Traveling in Tokyo is really tiring. Before I begin the chronological explanation of my day, I'd like to share a couple random thoughts. I think I mentioned before that there are not a lot of garbage cans. Well in addition to that, there is a distinguishing lack of benches and places to sit in public. Also, there are no buttons to signal that you want to cross the street. I suppose this might be more of an urban area thing because I vaguely remember streets in San Francisco that are alike, but I haven't spent enough time in the city to really realize it, so it still struck me as odd.
Anyway, today we went to Ueno Zoo, the oldest zoo in Japan at 129 years and I believe also the biggest in terms of number of species. Two things that separate your typical American attraction from a Japanese one include: (A) Entrance fees and (B) Prices of goods inside. For example, tickets to the San Diego Zoo cost 40 USD for adults (and note adult apparently means ages 12 and up) while at the Ueno Zoo in Japan, tickets cost a mere 600 JPY, or about 7.68 USD for adults (age 16-65). A staggering gap in price, no? Ages 13-15 are a mere 200 JPY while anyone younger than that is free. As for the second difference, in America at a theme park or the like, a meal might cost near 15 or 20 dollars, while here in Japan at the zoo I can eat for about 5 USD.
Moving along, I wrote all the animals that I saw down but in retrospect I think I will only mention the ones worthwhile. As you walk into the zoo, immediately on the right is the giant panda exhibit. Japan does not own any pandas, and thus have two on loan from China since February of this year following Ling Ling's death several years ago. Later on, we discovered a Sumatran Tiger as it boasted its loudest roar. Near the tiger was a Western Lowland Gorilla area and a Asistic Lion area. We also polar bears, Asian elephants, an American Bison, a few different kinds of monkeys, penguins, armadillos, giraffes, kangaroo, and pygmy hippos. These were some of the more interesting animals, but be aware we saw many more. Another funny thing about the zoo was the sheer amount of kindergartners. I estimate that there were at least 1000 of the little scamps. Occasionally I would hear some of them say, "Sensei, Sensei! Mitai! Hora!" or "Teacher teacher, look, look!" Also, youngsters around the same age but with their mothers would say the same, except with sensei replaced with okaasan. At one time or another, one of the little kindergartners greeted my own okaasan with an English, "Hello." As we were leaving, another boy in a middle school uniform said the same to us. I think some Japanese are really eager to practice their English with real westerners. Around lunch time in the zoo, I used a vending machine that actually dropped a cup and then poured your desired drink into the cup along with ice, much like a soda machine in a fast food restaurant except entirely automatic.
Afterward, we caught the train (I've got the JR Yamanote Line down now) to Tokyo Station and navigated our way to the Imperial Palace, home of the Emperor of Japan. Construction was being done on the face of Tokyo Station, but if you google it you can see a picture of its rather nice building. There's not much to see at the Imperial Palace really. We walked for maybe a 150 yards and took a few pictures of the grounds. For obivous reasons, we weren't allowed inside. I'm going to wrap this up with some pictures, as I'm going out with Yuya tonight to an undecided location.
From Tokyo with love,
Daniel
 |
| One of two Great Pandas at Ueno Zoo. |
No comments:
Post a Comment