Hide-san (right) arranged tickets for us all to go to Ghibli Museum, luckily there was a spare ticket, so Fran took the day off, and he was able to come too which was great!!!! We had to get up early to try to beat the MAD rush hour on the Tokyo train system! Fran suggested looking at a different route to get to Mitaka, because the quickest way would take us straight Shinjuku station (which is the busiest station in the world - an estimated 3.5 million pass through there every day!!!) which I really didn't want to go anywhere near at that time! So we took the slightly longer way around the outside of Tokyo, but amazingly the trains were dead it was awesome!
So we met Rieko, Hide and Sanoko at Mitaka station, and walked to the Museum which was about a 15min walk. It was really nice, but the only problem was it was getting quite hot (9:45am) and I had dressed as if it was going to be cold, probably cuz my air conditioning was set on cold(that's the stupid English person in me telling me to be careful... you don't want to be cold... you would of thought I would have caught on to the weather here by now!).
I saw this beautiful butterfly on the tree and I had to stop to take a photo of it!!!
I was just saying how nice it was to walk by the tree and not here that awful sound of the semi bugs screaching... then I heard one screaming really loud... so I looked around to see if I could see it and I walked full pelt into the bollard! I think my leg is gunna be ok, but must have bruised the bone cuz I can hardly bend my leg but there is only a tiny bruise! I can't bealive I just had the grin and bare the pain to walk round the museum, I felt like a proper idiot!!!!!!
When we got in there we didn't really know what to look at first, but we had some advise from a friend that if we wanted to go to the restaurant whilst we were there to queue up before it opened at 11am, otherwise we would be queuing for an hour or over, so we took the advise. We all had a laugh at the English translations of the Menu - I don't know if you can see but the top two lines read:
"Looking up at a Clear Blue Sky in the Field Cream Soda"
"Ice Tea Soda with Green Mandarin Marmalade"Also, me and Fran shared a meal and our meal was called:
"Cold Pasta of a Red Hill"Hide and Rieko shared fruit sandwiches, which were filled with whipped cream and fruit!
We had a great time chatting and laughing and Fran also had a "It's my day off" 11 o'clock beer!
They decided to get 3 desserts and everyone to share... I'm not sure what the one of the left was, but the middle was Strawberry Chiffon cake and the one on the right was an Earl Grey Tea Cake... I thought it smelt like a tea bag! haha!
They might hate me for posting this, but I thought it was great when we were talking and one of us said "posh" and Hide-san reached in his bag and pulled out his notebook! Love it!!! It's their day off and they are still studying English! That's dedication for ya! We learnt... posh, scrumptious and "dig in!".
When we finished our food we continued our tour of Ghibli. Now, actually you wern't aloud to take photos inside the museum but I took a few sneaky ones... I understand why you arn't aloud to take photos because actually there are 2 extremely special rooms to see there. So I didn't want to ruin that for anyone who was going to go. I personally thought it was a bit over the top with the security about taking photos! There was this (ok, this is going to be hard to picture...) big soft toy of one of Ghibli's characters, the Catbus... literally that is what it was! It was a play area for children inside and they had 3 people in there making noone was taking photos of it! So anyway, I took this picture of a gorgeous little stained glass window that was on one of the corridors. Every last detail from floor to ceiling was 'Ghibli'fied'!
We went outside and had our photo taken with the Robot Soldier from "Laputa Castle in the Sky", he stood 5 meters tall and was really great to see in real life! And then had a photo with some Magic Box or something... I'm not totally sure but all I can say is these guy should be actors - they said it was really hot from the sun!
Ok, So I mentioned these 2 very special rooms... I would 100% recommend going JUST to see these rooms!!! The first one we went in was set up like Ghibli's work studio, and had all his drawings and painting up around the room, they were absolutely incredible to see. We were all amazed and felt so inspired! I found this photo on the internet for an example to show of his work, but seeing it on paper and in real life is actually awesome. The colours were just nothing like I had seen before, and actually I was more fascinated by the backgrounds he drew and painted, the colours he had chosen were perfect!
Then, the second room I mentioned was just something else!!! It was a room dedicated to the history and science of animation... actually I have tried to describe this a number of times, and so far I have had no luck... I think because it was so breathe taking I am worried I just won't do it justice...! However, I found a description on Wiki that explains it pretty well:
"One of the displays uses models of Ghibli characters, each in a slightly different pose, arranged in a circle on a spinning table. The models and poses are created like animation frames, which becomes apparent when the table spins in synchronization with a flickering stroboscope. The light flashes illuminate each model as it passes the same spot, creating the illusion of movement and showing how animation works."But... even this doesn't justify JUST how good this actually is... If you ever visit Tokyo, it is soooooo worth paying a small entrance fee of ¥1000 just to see that!!!
On entrance we had been given a ticket to go and see a short Ghibli film. The one we saw was called "The Day I Bought a Star" (星を買った日) it was extremely deep!!! You can have a look at photos of the video by clicking here they are really worth looking at too. Also, I found the music on youtube... It's so pretty!!!
We had a great time!!!! I'll leave you with a picture of new my fave character from the day... "Makkuro Kurosuke"
Aww, the video of The Day I Bought a Star isn't there anymore. I really wan to see it :(
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