Day Two Observations - Tokyo

- Spent all day today in various temples and shrines. There is an elaborate ritual involving water, incense, change and clapping that Sue would only perform when noone was looking.

- There is a small subculture of teenage girls that comes out on the weekends. They wear strange gothic costumes and vamp on the sidewalks outside of Meiji shrine. We would have been more shocked, but they looked no more crazy than any other teenager here, so we walked right by them.

- We went to the Park Hyatt to drink at the Lost in Translation bar. But it was closed. So we ended up somewhere else in the hotel, drinking equally expensive drinks and listening in on the conversation of two nearby Australians. They discussed some important business in hushed tones. What could they have been talking about? They're freaking AUSTRALIANS! Nothing could be that important ... was it the merger of the Digiridoo Corporation with Wallabies, Inc.?

- There is this citywide campaign here in Tokyo to stop smoking while walking in public (complete with little smoker's stands and hilarious cartoon pleas), but you can still SMOKE IN EVERY RESTAURANT. It is like they turned New York's rules inside-out.

- Still no giant robots.

- Shinjuku, home of the Park Hyatt, is the place most like Taksim Square in Istanbul that I have ever seen. I half-expected to get in a fight with a Turkish cabdriver.

- Outside of the restaurant where we were having lunch (Gut's Grill -- how's that for appetizing?) there was a large group of drummers and musicians putting on a Napoleon Dynamite-level performance in front of a bewildered crowd. I've come to the conclusion that there is no word in Japanese for "That sounds like a really goofy idea." I think that would explain a lot.

- There is nothing here that I don't want to roll up in my Katamari.