Made famous by Bill Murray and Scarlett Johansson in Lost in Translation, the Park Hyatt Tokyo is described as many things by its guests: ‘luxurious,’ ‘world-class,’ ‘top-notch,’ even ‘the best hotel in the world.’ But I’ll cut to the chase and simply describe Tokyo’s most famous hotel as heaven.

I was lucky enough to have the opportunity to spend two nights in a Park Suite at the hotel. When I arrived, I was greeted and quickly whisked up to the 40th floor sky lobby, handed off to another employee, and led up another four stories to my suite, where I was checked in while sitting on the room’s sofa and the room’s features were explained to me in detail. The entire process was so seamless that I barely had time to blink before it was over and I was left staring out over the nighttime lights and hustle and bustle of Shinjuku from my quiet 44th floor sanctuary.

The view during the day was no less amazing, and the room itself was stunning: a large living room with comfy L-shaped sofa, chairs, work/dining table, huge minibar, and a giant HD plasma TV, a softly-lit bedroom with two oversized double beds and another giant HD plasma TV, and an amazingly large bathroom with shower stall, two sinks, deep soaking tub, and another HDTV.

The service was no less spectacular. The room was immacuately clean, and the staff went out of their way to be helpful. When the hotel mixed up the delivery addresses of our suitcases, the problem was dealt with quickly. The staff apologized profusely, sent us each a gift of handmade rice crackers in a wooden box, and saw to it that we were personally greeted by the manager of the next Hyatt property (the Hyatt Regency Kyoto) we stayed at.

After my two days here, I resolved to become wealthy enough to stay in these sort of places all the time. Unfortunately, that’s easier said than done, when a Park Suite will ordinarily set you back over USD$1000 a night.

Attempt to exit (or enter) any major train station in Tokyo and you are likely to find yourself lost in a maze of winding multi-level underground passageways and arcades lined with all manner of shops and restaurants. Make a wrong turn, and you’ll somehow end up caught on the designer handbag floor of one of the towering department stores attached to the station by a dizzying array of underground and aboveground entryways. For a first time visitor to Japan, a major train station and its associated passageways and tunnels can be both an amazing and frightening experience.

Last week, I spent a handful of nights at the Century Hyatt, a nice, four-star hotel located in Tokyo’s Nishi-Shinjuku skyscraper district. Of course, this meant that I would be making use of Shinjuku Station, the poster child for enormous and confusing Japanese train stations, and the underground tunnels connecting it with my hotel. It is often said that finding the same location in Shinjuku Station twice is impossible. I had previously used the station for visiting Shinjuku, but this was my first time using it as my jumping-off point for the rest of Tokyo, and I found that it definitely lived up to its reputation.

Each day, three and a half million commuters pass through Shinjuku Station (yet, like most other places in Japan, it somehow remains practically spotless). Six train companies operate over a dozen lines that stop at the station, which is connected to the rest of Shinjuku by miles of twisting below-ground walkways. Seven department stores are linked with the sprawling station complex. I only ever figured out how to get to one of them, though I can’t say I tried particularly hard.

Ah, yes, the department stores. Japanese department stores are amazing sights that have to be seen to be believed. Most are at least ten stories, selling everything from designer clothes, handbags, and cosmetics to stationery, electronics, and books. Department stores are also a great place to eat on the cheap. The top floor or floors usually have an array of reasonably-priced sit-down restaurants, but the real bargains are to be had in the basement. There, you’ll find a sensory overload of dozens of stalls selling every type of food imaginable, from traditional Japanese-style dishes to spaghetti. Countless varieties of sweets and bakery are also available. Employees shout out over the noise of thousands of shoppers, enticing hungry patrons to eat at their stall. Everything is freshly made and nicely displayed, and free samples are often available, if you can manage to pick them out from within the crowds of hungry commuters. Almost everything costs less than 1000JPY (about $8.50), so the department store basements make a great alternative to overpriced hotel food. The bento boxes sold by many stalls also make great lunches to take with you when out sightseeing.

For dinner one night, I found a stall at Odakyu called Chicken Deli that sold a rotisserie chicken stuffed with carrots, potatoes, and onions and seasoned with some of the most delicious spices I had ever tasted. I also picked up a great salad from an adjacent stall that went beyond typical American salad fare of lettuce, tomatoes, and cheese and added bits of pumpkin, beans, peas, and nuts. The whole thing cost barely more than an American McDonalds Extra Value Meal and tasted way better (and was no doubt way healthier).

One of the most amazing things about Japanese stores in general, and department stores in particular, is the care that goes into packaging your purchases. The salad I purchased was wrapped in no fewer than three containers - a small plastic box, which was placed inside a plastic bag, which was taped shut with an ice pack attached to the top of it, which was finally inserted into a larger paper shopping bag with handles. Items purchased are beautifully giftwrapped and boxed upon request at no extra charge. In contrast with most American department stores, where it is often nearly impossible to find anyone to help you, employees are always available and eager to assist.

Just in case the department stores don’t offer enough shopping and dining options for you, the shops and restaurants lining the underground walkways connecting the train station with other areas of Shinjuku are there to fill in any gaps in the department stores’ offerings. Convience stores, fast food restaurants, tiny sushi stalls, and even banks and post offices can be found tucked away in various locations inside the tunnels beneath Shinjuku’s streets.

While other train stations operate on a somewhat smaller scale, most major ones follow the same basic pattern: department stores and long underground shopping plazas connected to the station by dozens of tunnels and walkways. Tokyo’s Ikebukuro, Shibuya, and Tokyo stations and Kyoto’s main station all offer similar shopping and dining options.

Luckily for me, Shinjuku Station was fairly kind. I only got so hopelessly lost that I had to stop at a koban (police box) and ask for directions once. I managed to find my way back to the Odakyu department store’s basement each day to buy lunch, even though I never managed to get there in quite the same way twice. I found myself walking in circles or taking some horribly indirect path a number of times, but I always managed to get to where I wanted to go in the end. While sprawling and somewhat befuddling on occasion, I’m definitely looking forward to my next stay in Shinjuku. Now where is that Isetan department store?

Shibuya, a high-strung, fast-paced district of Tokyo, is the birthplace of countless consumer and pop-culture trends. Shibuya Crossing, the area directly in front of Shibuya Station is the world’s busiest intersection. With its multi-story Starbucks, fifty-foot high television screens, and bright neon, it is one of the most popular images of Tokyo.

Predictably, such an area draws many young people and features countless trendy boutiques and shops. In addition to their respective main department stores, Shibuya’s Tokyu and Seibu also own a number of other properties around Shibuya:

• The hip Shibuya 109, operated by Tokyu, a trend-setting complex aimed at young women and featuring ten floors and over 100 different boutiques.
• Tokyu Hands, a “lifestyle store” offering housewares, hobby supplies, stationary, and a variety of other items.
• Parco, a large, multi-building Seibu-run complex hawking all the latest styles.
• Loft, Seibu’s take on a Tokyu Hands-style store.

Of course, there are also countless independent shops not affiliated with either of the two goliath department stores.

I didn’t head to Shibuya to buy the hottest clothes, though. In addition to the hip boutiques and enormous department stores, Shibuya is also home to two of the biggest record stores in Japan: HMV and Tower Records, both names no doubt familiar to most westerners. Since I’d heard good things about it, I headed to HMV.

There, I found six huge floors filled with CDs (and even actual viynl records) of every genre of music imaginable. On the first floor, the latest Japanese releases were prominently featured at listening stations and special displays. Further inside, long aisles held tens of thousands of rock, pop, dance, and other releases. An entire section was devoted soley to independent artists. I was amazed at the wide selection: in Cleveland, a “record store” was a chunk of the local shopping mall barely bigger than my bedroom or a small corner of a Barnes & Noble bookstore. At home, if I looked for practically anything that wasn’t a #1 hit, I would be told that the disc would need to be ordered in. Here, though, I was able to find every single artist I looked for, popular or not.

I quickly filled a shopping basket with way too many yen worth of merchandise and headed up to the second floor. Every bit as big as the first, it offered popular and rock music from American and dozens of other countries. This came as a shock, considering that most places in Cleveland offer either no imports at all or only a handful of English or Spanish-language dics that are left lying neglected in some back corner. Here, though, music from around the world was displayed prominently. A small cafe served up Starbucks-style drinks and pastries at tables which each had a pair of headphones and a selection of music to listen to while you enjoyed your coffee and cake and looked out over the bustling streets of Shibuya.

The remaining floors in the building were no less amazing: an entire floor was dedicated to jazz and classical music, another to DVDs released both in Japan and elsewhere. An entire wall was devoted to documentaries and was lined with thousands of discs from the genre that barely gets any shelf space in American stores. There was a stage for live performances and an on-site radio studio where live FM broadcasts were occasionally produced.

Eventually, though, I knew I had to leave before I spent every yen I had on me, so I paid for my basket full of purchases and left with my wallet a few 10000-yen bills lighter. Before, having nothing to compare it to, I thought the selection at the new fye in my local mall was pretty good. I don’t think I’ll look at it in quite the same way anymore.

Simply put, Ginza is a shopper’s paradise. With seven department stores and countless pricey designer boutiques, it is Japan’s most famous shopping district. Ginza is home to the (in)famous $15 cup of coffee, the ultra-exclusive Wako department store (where it is seemingly impossible to find anything costing less than a few hundred dollars), and real estate worth well over $100,000 per square meter.

Ginza is often recommended as a “must-see” area of Tokyo. Its stratospheric prices and enormous stores and boutiques are certainly awe-inspiring. However, as someone not in the market for Prada handbags or $50,000 wristwatches, I found myself becoming quickly bored by the endless onslaught of expensive brand-name goods.

Until I walked into the Sony Building. Yes, it was another building filled with expensive, brand-name merchandise. However, at least for a gadget freak like me, the type of pricey items contained within this particular Ginza building were far more interesting than the thousand dollar scarves available next door. Here, you can get a glimpse into the future of computers, televisions, digital cameras, cell phones, and a variety of other electronics. Or, at least the future if you don’t live in Japan. Almost everything in the showroom is already available for sale in Japan, but most items are not available elsewhere.

The Sony showroom fills four of the building’s eleven floors (the rest are shops, restaurants, and other businesses). Digital cameras barely longer than my thumb, giant HDTVs, computers with folding keyboards that seem more like pieces of art than productivity tools, finger-sized MP3 players, ultra-high-tech boomboxes, and a dizzying array of other electronics are presented. Cell phones as thick as a few credit cards with built-in cameras better than the one I bought for $300 last year and high-definition camcorders that fit in the palm of your hand are also among the items on display. Unfortunately (or is it fortunately for my wallet?), almost nothing is available for sale within the building itself, with the exception of some very overpriced “overseas models” aimed at tourists which include English-language manuals and some headphones, batteries, and other small items.

Everything is very nicely presented, making the showroom seem more like a musuem than just a display of products. It makes a very nice place to spend an hour or so admiring the latest technology. The only downside is that you feel entirely depressed when you realize that the majority of these products won’t be available in your home country for another year or so.

If you’re a gadget nut, it’s also worthwhile to check out the five-story Apple store while in the area. While everything inside is also available elsewhere and therefore lacks the wow factor that the Sony showroom does, Apple’s Ginza location is perhaps the company’s best. The store’s 27-foot-long Genius Bar, 84 seat demonstration theater, and employees proficient in 10 languages make the Ginza store stand out from Apple’s other retail outlets.

Yasujuni Jinja, a Shinto shrine located in Tokyo, attracts a lot of controversy. This controversy has recently placed the shrine at the center of a number of international political issues, and as a result, many people outside of Japan have read about the shrine in newspapers or heard about it on television.

Originally called Tokyo Shokonsha, the shrine was created in 1869 to honor those killed in the wars surrounding Emperor Meiji’s return to power. In 1879, it was renamed as Yasukuni Jinja and became one of the most important shrines connected with state-sponsored Shinto. Over 2.5 million souls are enshrined at Yasukuni, representing all Japanese (as well as some Koreans and Chinese) who died in the service of Imperial Japan through the end of World War II.

It is from this fact that the controversy surrounding the shrine stems: among these millions are 1,068 who were convicted of war crimes at the end of World War II, including 12 Class A war criminals. Visits to Yasukuni by Japanese government ministers (including the annual visits that former prime minster Koizumi Junichiro made) have been protested by China, Korea, and Taiwan and are frequently the subject of political contention.

Even within Japan, views differ on the issue of the enshrined war criminals. However, for most Japanese, Yasukuni Jinja is simply a place to honor those who died in war and remember history. While the shrine itself is interesting, Yasukuni Jinja also has a nicely-presented museum detailing the history of wars in Japan through World War II that is in my opinion the star attraction. The museum contains a wide variety of artifacts and exhibits, including among other things some beautiful examples of Japanese armor and weaponry from a number of different periods in Japanese history. Also featured are human torpedoes, World War II-era airplanes and tanks, and items recovered from planes and boats destroyed in World War II. There are many English signs explaining the various exhibits, though much more information is available only in Japanese.

The musuem’s account of the war is definitely slanted in such a way as to make Japan’s military actions appear to have been the right and justifiable course of action in each and every situation. However, the museum explores some interesting events that most Western accounts leave out, and makes you consider the ways in which the accounts of history you are more familiar with are also slanted in a different way. What if Japan had won World War II instead? Why isn’t Truman considered a war criminal? After all, what could be considered a worse “crime against humanity” than the use of the two most distructive weapons the world has ever seen? The museum raises a number of questions such as these that are worth considering.

The museum at Yasukuni is often criticized as glorifying war. While many of the exhibits are undeniably militaristic, the final rooms of the museum make it difficult to leave with that impression. An entire wall is filled with books of letters, one of which is translated into English, sent by soldiers to family and friends. Many of the letters are heartwrenching; in many, soldiers write to their children and loved ones with advice or memories, clearly realizing that they will never return home. The final room’s central exhibit is a case filled with bride dolls. These were sent to the shrine by grieving mothers whose young sons had been killed in World War II before they had a chance to marry. The dolls were intended to provide comfort in the afterlife for these victims of war. By the time I reached the end of the museum, I was left with the distinct impression that war was anything but glorious.

In addition to the shrine itself and the museum, Yasukuni Jinja has a nice, small garden that is worth a visit.

Its controversial nature and excellent museum make Yasukuni Jinja well worth visiting at any time of year, but the sakura trees throughout the shrine make late March through early April an especially nice time.

Tokyo’s Harajuku district is famous for a number of things - the costumed teenagers who each Sunday afternoon stand on the bridge in front of the station, the famous Omotesando shopping street, and the beautiful Meiji Jingu being among the most famous. I came to see all three.

Walking out the main entrance of JR’s Harajuku Station, I immediately found myself in the middle of a crowd of cosplayers and street performers. The cosplayers come in a variety of styles, ranging from gothlic lolita to visual kei. Street musicians wander among the crowds, carrying their guitars, microphones, and portable amplifiers with them as they go. Someone in an orange spacesuit makes a glass orb appear to hover in the air and move without being touched while moving hypnotically. A group offers “free hugs” to passersby, but I don’t see anyone take them up on it. Near the entrance to Yoyogi Park, a group of breakdancers blasts a boombox and puts on a show for the crowd gathered around them. It’s a good arrangment - the people hanging around the Harajuku bridge and in front of Yoyogi Park are there to be seen and heard, and the thousands of tourists from Japan and abroad coming to Harajuku each weekend are there to stare at them, listen, and take pictures.

Just a few seconds away from these noisy crowds is the main entrance to the peaceful Meiji Jingu (明治神宮). Founded in 1920, Meiji Jingu enshrines the souls of Empress Meiji and his wife, Empress Shoken. Set within a 175 acre forest, the shrine is a perfect refuge from the hustle and bustle of Harajuku that surrounds it. Meiji Jingu is famous for being the home of Japan’s largest wooden torii, made out of beautiful hinoki (Japanese cypress). Several festivals are held throughout the year, and several million people visit on New Year’s. I was lucky enough to see a traditional Shinto wedding and some sort of special event involving traditionally costumed men, drums, and swords which no one I asked understood. I watched as people visting from around the world wrote their prayers and wishes on ema (絵馬), wooden boards hung for the gods (and mortals) to view, in dozens of languages.

After tossing a coin into the offering box and praying for the always popular goal of world peace, I started back toward the entrance to the shrine. Along the way, though, I paid the few hundred yen to enter the shrine’s garden. It was well worth the small entrance fee even though the Empress’ iris garden, the star attraction, was not in bloom. Perfectly manicured bushes, small, delicate bamboo fences, and a nice pond made for a pleasant walk. Meiji Jingu also has a treasure museum, but I didn’t stop and instead headed on to rejoin the frenzy outside along Omotesando.

The fashions here were somewhat more mainstream. The busy Omotesando is lined with expensive designer boutiques from the likes of Louis Vuitton and Gucci, trendy comsetic shops, and the modern Omotesando Hills shopping complex. Tourist trap Oriental Bazaar, a one-stop souvenier emporium selling lots of made-in-China reproductions of traditional Japanese goods (as well as some authentic items, though low quality ones), is also located along Omotesando and may be worth a look if you have people you feel obligated to buy souveniers for but don’t want to spend the money on high-quality items. Among the back streets and alleys along Omotesando are a variety of small restaurants, bars, and shops.

After exhausting the window shopping possibilities of Omotesando, I backtracked to the entrance to Takeshita Street, home to dozens of independent shops offering for sale many fashions of the style being worn by the cosplayers standing just a few blocks away. Even though the street is well under a kilometer in length, the throngs of teenage shoppers combined with my window shopping prevented me from reaching the end for the better part of an hour. The offerings from the stores along this street range from the strange to creepy, and anything remotely representing “normal” for any area of the world other than Harajuku is impossible to find here.

At the end of Takeshita Street, I pause to get something to drink at the Starbucks on the corner and reflect on the afternoon’s experiences. Harajuku is a place of sharp contrasts such as can only be found in Tokyo. Crazy youth fashions and loud rock music are separated from the traditional beauty of Meiji Jingu and its far more conservatively dressed visitors by a seemingly invisible line drawn across a strip of pavement. While in the middle of the Empress’ iris garden, it is easy to forget that you are only a few hundred feet away from a girl with bleached hair dressed as a vampire, and likewise it is difficult to imagine that a 175 acre forest could possibly exist just two minutes away when standing in the middle of a crowd on Takeshita Street. Japan is a land filled with contrasts like this, but the area around Harajuku Station is definitely one of the better places to experience this juxtaposition of seeming incompatible worlds.

Each year, millions of people across Japan enjoy hanami (花見). Although the word literally translates as “flower viewing,” it is most commonly used in reference to one specific flower: the sakura, or cherry blossom. From late March through early April, when the sakura bloom throughout Japan, friends, family, and co-workers gather for hanami at cherry blossom viewing parties to eat, drink, and enjoy the delicate pink blossoms.

Shinjuku-Gyoen, a large park located a few minutes east of Shinjuku Station that barely gets a mention in most travel guides, is one popular hanami location. It is one of the many oases of green space that dot Tokyo, and as with many of the others, you soon forget after walking through its gates that you are smack in the middle of the largest, most crowded city on the planet. As you enter, the noise from the streets dies away and all that remains is the sound of birds and muffled sounds of people enjoying the season.

The park, officially declared a “national garden,” is one of the largest and most beautiful in Tokyo. Originally designated as an imperial garden upon its completion in 1906, it was re-opened as a public space after World War II. The garden’s 144 acres are divided into formal French, English landscape, and traditional Japanese sections. It also containing a greenhouse featuring a variety of exotic tropical species.

Over 1,500 sakura trees can be seen at Shinjuku-Gyoen, and it is obviously these that draw the most attention each spring. The Saturday morning I visited, I arrived just as the first of the crowds of picnickers were flowing in, laying out their bright blue tarps and staking their claims to the prime hanami locations. Groups of sakura admirers carrying thousands of dollars worth of camera equipment surrounded the trees with the fullest blooms, planting their tripods in the ground to take the ultimate close-up of the blossoms.

Since this is the first time I have been in Japan while the sakura are in bloom, it was also my first experience with hanami. I didn’t have a group of friends and a blue tarp, so I just walked around taking it all in: the children running around on the grass while the adults sat and chatted under the canopy of cherry blossoms, the young couples sharing bento boxes, the men and women painting pictures of the beautiful landscape around them, and, of course, the beauty of the park and blooming sakura.

Aside from the sakura, the definite main attraction at Shinjuku Gyoen, there were a variety of other gorgeous flowers, trees, and buildings. The Taiwan Pavilion provided an excellent vantage point overlooking the sakura trees below. Exposed cypress roots in one section of the garden made me feel as though I had stepped into a fairy tale or onto an alien world. Outside a traditional teahouse (of which there are two inside Shinjuku Gyoen), a stone lantern stood watch. Walking around a corner inside the tropical greenhouse, I found myself face-to-face with a dangling mass of fruit that looked more like part of a squid than a plant. A giant lilypad floated in a pond among beautiful purple flowers. A bright pink azalea bush provided an eruption of color in front of a row of trees covered with the paler pink sakura blossoms.

The calm, leisurely pace that was dominant here was in stark contrast to the fast, frantic action of the city that loomed in the background and provided my jet-lagged mind with a nice break from the endless crowds of the Shinjuku Station area. After spending a few hours walking around Shinjuku Gyoen, I headed back outside, refreshed and ready to deal with the crowds of cosplaying teenagers, loud music, and hordes of shoppers in Harajuku.