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Permalink Reply by phauna on December 28, 2007 at 5:11pm

The places I want to suggest, I'm not sure if they are famous or not. However they were places which weren't in the Lonely Planet guidebook which I've been using, so they are perhaps less known to foreigners.

The first is Nezu, there is a shrine there and I walked to the shrine along an old street which used to be a stream, I think. And about half way there is a famous shopping street which features in TV dramas, apparently. I'll have to chase up these names unless someone knows what I'm talking about. I was taken there by some Japanese friends and it was a nice area. Sorry it's so vague. Here's some info:

http://www.jref.com/practical/yushima_nezu.shtml

The other place I recommend is Jindaiji temple, in Chofu. It's the nicest temple I've seen, lots of greenery and nice architecture. It's a bit out of the way so I don't think they get anyone except locals.

http://www.xs4all.nl/~daikoku/junrei/reijo/50-ban.htm

Oh and Nekobukuro in Ikebukuro is pretty weird. It's two rooms full of free roaming cats on top of the Tokyu hands department store. You can pat them and chase them, but none of them seem very impressed by their lot.

http://www.mediatinker.com/blog/archives/008028.html

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Permalink Reply by Yuki Naotori on December 31, 2007 at 9:40pm

Nezu is one of my favorite places in Tokyo. I think Nezu is well known for an abbreviated phrase "YANESEN" (YAnaka, NEzu, and SENdagi, three towns next to each other) for their good old looking wooden houses and temples of "Shitamachi" (and I think the area is pretty famouse for foreigners 'cause I saw a lot of backpackers in the area. There is Sawanoya Ryokan (http://www.tctv.ne.jp/sawanoya/)" at Yanaka, famouse for backpackers)

If members of this community are interested, I would love to guide you around YANESEN area :-)

Jindaiji is one of the places I want to visit but haven't visited in Tokyo. I hear it's really worth visiting (and living, too)

Never been to Nekobukuro either. Ikebukuro is too crowded to me ;-)

Yuki

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Permalink Reply by nabejun on January 19, 2008 at 11:44am

Nezu is good idea I think .I have never been to Nezu,so I look forward to going there.

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Permalink Reply by Serkan on January 16, 2008 at 2:21am

I liked Jun's idea with Utsunomiya. Also I would like to see Nezu, it sounds cool. The problem is I have not been to either of these place mentioned here on during the kickoff-meeting so I am equally interested in all of them;).

Also, isn't there a spot where you can eat weird/local stuff since cuisine was stated as the No. 1 reason (by far!) foreign travelers are coming to Japan:
http://search.japantimes.co.jp/cgi-bin/nn20071225a6.html

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Permalink Reply by phauna on January 16, 2008 at 2:05pm

Well there is a Ninja themed restaurant in Akasaka. A review is here:

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000088&sid=amKi9JEU5.4...

Some pictures of ninja food:

http://www.kirainet.com/english/ninja-restaurant/

I always wanted to try the noodles that are continually served to you by some lady in a small bowl. It's kind of a challenge which occurs in some prefecture that I don't remember, they count the number of bowls eaten or something like that.

I also saw a Japanese TV show which showed a chef slicing off the meat of a still alive fish and then throwing it back into the fish tank and it swam around. It sounds disgusting but it's weird. Someone must know about that restaurant.

I suppose some whale eating opportunities could also be appealing to some tourists although I'm not sure how ethical it is to promote that. I saw a large restaurant with a huge sign outside selling whale dishes in Kabuki-cho.

Here's a restaurant where you have to catch your own fish before cooking it yourself:

http://cbs13.com/watercooler/Japanese.restaurant.Zauo.2.486046.html

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Permalink Reply by nabejun on January 19, 2008 at 11:42am

Hi,everyone.
The place I recomment is below.
- Utsunomiya city : famous for Gyoza(almost Japanese food likes Raamen),near Nikko city(Nikko city is famous for Nikko-Tosyogu http://www.toshogu.jp/ , Nikko-Edomura http://www.edowonderland.net/nikko/index.html ofcourse there is onsen)
- Hakone and Atami : famous for Onsen,Sea food and...
- Odawara : famous for Odawara-castle http://www.city.odawara.kanagawa.jp/kanko/kanko_4/e_index.html

Sorry for poor English...
Jun.

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