Our fifth day living as housemates, coursemates and roommates for some. Our usual gear up with simple breakfast as we run in and out getting ready for the day. At this point, our car-centric city accustomed legs were already properly blistered and muscles rightfully strained but our spirits were still up high. Our goals for today were Shibuya Scramble Crossing, Sunny Hills - another piece by Kengo Kuma as well as the Mori Art Musuem where they were having the Heatherwick Studio exhibition on-going.
We walked to our much familiar Minowa Station to begin todays journey, at this point we’ve recognized the path that leads us there and have learnt to navigate with the help of some of the more recognizable buildings or shops with a certain scent like the laundromat that we pass by daily.
Our first stop was the Shibuya Scramble Crossing. On our way there we found the Miyashita Park along the road and agreed to visit it after the Scramble Crossing. Upon arrival, it was a little smaller in scale than expected but a lot more crowded. We joined in the scramble and found ourselves on the opposite end before we knew it. However, the speed of people walking here feels significantly slower than the rest of Tokyo, maybe it was the population of tourists who have came to experience the scramble much like we have.
We went upstairs of Tsutaya Bookstore, the same one that recently opened in Malaysia and went viral due to the queue visitors created when it first opened. At the second floor, we were able to see the entire Shibuya Scramble and the crazy amount of people that crossed it. That piqued my interest of how many people actually crossed it on a daily basis, so I decided to get a cup of coffee and started counting…no I didn’t, I have of course turned to my trusty friend Mr Google and did a quick search and I was shocked, 2.4 million! An average of 2.4 million people cross it every day.
After we are done we headed over to Miyashita Park. And much like many parts of Japan, in order to get there we had to go past a series of stairs, which jokes on us, there is actually an escalator further down the road. Anyways, we headed up to the park, grabbed a drink and pretended we were Japanese (just kidding). We observed how some of the grass are real while others were artificial, many locals were there sipping a cold drink listening to music while hanging out with their favourite human.
Rejuvenated from the short break, we continued our exploration to Sunny Hills. On our way to Sunny Hills, we saw boutiques upon boutiques along the street. This reminds me of the part of Bangsar with lots of boutiques along the street, main difference would be there are a lot more pedestrians here than in Bangsar. We saw the freedom and appreciation of art and architecture, materials that we were told “too expensive” can be seen here, used freely.
Upon arrival at Sunny Hills however, it was quite a ‘wow’ building as it definitely stood out. But the interiors were a little disappointing for me. But we were still appreciative that the owners understood that it is a piece of architecture designed by a world renowned architect and would attract many around the world to visit and allowed us to freely roam the building after simply informing the staffs the number of people that will be in. Sunny Hills is currently operating as a cafe which serves intricate and not to mention expensive and exclusive biscuits that costs about RM 40 for 6 pieces or so.
Our last stop for the day was Mori Art Museum. This too was one of my favourite exhibition - to date! It featured works done by Heatherwick Studio and everything in between. They had samples of actual hand rails, scaled models for every project from conceptual to final as well as the thought process behind it. My excitement as we went through this exhibition was through the roof! And if that wasn’t enough, Mori Art Museum had a view of Tokyo where you can also see Mount Fuji in the background. The day couldn’t have ended any better.
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