Day 2!

Tuesday June 17, we explored the whole of Shibuya on foot, without a map, before meeting up with Kayoko at Shibuya station’s famous dog statue, Hachigo, around 2:30pm. Kai was surprised to hear of all the places we’d been, including the bike shop where she knows one of the mechanics, before catching up with her, and was even more impressed to learn we’d done it without a map! Despite my fears, and thanks to Jermaine’s keen sense of direction, we didn’t even manage to get lost. As Jermaine’s told me at least a hundred times, I need to just relax, we’re on vacation.

Kai took us to a cheap, family-style restaurant for lunch. It was really good, despite the cheapness of the meal. I had meat sauce spaghetti, Jermaine ate a pizza and Kai had what she described as “curry rice.”

Video at restaurant:

After eating, Kai led us to a bookstore so we could purchase a map and then took off for work. She had to go audition little kids to be part of her dance team. We’re meeting up with here again on Thursday, her day off, for more Kayoko adventures.

Kayoko and her bike (click to enlarge):

After we got our map, we spent some time in Yoyogi park, which is by Harajuku station. We walked all around the park, and then around the outside of the park, where we found a riding school, Tokyo Rider’s Club, full of horses and riders.

Horses (click to enlarge)!

When we were done with the park, we got on the train back to Komagome because we were both dead tired. Once we got back home, we decided we were tired but hungry and got some dinner at a ramen house near to where we live, and only looked like dorks a little when we ordered extra green onions, like LOTS of them. We passed it off well, though, we made it look like we LOVED them.

Dinner, ramen and gyoza (click to enlarge):

The rest of the evening was spent asleep for me, and playing video games for Jermaine. We woke up briefly this morning at 4am and I took that opportunity to look up the locations of a couple of bike shops we want to go to, which were all surprisingly close to places we’d gone to on Tuesday, and we’re planning to visit them today. Also on the docket for today: sitting and staring at people and eating. Should be exciting.