We met up Friday night after the workshop was finished, and headed out to enjoy the bustling Tokyo nightlife. Naturally we came home pretty late, but regardless of being a bit tired we got up already (?) at noon to go out for sightseeing. The weather wasn't really that good, so it was pretty unfortunate that I had managed to forget my umbrella in the night-bus the day before.. ><

Anyway, despite the bad weather we decided to first head out to a place called Iritani (入谷), where they were celebrating the so-called Asagao-festival (朝顔祭り). Asagao is actually the name of the flower Japanese Morning Glory (Ipomoea Nil), and thus there were hundreds of stands in the area selling the flower.

Entrance to the Iritani Asagao-Festival

Japanese Morning Glory (朝顔)

A smaller shrine in Iritani

In the shrine they also sold different types of paper flowers.

But there was also some other things to do at the festival in addition to looking at the pretty flowers. In typical Japanese festival style they were selling different types of food such as takoyaki, and there were some games for the kids to enjoy.

A girl trying to catch the fishes

The food section of the Asagao Matsuri

After our visit at the market we continued to the southern part of Tokyo, to be more specific to the Tokyo tower. Although the Sky Tree newly opened I had never had the chance to go up in the Tokyo Tower. Further, as Saturday was the day of the Japanese festival 'Tanabata' they were going to have some event going on up in the tower, so it was a good chance to go and take a look at the tower.

Tokyo tower

Tanabata wishes in Tokyo Tower

A shiny model of Tokyo Tower

A shrine (!?) inside Tokyo Tower

..There were both wishes in Japanese and English..

Live music concert in Tokyo Tower

Oh yeah^^

A small glass floor in Tokyo Tower

For those of you who aren't familiar with the Tanabata festival; to explain it shortly it is based on the story about two lovers who are separated by the milky way, and who only can meet once a year, on the night of the 7. July (Tanabata, 七夕, actually means "7th night"). As you can see on a couple of the pictures above, people can write their wishes on a piece of paper this evening in hope for their wishes to come true. In addition to this, Tokyo Tower's Tanabata event also included live music, so we spent some time here before heading back for dinner.

Yokohama's China Town!

A statue by Yokohama's harbour

And with the day-trip to Yokohama coming to an end it was time to go back to Kyoto again. It was sad having to leave my boyfriend again, but this weekend we are going on a weekend trip to Amagisou onsen (天城層), so I'm already looking forward to meeting him again. Now it is time to get back to my thesis, which I have been staring blankly at for some hours already today. *Sigh*

Yokohama harbor

イケメン達！

Adaora checking out local food at a nearby market.

Our hotel had an infomeeting in the morning, so after getting some tips about the area we headed out by Tuk-tuk (ตุ๊กตุ๊ก), which is a three-wheeled vehicle looking like a motorbike with seats for passengers.

This is an easy and cheap way to travel; tuk-tuks are basically everywhere, and they will NOT hesitate to try to convince you to take a ride with them. However, most of them has so-called "sponsers": souvenir- and tailor-shops gives them free petrol cards if they bring new customers to their store. so don't get confused if you end up in places you originally didn't plan to go.

Me and Adaora also experienced tuk-tuk drivers who did not want to drive us to a tailors store, because I had already already ordered the dress and was going back only for the fittings, which meant that the tuk-tuk driver would not get free patrol cards.. 

Me being measured at the tailor-store.

After spending most of my dollars buying the dress me and Adaora continued our sightseeing-trip, heading for some of the smaller temples in the area. First stop was Wat Thepthidaram, a small temple in the west-side of the city.

Me and Adaora inside the temple.

 And the temple from the outside.

Wat Benchamabophit

 And here are some more pictures of the temple..!

 .. Aaand a little close-up!

 Picture of the temple taken from the other side of a small river in the temple area.

 There were not that many tourists in the area either, so it was so nice and peaceful there.

 After finishing the last temple visit we walked down to Chinatown, which was somewhere between the temples and our hotel.

The gate to Chinatown with a more traditional Thai temple in the background.

After leaving from Kyoto by the night bus on the 17th of February, i arrived in Yokohama early morning on the 18th. The weather was truly awful, and I actually feared that the sightseeing would end up being pretty bad.I spent most of the morning in Sukiya, which is a Japanese fast food chain selling more or less traditional Japanese food, waiting for Adaora which was supposed to arrive by Shinkansen (bullet train) some hours later than me. But since she came to Yokohama a bit later than expected, I decided to walk to the city center and doing some sightseeing while waiting.

The ship Nippon Maru with Yokohama´s ferries wheel in the background

The Yokohama harbour area is actually quite nice; luckily the weather cleared up so I could get a clear view of the attractions there. After some hours walk I finally met up with Adaora down at the harbour, and we decided to check out chinatown.