The SEAA is over. It was my first time to Waseda University - who would have thought it was so big? After much wandering through the campus and extreme heat I finally found the venue and could enjoy some interesting presentations and discussions. Our session on Saturday went very well. I was happy to meet old and new colleagues.
In the next few days I will deal with my post-conference blues and Tokyo culture shock with posts about some of my adventures.
But Tokyo did not start out well. I made the mistake of getting a hotel room in Shinjuku...
Big, intimidating, hot and crowded... Not knowing much about the area, all of the shops and restaurants looked suspicious. But I was able to find a little respite at a nearby English-style pub that was showing the Hanshin Tigers baseball game (and the return of pitcher Fujinami!).
But unfortunately the pub was not smoke-free...
And worse yet I had to return to my hotel room. The biggest mistake I made was booking a room at an APA hotel. It was inexpensive and conveniently located (or so I thought) - what could go wrong?
I was aware of the problematic politics of the owner of the hotel chain, his ultranationalistic right wing opinions and his tendency to place a certain kind of "literature" (right wing ethnocentric propaganda), including books he wrote, in all of the hotel rooms (and on display at the front desk). But surely after this was exposed in the news with great controversy this practice had stopped. Nope.
"Despite calls for boycott, Apa hotel chain will keep books denying Nanking Massacre," The Japan Times, 1/25/17.
url: https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2017/01/25/national/despite-calls-boycott-apa-hotel-chain-will-keep-books-denying-nanking-massacre/
"Apa hotels won't remove books that deny 1937 Rape of Nanking for Olympics," The Japan Times, 6/3/17.
url: https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2017/06/03/national/apa-hotels-wont-remove-books-deny-1937-rape-nanking-olympics/
Here is what I found in my room.
There were a lot of foreign, especially Chinese, guests staying at the hotel... How about not insulting your customers? And where was the omotenashi?
Perhaps I shouldn't complain about the small room (very different than the picture on their website), unfriendly staff, broken air conditioner/television/toilet, slow elevators and poor barrier-free facilities. After all, this is not a hotel review (but I do hope you can find mine on a certain hotel reservation website titled WORST HOTEL EXPERIENCE EVER!). But I do want to mention the fire alarm that went off around midnight on the 24th floor. I was staying on the 25th floor. We were told to stay in our rooms until the staff could determine what was going on. I watched staff members going from room to room on the 24th floor. One room didn't answer and they merely skipped it and moved on to the next room. After almost an hour we were given the all clear signal - false alarm. Safe. But it did make me wonder about their fire safety and evacuation procedures. And there it was on the hotel tv monitor. Check out these crappy screen captures from their "for your safety" presentation.
Here is the actual safety hood.
The safety instructions continue...
Feeling safe?
To end on a positive note, the hotel does feature a public bath on the top (28th) floor. It might be the safest place in the building...
Ah Tokyo... and oh yeah, there was an earthquake during my trip as well...
I have an obvious bias against Tokyo. But there are a lot of great things there if you can find them. I will try to focus on some of those in the next posts...
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