the heart made of candles. Can you pick which one is mine?
Free Hugs? Yes please
The beautiful flowers of Yoyogi
Imperial Palace gardens!Sunday June 20 (Day 18)
FATHERS DAY! How lucky I am to have my father here, in Japan, for Father’s Day.
So if you don’t remember, Bean and I held a vow to run this morning. Well, FAILURE. Out of pure exhaustion of the day before, the snooze button was my best friend and I barely realized the time or the presence of morning till I realized it was 920am. We were to meet my dad at his hotel at 10am. Rushing around to eat breakfast and get ready, we cursed our sleep-induced laziness. We spent a good bit of time in the lobby of my dad’s hotel trying to look through booklets of things to do. Despite our desire to go to Hiroshima, it was already too late in the morning for us to make the one-way 4 hour trip (hopefully at a later date). Instead we decided to first walk through the Imperial Palace's gardens. The beautiful greenery in the middle of the tall city buildings gave the Imperial Palace a secluded feel that left us happily aimlessly walking. After seeing the various tea ceremony houses and taking the various garden trails, we soon decided to take my dad to the absolute delicious ramen noodle restaurant that we had our first week at Tokyo Dome. This time we actually knew how to order with ease. The meal was equally as wonderful and it had my dad convinced we needed to open one of these restaurants in Athens, Georgia. After a delicious lunch we sat and people watched for some time while trying to figure out our next move. Finally we decided to go to Shibuya and Yoyogi Park. Tietz told us that Shibuya was the place to go, and although it wasn’t nighttime we thought it would be good to scope out the scene. Getting out of the train station at Shibuya was a different world. People, lights, shops, and sounds were EVERYWHERE. This is the Tokyo people imagine. Next we spent about 30 minutes asking various people on every street where to find pearl (bubble) tea. Two girls, at last, came to our rescue and seeing our tired, desperate expressions personally walked us to the bubble tea. Totally worth it. On the map Yoyogi park was down one road for several blocks, but what seemed not far ended up being a walking adventure. We passed numerous stores, starbucks, and people before asking an English speaking Jamaican guy (selling NY dogs) if we were on the correct road. Yoyogi soon came into view and along with goth, anime, and interestingly dressed people…including a guy saying he could give free hugs and free communication, we took in the scene with awe. In the end we think the place we reached was Yoyogi Park, but we really don’t know anything besides the fact we walked through forests of flowers. In order to make it back to Roppongi in time for candle lighting we headed back. Dinner was to be an amazingly cooked AMERICAN meal. The first time since we reached Japan, Bean and I ate a “home-type” meal…Hard Rock Café...and it surely proved to be the best choice of the day. Bean and I, finally, got a real BEEF burger to share, and I got Mac n cheese that I had been craving even in Australia. The last thing on our list of things to do was go to Midtown to see this set up of candles. Earlier in the week we had decorated separate candle holders to be used in this love, earth candle lighting event. Seeing the candles from above, our eyes were met with hundreds of candle holders beautifully crafted into the shape of a heart. We got to take pictures with our personal candle holders, even though mine was unable to be re-lit. I destroyed about 4 more lit candles trying to exchange them. Now, time to sleep to get ready for work and the last breakfast with the Father. I am convinced we walked at the very least 10 miles the past two days so sleeping wasn't a hard task.
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