January 2, 2025
We had to be in Shibuya at 9:30 at the latest for Aubrey, Erez, Zev and Noam to prepare for their Street Karts driving experience. We made it in time because I gave everyone a purposely early departure time.
While the boys were driving around Tokyo, Mae and Teva went to a cat cafe, and Kerrie and I went shopping. Shibuya was actually pretty quiet, as it was early in the day and many things were still closed for the New Year’s Holiday. We also visited Don Quijote again – this time it was a bit quieter, but still overwhelming as always.
After the drive, we met up at a store called GU that Kerrie was checking out. We ended up shopping in there a little bit too long and we missed our window to go to the fish market. We weren’t too worried because we still have one more day in Tokyo. On the upside, Aubrey got 4 pairs of pants for work, and Noam and Erez and Kerrie all got some great clothes they needed. On the downside, they had to carry said clothes around for the rest of the day.
Because we weren’t going to Tsukiji Outer market for lunch anymore, we had to feed the boys. We found a Kebab stand and a Ramen shop next to each other. A worthy substitute for our postponed dream lunch.
We then headed to the Tokyo Bay Area to look around a bit before our tickets for TeamLab Planets started.
From the teamLab website:
“Together with Others, Immerse your Entire Body, Perceive with your Body, and Become One with the World
teamLab Planets is a museum where you walk through water, and a garden where you become one with the flowers. It comprises 4 large-scale artwork spaces and 2 gardens created by art collective teamLab.
People go barefoot and immerse their entire bodies in the vast artworks together with others. The artworks change under the presence of people, blurring the perception of boundaries between the self and the works. Other people also create change in the artworks, blurring the boundaries between themselves and the works, and creating a continuity between the self, the art, and others.”
It was pretty spectacular – unlike anything I have ever seen. I loved it. Below is the website if you are interested in learning more; they have other locations in the world as well. If you ever find yourself having an opportunity to join this experience, I would suggest you do it.
https://www.teamlab.art/e/planets
From Wikipedia:
“TeamLab houses multiple permanent collections that are located in the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney; Art Gallery of South Australia, Adelaide; Asian Art Museum, San Francisco; Asia Society Museum, New York; Borusan Contemporary Art Collection, Istanbul; National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne; and Amos Rex, Helsinki.[17]
Singapore has the most TeamLab permanent exhibitions outside of Japan. These include places such as the National Museum of Singapore, Jewel Changi Airport, Marina Bay Sands, Gardens by the Bay and the CapitaSpring.[18][19][20]
In late 2020, TeamLab premiered “Resonating Life in the Acorn Forest,” a permanent art installation at the Kadokawa Culture Museum at Tokorozawa Sakura Town in Tokorozawa, Japan. Situated in the Musashino forest[21] it consists of color-changing ovoid shapes in the woods which respond to touch and wind.[22] During the day the silver ovoid shapes reflect their forest surround but at night the trees in the part of the woods where the instillation is placed are individually flooded with colored light as are the sculptured interactive shapes.[23]“
Here are a couple shots, but not too many as I wouldn’t want to ruin it for anyone else. If you want more photos, just ask me. 🙂
We finished off the day back at the house, and finally ate the curry I made, plus a smorgasbord of things we bought at the convenience stores. We had our logistics meeting, We FaceTimed Maxine and Redd, whose birthdays are both January 2nd, and then crashed. Another fantastic day. I can’t believe that tomorrow is our last full day!