Japan & Internet: less than ubiquitous

Now, the people I spoke to before I left Canada assured me that I would be bathed in internet in Japan. The wireless would fill the air like oxygen. I could practically tune in and download terabytes of information using only my brain. This is just not true.

My experience, and the experience of several of my fellow travelers staying in quite swanky hotels, has been that wireless is not ubiquitous (unlike heated toilet seats, which are) and that even wired connections can sometimes be hard to come by.

My stalwart little travel laptop is a good machine, but its hardwired ethernet port has been sadly broken for some time, so I was at a loss as to what to do in a hotel room with no wireless. I specifically booked in at the Keio because their website promised wireless, but apparently that only comes in smoking rooms in the main tower and I’m in non-smoking in the south tower (or some such nonsense) so it was wired internet or nothing.

Anyhow, Wadman and Gorman came up with the excellent plan of buying me a USB ethernet adapter, so we went to a local electronics shop and searched through the 5 floors worth of tech heaven (the vertical integration here in Tokyo is incredible – I’ve never seen so many escalators in my life!) for something to suit my needs. In the end, I went old-school and bought a PCMCIA slot cardbus adapter, to keep my USB slots free for headset and card reader use.

You know the other thing that I found a bit disappointing? The tea ceremony. Man, after so much hype I really thought it would be better than this…

Shibuya Gothika

On my first Friday night out in Tokyo, I went to a goth club in Shibuya.

Fighting off exhaustion after 17 hours flying and in airports, and another 2 hours on the train to get to Shinjuku from Narita, I nearly passed out at the hotel, but managed to stay awake long enough to call Conrad, get her to persuade me to come out with her for a bite to eat, and then stagger out on the town with herself and Messrs. Wadman and Gorman; delightful companions one and all.

We navigated the underground walkway adjoining the Keio Plaza to Shinjuku, then went 3 stops south to Shibuya, where we crossed the famous intersection.

Gorman walked us around to see the sights, then took us to the Christon Cafe for some extreme Goth fun. The decor was pretty amazing – a spooky gothic cathedral complete with stained glass window, massive chandeliers and stone walls – all in a basement two floors below street level in Shibuya. As is now officially tradition for Heather & I, we ate steak together, I had a Sapporo, and then I hit the wall. The gentlemen kindly picked up the bill (I owe you, Wadman) and we departed to go see the statue of Hachiko, the cutest and most loyal puppy in the whole world, and deal with my little internet problem.

Then, we went back outside, and enjoyed some free musical entertainment. Here, you can enjoy it too…