Touring Tokyo and Sakura peeping!
Our tour bus picked us up at 7:50AM and we discovered that it was actually just a transfer bus. One other important fact that we learned was that this tour did NOT drop us back at our hotel like we were told. The tour operators informed us that we would be taking a taxi or train back at our own expense. A taxi would be around $50 and the train would be around $3. Pretty safe to assume we chose the train. More on that later.
We arrived at a transfer station and were shuffled to another bus for the Panoramic Tokyo tour from Sunrise Tours. Our first stop on the tour was the Meiji Shinto Shine. Shinto and Buddhism are the primary religions in Japan. According to our tour guide, breaking down the word Shinto helps us to get a better meaning: Shin means “God” and to means “the way”, God’s way or the way of God. However in Shintoism, there are many gods. The Shinto religion has shrines where Buddhism has temples. A way to distinguish a temple from the shrine, is to look for the presence of gates (pictured below). Shinto shines have gates and Buddhist temples do not. The second picture is a of spring water which is used to cleanse yourself at the shrine.
While we were at the temple we saw a few weddings take place and the different clothing they wear for the Shinto wedding ceremony.
Upon leaving the Meiji Shinto Shrine, we drove by the Tokyo Tower but unfortunately I was not able to get a picture of this. The tower, designed after the Eiffel Tower, stands 333 meters tall and is primarily used for TV transmission.
Our next stop was the Imperial Palace East Garden. The gardens are open to the public but the palace is not. It is only open twice a year on January 2nd to celebrate the New Year and December 23rd for the Emperor’s birthday.
The cherry blossoms (sakura in Japanese) are in full bloom here and it is a HUGE deal! People packed the streets of Tokyo to hang out, party, and drink under the cherry blossoms. This also caused the Imperial Palace East Garden to be quite crowded. We only took a few pictures of the cherry blossoms because there were so many people crowding around all of them.
On the drive through town we noticed several people with blue tarps. The government gives the homeless blue tarps to keep warm and attempt to create a shelter. We didn’t get much more information on this, but I would be interested to see what other programs were offered and how they compare to programs in the US.
The Asakusa Kannon Temple, the oldest Buddhist temple in Tokyo, was our next stop. This is quite a popular place as well and had dozens of cherry blossom trees. See the picture below for the market surrounding the temple. It was pretty busy and the cherry blossoms are visible on the right.
Unlike the Chinese Buddha images, the Japanese images lacked the swastika on the Buddha’s chest. There where however several on other items on the temple grounds which displayed the symbol. In Japanese culture this symbol represents harmony and was in use long before the Nazi party adopted it.
The afternoon featured a short boat cruise through Tokyo Bay passing under Rainbow Bridge and a visit to Odaiba where there is a replica of the Statue of Liberty. France had loaned the statue to Japan to display and the Japanese loved it so much that France made a replica for them. From Odaiba you can view the Statue of Liberty with Rainbow Bridge, Tokyo Tower, and other buildings in the Tokyo skyline in the background. I think I have seen the Statue of Liberty more times on this trip than I have when I am back in NJ. 
This concluded our trip and the tour made our way back to the bus terminal. From here we had to take a train back to Meguro Station. Our original itinerary stated that we were supposed to be dropped back at our hotel, but since it is far out of the way we do not get that service. We thought that it was going to be difficult to find our way, but there is a rail system that runs around central Tokyo and it quite simple and nice. There are video monitors in the trains that have maps depicting each stop in both English and Japanese. The train was immaculate, no dirt, trash, or graffiti. Nothing like the US. At Meguro Station, there is a shuttle bus that runs back to the Sheraton. From there, we called it a night.
Other comments…(and facts for those following along at home)
We have become spoiled by our private tour guides (Pat and Kay from Thailand and Ricky and Corona in China). There is really nothing like being on a tour with your OWN tour guide where you can stop and take as much time to absorb the scenery. In Thailand and China, these were more economical, but in Japan we would have paid upwards of $1,500 per day!
Tokyo fashion is quite interesting as there appears to be a wide array of styles. There were a lot of people that were wearing clothes that did not appear to match. Susan commented that it looked like they took clothes from all different time periods and put them on in layers. I never really paid attention to anything like this in the US, so it may be exactly the same.
We wanted to see a performance at the Kabuki theatre, but theatre is off the last week in March for rehearsal.
Saturday is a popular day for weddings here too. We saw a total of 6 throughout the day and 4 on the boat cruise alone!
Drivers in Japan drive on the left side of the road and the right side of the car. (Like the UK, Australia, New Zealand, etc.)
There are over 4,000 islands that make up Japan.
People of Tokyo are called Tokyoites.
-Allen
