It's a beautiful day here, and the cherry blossoms are amazing.
"I'd really like to go to Ueno Park," said Chris. He'd been there before and knew it to be
a place that had a lot of nice cherry trees and photo ops. So off we went. What he
didn't know, nor did any of us, is that Ueno Park is possibly the most popular cherry blossom viewing site in all of Japan! It was on this trip that we got our first taste of Tokyo crowds. Holy smokes, was it ever crowded. And while it was generally an orderly crowd...the old folks will shove you. I'm not 
basing this on anything other than my own experience...and we certainly didn't get shoved all the time...but every time one of us has been shoved in a crowd it's been from an old person. Not sure what that's all about, but it's a little disconcerting to say the least!
So, even though Ueno Park was absolutely packed, it was still a really cool experience to have had because we really got a sense of what hanami is like. Families, friends, and coworkers all stake out the best spots under trees and have big picnics while viewing the delicate and ephemeral cherry blossoms. The whole concept, of fleeting and fragile beauty, is somewhat bittersweet and strongly appeals to the Japanese aesthetic. 
OK, so there's your sociology lesson. We also got to eat, eat, eat.
There were food stands all along the way. Soup spots where all sorts of dumplings were waiting to be dunked in a bowl. Giant ear of roasted corn. (Really, the biggest I've ever seen, and I grew up in the American Midwest). Deep-fried bundles of spaghetti, which were then fanned out and sprinkled with powdered sugar. And yakitori stations, where I pointed to the meat I wanted (some of which I wasn't sure 
what it was but I had faith that it would be yummy) and the man grilled it up and drizzled it in sauce before handing it to us on a paper tray. I also bought a big thing of fried corn nuts, which tasted like the ones you can buy in America in convenience stores, but much fresher.
After leaving Ueno Park with full stomachs, we headed to Shinjuku to do some shopping. Sandra has been quite the expert in knowing where she wants to go to get what she needs. You'd think she'd been here before, but she's just been doing a LOT of studying! We headed to a store called Marui One , where they had floors and floors of
Japanese brand. Kate and Sandra, naturally, were in pure HEAVEN. I actually got really excited for them, because they finally could go to a store where all of the clothes were just what they liked. These girls are hardcore Japanese fashionistas!
I'll let Kate tell you about the LMC concert they went to that night. They really, really had a great time.
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