During the whole time I've been away I'm pretty sure I have learned endless useful pieces of information about my personality, how I've coped in difficult times, and just generally what I've picked up about the world around me.
It's impossible to say how much it will impact my life going forward, but it's also naive to think that this four month stay in a different continent won't have affected my being in anyway.
Throughout your formative years, the things you encounter, and the experiences you have turn you into the person you eventually become. But I'd say that even by the end of your teens you're still not anywhere near a 'finished product'. People always refer to your adolescence as the time when you develop most as a person, but I think that the time between the age of twenty and thirty has had an equal, if not greater impact on my life.
I feel like for me that there are two pretty large events that I can look back upon and feel like they had a major impact on the way I like at things. The first took place when I was nineteen years old and I moved down to London to study at the University of Surrey. For most people, even those who didn't make it through all three years, university is a fairly pivotal time of your life, and I think it's the moment when you truly become an adult as you have to start managing your own schedule as well as be in a position where you look after yourself full time. Balancing your money, time and education isn't an easy task for sure, but I think that every single person who went through this experience came out of the other side totally different.
For me, the second big experience was moving to South Korea. I know I have lived in other countries also, but Korea was the first time that I had been away from home for so long, and it obviously had a massive impact moving to a foreign culture and knowing that I was going to be there for a year. I've discussed many times that I think I found myself in a fairly fortunate position with the school I worked in, the city I resided in and the friends that I made. Twelve months away from home arguably had a bigger impact than three years being at the opposite end of the country just a couple of years earlier.
On this journey through Asia I have definitely learned plenty, and even now I'm still picking up little bits of information here and there that will help me moving forward. Some of the things I learn, are confirmations rather than pieces of entirely new information, but other things are more major.
One thing I have definitely learned is that living in a foreign country is an entirely different to travelling through one for a short stay. My experiences in Korea this time around were totally different to the ones I had in 2009-10 although I'd imagine a lot of that had to do with where I visited, and the fact that I was out and about all the time rather than working.
The things you pick up whilst passing through from one place to another are obviously just impressions, and I guess the longer you stay somewhere the more you get accustomed to things being how they are.
I read an interesting article yesterday on the BBC website yesterday that discussed how many expats struggle when they return to their life in their native country.
The article discussed that many of the reasons are related to the person's outlook on their experiences, and also that when the return home they're in a haze, and almost confused by the things which have changed from when they left.
I don't think I've been away from England long enough for that to happen as yet, but I'm certainly thinking that there might be a brief period of transition when I finally get back to the European way of living.
*********************************************************************************
This was a strategy that I adopted earlier on in my travels, and part of this was usually because of the fact I needed to get out of the sun for a little while and cool down after a busy day.
Partly due to where I'm staying, and it being so far outside of Tokyo, and partly because I find my days much more filled with activities, I seem to be getting back to my hotel later and later each day.
Not that it's a problem, because after all, I didn't come away so that I could stare at the walls of my hotel room, but I do have to be aware that the later nights are probably going to have an impact on my already broken down body at some point.
I was up pretty early in order to go to Kamakura, and because of the length of the train journey I think it was around 9pm when I eventually came back to Tokiwadai.
I didn't have to get up ridiculously early this morning as my plans were mostly for this afternoon, and I'm sure that my body was pretty glad of the rest. Even though I'm staying on a main road, I barely get woken up by vehicles travelling up and down the it, and to be honest, the noise in the hotel in general is pretty minimal. I don't actually think I've seen anyone else going in and out of their room, although I've heard a few people opening and closing their doors.
When you stay in a hotel it's always hard to tell how many people are staying there each night (not that it's important information) as everyone is on their own schedule.
There isn't really a lobby in this hotel as such, and the reception closes at 6pm so I don't think apart from checking in I've actually interacted with anybody because the easiest way for me to exit is via the stairs which go down the back of the hotel itself.
With some extra time in my room before leaving I planned out what I was going to do with myself today, and also booked a couple of hotels for the stops after Tokyo. I tried to make my route as logical as possible here (not that it wasn't in other countries) so I'm travelling from north to south. Part of this was due to having to figure out a way to get from Beijing to somewhere in Japan without have an incredibly long layover, and then I also needed to find a city in Japan that would easily allow me to get to Hong Kong.
Logically I could have made both of these journeys from Tokyo, but I really didn't want to have to go back on myself considering I need to save up as much money as I can for hotels / train journeys in each city.
As well as some entertaining activities, I had to carry out one practical task for today which occurred as something dawned on me last night.
To get the authentic Japanese experience I wanted to spend one night in some traditional local accommodation which is located a little closer to the centre of the city. I'm making this move on Tuesday which also happens to be a terrible weather day, but thankfully I have an activity I can do which will mean that I don't have to get too drenched.
Firstly, as it is buried somewhere in the packed streets of Tokyo, I wanted to make sure that I knew where the hotel itself was, as I'll be arriving there in the morning - probably during rush hour - and also I needed to make sure that even though I'm not allowed to check in until later that afternoon, that I will be allowed to store my baggage there and then return later to sort my room and everything else out.
That wasn't my main task for the day, but it was something I'd planned to do along the way, and considering I was going to be spending some time in that area of the city today I figured that it would be a good idea to try to be at least a little prepared rather than winging it on the day.
I don't think it's any secret that the skyline here in Tokyo is amongst the best on this continent, if not in the world. There are plenty of opportunities to get great views out over the city and that was something that I was hoping to do at some point today.
Although I'd spend some time in Shibuya when I arrived on Friday, I hadn't experienced too much of down-town Tokyo, but I sought to correct that as I caught the train to an area called Hamamatsucho.
Having figured the train out in Tokyo (finally) I knew that I needed to get my usual Tobo-Toju train to Ikebukuro, and then make my way on to the Yamanote line in order to get to Hamamatsucho to start the day. The Yamanote Line is essentially a circle which runs around the twenty-five to thirty main stations in the city, it's the line which gives you connection to most of the other ones you need to access.
I'd say that there are probably five main train stops here in Tokyo; Shinjuku, Ikebukuro, Ueno, Tokyo and Shinagawa with each of these stops all on the Yamanote Line service.
From Ikebukuro it was equal stops whether I went clockwise or counter clockwise to get to Hamamatsucho, and I decided to go clockwise as I'd not actually been through any of those stations as yet.
Two of the options for getting great views out over Tokyo lay in the area, one directly in front of the station as I got off the train, and one a bit further in the distance.
The first building I came to when exiting from the station was the very tall and very imposing World Trade Center which is essentially the first of many skyscrapers which lead towards the business district.
I think it was actually quite reasonable to go up the World Trade Center, but I'll explain why I didn't consider it as an option later on in this post:
From there I walked down towards the second of my photography points today which was the Tokyo Tower. You could see it peaking through the gardens of a nearby shrine which I used the gardens of to access it.
For some reason, one thing that sticks in my head about Japan, or Tokyo particularly is that for some reason there are pylons here which are red and white instead of being a steely grey. I'm not sure if they were just looking to do something different with them, but that's something I have always noticed when I've seen pictures of Japan:
Whilst the country were trying to make their electricity supplies unique, they were copying the example of Paris by building a pretty much exact replica of the Eiffel Tower. Whilst we have the very glamorous Blackpool Tower in England, the Japanese have the painted red and white façade which is Tokyo Tower.
It very much stands out amongst the buildings around it, more for it's colour than size, and is a popular place for tourists.
Again, I made the decision not to go up, and instead just walked around marvelling at it, and figuring out how on earth I was going to try and fit it into a picture:
From here I was intending to go towards Shinjuku and try to find my hotel and then continue with the rest of my day, but I actually ended up spending a long time walking around the area trying to find somewhere to exchange some currency or locate a cash machine which would actually accept my card. I tried three different stations, and pretty much every bank going, before I eventually found a cash point in a convenience store which would provide me with some money in order to be able to get back on the subway.
It was a little frustrating to say the least, but I guess this is a disadvantage of not being very familiar with your surroundings.
I moved on to Shinjuku, taking one of the many underground lines to get there and then searching through the maze of streets for my hotel.
I'd written down some instructions on paper and taken a screenshot to help guide me, but it's no underestimation to say that Shinjuku might be one of the biggest and most confusing stations on the planet. It has about seven or eight different lines which run through it, and trying to find a way to exit and go in the direction I thought I needed to go was an interesting experience.
Thankfully there were tourist maps dotted all over the place as I made slow but steady progress towards where I needed to be before eventually finding the street.
The combination of the sun disappearing behind a cloud, and night starting to fall made Shinjuku look pretty incredible and although I was engrossed in finding my hotel I couldn't help but enjoy my surroundings. There are obviously lights everywhere in Tokyo, but this is probably the most authentic of the experience I'd had, which sounds strange considering on my first night here I'd visited the Shibuya area which is essentially like Oxford Circus:
It took an hour or so of searching, but I eventually found the hotel I'll be staying in, and they confirmed that I'd be OK to leave my bag there for the day so at least that was sorted, and I've avoided a potential nightmare on Tuesday morning when I have to travel there with absolutely no idea where I'm going!
I knew finding my hotel was going to be a bit of a disaster so it hadn't put me behind in anyway as I still had one more task to complete.
The beauty of doing plenty of research and using several different websites as sources is that you get the opinions of different people, but also find some information that may not be divulged otherwise.
As I mentioned there are many different ways to view the Tokyo skyline, however, having looked into it a bit deeper I'd managed to find an option within the city that was actually completely free.
Close to Shinjuku Station is the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building which opens up it's towers on a nightly basis for people to go to the 45th floor of either tower and get a spectacular view out over the city.
As great as the other commercial options were I figured that it would be a great opportunity to see out over the city in a less crowded space, and without having to shell out too much money.
I walked in the direction of the building from Shinjuku, but when I got there, it was actually looking pretty closed. I wasn't sure if the opening hours were shortened on a Sunday, but I followed a few signs which were very subtle and eventually found myself at the access point of the observation deck itself.
There was a queue of a few people when I got there who obviously knew about this rather 'secret' option for great city views, and very soon we were all in an elevator up to the observation deck.
There were probably about twenty five or so people up there, although more joined as the sun started to disappear.
The views out of the windows were pretty spectacular:
There were even a couple of souvenir shops up at the top which were interesting to look around.
The fact that the sun was setting made it look even more perfect......
....and when I was leaving, more and more lights were starting to come on to give it that authentic Tokyo look.
Having to do a couple of essential tasks obviously got slightly in my way today, but they thankfully didn't spoil my enjoyment of being in the city. Seeing all the lights made all the hard work and effort totally worth it and with those remedial tasks out of the way I can now focus on enjoying the rest of my stay here.
The Best Things in Life are Free
Janet Jackson and Luthur Vandross (1992)
No comments:
Post a Comment