Ame

The past week or two it has started to rain a lot. At first it was mostly just annoying drizzle, but in the past weekend we experienced the edges of a typhoon, so it got kind of nasty. The Japanese use ordinals rather than names to keep track of their storms, and this was Typhoon #22.

On Friday Brian and I (and some others briefly) went to Shimokita-zawa to look at the many small record shops. I am hoping to acquire some Japanese rock or indie music, and I think this might be the place to do it. It’s a bit difficult to do though, for a variety of reasons. First, I don’t know any bands so I have to look for places with listening stations and then stand around patiently using them. Second, all these shops close early, and class intrudes on most business hours. My favorite so far is High Line Records, which closes at 8:30 every day. Third, CDs are really expensive here, so I want to be sure before I drop any cash. Anyhow, it rained on us pretty hard Friday and we got soaked. It kind of sucked. It should clear up a bit now that 22 has passed though.

Last Monday my group from business class went to a couple spots in Tokyo to start research for our presentation. We first went to Jimbocho, a district full of little book shops. There are a couple pictures. We didn’t stay too long because it’s kind of boring unless you like book shopping. We moved on to Suidobashi (not sure on that name) where Tokyo Dome is located. We hadn’t intended to research this place, but just sort of wound up there thanks to our guide. Since it’s right next to Jimbocho and so totally different, we are probably going to change our research locations to Jimbocho, Suidobashi, and Akihabara. These three are contiguous, yet vastly different cities, so it could be interesting.

Anyhow, Tokyo Dome City (the area around Tokyo Dome) is pretty cool, since it’s mostly shopping mall and amusement park. We snuck into Tokyo Dome Hotel and rode the elevator to the top floor (43) for pictures. I want to go back later when the park is open for more “research.”

On Wednesday we took a trip to the Toshiba Science Museum. It was OK. We saw a demonstration of levitation via superconductors that was pretty sweet. I got some video which will go online eventually. All in all I’m not sure it was worth all the time it took though.