Day 3!!

Today was a day full of learning... we had some amazing speakers and presenters come to the hotel and educate us about Japan. The head of the International Education Department of the Ministry of Education discussed the state of Japanese education - its strong points (hello academic performance) and its weak points (lots of bullying, stressed out kids, rebellion and anti-social behavior, lack of independence). We also saw a leading professor of Economics at Tokyo University describe the state of Japan's economy, especially in comparison and relation to that of the U.S. and China. Finally, two highly-esteemed members of the House of Representatives discussed the structure of the Japanese government and leading political questions of the day. Don't worry, I took a lot of notes... there will be a quiz later. :)

Then, in our free time, I actually left the hotel and wandered out to the Harajuku area - full of fashionable and wild young people, and then to Roppongi, a busy shopping and eating area that reminded us of Times Square. Hopefully, the videos will load or you will have to wait for my return because I got lots of great video footage today, but no pictures. Plans for karaoke were postponed until tomorrow night... you'll just have to wait to see that later.

Oh yeah, just wanted to mention that the video of Roppongi (2nd video) was shot at 8:30 pm on a weekday evening!!

Harajuku shops


near Roppongi station