One day in Tokyo afternoon · Afternoon in One day in Tokyo
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Afternoon in One day in Tokyo
Afternoon in One day in Tokyo
Board the JR Sobu Line at Ryogoku.
- If you're feeling geeky, you can stop just a few stations away at Akihabara and plunge into one of the world's largest electronics retail districts. You can also find oodles of software, games, comics and various mixes of the two here. Remember that most everything here is aimed squarely at the Japanese market, so voltage (for hardware) and operating systems (for software) may not be compatible, and the language in the manuals certainly won't be ? check out the export retailers like Laox for international versions, but be prepared to pay an "international premium" as well.
Ride all the way through central Tokyo to Yoyogi, then change to the Yamanote Line and ride one stop south to Harajuku. Immediately to the west side of the station is the majestic Meiji Shrine, one of the largest and most serene in Tokyo, located down a wide foot path into a forest of tall cedar trees. Once at the shrine entrance, rinse your hands and take a sip of cleansing water before entering. (Note: Do not drink the water. Take the dipper in your right hand and pour water over your left hand. Change hands and pour water over your right hand. Change hands again and pour water into your cupped left hand, transfer the water to your mouth, rinse and spit---yes, spit--out the water into the trough at the foot of the fountain. Again, rinse your left hand, rinse the dipper to clean it, then put the dipper back on the rack.) Here you can make a wish (remember to throw a coin; a five-yen coin is preferable) into the money box as an offering. Also, notice the other worshipers bow and clap twice to call the gods or buy a votive plaque (ema) to write a wish on. If it's a weekend outside winter, the odds of catching an elaborate Japanese wedding ceremony here are pretty good.
- On Sundays only, there's a ceremony of a different sort going on outside the shrine entrance and in nearby Yoyogi Park when the unofficial Tokyo freak show is held. Here you can catch punks, gothic lolitas, bloodspattered surgeons and other bizarre subcultures showing off to each other and the gaggle of photographers.
Backtrack to Harajuku station and cross to the east side, where an entirely different vista will present itself: right across the road is Takeshita-dori, the nexus of Tokyo's teens, home to the world's heaviest concentration of Hello Kitty goods and other forms of extreme cuteness. Kawaiiiiiiiiii!
Walk through the narrow winding street and take a right at its end onto Meiji-dori. The next intersection is Omote-sando, a tree-lined boulevard occasionally compared to Paris' Champs-Elys�es, with trendy boutiques and snooty cafes priced almost as high as the original.
- Feeling a little peckish? Stop at Tenya on Meiji-dori (on the right side before the Omote-sando crossing) for a �500 bowl of tempura and rice (天丼 tendon).
Cross Omote-sando and keep walking past the Condomania shop. A few blocks down, take a right to cross under the Yamanote train tracks, and after this you are now officially in Shibuya, Japan's capital of cool. The shops here change at a blistering pace nearly as fickle as Tokyo teen fashion, but a few long-termers along the road include the OIOI (say "marooee") fashion mall and the seven-story Tower Records music and book store, where foreign (read: English) books can be found on the seventh floor.
At the end of the road you will find Shibuya station and Hachiko, the busiest pedestrian crossing in the world. If you want to explore Shibuya a little more, make a sharp right here to stroll down the pedestrian street Center-gai. Along the street one shop that's worth a stop is Tokyu Hands, a DIY department store that retails absolutely everything imaginable (and some things that aren't), and otaku certainly won't want to miss out on manga/anime superstore Mandarake.
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Where To Stay & Best Hotels in One day in Tokyo - updated May 2024
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One day in Tokyo Travel Guide from Wikitravel. Many thanks to all Wikitravel contributors. Text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0, images are available under various licenses, see each image for details.
