Japan #3 Tokyo and Kobe

Konnichiwa!

So, here is my last post in the series, and I'm taking you on a quick but insightful tour of my happenings In Tokyo and Japan. I spent the first two days of my time in Japan in Tokyo, in a monsoon. It was crazy, and overwhelming, and I had horrendously bloodshot eyes from jet lag. But still, It did impress. The lights, the smell of the food, and the noise of the constant traffic was a little overwhelming for a small town girl like myself.

So have you ever heard of Shinjuku? It has the busiest train station in the world and the biggest pedestrian crossing underneath the huge bright boards of advertising and the busiest starbucks in the world. It's an amazing sight and I remember just staring from a train station above for a few minutes and taking it in. I went at night so I could appreciate the bright lights and that city feeling. Shinjuku mainly consists of huge department stores, restaurants and hotels but it's also the central hub of Tokyo businesses. It's densley populated and you can see this just walking through the little streets.....

I visited other famous places such as Harajuku, the centre for Harajuku girls who dress up in costumes. (Remember Gwen Stefani's Harajuku girls? Well this is Gwen's favourite place to be, unfortunately, she was not there,boo). Again shops, shops and more shops.... I also found a Japanese Topshop!  Anyways, one of my favourite places was the meiji jingu shrine near harajuku, it's beautiful... here are some pictures. I won't bore you with the history but I just want to convey how pretty it all is....

Kobe, having only just recovered from a horrendous earthquake in 1995, is moderately new looking. Posh clothes stores line the streets such as Gucci and Dior and the place looked very Western...I also found a red phone box. Kobe has a large amount of Western expats and this explains the Western feel to it all. It has Western style houses that dates back to 1868 including a picturesque English house for tourists to visit. There is a China town which is pretty much tourist-based and Kobe port offers great views of the Kobe landscape and boat trips across the harbour. Zena and I braved the rope-way which travels 1,083 metres above Kobe. (pretty impressive)

Here are some of my pictures....

Although this is my last post in the series, I thought I might do a general post with all the general pictures I took? I know everyone like to nose around blog photos and I'm guilty of it myself. PLEASE let me know if you want to see more of this?! Anyways, I know my descriptions of Japan are brief, but I don't intend to make it uninteresting! Hope you are inspired to go.....

Lauren x