Day 2 - Tokyo Hamfest

Saturday is the Tokyo Hamfest.  For those not familiar with that term, it's basically an Amateur Radio (Ham) event where manufacturers show up to show their wares that support the hobby (radios, antennas, accessories), where Amateur radio clubs and groups show up to tout their portion of the hobby, and where some hams gather for a flea market to sell old stuff. Or newer stuff they don't want anymore.

Art, Donna, and I made our way through the Tokyo transit system and got to the Tokyo Big Site facility.  It was a large events center with a rather odd entryway - it looked like some kind of transformer.

Inside, there was a lot of organization - cues for buying tickets, and cues for those with tickets waiting to go in.  Lots of volunteers were on site to insure the attendees were getting in the right line.  At least, for the Japanese attendees, that was obvious.  All of the instructions being yelled and the signs being waved were in Japanese.  Fortunately, Art was there to translate.

Once inside, I began making the rounds and looking at the stuff.  There was a lot of it, and I was able to make conversation with some attendees.  A couple of Navy sailors were there, and we had a good conversation with them.  One of the attendees manning the APRS information booth spoke some english, and once he heard I was from the Seattle area, he asked me "do you know K7OFT, Bob?".  Normally, you would hear a comment like that, and think to yourself "gee, there are hundreds of thousands of hams in the US, why would I know that particular person?".   But in this case, I could say yes - I did happen to know K7OFT, Bob King.  He is a local ham that I periodically have breakfast with at a local ham gathering.   This Japanese ham and Bob exchanged emails in the early 2000's about APRS issues.   Man, what a small world.

Here are some pics of the event:

It was one of the largest ham radio events I've ever been to.  Well organized and with a lot of things to see.

After the hamfest, we ventured into the nearby area and found a ramen place nearby.  It was under the railroad tracks, and you ordered by a machine just outside the door.

After that lunch, we hiked through the neighborhoods of Shinbashi to make our way to the Tokyo Tower.  We purposely took smaller side streets and alleys.  Or, what we thought were alleys.  When you look down some of these streets, they look simply like service alleys behind the main businesses.  But, many of them have small businesses shoved into every nook and cranny.  We passed an Indian restaurant that was open for business - the guy working there was sitting outside, smoking a cigarette, and music was blaring from inside.  There were no customers, and based on the activity in this alley his outlook to have any customers was bleak.  But, he was certainly ready for the influx.

We also found small parking lots with an interesting wheel boot system.  Presumably, you pay for some time in the lot.  If your time runs out, the boot pops up and prevents your  vehicle from leaving.  There were even small lots for motorcycles - with the same boot system in place.

We also stumbled into a shrine area.  There are lots of shrines in Tokyo, and the city has grown up around them.  The shrines are sometimes not very obvious, so you either know they are there, or just come across them.  Like we did here.

Forging on, we made it to the Tokyo Tower.  It was built in the 1950's and was mainly there to provide a platform for broadcast TV stations.  But, it provides a pretty decent view from 150 meters up.

Moving on, we headed to the Shibuya area, where one of the busiest pedestrian crossings is carried out.  It's a major intersection, but when pedestrians get the green, they go all directions.  I can't post the video on the blog, but here's the video I took and posted to Youtube:

Shibuya Crossing

From Shibuya we just walked around for awhile and was amazed at the amount of people and activity there was.  it was Saturday night, so everyone was out and about and enjoying themselves on this very comfortable evening.

Another long day of walking.  I'm getting a blister or two.