Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Introduction to
Tokyo
With its sushi and sumo, pop culture and age-old tradition, serene
gardens and tra
c hell, Tokyo bombards the senses like no other city.
Ordered yet bewildering, Japan's pulsating capital will lead you a merry
dance - but being lost has never been so much fun. The planet's largest
metropolis is Asia at its weirdest, straightest, prettiest, sleaziest and
coolest, all at the same time.
Caught up in an untidy web of overhead cables, plagued by seemingly incessant noise,
the concrete and steel conurbation may seem the stereotypical urban nightmare. Yet step
back from the frenetic main roads and chances are you'll find yourself in tranquil
backstreets, where dinky
wooden houses
are fronted by neatly clipped bonsai trees;
wander beyond the hi-tech emporia, and you'll discover charming fragments of the old
city such as
temples
and
shrines
wreathed in wisps of smoking incense.
Centuries of organizing itself around the daily demands of millions of inhabitants have
made Tokyo something of a
model metropolitan environment
. Trains run on time and
to practically every corner of the city,
crime
is hardly worth worrying about, and shops
and vending machines provide everything you could need (and many things you never
thought you did) 24 hours a day.
With so much going on, just walking the streets of this hyperactive city can be an
energizing experience. It need not be an expensive one, either. You'll be pleasantly
surprised by how
affordable
many things are. Cheap-and-cheerful
izakaya
- bars that
serve food - and casual cafés serving noodles and rice dishes are plentiful, the metro is
a bargain, and tickets for a sumo tournament or a kabuki play can be bought for the
price of a few drinks.
Browsing the
shops
and marvelling at the passing parade is mesmerizing - the next
best thing to having a ringside seat at the hippest of catwalk shows. The city's great
wealth and relative lack of planning restrictions have given
architects
almost unparalleled
freedom to realize their wildest dreams. Likewise, in über-chic bars, restaurants and clubs
ABOVE
IMPERIAL PALACE GROUNDS AND MARUNOUCHI
