I guess you don't know how bad you're feeling until you feel good again. Today was the most energetic we've felt since we got here. We started early and stayed out late. None of that dizzyness of other days, and none of the collapsing fatigue that would leave us standing on a street corner blocks and subway stops from the apartment, unable to move or to decide what to do. Today I didn't even notice the weight of the bag on my shoulder. On other days it has seemed to weigh and bruise.

I'd made reservations for us to have brunch at the New York Grill at the top of the Park Hyatt Hotel in Shinjuku. This is the bar made famous in the movie Lost in Translation. We dressed up a bit, with Andrew taking his Zegna for a sunny day ride. The skies were exceptionally clear and the weather overall was back to June. This means that visibility from blimp height was long and sharp. It really was an incredible view of an unending city, and this type of perspective is important, I think, for people who have never been in cities this size. For as far as the eye can see, dwellings and commerce of millions. And no large mountains to slow the spread. It's a vertical city, so the topography is rough and bumpy, not like LA, where the buildings flatten out eventually and you see twinkling lights in the patterns of roads.

Not the best food ever but pretty damn good and fairly fine service if a bit slow. They rotate you through from your appetizer and main course on the dining side of the building to a dessert and coffee course in the lounge where a gaijin duo played piano and upright bass.

We stayed two hours.

Afterward we returned to the apartment to put on civilian clothes. I wanted to see what all the fuss was about in Harajuku, so we went there next. It was a scene, but mostly because so many visitors want to take pictures of the people dressed up there and not because of the small clusters of cosplay kids (and oldsters) themselves. While we were there the black propaganda vans came by playing Flight of the Valkyries and issuing some indiscernable proclamations. Everyone turned their camera lenses on them.

1. Top of the Park Hyatt 2. Harajuku and the black vans

We walked from Harajuku down Omotesando-dori to see the overly fashionable tree-lined streets. I wanted to see the Commes des Garcons store, so we walked that far and then turned around. We walked all the way back to Shibuya that way and caught the train again for Shinjuku for some last-day shopping. Some books, some electronics, that sort of thing.