Afternoon in Tokyo - Nov. 15

Everyone in the Ueki family was busy today, so I left Chiba late in the morning and headed to Tokyo to meet up with two friends who are also studying abroad in Japan this year. They are spending their third year of college at Waseda University. I was supposed to meet up with them at noon, but they couldn't meet me until 2:00, so I had two hours to spare. I spent a good portion of time walking through Tokyo Station, because it is huge, with four floors and many shops. I had just exited the station when I received a text from Okaasan (the one in Kobe) informing me that Yoko had come down with influenza. I sent Okaasan a message asking if Yoko had swine flu, but Okaasan said that at this point, Japanese people aren't concerned with which type of flu anyone has, they just want the person to not contaminate anyone else. Yoko now has to take a week off of school, and she is restricted to her bedroom on the second floor.

Anyway, after that message, I just wandered around the area surrounding Tokyo Station. I didn't find it to be a happening, glamorous place, and I had a lot of luggage and bags with me, so I decided to sit in a coffee shop for a while. But when I realized that smoking was allowed in the coffee shop and everyone around me was doing it, I relocated to a ramen shop and enjoyed a tasty lunch.

I then walked back to the station to meet my friends, and we had a lot of fun catching up on camp news (these are friends I met at my part time job working as a camp counselor in Minnesota) and comparing our exchange experiences. They took me to an area of Tokyo known as Ueno, and I bought a full-body bear costume there. The bear's name is Korirakkuma, and it is a new toy in Japan that has become wildly popular, comparable to but not nearly as famous as Hello Kitty. I also bought my host family "Tokyo Banana," a popular sweet that's made in Tokyo and serves as a good souvenir. I don't see what the connection is between Tokyo and bananas, but hey, these Tokyo Bananas are in demand!