Roppongi Hills / Mori Art Museum

My first day in Tokyo was before Eugene and Erik and Roger arrived.

Thanks to the wonder of Facebook, I found out that my long-lost high school friend RyujiYamaguchi happened to also be in town visiting family while I was there (he lives in Jordan) and so I jumped at the opportunity to have him as a tour guide.

We met up at Roppongi Hills, the glorious upscale shopping complex and commercial center just down the street from Aly's apartment where I was crashing.

And we had an awesome soba and tempura lunch.

Ryuji had the ten-don and I had the katsu-don and it was THE BEST katsu-don I've ever had in my life.

That, and it was from a restaurant we just chose randomly because we happened to walk by it...so Japanese food really IS better here in Japan.

After lunch, we went up to the top of Roppongi Hills, where they have an art museum on the 65th floor.

They were having a special exhibition featuring the art of Aida Makoto.

Photos weren't allowed...but here are some of the pieces that were featured. They were really large-scale canvases that took up entire rooms and were extremely detailed. If you click on the pics and expand them you might be able to see better.

This was a monstrous canvas of fighter planes destroying New York City.

Below on the left there is a huge one of a giant blender full of beautiful naked girls...

And this was my favorite. "Ash Mountains". The canvas was like the size of a tennis court.

If you looked up close, the mountains are made up of thousands and thousands of office workers in suits and uniforms...

Here are a couple pictures I did manage to sneak...

After the Art Museum, we went up to the top floor which features 360 degree views of the city...

Tokyo is so huge...

On our way out of Roppongi Hills we passed by a dog grooming studio. Funniest thing I've ever seen.

This dog was loving it.

Tokyo is just full of funny Engrish or lost-in-translation types of things...

A popular clothing store...

Some really popular J-Pop bands...

Finally...before an epic dinner (at Jiro), we stopped in Ginza to meet up with Risa ("Lisa?"..."NO!, Risa.") for happy hour beers and snacks at a streetside hole-in-the-wall.

Yummy!!!

Loves a Gyoza on a stick!

Next I will tell you about $300 Jiro sushi which obviously deserves its own post...