Clubbing in Tokyo is a curious thing indeed, a city that has a notorious reputation for one of the most expensive places in the world does little to dispell the myth when entry to a club is usually between 3000 and 4000 yen (anywhere between £24 and £32) and most of the clubs in Shibuya co-exist within a very small radius that is only a short walk from an area of 'love hotels' where couples that have only just met can choose to stay for afew hours.
and apart from the happy hour that we seeked out in an empty bar in Roponghi, last saturday was the only night we'd been out drinking in Tokyo and also our last night in Japan. With our flight at half 11 in the afternoon, this meant we had to be checking in for our flight at half 9 and catching a bus to the airport at 7 in the morning.
Starting with a couple of cans of Asahi bought from the AM-PM across the road and consumed in our room before moving on to the extortionate hotel bar and their lavish cocktails served with Titanic style icebergs.
The plan was to carry on our drinking at the J-Pop Cafe but when it looked like it was holding some kind of porn x-factor and were shooed off we crossed the road to the very un-japanese Outback Steakhouse to pass the time.
two tequila and cokes later, with an eye on the time and feeling particularly non-drunk we headed along to Atom, a club that appealed the most since it had a discounted 1000 yen entry before 12 and an RnB/Hip Hop room and where things took a turn for the surreal because the RnB/Hip Hop room chose to play Backstreet Boys and Natasha Beddingfield amongst there more urban selections and the main room was chanting along to Avril Lavigne's 'Girlfriend' and YMCA while packing in and facing straight at the DJ instead of just dancing.
I felt slightly uncomfortable ordering a drink called 'Kamikaze' from the japanese barstaff but as my girlfriend discovered, it seemed to be the strongest thing on the drinks menu and had soon done the trick in pushing me over that edge and had me chanting along with the rest of the japanese clubbers and holding hands with a stranger on the next floor dancing to some 'psychedelic electro' in a room that looked like a grotto lit for a party.
and thanks to the kamikazes i have a very minimal and hazy memory of the superclub Womb, apart from going in was like heading into an abandoned factory, that the music was less than thrilling (at least we'd hit Atom first) and i have it on very good authority that after paying 4000 yen each to get in we only stayed for about twenty minutes. sadly, my carefully calculated plans of club hopping before retiring and seeing out the small hours until the first train in Kareoke-Kan or a manga crash pad were dashed by the demon kamikazes.
now, getting stupidly drunk definitely isn't big or clever and it didn't impress my girlfriend as she had to rush me out of our hotel room in the morning or when we checked in for our flight as i sang 'peanut butter jelly time', but twinned with the lack of sleep, it was extremely effective for knocking me out during the ridiculously long flight, only waking for some mush they called lunch, and going most of the way to resetting my body clock as i tried to make up for lost sleep, snooze off the alcohol and wake up at what the UK would have known as 8 in the morning which was in fact midnight back in Tokyo.
and with that the adventure was over and there was nothing else to do but fill another 6 hours with inflight movies and wondering when it was time for the next 'meal'.
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