Hot-springs and capsule hotel
After the bus tour, we rode the amazing Tokyo subway to a a place that
offered onsen (hot-springs) and a capsule hotel. I'd long wondered
what it would be like to sleep in a capsule hotel and the Tokyo subway
stops running at midnight so we needed a place to crash anyway. The
hot-springs were almost entirely filled with Koreans! I had to stick a
band-aid over my tattoo to avoid being mistaken for a member of the
Yakuza (Japan's organized crime rings). But I got to wear a yakata
(traditional Japanese bathrobe), which was pretty neat.

We had some trouble gaining access to the capsule hotels because none
of the staff spoke any English. Eventually one of them resorted to
using a Web translator, which did the trick. The capsule hotels did
not quite match my expectations of a tempofoam coffin in a drawer,
being more like bunk beds in a hostel.

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