ginza today, mostly because it looked like it had the fewest things I really wanted to see, and I knew it was going to be only about a half day.
 
After getting ready, I struck out to get some lunch.  I’m reluctant to admit that I went to McDonald’s.  I saw the sign for the McD’s the night before when I went to find the WiFi hotspot, so I knew where it was and I knew it was close to the WiFi place, so I figured this was a good choice.  In the end, I’m really glad I did, because it turns out that by finding McDonald’s, I also found Shinagawa Station, which turns out to be right across the street.  It’s really great — the station really is about 2 minutes from the hotel.
 
After lunch, I returned to the WiFi hotspot to do a little bit of research on the route to Ginza.  It turns out that to get to Ginza from Shinagawa you have to take the JR Yamanote Line to Shimbashi Station, then change to the Ginza line and go one stop.  I have to say that I was unprepared for the scale of Shinagawa Station.  You must understand that Tokyo has an extensive system of subways and surface trains.  Shinagawa is a station for multiple train lines, as well as the Shinkansen high-speed train, so it is huge and somewhat complicated.  Fortunately, thanks to the fantastic info on Wikipedia, I was prepared with just enough information to eventually decipher which entrance I needed to use, and which ticket machine I needed to visit in order to get onto the Yamanote Line.
 
I had stressed a bit about being able to find my stop, and even wrote down the station names (very badly) in Japanese just in case, but it turns out that the Yamanote train announces every station on a display screen and over the speakers both in Japanese and in English, including which lines you may transfer to from each station.
 
Shimbashi wasn’t as big as Shinagawa, but it’s not small.   If you know Boston, think Washington Street Station, but with twice as many lines, spread apart a bit farther.  It took a few minutes once I got there to find the Ginza line and decipher the different type of ticket machine, and then I was on the way to Ginza.
 
My principal goal in going to Ginza was to see the famous Apple Store — five stories tall in one of the most expensive retail spots on the planet.  So, I was a bit disappointed upon arriving to discover that the store wasn’t listed on the helpful charts at Ginza station that tell you which exits will take you to which stores.  I decided to take the exit to the Sony Store instead.  It turns out that this is again a bit like Washington Street — you exit right into the store.  Pretty nice, given that it was raining.
 
Sony turned out to be an interesting visit, and I spent some time playing with new Sony HD camcorders and very small digital cameras, and even got a little demo of the 1080p SXRD VPL-WV100 front projector (although I could have done without the pinpoint spotlight shining on my head while watching the projector).  Then, I decided I would just have to prowl around until I found the Apple store.
 
It turned out to be an interesting day to visit Ginza.  I have no idea what the heck was going on, but for some reason the main drag was closed to traffic, so you could literally walk right down the middle of the road.  It was a bit trippy, but it really made it easier to see the various stores, since you could look easily at both sides.  I was really, again, unprepared for the scale of Ginza.  I figured it was going to be maybe sort of like Times Square, but in fact it goes on seemingly forever.  And it is absolutely jam-packed with high-end stores.  Louis Vuitton, Lladró, Van Cleef & Arpel, Ferragamo and on and on.  I actually went into the LV store just to see what the real thing looked like, after seeing so many knockoffs in China.  Interestingly, I had guessed pretty much right what the giveaways of the fakes would be (I mean, the somewhat-good fakes.  Not the Louis Buitton kind...).
 
I was about to get all upset that there was a McDonald’s in Ginza (and a Starbucks and a T.G.I. Friday’s) when I found something totally new to make my blood boil.  You know those Peruvian guys with the pan pipes who hang out in Harvard Square, play music and sell CDs?  Well, guess what?  There was not just one group, but TWO groups of these guys at Ginza.  And, one of them was parked right in front of the Apple Store.
 
Yup, at last I did find the Apple Store.  I spotted the rotating Apple logo from a distance (whoever decided to make the logo turn: good move; it caught my eye).  For anybody who’s wondering, find “Ginza 3-chome”, and you will have found the store.  This is, truly, the busiest and biggest Apple Store I’ve ever seen.  There’s a super-cool pair of glass elevators (all four sides are glass, including the doors!) that just automatically shuttle between the floors.  No need to push a button; just get on and off as they stop by.  As usual in Apple Stores, there’s iPod stuff everyplace.  Interestingly, on the three levels of the store that have merchandise, each level had iPod stuff.  In fact, there was a lot of duplication among the floors, although each floor clearly had a focus.  The first floor was Macs and PowerBooks (no 17” MacBook on display yet; damn!), the second floor was iPod and Genius Bar, and the fourth floor was software, Internet-connected Macs and general accessories.  The third floor was a many-seat theater where they give classes throughout the day.  I prowled around for a bit, but with no new MacBook to see I really wasn’t shopping, so after about 45 minutes I moved on.

Dave told me I should definitely visit a Ginza department store, and I stumbled across not one but two of the stores on his list (Mitsu Koshi and Matsuya).  So, naturally, I visited both.  It was muggy today because of the rain, and I though I might buy a pair of shorts, but I wasn’t able to find casual wear.  I will say that I was very amused by the directory of one of the stores, which featured women’s wear on FIVE of the nine floors, with men’s wear on one. Hah!  I wandered around for awhile and browsed lots of nice things, and ended up buying myself a very pretty pair of chopsticks that I doubt will see much use, but they’re nice to look at.
 
Mitsu Koshi has three basement levels, and two of them are devoted to food.  One is pastries and sweets, and one is a full-on grocery store.  Just to show what a moron I am, I actually found myself looking at the meat counter even though I have no kitchen here.  It was good-looking stuff though, and it put me in the mood for food.
 
Now, I’m really getting sort of ashamed at this point of my dining choices.  I wandered around for about a half hour looking for a place to get some udon or something else both Japanese and appetizing.  In the end, I went to an Italian restaurant.  I saw plenty of Japanese places, but many were super-fancy (not what I was in the mood for) and some were just serving things that I was not craving.  In the end, the choice boiled down to a decent-looking sushi place, an interesting looking Spanish place with tapas but an all-Japanese menu, and the Italian place.  I must say, they do seem to know how to do pasta right here in Tokyo.  Both the salad and the pasta were excellent and the price was very reasonable: ¥2100 for both plus a ginger ale (Around $21.  Divide yen by 100 for pretty close to correct dollar values).
 
At that, I wrapped up the day.  Back to Ginza Station and on to Shimbashi and Shinagawa.  It was definitely much easier navigating the ticket machines and transfers the second time around, and I’m confident that I won’t have too much trouble getting to my other points of interest while in Tokyo (with the possible exception of Tsukiji, because I’m not sure the subway is even open at the hour I need to go!!).
 
Upon return to Shinagawa, I prowled around a bit to see if there might be a Starbucks with a WiFi hotspot, but I didn’t see one.  Pity.
 
Tomorrow, on to Shinjuku.
 
Saturday, April 29, 2006