After a 9 and a half hour flight and an hour and a half express train ride from the airport, we made it to Tokyo! We left Hawaii at 8:50AM and arrived in Japan at 1:30pm the next day! Crossing the international date line is hard to get used to. We flew on a Japanese airline called Zipair. It is a low-cost airline from Japan, but it was really nice. New plane, nice seats, great legroom, etc.
When we arrived at Narita airport, we had to go through three different areas. We had filled out documents on our phones before leaving the US, so they just checked these at each stage. First was “quarantine” where they took our temperature with a remote infrared camera and checked our documentation for Covid vaccines on our phone. There must have been a hundred workers directing us through this area. I was amazed – every 10 feet, there was another person directing us on where to go and making sure we had the right screen on our phone. It wasn’t busy, so it seemed like there were almost more workers than passengers. They were very friendly and welcoming. The next stage was the typical passport control, then we picked up our luggage and went through customs which was done on a kiosk that took our picture and allowed us to get through the final gate via facial recognition. Here too there were so many workers directing you through each station. I was really amazed at this as we seem to have so few staff at US airports helping people through customs in comparison.
We took the Narita Express train to the Shinjuku train station in Tokyo. I didn’t realize how far out the airport is from Tokyo. The train went really fast and only had four stops, but it was still an hour and a half. We successfully navigated our way through the train station with our luggage to our hotel. Turns out this was a feat as the Shinjuku station is one of the busiest in the world – serving 3.6 million passengers each day! It was actually pretty easy to navigate and we were amazed that it was so clean! There were workers with small vacuums cleaning the stairs here and there, but there wasn’t much to clean up as the Japanese appear to be very conscientious about not leaving trash around, etc.
Our hotel room is amazing. We are staying at a mid–range hotel – maybe comparable to a Marriott courtyard. Everything is so well-made and well-designed. It reminds me of Scandinavia a bit that way. Doors and windows open and close with precision, the HVAC was completely quiet, the faucets work effortlessly, the toilet – well the toilet is a modern marvel. I’m not even sure all the things it does, but when you sit on it the seat is warm, things start whirring below and you leave feeling clean and refreshed.
Our room came with a washer/dryer which is the main reason I booked it. Another little marvel – it’s a front loading washer that is also a dryer so you just put your dirty clothes in and they come out washed and dried. However, trying to understand how to operate it took us quite a while as the buttons are all in Japanese and the instructions were sparse. You should have seen Sophie and I try to figure it out – we ended up laughing a lot as it felt like one of those challenges you see on the Amazing Race.
The room included slippers and button-up robes they translated as “night clothes”. Cleanliness appears to be super important to the Japanese. That suited us just fine, but takes a bit to get used to. Their Covid protocols (many still in place) ratcheted this up to a whole new level. For instance, when we went for breakfast in the hotel, we were required to sanitize our hands and put on plastic gloves before taking food from the buffet. Masking is still pretty much 100% in place. While it is no longer required outdoors, we rarely saw anyone unmasked. Hand sanitizing is required at all stores and restaurants as you enter. Our hands have never been so clean.
After starting a load of laundry in the hotel and resting a bit, we headed out for supper. I found a ramen place near us that got good reviews on google maps so we headed there not really knowing what to expect. The restaurant door was in a little crowded alley. We opened a little door which revealed a narrow stairway up. Up we went and when we poked our head up, we discovered a crowded narrow room with tiny stools squeezed in between a wall and a counter, with a cook and server on the other. We were just about to turn around when the server asked some people to move opening up the last two stools. There were room for only ten patrons at a time. So, we sat down and the server pointed to a box that was just above the stairs and told us to get tickets. Another Amazing Race challenge. We put some yen into the machine, clicked a button for what we wanted and got tickets. We gave them to the cook and hoped we ordered something we liked. Luckily, we got served a nice big bowl of pork ramen in an anchovy broth with two types of firm noodles. The bowls were 900 yen each, which is less than 7 dollars. Not bad. We noticed a note on the wall by our seats that was signed by Wayne Gretzky proclaiming this place the best ramen in Tokyo. I don’t know if it really is, but it was quite the experience for us.
Our first few hours in Tokyo were memorable and almost overwhelming with so many interesting things to notice. We really like it so far and are looking forward to our next few days.
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