Heading back to Tokyo

Leaving Hiroshima was hard to do. I really loved the city and wanted to spend more time getting to know it intimately. If I were going to live in Japan, it would be in Hiroshima. Big enough to have the advantages of a real city, small enough to get around  easily. But all good things come to an end sometime and my time was up.

Again with trains. From Hiroshima to Shin-Osaka (that's Osaka with an added Shin). From there to Kyoto, where I got off the train, stowed my bag in a handy coin locker and re-visited a place I wanted to explore a bit more.

Then a hasty trip back to the station - dodging huge groups of school kids - and on the Shinkansen to Tokyo where I checked into my new digs in Ikebukuro. In one of my posts, the one with the 3 owls promoting a reading campaign (by the way - on the way to Takayama, I saw 4 huge boulders on a road painted to be owls), I mentioned Ikebukuro and frankly thought it was a bit dull. Well -- you just need to be there on a Saturday night to have an entirely different opinion. I couldn't believe all the people on the streets. Cute couples everywhere obviously going on dates. Groups of totally dressed up young guys hanging out in front of the station. I can only presume they were hoping to meet someone or had appointments to meet with someone. Or were just hanging out. The energy of the place really rocked.

The next day was going to be an early one, so I did the sensible thing instead of going out again after dinner.
Can you tell the trip is winding down?

A word about the boys in the photo. They are on a game show and apparently in a lot of ads and some dramas (I think). They are so adorable, I had to show them to you.