Five Nineteen O Six / Japan III

Japan III - last day in Tokyo...

For you doubting thomases, I HAVE been working here in the Keio ER over the past two weeks. Not as much as their interns (they work from 8am to 8pm, six days a week, sometimes on Sunday morning too... oy) but I think everyone here works too much. I have also done some ACLS training, visited two other hospitals, rode on the ambulance and toured the fire station. The firemen were especially cool and I got to go up on thefire ladder (30 meters) which was scary but great. The interns here have been awesome as well - they took me out to Thai food one day where I had some crazy spicy curry. I think the owner of the restaurant was very confused when I could speak Thai but no Japanese and then carried on in English at my table.

I attended a Kendo club practice session, which was awesome. I think there is something very primal about swinging around a sword (even one made of bamboo) and screaming at the top of your lungs. But even being largely a spectator, I could feel the floor revibirating with each yell or charge and it really made me wish that I had done a martial art (as stereotypically asian as it is) at some point in life. Still perhaps it is not too late and maybe they will have some kickboxing class at UCLA I can join. I also went out to dinner with the kendo students (which, after they took off the protective gear, turned out to be largely women) to an italian place where we had pizza and pasta. Pretty good thin crust too...

I also finally went into a pachinko parlor. A japanese institution, pachinko parlors areessentially gambling establishments where people go to play on these machines that shoot little metal balls into a maze of pins and essentially win prizes/money depending on where they fall. This is a 26 trillion (that's right, trillion) yen industry here - equal in cost to the entire healthcare industry = 260 billion dollars - so, of course, I was wondering what the deal was. I ended up spending 500 yen for 125 small metal balls... these were quickly shot up by turning a small knob and bounced around with lots of noise among the pins. While some balls did land in the correct holes and many lights went off at various times, I was surprised/disappointed that all you could control was the speed at which the balls were sent up - it wasn't even like pin ball where you could bounce the ball around. Anyway, it took me about 2 mins to run out and then we quickly left the smoke filled room. All in all, not so exciting...then again, I'm not so good with the gambling anyway(as proven by my last trip to Reno where I was quite happy to quit after winning $10 at blackjack.)

Also managed to make it to the top of the Park Hyatt building (for movie buffs, it's where Lost in Translation was filmed) to their bar on the 52nd floor. Quite posh, live jazz, low lit, imaculate decor and, though the view was marred by drizzling clouds, you could still make out the lights of Tokyo in the Distance. I'm hoping for better weather this Friday so I can go up to the observation tower on the Gov Municipal Building and see Mt Fuji.

One of our attending doctors took us out to this Ninja Restaurant - it's pretty famous I think and they said there is a branch in New York. The decor was old japanese houses and rooms within these caves and the waiters were dressed in ninja costume. Many of the dishes were smoking (dry ice) and lit on fire (sweet...) Then a senior ninja comes to your table to do magic tricks (mostly just card tricks) still it was pretty cool... But the most impressive thing may have been the desert - I ordered the Bonzai, which turned out to be ice cream buried under chocolate cake crumbles and then covered with cookies and green sprinkles... so it totally looked like a bonsai tree!

This sunday was also Kanda Matsuri, one of the three biggest festivals in Tokyo during the year. The celebrants carry around this shrine (mikoshi) which represents the area/temple's guardian spirit and everyone is out in the streets drinking and celebrating. It was pretty cool to see.

I also managed to sneak out to national history museum one afternoon, went for a walk in the nearby Shinjuku park (parts of which were modeled after famous japanese paintings), met this dutch guy who lives down the hall, found some cool souvenirs, went to thetraditional crafts museum (it was nice but they wouldn't let me take pictures... ugghh), watched lots of sumo (amazingly,their names have become familiar and I know that the top ranked sumo wrestlers are called Ozeki), had great okonomiyaki (kind of like a pancake with cabbage and other stuff inside... excellent) and watched a korean movie with japanese subtitles (Il Mare) - which I highly recommend (no, not the watching a foreign movie in a foriegn country with foreign audio and subtitles... just the movie.

And lastly, everyone at the hospital took me out for dinner on my last night here yesterday. We went to this restaurant called Mu Mu, which turned out to be organic new age Japanese cuisine. It was on the 49th floor of the Sumitomo building and we had a spectacular view of the city along with some small fireworks from Tokyo Disneyland. Afterwards, some of the interns and I went out for yakitori (small skewers of chicken) and more drinks and basically stayed out til 2am. It was an excellent way to finish off my two week of work.

So for my last day in Tokyo, I ended up at a bar in Shibuya called Xanadu. I had heard about this place from a couple people and it was a cool place but the crowd was so-so. I did meet these guys playing darts and learned how to play 'cricket' (not of the wooden mallets and wickets variety). I tried the game as well and did fairly well and as such, did lose track of the time and manage to miss the last subway train home. I was about to hail a taxi when I saw a Bagus Gran Cyber Cafe across the street. A friend had sent me an article earlier about them and basically they are these suped up internet cafes where you basically rent a cubicle and there is a library of thousands of manga, comic and many DVD movies that you can check out and watch. There is playstation and internet as well and many people check into these cafes when they are unable to get home or when they want to get away from it. So, curiousity piqued, I decided to see what this was all about. It was at the counter onthe sixth floor when I discovered that I only had 1220 yen left and that the price was 1300 yen, cash only... d'oh. But then I had a thought... 70 yen is like 70 cents in the US, not so much money, maybe I can dregde up something. Hmm... you try wandering the streets, not speaking the language and asking for money at one in the morning... a humbling experience to say the least and I almost gave up (I had enough money for a taxi home) but the help of a friendly Canadian guy and Spanish girl (from Madrid - probably helped that I spoke espanol), I got the cash. And now, I am checked into my cubicle. After publishing this page, I am off to explore the book stacks, maybe grab a DVD, have some tea and maybe catch a nap... Ahh, Tokyo, what an interesting place...

Tomorrow I'm off to Kyoto for four days and then it's back to San Jose!

ps. the last three pictures are kind of random but there's a privacy code about this cyber cafe and I don't think anyone would appreciate pictures... :)