Only six days after their arrival, we said 'sayonara' to mom and Joe. Jonce and I took them to the airport and enjoyed a helping of pork cutlet curry before they went through security. On the drive back, Jonce and I discussed plans for the rest of their stay with us. We had about a day and a half together before they met up with Katie Jean's cousin on the other side of Tokyo. Jonce and I enthusiastically decided that we MUST stay in a sleep pod hotel. The girls found and reserved a really cheap one in Asakasa (East Tokyo).
A couple of things are givens when it comes to Japanese karaoke. Beer will always be involved, the re-verb is turned up way too high, and everyone will spend 90% of the time standing on the seats.
The men's pod room housed 8-12 pods. Apparently there were some other men in our room, but Jonce and I never heard a peep. The women's pod room was separate and had about the same number of pods. Between us was a community sink. Bathrooms and showers were located on different levels because the hotel was in a tall, slender building.
Asakasa Flashback
I must come clean...before I go on any more I need to catch up on a small adventure us young bucks experienced on Thanksgiving night. Since we weren't able to visit Asakasa on the day we went to Tokyo, we decided to go check it out. 
Getting gussied up for the night. We convinced Jonce to at least trim his beard so he didn't look like a charity case.
While walking around Asakasa, we came across this lady playing music outside of her store. The beauty of her playing stopped us dead in our tracks. We literally just stood there, dumbfounded, for at least 5 minutes.
Jonce and Katie Jean outside of Asakasa's main temple "Sensoji." It is one of Tokyo's oldest temples as it was originally built in the 7th century.
While we were walking around it started raining...A LOT! Although we were prepared for a little rain, I ended up having to go and buy one more big umbrella (I think I have 10 umbrellas at this point). We walked around a little more, but were still getting wet so we holed up in a Mcdonalds for a while before heading back to Tsukuba for the night.
Bambi-na: A cute girl with eyes and legs like Bambi
Okay, now that I got that off my chest I can continue...where was I...? SLEEP PODS IN TOKYO! That's right, now I remember. We all got packed up and was just about ready to go when the girls mentioned one thing they wanted to do before we left Tsukuba. Kate looked at me with deer-like eyes, batted her eyelashes and said "Bambi-na!"
'Bambi-na' is a photo booth that the girls discovered a couple nights prior (the night of unspeakable karaoke in Tsukuba).
After you take photos you are given a couple minutes to add all manners of goofy things to them. The final product is nothing short of a masterpiece.
Here is a collage of our session. Click on it for a larger view. One of the funniest things about the photo booth is that it automatically detects/enlarges your eyes and whites out your skin. As you can clearly tell, we had fun adding all sorts of things to the photos. My favorite is the 'emo' hair that got added to Jonce in the upper left corner.
I prefer my Asakasa dry
Satisfied with our photo shoot, we boarded the train bound for Asakasa. This time there was no rain, which made our exploration of the area much easier. I lead everyone in the direction of the main canal that cuts through the area. We found our sleep pod hotel, dropped off our bags, and dilly-dallied around for a while. 
Hanging out on the illuminated staircase of the Asahi Golden Flame (officially the "Flamme d'Or", unofficially the "Big Lump of Crap") building.
After sightseeing, we dropped in on a restaurant with purely Japanese menus. I flexed my Japanese speaking muscles, but we somehow ordered too much alcohol an accident. All things considered, ordering too much alcohol is the best kind of mistake a person can make.
A more enjoyable karaoke experience
There was a "Big Echo" karaoke shop pretty close to our hotel, so we convinced Jonce and Katie Jean to give karaoke another shot.
Hallway leading to our room on the 4th floor of Big Echo.
Perhaps the most interesting thing about singing karaoke is actually learning what the songs say. Here is a picture of Jonce and I singing a song with the lyric "ghetto princess" in it.
Forget a king size, just give me a sleep pod.
With my vocal chords properly destroyed from singing yelling screaming the songs at karaoke, we walked back to our hotel. It was time to FINALLY drift away into a peaceful slumber in a sleep pod. This experience has been on the top my list of things to do in Japan for a very long time. Truth be told, they weren't true sleep pods for a couple subtle reasons, but they were still awesome.
Left: Jonce putting his clothes in his allotted locker. Right: View from the head of the bed.
View from the foot of the bed. Each pod had its own television, radio, light, digital clock, and alarm.
As I laid in the pod I thought about how much life can change in one day. It was only that morning that my mother and Joe left for America. At that moment they were somewhere over the Pacific and I was in a sleep pod in Tokyo with Jonce and the Katies. I pondered this for a moment before I skimmed through the most recent Popular Science (nerd, I know) and passed out.
-Seth
January 13, 2011 at 9:58 PM
Jonce's bangs remind me of what he looked like in the six grade.
Did you say the pod comes with a digital clock? really? Did Jonce find a guy that said "Maybe cause I like him"?
January 14, 2011 at 8:07 AM
oh man...what a great post! There is one detail that was left out about the restaurant with the japanese menus...I HAVE to mention this, purely for keeping the record of our memories... Seth mentioned that too much alcohol was ordered, but he failed to mention that as a direct result, he accidentally poured his soy sauce for sushi into the ash tray instead of the soy sauce dish :)