Tokyo for Dummies

If you're tired of life in Tokyo,

then you must be tired of your own life.

★Shu Kuo-chih's masterpiece, a companion to his classic travel literature "An Outsider's Kyoto"!

★If you love "exploring hidden gems," you absolutely cannot miss this ultimate city—Tokyo

★A Tokyo guide that is most flexible, resourceful, yet not overwhelming, but just right!

★Includes Shu Kuo-chih's Tokyo walking e-map, enjoy this city for walking!

There are many hidden paradises, and in Tokyo, that is truly the case!

Tokyo. A city rarely seen in the world, full of urban nooks and crannies, ancient and modern; a remarkable place where people in every corner seem to be practicing self-cultivation. And walking in this city is simply a joy. Shu Kuo-chih, with his unique "Shu-style," replaces professional "focused observation" with leisurely "broad observation," inferring the origins of urban crevices and finding amusement in it; searching for the beautiful marks carved little by little in the huge city, each unexpected "encounter" is an astonishing delight. And the most outstanding among such cities is Tokyo.

"Tokyo, to me, is already a vast encyclopedia. I can never grasp its entirety, I can only occasionally flip through it, browse it, and my heart fills with joy."—Shu Kuo-chih

Shu Kuo-chih's "Outsider's Mindset for Tokyo":

♦ The theme is seeing: Tokyo is one of the rare cities in the world that is a metropolis full of urban crevices where ancient and modern come together. When you increasingly notice the crevices and learn to infer their origins, gaining amusement, then your walking in this city becomes utterly delightful.

♦ Enjoy encounters: There are many towns in the world where "encounters" might not suit you; but in Tokyo, if you don't seize the opportunity to "encounter," it's truly a pity! For it has too many good shops. And surprise, in a lifetime, how precious it is!

♦ Walking as cultivation: To complete the process of "reading," "researching," and "exploring" through walking as movement will achieve the "high" in my mind in many ways. And for places with a lot of exploratory, reading, research, and investigative walking, there is one such place: Tokyo.

♦ Play appropriately: Tokyo has so many parks, museums, celebrity residences, department stores... can you happen to enter exactly when you most want to, without being able to avoid it, and do so with immense joy?

♦ Park treasures: Parks are truly treasures in Tokyo, as many of them are framed by the best ancient landscapes. If you can step into one or two flavorful parks during your day's itinerary, then I would say you are a connoisseur of Tokyo!

♦ Subway quick peek: Use a 72-hour subway pass to quickly "play half a district," thus crossing several areas in two or three hours, and thereby getting a slight sense of the atmosphere of each area. "Crossing districts" is how you'll remember their differences.

♦ Architectural pilgrimage: The standalone beauty of a tall building might not be particularly awe-inspiring, but its placement in a certain corner of the city, after so much consideration and planning, and requiring immense sacrifice, is what makes it interesting.

♦ Dining in Tokyo: Find restaurants on the streets. Even though Tokyo is large, its various districts can be explored using a "Beigang ancient town style" visual observation method to find the restaurant you want to eat at. Restaurants specifically sought out might offer more, but they lack the surprise of an accidental encounter.