Tokyo Time

Well, we're here!
Arrived yesterday afternoon after a long day of planes, trains and buses. We left Lee Gardens in the wee hours of the morning and caught the A21 airport bus from the Chatham rd bus stop at 5:50am. We could relax! The airport was a good hour away from Kowloon so we didn't want to leave anything to chance. We checked in and then went through to wait for our 9:30 flight to Narita airport. I found the duty free shops pretty disappointing unless one is into high fashion; there weren't even any decent electronic shops to browse around. We had pancakes and coffee for breakfast and we played cards and read until time to board. It took ages to get to our boarding gate, it was a 25 min walk and train ride away. Our flight was great, caught up on some movies and with a 125 km/h tail wind we landed about 20 mins early. The trick was now figuring out how to get to Asakusa! We eventually found our way to the Keisei limited express train line and headed into town. We changed trains at Aoto station for the Asakusa line subway, alighted at Asakusa station, shouldered our backpacks and 20 minutes later - at about 5:30 pm- arrived at K's House - Tokyo Oasis and oasis it is!. New, clean and very comfortable. Staff great.
Like most backpackers places, very friendly and full of kindred spirits who live, eat and sleep travel. After a welcome cup or two of tea I headed out to buy some food for supper - easier said than done when nothing is marked in English. Anyway ended up, more by accident than design, with rice and chicken and salad for BW and after watching some football fell into bed. An entire day taken up travelling.
Friday 18th - Slept late, probably still shaking off some residual jet lag.
We planned to stay local today so walked around the neighbourhood getting our bearings. We visited the Senso-ji Temple, the oldest in Tokyo and the Asakusa-jinja Shrine - where we saw a man having a blessing ceremony for his new car and a family having their baby blessed. The grounds are dotted with little shrines and lots of people praying and clapping in front of them. We then walked towards the Sumida River where we took the water bus down river to Hama-rikyu Gardens. Such beautiful gardens, an absolutely stunning island surrounded by a sea of high-rise buildings. It started raining with a vengeance as we plotted a course on foot towards the Zojoji Temple. Of course I had only brought one umbrella so I was pretty damp by the time we got to Mos Burgers where we had authentic Japanese burgers and a pretty decent cup of coffee. (Note to self: put both umbrellas in the pack next time!) Zojoji Temple was magic. We sat for ages and watched a monk come out and conduct a sung service under one of the budhas off to one side. At about 5pm after the big drums sounded, a procession of 4 monks came out in to the centre of the temple and conducted a very peaceful service accompanied by bells, drums and gongs. The temple is in the shadow of the Tokyo tower - a 333m tall Eiffelesque type tower.
We then caught the subway back up to Asakusa and we zig-zagged our way through the narrow shopping arcades and streets back to the supermarket where we bought sushi and tempura for supper. BW is very keen on K's House. Any opportunity to go to our room to fetch stuff on her own is seized with glee. She feels really important and empowered to use the lift by herself. Unlike at Lee's in Hong Kong where the lift is one of those old ones with the single sliding door so we didn't let her. Japan for us so far - organised, polite, clean and calm - even the pedestrian alarm on traffic lights is gentle and far less frenetic than its Kong Kong counterpart. Lots of people travelling around on bicycles, on and off the pavements so you do have to keep a look out for them. We like it a lot!!