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01/04/10 giov: Ueno (Hanami, zoo, National museum of western art, cimitero Yanaka)

Salutiamo il Capsule Hotel, ci liberiamo dei bagagli alla Taito Ryokan, nostra futura “casa” per tutta la vacanza. Le ryokan sono le tipiche case di carta e legno, in questo caso la nostra era vecchiotta e bisognosa di qualche ristrutturazione, ma era pulita, c’erano in comune sia le turche giapponesi, sia il water occidentale, e un ampio lavandino per lavarsi i denti, e la doccia, con una piccola vasca, era privata, quindi potevi chiuderti dentro e lavarti in santa pace. Il bilancio finale se a uno non infastidisce il legno non lucido e il dormire praticamente per terra (il futon non è altro che un sacco a pelo stesso per terra) è sicuramente positivo.
Passiamo il resto della giornata al Parco Ueno, che data la stagione è immerso nelle fioriture di ciliegio bianco e rosa chiaro.
Percorriamo tutto il viale attorniato da ciliegi e lanterne, guardiamo i tanti jappi che hanno preparato l’hanami, ovvero una festa che consiste in un pic nic, sotto l’albero di ciliegio. Persino in questa occasione i jappi sono quadrati: i teli tutti della stessa plastica blu ordinati geometricamente, they have all the bento (lunch box) and chat or simply watch the cherry trees. A curious thing is that every time a gust of wind (the wind any day now and then is heard) that shakes the branches to the ground by dropping graceful petals you hear the "oooh" of admiration.
The "oooh" are pronounced simultaneously, such as those from other expressions Jappe not even agree (remember the "Kawaiiii" and other elongated vowels, which they perceived wandering vocals).
The road ends into the INPUT of the cherry trees to the zoo, where you make your ticket by entering the yen in cash machines (the same I find even in some restaurants). I'm not a big fan of the zoo because it saddens me to see the animals deprived of their freedom, but while the Berlin Zoo each animal had a rather large move in which, unfortunately in Tokyo areas were small, and some cages even smaller . However I can understand their concept of open space is very different from ours, because they themselves live in tiny apartments pigeonholed. In every known case, then I will notice how even in a shop puppies, that the expressions of the animals are almost always tend to the sad, and also met the cats on the street, hardly ever have the pleasure of being pampered. The only animals happy and joyful that we have met have i cani di piccola taglia.
Lo zoo era un tripudio di famiglie composte da coppie molto giovani. I bambini vengono davvero considerati il futuro, ci sono un sacco di passeggini tecnologici con imbottiture e cerniere per non fargli prendere freddo, abiti con spazio marsupiale bimbo compreso, nei bagni, in praticamente tutti, addirittura c’è una specie reggi-bimbo.
Passeggiamo tra gli animali, con monologo a stampo filosofico misantropico di Alberto riguardo al Lama da solo che ravana nel sabbione, passando una vita più facile e felice, rispetto ai tapiri, che già per il fatto di essere in due, avevano problemi di interazione sociale.
Usciti dallo zoo anche se la mia prima scelta was to avoid the museums to star as much as possible to the air and enjoy the real Tokyo, do not resist at the Museum of Western Art, which contains many works of 400 and 500, a large section on the Impressionists, then a work or two of famous artists such as Picasso, Miro, Gaughin, Van Gogh, Erbst, and a wonderful part of Signac, really tasty see him live.
We continue our march, passing by the first of several schools that I'll see later. I totally like the drawing, pastel-colored, with the tallest building in orologione, vast courtyards and classic canceled.
continue to one of the largest cemeteries in Tokyo, Yanaka Boch where it rests on the last shogun. The difference between our cemeteries and Japanese is that the latter rather than place of death looks like a place of rest. Silence (except crows), many trees, cherry blossoms ..
E 'relaxing walk and look at the graves with their elegant wooden plates. The feeling is of being in a completely different world, their concept of death is so far from ours, which shines even by the simple graves.
The cherry avenue back home are in addition to a fantastic shop full of trinkets and figurines of cats good buy (the ones with the paw raised which are found in every business because augur well for trade) of Charity stalls, very curious and pretty, which will buy the advice of a good toy Albe-Godzilla, which will then detect the star of the holiday.
continues to try to walk a huge dinner, avoiding the places that serve "the usual dead dog", and "the usual breaded dead dog, but you could take off the hair" .. in fact in Japan, I always ate very well, these comments were just looking at the plastic plates depicting the various menus (brilliant invention for foreign tourists who do not know how to translate their writing).
After walking so much understand that the card is almost a meter of the life-condition, then we deal with machines and we can have our Suica card, which like everything in Japan, has its own mascot, a penguin in this case. The Suica (later dubbed Suca) is a wonderful invention, it is a prepaid card, which passes to enter the metro, but you can also use to buy drinks to distributors, and is also accepted in many combinations (where discount stores are open 24-24h all). Besides the comfort that you just put the purse, wallet or pouch which is (no need to remove it, and it works on contact, then you do not enter) to go to the gate of the subway. We use this treasure of thing to reach the rest of the company in Shinjuku, home to other traveling companions (another re confirmation that what appeared near the map, in reality is a lot 'in there!). We go down to Takadanobaba (if it seems strange the name, imagine how he could pronounce the voice of the subway), and enjoy the life of a youth of our district.
We understand fully realize how inconvenient that the Metro closes from midnight to five (or so you go to bed early, or go to bed at dawn), then allocated to the Ryokan, and close the evening with the first of Combine a long line of beer - Futon.