On my last day in Tokyo I decided to head over to Odaiba (on the monorail) to see the giant Gundam exhibition.  To be honest, I had no idea what Gundam was before I went to Japan, but the exhibit was popular so I thought I would give it a try.

I did not do a lot of research before my trip, and Odaiba was a lot bigger than I had expected.  When I arrived I was not sure which one of the 6 or so monorail stations to get off at, so I ended up getting off in the middle and walking around for a while trying to find a 30 foot robot.

In the end, I was glad that I got a little lost since I had the chance to look around the cool and slightly retro (in a Disney Land of Tomorrow kind of way) futuristic Odaiba architecture . . .

When I finally arrived at the Gundam site, I was very surprised at how busy it was!  There were literally hundreds of people queuing for access to a gift shop selling related merchandise.  There were even more people queuing for a chance to walk underneath the enormous mettle model and get the chance to touch it’s foot.  The real life robot based on a popular Japanese cartoon was the main attraction, although there were also lots of food and drink stalls around it catering for thousands of fans/spectators.  It was very surprising how long everyone seemed be staring at the giant, waiting for it’s head to move (which it did every few minutes). 

I was not as fascinated by the giant real life cartoon character as the rest of the crowd, but did decide to get some shots for a PhotoSynth, so here it is . . .

I recommend zooming in on the right foot for a close up (that was the only part I could get really close to)…

I spotted this building near the People’s Square in Shanghai yesterday.  It looks a bit like a tall version of the Cardinal Place building which hosts Microsoft in London.  I wonder if the architect had been to Shanghai before coming up with the design!