Shinjuku City, Japan (October 21, 2025)
We’re here in Tokyo for the next few days, but like New York City, Tokyo is massive. To say “I’ve been to Tokyo” is like going to Central Park and saying “I’ve been to New York City.” Sure, technically, you saw part of the 843 acres that spans 2.5 miles long and 0.5 miles wide, but that’s not even part of the full 304 square miles of NYC when you include all five boroughs (with Manhattan being just 23 square miles of it).
Tokyo, by contrast, is 847 square miles. That’s nearly three times as large. Now if you include the greater metropolitan area, you’re talking 5,194 square miles, comparable to Los Angles County — so a lot more spread out. Density and GDP wise, it’s second largest in the world (only to New York) with an estimated total population of 38,140,000 and $2 Trillion respectively. All of this is to say, there’s a lot to see and do here.
Love sculpture in Nishi-Shinjuku, Tokyo (first LOVE sculpture, in Indianapolis, was made in 1970)
This LOVE sculpture was very much how I was feeling today. Love being with my family here in Tokyo, Japan. I love seeing Violet so happy with her jaw dropping as she admires all the various shops and restaurants. Love seeing Elena using the Google Translate app to get the information she needs and ask questions to locals holding up her phone when English just won’t do the job. Love being here in Japan and taking in all the cultural differences and the oneness we share.
Love being in Tokyo with Violet and Elena as we discover together
Everywhere in the world is different and so much is the same. Public transportation in Tokyo is awesome. While it took a few extra steps to set up each of our Suica cards set up both in our Apple Wallets and for Violet, a physical card. But once we had loaded up our digital wallets, it was quite easy to get around Tokyo via public transit.
When looking at attractions nearby, I wanted to check out the Imperial Garden, which, to me, implied a park-like area, but turned out to be a Buddhist temple with a graveyard (which was not at all what I was imagining). Still, it was impressive and gave me a destination to check out as I was wandering different parts of the city.
While I did this, Violet found a few more rare items from Re: Zero and I asked the front desk about shipping options to avoid having to carry around all these items with us for the next month. I still have no idea what the cost of shipping will be and any additional hoops we’ll need to go through in order to get these items safely home. It’s another part of our adventure, and certainly beats buying a suitcase and checking bags for the next several flights until Elena and Violet go home about a month from now.
More items to attempt to ship home … part of the “adventure”
Ultimately, these are rare items that Violet was psyched to find. They are typically out of stock — not just online, but even in-store. She was lucky to find each of them when she did. So finding a way to bring them home is just part of the process. Afterall, this was one of the big draws of coming to Tokyo — home of the legendary story of Re: Zero.
