Tokyo JSPS Orientation - part 2

On the second day of the orientation, after the closing of the official event, we had an evening tour of Tokyo.  The tours were organized by this travel agency and we had an awesome Japanese tour guide who spoke very good english and was vey talkative about everything.  Thus, we had an opportunity to learn a lot!

We started with a tour of the Imperial Palace.  Well, in reality, we only went up to the main gate of the imperial palace but it was quite nice.  The whole area is a huge park and is very impressive.

 The trees that were planted in the park are amazing looking.

 One of the two bridges to the imperial palace.

 We just happened upon the changing of the guard at the main gates - the stone bridge:

 There is the second bridge - the iron bridge.

 Large moat surrounds the palace grounds.

 After the Imperial Palace, we went up the Tokyo Tower.  The view of the city was quite nice.

 That group of tall buildings in the distance is Shinjiku, another famous district of Tokyo.

 After the tower, we went for dinner to this interesting mall in a newly developed area of Tokyo on an island.  The mall was quite interesting since it was in the style of european city streets.  Also has a Barbie store! hehehe.

 The restaurant we went to was an all you can eat italian style place.  Food was pretty good.

 The mall comes with its own sky!

Who remembers this cat? :P

 After we got back to the hotel, I decided to go visit Akihabara, another famous place in Tokyo for its electronics, computers, and anime/manga shops.  Otherwise, it is an area of brightly lit neon signs!

 If you want to see AKB48 live, this is the place to go (unfortunately it's a bit complicated since they now use a lottery ticket system).

 Akiba has a large number of maid cafes, so there were girls dressed up in maid outfits standing on the sidewalk and walking around to advertise and give out ads.  Sadly I didn't take direct pictures of them but here are 3 of them walking.

 So much anime!

 The akihabara train station.

 This is one anime shop, basically the sign says that floors 3 and up are 18+.

 Pillar at the corner of the AKB48 theatre building showing some of the girls.

 Here are some adversing for the maid cafes.

 Coming back to the hotel, I found this interesting ad in the subway.  Akiba education institution??