So Long Hong Kong

So after a day of trekking up a mountain to see the world's largest Buddha, Bry and I had dinner at a restaurant called Aqua with stunning views over the bay to celebrate our anniversary. Little did we know that at 8 p.m. the city turns into a virtual Pink Floyd concert (minus the music) with a laser show. It is pretty cool how all the buildings are synced up with each other and the lights change from one building to the next in Vegas fashion. Bryan, who actually has dubbed himself Laserman in the past year, was seriously distracted by this display and snapped about 20 pictures as I quietly ate my dessert and as his coffee got cold.

So this morning it was bye-bye Buddha and we got up at 5 a.m. and began our 12-hour journey to our hotel in Tokyo. Long flight, you might think? Actually, the flight was only three hours and we got in ahead of schedule at 2 p.m. But once we got to Tokyo, we had to wait an hour to catch a bus, that took an hour and a half to get to our hotel. Once we got in, we did a little bit of changing around of our plans for this segment of the trip. Normally when I wear my hat as trip planner, I score all As. Unfortunately, as of late, my role as bass player/band manager has had me seriously distracted, and I overlooked a lot as far as how we're going to spend our six nights in Japan. We had originally planned on two nights Tokyo, two nights Kyoto, one night Osaka and then a last night in Tokyo. I only really got around to looking at the guidebooks on the plane to see how impractical the Osaka night would be, so I got in and cancelled that and got our accommodation set for the rest of the week (we'll be back in Tokyo on that night.)

In our few hours here so far, while we haven't actually left the hotel, we can already tell that it will be a little more challenging in terms of the language, both written and spoken. Luckily Bryan enjoys learning bits of the language, whereas my knowledge of Japanese is limited to a few words in a Styx song preceding "Mr. Roboto." We did have plans to venture out for dinner, but after forgetting the camera and making a trip back to the room, then getting back outside to find it raining, all roads led to staying in. We had a nice meal in the hotel lounge where a guitarist and upright bassist were playing some jazz, and now we plan on getting a good night's rest in our sweet sleeper. The other thing we learned upon our arrival is that the Radisson I had us booked at is now a Sheraton. Luckily I locked in on the Radisson price, as the Sheraton price is close to double. Domo arigato, Mr. Roboto, domo...domo.