Kanda Myoujin Shrine (Shinto shrine)
https://www.gotokyo.org/en/spot/17/index.html
The main part of this shrine was built in 730 it was moved to the Akihabara district of Tokyo in 1603 which you can see depicted in the mural above.
There is a miniature donkey that is the sacred Animal at this shrine, we couldn’t see him as he was in his shelter on a rainy day but this sign is on his pen (using Google translate):
Temizuya ritual upon entering Shinto shrines.
https://www.nippon.com/en/views/b05205
The above picture is from a different shrine but represents pretty well what the ritual looks like. You put water from the ladle over your left hand, then right hand, then a tiny mouthful which is spit beside the temizuya.
We walked around Akihabara and then went to a French cafe for lunch. The focus is croissant type bread with things baked on it. A whole meal on a bread. We also had our favorite red bean paste filled donut. Pillowy soft.
After lunch we decided that a nap was needed. We are starting to slow down after a week and a half of go go go.
Food tour in Tokyo with guide Hiro was so much fun. He took us around and gave the history of the train station we were in which was the oldest in the area. We went to two different restaurants, both were fantastic and not on the general tourist path.
After the food tour, four of us went directly to Pachinko. It was immediately clear that this was not for the tourists as there was no way to switch the language on the machine and the staff spoke zero English. The machines make absolutely no sense at all but the goal was to run the balls through a series of bars that bounce them to one single ball sized hole. There is an anime video playing that probably would have been helpful if we could have understood it. Even so, 99% of the balls avoid going into the hole. The people around us were just mindlessly holding a side knob so skill did not appear to be a factor. Our machines kept jamming which meant we had to do a pantomime with an extremely grumpy attendant repeatedly. I am pretty sure we lasted about 15 minutes before our stress level(and theirs) peaked. I won a couple snacks and another person did manage to win back 3 thousand of her 5 thousand yen that she put in. This will not be our retirement plan.
https://www.japan-zone.com/modern/pachinko.shtml
Side note: we weren’t allowed to take photos or videos inside.