Tech-Tokyo

I always heard that Japan is extremely hi-tech, so before arriving I was imagining Tokyo as a city similar to The Jetsons. Ok, I’m exaggerating. But once I got to the airport, I was surprised with something that I haven’t seen on the airports around the world: fingerprint identification. In Portuguese! For me, of course, because I gave them my Brazilian passport.
To go to my accommodation I took a bus transfer from the airport, and it wasn’t a big deal. No automatic roads; and the driver was driving the car without automatic pilot or any other robotic help. I was almost forgetting about these technological things until I went to the washroom. The toilet seat has automatic heat and some other functions, to wash yourself when you are seated. Too strange for me; I couldn’t try. There are some things that are better to keep the traditional way. In the streets, there are lots of vending machines, which I only know for selling beverages or snacks. In Japan, you can buy also sushi or even underwear! The nightclubs do not escape from all this technology. We went to one that you can only come in if another guest already allowed in authorizes your fingerprint. If you belong to the lucky group of people, you can enjoy rooms with modern karaoke or virtual golf. Japanese people love these things. Not just singing and playing, but all the wonders of the modern world. I can’t deny that I had fun on the photo machines. You enter the cabin with your friends, pose for the picture and then run to another cabin, where you can customize your photos with drawings and frames, the machine sends your artwork to your cell phone via Bluetooth or infra-red and prints it as a sticker. The best! I trusted so much on Japanese modern techniques that I went to a hair saloon and got my hair what we know in Brazil as the “Japanese straight”. I love it. But I was really amazed when my new friend Ryoko, the Japanese girl that went to he Smirnoff Ten selection final with Takashi, showed me the functions of her cell phone. It has free TV access with perfect image, reads business cards and keeps it in your contacts, recognizes these new barcodes that some stores and restaurants have for the to customer connect to the website of the place by the phone and, the best, makes video calls! You can see whom you are speaking to, in real time!
After that, we were discussing what is next. Is it possible to invent more and more things? I hope that the teletransportation comes soon. Than I’ll not have to go to the other side of the world to see these new and old wonders…