Day 8 - Tokyo. England vs Argentina

Day 8 - Saturday 5th October 2019

Saturday was a fun day. Everyone wanted to do different things, so Matt and I headed to the imperial palace, while Margaret and Tony headed to Tokyo tower for a view of mt Fuji. The palace was very pretty. We could only see the most and one building because it's still lived in by the imperial family today. There was some sort of run going on around the streets too, which was interesting to watch.

We then walked to the nearby fish market. Matt had been desperate for sushi since we arrived. We had sashimi in Hiroshima, but sushi is the same raw fish just with rice. First, we had a blow torched tuba skewer, then went into a sushi restaurant for sea urchin, salmon roe, shrimp, tuna, great amberjack, sea bream, scallop and sweet omelette. Delicious.

We had our England rugby tops on already, so we headed to the Tokyo stadium, along with lits and lots of England and Argentina fans, to the fanzone where they were showing the match before ours. The stadium was just a sea of England shirts. There were so many England fans there!

We met up with our friend Bernie for a couple of beers. He moved to Myanmar last year and was here on a school trip, but managed to sneak off to watch the rugby. It was lovely catching up with him.

Our seats were great! We were in the 9th row from the front, behind and just to the left of the goal that England were aiming for during the first half. It meant I got some great photos of the England tries. We had some very drunk English lads on tour in the row behind us who spent the entire match trying to start fights with Argentina fans. I spent the whole match convinced I was going to get either beer or vomit down my back. Luckily I didn't get either! The 5 of them spent the entire match arguing with each other, as some were very drunk and some just merry and getting annoyed by their mates drunk behaviour. We chatted to them quite a bit. They were very friendly drunks... To England fans anyway!

The match was enjoyable. The Argentina team had a man sent off very quickly for a very dirty and dangerous tackle, so it was fairly easy from there. The referee was Nigel Owens who is probably the most famous ref in the world for rugby, so it was cool to see him too.

We had beers in the seats and did lots of cheering. It was great fun. After, we met up with Matt's office buddy, Will and his mates again to let the crowds clear at the station, then headed back to the hotel after a cheeky McDonald's. While we were drinking with Will we worked out that it was 36 hours until they would see each other in their office on Monday, which was a bit depressing!

Today is Sunday, and we all have travel days. Luke left early for his flight home. Margaret and Tony head to Kyoto on the train and Matt and I have a 2 hour train to Nagoya, to get our flight back to Shanghai. It's been such a great holiday. I seriously love Japan and would love to come back to see more. But for now I'm looking forward to an evening at home watching Bake Off and enjoying kitty cuddles.