Electric Town, ponds and a bit of history.

By-passing the only stand-offish station employee we've encountered to date (I'd like to think his bitterness stemmed from not being allowed to wear those white gloves the other train guards were sporting), we made it to the Yamanote Line (which does a huge loop around Central Tokyo). 

We got off the train at Akihabara, otherwise known as Electric Town (known for its many electronics outlets). Hamish was more than a little keen to take a peek in one of the multi-storey gaming arcades. We obliged, and to our delight - found that the placed reeked of cigarettes and single males.

Note the complimentary ash-trays at each gaming station  - cute.

We thought we'd wash down the smoke with a healthy dosage of KFC. Joshie was quite enjoying his swivel stool, when a young employee (whose sole function was to take peoples trays and navigate the multi-garbage receptacle mine-field) offered a high-chair. Naturally, we accepted the offer - but Josh was not impressed. After a few minutes, a frown appeared, closely followed by an impressively protruding bottom lip. The wail that followed shook the nigh-on silent diners, and woke one poor lass who had been dozing face down on her table. The clearly distressed Tray-technician rushed over and enquired after Joshies well-being, obviously expecting him to have ruptured something to have led to a cry that hearty. We assured the poor young man that everything was fine, and took our leave shortly after. I'm fairly certain we passed some local shopkeepers asking each other the equivalent of, "Did you hear that?". Lily, meanwhile, was announcing to all within ear-shot the details of the fully-automatic toilet she had visited during our short stay in KFC.

Akihabara - home of the smoke-filled arcade,

and normally silent fast food restaurant.

Our next stop was Ueno - known for its Park and Museum. Somewhat embarrassingly, we circled the entire Station complex before finally locating the way across the train line (we did however locate two Cafe Latte Grandes - a fair trade really) to the Park.

Gojo Shrine Torii

Gojo Shrine

The Martin children lit some incense at Benten Hall, not really getting the concept of 'smoulder', and going more for 'leaping flames'. Still - sufficient incense smoke wafted our way to ensure good fortune.

Benten Hall - site of the Great Incense Fire of 2012

Josh and his steed of choice.

Tosho-Gu Shrine

Somewhat ambitiously, we ventured into the Ueno Museum with our silence-shattering children. They were in fact remarkably well-behaved, and enjoyed the statues, Noh masks and Katana swords. They grew a little weary of the rooms dedicated to lacquer-ware boxes housing documents of some 18th Century official of dubious importance (which is fair enough).

As we were leaving, we were pleased the Museum folk advised us of the inherent dangers of the 30 cm deep pond at the front of the main building. It positively oozed danger - I'm pretty sure I saw a dorsal fin.