Shanghai Surprises: Japan

Sorry gang, it's been nearly a month since my last post and I don't really have an excuse- I'm just lazy. Anyway, thought I would fill everyone in on our trip to Japan. We went over the Chinese holiday in the last week of September. I guess I was expecting more similarities to China but other than the fact that they also eat with chopsticks, it was an entirely different world. Civilized, clean, polite, modern, and yet ancient and traditional at the same time. Since the primary purpose of the trip was Disneyland (of course) we really only spent one day exploring Tokyo. We took the train/subway from our hotel near DL right into downtown Tokyo. Totally convenient and no need for a car rental- which was good because they drive on the opposite of the road from us westerners! We first explored a traditional park in the middle of the city. Lots of green spaces for the kids to run and for our nature starved children, it was perfect. We then took a tourist boat along the river that runs through the city to our next stop at a Shinto temple. It was definitely not as interesting as the Buddhist temples that we see in China- not as ornate but still worth seeing. Then we walked around a popular shopping area with traditional Japanese souvenirs. The coolest thing was seeing many of the local women dressed in their kimonos out for a stroll. Both young and old were dressed in traditional costumes (saw some men dressed in theirs as well) and they honestly were not doing it for the tourists, but for themselves. Finally, we were blessed with both the kids falling asleep on the walk so Sev and I found a very local restaurant down a back alley and enjoyed lunch. We made friends with some of the locals, shared some beers and some sign language since their english was not so good, and had a blast pointing to everyone else's dishes in an attempt to order- no english menu of course!

And the next 3 days after Tokyo were spent at Disneyland and Disney Sea. It rained a lot and it was really crowded but we still managed to enjoy it. The craziest thing was that 80% of the people at both parks were adults- who were there without children! And 99% were Japanese. We hardly saw any other westerners which really surprised us. By the way, the kids wore the same costumes for Halloween so we got a lot of use out of them. And thanks to mom for making Grace's Snow White dress! So here is a brief compare/contrast of Japan and China based on my limited experience in the land of the rising sun:

1) People line up for things in Japan/ Not in China

2) Cars stop when pedestrians cross the street/ Not in China

3) It was extremely clean for a big city/ Not in China

4) People stopped and took pics of the kids/ Same in China

5) Hardly anyone spoke English/ Same in China

6) Starbucks opens at 8am/ 6am in China (thank heaven)

7) Lots of scary stuff on the menu/ Same in China

8) Tokyo was ridiculously expensive/ Shanghai is relatively cheap

9) Japan continues to practice whaling (unfortunately)/ The Chinese continue to eat dogs (also unfortunate)

Overall, we really did enjoy Japan and would love to go back and explore the country outside of Tokyo. Enjoy the pictures!