Poppin’ Around? Here are the Japan links: Overview | Tokyo | Kyoto | Sendai | Final Day
We would have to be at the airport relatively early the day of our return flight, so we made sure to spend one more night in Tokyo the day before. It was an opportunity to see one more exhibit that had a lengthy lead time for booking tickets: teamLab Planets, a sort of environmental, interactive art installation.
Planets is organized into three exhibit spaces with environmental themes; the Water exhibit, for example, has you roll up your pant legs to wade through water in a variety of rooms with varying light effects; my favorite was one where koi and lily pads were projected onto the surface of the water. There was also the balloon room, with large, tethered balloons one could (gently) push around.
There were also interesting light effects, disorienting at times.
In the end, we spent some time in a small park afterwards before finding dinner. While we had designs on an elaborate dinner send off, we settled for a smaller venue, quiet for reflection on the trip. We all had our favorite city, our favorite activity, and ideas for what we might do differently, if we could do it again.
Our flight back was uneventful. We had the curious experience of taking off from Tokyo at 11 in the morning on Tuesday and landing in New York at 11 in the morning on Tuesday. We prepared for one more night at my apartment. I made dinner for the three of us.
The next day, I took M to the airport for her flight home, and the day after that, the same for J. It was eerie at first to have my place to myself after two weeks of sharing accommodations.
I highly recommend visiting Japan. I would say at least two weeks, a week and a half at minimum, counting travel time separately. What appears to be a small country is so large, so varied, so interesting. I hope to visit again one day, perhaps sooner than one might think.
Poppin’ Around? Here are the Japan links: Overview | Tokyo | Kyoto | Sendai | Final Day