Odaiba is a man-made fantasy floating by the Sumidagawa River, and from which you can see the Tokyo skyline, the Rainbow Bridge and the Statue of Liberty.
What? The Statue of Liberty?
That's right -- and did I mention that the Rainbow Bridge is essentially a brighter Brooklyn Bridge? Add the towering skyscrapers that reflect in the Hudson-like river, and you've got yourself a scene from New York City replicated halfway across the world.
On the island itself is a variety of shopping centers, hotels and other buildings from the future, particularly the Fuji Television building, whose architect was probably M.C. Escher. A giant silver orb juts out from the top of the monstrosity, a bit off-center but big enough that the tumor is viewable from miles away. At night, it lights up in different colors.
To get into the building to take the free self-guided tour, you have to enter an escalator tube that is reminiscent of both Futurama and Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator. Once inside, there's a smorgasbord of children's TV characters and bright colors, including a green screen that transposes ant images onto people. There are also descriptions of TV shows like "Hey! Say! JUMP" and "HEY! HEY! HEY! Music Champ."
Inside one of the shopping malls was an electronics store that might as well have been named, "Things That Might Be Popular in 2050." In the store was a series of laptops. Some were the Japanese Sony Vaio "pocket" computers that are about four inches wide and can fit into the back pocket of a pair of jeans. Others had built-in webcams that were automatically catching everyone who walked by and manipulating their images -- I was, for example, shoved into the helmet of a football player dashing down the field. Other effects had funhouse mirror results, and some were as random as a Jackson Pollock Spin Art design.
And then there was the "Rolly," a species of wireless music speakers that not only play songs -- they dance to them, spinning around on the table and flapping their oval wings. Nothing practical about that, but the Japanese people there loved it.
Making the whole time travel more enjoyable for me was the company of a dozen or so public-relations students from Indiana University whom I met up with, because the woman leading their week-long tour is the wife of the dean who led us around over the summer. I met them in Asakusa and, after they realized I spoke minimal Japanese, showed some of them around and helped them order lunch at a small noodle restaurant.
Being the gorgeous and crisp spring day that it was, the shrine was packed as usual. Maybe it was just me, but there seemed to be a lot more kids running around ...
So that was Odaiba, which was chronologically opposite from the previous weekend, when I went to a Farmers Market in Yogogi Park. I didn't eat lunch that day because I had enough free samples of super delicious Japanese food to hold me over well throughout the night. The sashimi, crackers and lemon-grass tea were easily the best-tasting.
But the best-looking were the pea and the peanut:
And, of course, the giant cow behind which dozens of kids were waiting for their turn to milk her.
It was udderly enjoyable.
you did not even just say that. "udderly," honestly. -kw
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