stayed in the Hotel Seeds I (not the adjacent Hotel Seeds II) in early February 2002. Hours of walking through Yushima and Uguisudani looking at the lighted placards for an interesting room. Late Saturday night is a tough time to try to find something lively; most of the mirrors on the ceiling, spaceships and wagon-shaped baths were taken. The nearby hotel offering stone onsen-style bathtubs was all filled up.
The Seeds offered a few rooms remaining; the choices were between one with mirrors on the ceiling and a room with a blacklight in the bathroom. I punched the button beneath the picture of room 202 and the 'obasan' (old lady) behind the counter handed me a key after charging my Visa card and asking for my phone number. I was given a Seeds Club frequent flyer card.
The room was large by Tokyo hotel standards - about twice the size of the average 'business hotel' room. The TV was huge, maybe 36 inches. The porn and movies offered for pay-per-view by other hotels were here playing free. They had the Playboy channel and some Japanese adult channel called 'Ruby' - all the private parts were fuzzed out. Ruby had a series of short vignettes - my first experience watching Japanese porn. The usual hijinks it seemed, except you couldn't see any of the details. There were some particularly funny moments where people would be laying in a patch of digital censorship fuzz; all you could see was a woman's face, largely expressionless, as she made some helium-inflected squealing sound. For three straight minutes.
I had just paid 14200 yen for a tiny room at the Tokyo Green Hotel in Kanda. Here I had a larger room with more distractions for two thirds the cost.
It was a fantastic deal on lodgings, if you're willing to check in after 11pm, leave with all your luggage the next morning at 10am. Maybe not being able to make a reservation would bother you.
The surfaces were quite clean. The ceiling was adorned with some decorated glass that looked a little aged.
The high-point of the room was doubtlessly the bathroom. A shower and large tub in a dark-tiled room with a painting of a mountain scene in flourescent colors that glowed bright under the rooms blacklights.
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on Aug 25, 2002
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