I scheduled a full day in Tokyo to get my fancy watch serviced,  a particular errand that I’ve been unable to perform for years. The problem with having a multi-thousand-dollar watch is that you’re supposed to pay hundreds every few years to have it “overhauled.” It’s best to have a Grand Seiko overhauled in Japan because they’re supposed to do a better job and Seiko Japan also performs a “complimentary” polish of the scratches on the case and wrist strap that the US repair shop is unable to do. It also takes about a month and you have to hand-deliver and pick up the watch in Tokyo. I’m usually not in Japan for a whole month. Since I’m in Japan for much longer this time, it was time to get the overhaul done. Probably more about watches than you ever wanted to know.

The plane from Portland arrived in Narita early so I was able to drop off the watch in on the day I arrived (yesterday). This gave me a full day to kill in Tokyo with very little planned. First, I went out in search of breakfast. (Actually, first I fought with the janky WiFi in the Green Hotel.) I entered the first coffee shop I saw (just at the corner) and bought a “morning set” and a coffee. They were great, by the way.

Then I went out and ran the only other errand I had: mailing presents to friends rather than hauling them around with me for two months before I saw them. Being Asian I have to bring presents for a lot of the people I’m visiting (especially relatives) and rather than carry them around the trick is to drop them in the Japan Post. You can try the excellent delivery services, but they require you to write the address in Japanese. Japan Post is used to getting international mail so you can just scribble addresses in English. Plus they were trying to sell me curry from APA Hotels at the Post Office.

After that I was lost, so I took my sister’s advice to go see a stationery store called Kakimori. As soon as I found it I went in through the open door and got kicked out because it was 40 minutes before they opened. And I couldn’t even look in the window because they were taking pictures of the front of the store. What I did see looked a little boring and not worth the trouble, but I read up on the store and they have lots of papers and options for you to create your own notebook. Cool for notebook nerds.

Getting there early gave me time to wander. I didn’t mind because I rarely come to this side of the Tokyo loop line and I like wandering around Japan. In fact, I don’t even mind being bored in Japan. I’m not at work and it’s very different than home.

I found the ink store that was part of Kakimori where you can mix your own fountain pen ink. It was a ways from Kakimori, and they also weren’t open until 11AM.

But close to the ink shop was chocolatier who had various varieties of coffee and hot chocolate! The chocolatier was definitely worth the walk, even if I didn’t go to Kakimori.

But I did go back to Kakimori and  then more wandering. No pictures from inside the store but if you’re curious there was a nice blog post about it from the Three Staples blog.

At some point my wanderings led me to a massage shop of the Raffine chain. Japanese massages are odd. You don’t disrobe (though you can change into sweats they provide) and they also drape a towel over you and massage you through the towel and your clothing. I got a 15 minute head and shoulder massage, had lunch, and went back for 40 minutes of leg and 40 minutes of back. The second set of massages was from a tiny woman who was incredibly strong and my legs still feel worked over.

Oh, and I had lunch at Wendy’s, part of my experiment to see if American fast food is better in Japan (mostly yes).

At dinner I broke a silly rule I used to have. The rule is to avoid places where you order by buying a ticket out of a vending machine. You then go in and hand the ticket to the wait staff and they deliver the food. It’s a stupid rule and I ate at a restaurant that I walked by last year. I asked a guy outside how it was and he said, “It’s great, and you can get refills on your rice.” (Of course he said that in Japanese.) It was better than I thought it would be for a ticket restaurant and realized the rule was stupid.

On the way home I stopped into Lawson to get some Japanese craft beer and nearby there was a dimly lit sign for the temple where Jigoro Kano invented/codified Judo! I didn’t take a picture because it was too dark, but now I know where it is!

Well that’s it for Tokyo for a while. I’m off to Sendai tomorrow.