Having fun in Tokyo

We spent today at the Edo Tokyo Museum, a really fascinating place. It focuses on Tokyo history,starting with the Shogun period. If I am understanding things, Tokyo (which was originally called Edo) was founded by a high ranking Samuri. Political power had been centered in Kyoto, but that was in decline. This Samuri set up a center of control here and intermarried with nobility from Kyoto to create a new class of leaders. This was around the mid 1600s. Life in Edo seems to have been interesting in some ways. Common people could write and public books, and there were literary and intellectual gatherings, along with Kabuki theatre and street performances. It was also a very stratified society and authoritarian culture though, very much subject to the will of the Shogun and his close followers.

The Shoguns lasted until the mid 1850s when Admiral Perry arrived and demanded that they open Japan to commercial trade with the US. The Shoguns lost power, and a new government introduced industry and western culture. All this was very interesting; we both noticed there was almost no focus on imperial Japan and WW2. The one thing it focused on was the bombing of Tokyo, which I gather was pretty horrific. One could speculate on why the Museum ignores this period. Still, I:d recommend it for a visit when you are in Tokyo.

This is quite a city. A cup of coffee or tea can go for $6. We discovered that 7-11 sells warm bottled coffee and tea for about a quarter of that price. 7-11 also sells sushi, salads and other
useful things - when will they catch up in the US? The strangest thing we saw was a wind up Hello Kitty in a cow costume walking around in a circle singing "Twinkle,Twinkle Little Star
in a very jangling voice. I hope that was a tongue in cheek thing by that store! It can be a little tough to find a veggie meal, but we had soba noodles with veggies for lunch - very good - and Chinese for dinner. We will do ok.

We will explore more tomorrow and post more then. PG