After my 20 hours of sleep, I felt a lot better. I wasn’t sure I was up to heading out but I felt OK after breakfast so I went outside. I was surprised at how cold it was and had to come back and put on long pants.

My first stop today was a controversial one, but not too far from where I’m staying. I went to Yasukuni Shrine, which “was established to commemorate and honor the achievement of those who dedicated their precious lives for their country,” which can be seen as a commemoration of Japan’s participation in World War II, or warfare in general. The nearer portions of Asia that were annexed during WWII aren’t very fond of it in general. Nevertheless, I wanted to see it and today I did.

There was a large police presence in the neighborhood around the shrine, but that made sense since it was controversial and also near the Imperial Residence. There are also several embassies nearby and I did see quite a few policemen around the “Korea Center”. They weren’t there to keep people away, necessarily, since the path around the Imperial residence is a popular running route and was so busy that it looked like a race was going on.

I decided to walk back from the shrine because it would be more interesting than just sitting around for another day. By google maps it’s about 9 miles of walking, but I had all afternoon. Everyone was a bit surprised when I’d ask which direction Shinjuku was, but that was only about 3 miles of the total from when I started asking. On the trip back I stopped at the Tokyo Fire Department Museum and Mos Burger. I only have a picture from Mos Burger. The tempura pork burger was tiny and I could have eaten another, but I didn’t.

I made it back to Shinjuku and looked for the restaurant that my sister wanted me to find which got me sidetracked into a dangerous neighborhood before. I was much more careful this time and had my iPhone and maps running and figured out that the planned renovation was still taking place. And by planned renovation, they tore the building down.

All that’s left is that wall. The restaurant has relocated “around the block” which was a bit trickier than I expected. I found the entrance between a couple of electric stores.

I left to find another spot my sister suggested, the Paul Bassett coffee shop, which is somewhere I wanted to go and have a cup of coffee. It was more popular than I expected and crowded even on a Saturday in the middle of empty government office buildings. I had a machiatto which was tiny and tasty.

After that it was time for the final walk home with a side-trip to the ¥100 store. I also found out that the area I’m in, which I thought was the biggest part of Korea Town, was nothing compared to the area on the other side of Shin-Okubo station. It was incredibly crowded, the signs were in Korean, and merchants were yelling out Korean phrases. But I made it to the ¥100 yen store and bought an umbrella (¥100), a bar of soap (¥100), 500g of possibly-sea salt (¥100), a wash bag (¥100), and a ceramic teapot that I’m going to use as a neti pot (¥100). OK, so I’m exaggerating and there’s a 5% tax so everything was ¥525 total.

The rest of the evening was much more uneventful. I found out that the udon shop on the first floor is a chain and isn’t the best though it is better than most of the things I get in the US and only cost me ¥550. And I figured out how to use my teapot as a neti pot, so I hope I don’t have any more repetitive dreams about having to go find a neti pot in Japan. 20 hours of sleep make for enough dreams that it can feel like you’re hallucinating.