Posted on Wednesday, April 04, 2007 5:02 PM
We decided that today was a good day for exploring Ueno itself a bit. While we often travel through Ueno to get somewhere (Ueno is thé station to hop onto a Shinkansen towards eastern Honshu) and we grab a bite to eat now and then at a certain rstaurant across the station, but Ueno itself is kind of unknown.
We started walking towards Asakusa, spotted a Post Office (for future reference) and before we knew it, we were on a rather large and wide street, which turned out to be Kappabashi Kitchenware Town.
You see, for most common things, Tokyo has a designated area in which shops selling these things are concentrated.
If you want cloth, you go to Nippori; for electronics, you go to Akihabara; for expensive branded clothes and accessories, you go to Omotesando in Harajuku, and so on.
In case you want to start a restaurant or something like that, Kappabashi Kitchenware Town in Asakusa is a good way to start. ;)
Afterwards, Robert and I went to Shibuya. This is another shopping and entertainment district in the region, and is also famous for the tale of Hachiko the dog.
Hachiko was an
Akita dog, owned by a professor in the agriculture department at Tokyo University. During the professor's life, Hachiko saw him off and greeted him at the end of the day at Shibuya Station.
One day in May 1925, the professor died while at the university, but Hachiko returned every day to the station to wait for him, and continued to do so for the next 11 years until his own death.
The dog was fed by various people while he waited for his master to return, and a statue was erected in Hachiko's honour.
Hachiko's story also accomplished the saving of the Akita breed; at the time of Hachiko's death, the number of Akita's was down to 29.
After mucking around in Shibuya, we returned to the apartment to rest a little, and shortly after, we went back into Ueno to find a decent restaurant.
We did; having some Chinese food with beer and gyouza for little more than 1000 yen. Adding that up to the money we spent on lunch and some drinks, we fed ourselves today for around 2600 yen, which is something in the line of 16 euro.
Most Dutch restaurants won't even hold the door for you for that kind of money!
Tomorrow, we plan on going to Odaiba, to visit the Science Museum. Should be fun.
Cheers, K.