Konichiwa!
The Japanese blog post has arrived! I decided that because so much time has passed and so much happened in Japan, I would split our time there into several posts, detailing the saga of my first international stop on this voyage around the world.
To begin, if you need a reminder as to how antsy we were after 10 days at sea, please refer to the last two posts. Let’s just say, things got weird. I’ve been trying to upload a video of the storm we encountered on our way to Japan, but so far, no luck.
Oh well, onto bigger and better!
The morning we pulled into Yokohama, Japan, my roommate stormed into the room and yelled, “Hurry, you can see Mt. Fuji outside!” If I had a nickel for every—oh wait, I’ve never heard that before in my life! Half an hour later, which was hurrying in my case, you could still in fact see the mountain from the outer deck. That’s when it hit me that we were ACTUALLY IN JAPAN:
Japan was the first international stop on our journey, so you can imagine our anticipation for debarking the ship. Add to that our marching band welcoming on the dock, and you get one excited group of people.
Japan was one of the few ports for which I had not made travel plans ahead of time. In the days prior to arriving, a group of friends and I set a game plan for the next 5 days: we would travel overland and spend 2 days in Tokyo, 2 days in Kyoto, and the final day in Kobe where we would meet up with the ship and depart for China. I’ll tell you right now that I wildly underestimated not only the size of the country but the lack of communication among our traveling party. Oops.
The only thing that came to fruition from these plans was that we actually made it to every city on the list… the rest was a total surprise.
Having never been to Asia before, I honestly expected an extreme amount of culture shock. The countries of the Asia Pacific and the ‘East’ in general have always had such an air of mystery to me that I even found myself a little nervous before we debarked. What I ended up finding was that not only did Japan feel unbelievably familiar, but the people were also some of the friendliest and most ingratiating I have ever met.
More to come on that in following posts.
Once we finally set foot on solid ground (LAND!), most of the group headed directly to Tokyo on free shuttles provided by the ship. However, my friends Rylee, Grace, Grayson and I stayed behind to check out Yokohama for a couple hours. You may already know this, but Yokohama… not exactly a tourist destination. So that led to Japanese mistake number 1: traveling to the train station on foot.
Sounds easy enough, right? Welp, friends, it was a trial. I won’t bore you with the details but Rylee and I got separated, walked at least five miles, navigated a highway walkway, found our way through the subway to the train, deciphered the ticket system, and barely caught our train to Tokyo. After that, we decided we had conquered Japan, and rewarded ourselves with ‘scarf beers.’
After arriving in Tokyo, having fully celebrated our victory, we realized we had literally no idea where we were. It was at this time that Rylee decided to share with me the fact that her friend who had lived in Tokyo, described it as 5 different cities, each far enough in culture and distance to represent its own unique space within the larger city. Japanese mistake number 2: I had assumed we would be able to walk to our hotel.
I’m an idiot.
Friends, Tokyo is HUGE! It’s literally Manhattan but cleaner and full of Japanese people. I know I sound dumb, but I promised to be honest, and I honestly thought that there was a ‘downtown’ area, and we’d all be near each enough to each other to just bop across the street to our friend’s hotels and have a big ol’ Semester at Sea party.
NOT.
It took us half an hour and a very, very friendly Canadian named Shane to learn that none of the sections of the city were not, in fact, walkable nor were they easy to navigate at first glance. The subway map was the first inclination we had that this might not be the simple city we expected.
Not only is this particular map a bit convoluted, but you’ll never see the same map twice. Each subway station (and accompanying map, of course) is owned by a different company and will thus, look different. I wish I had snapped picture of each one, but I kid you not, we saw another map that was this one—only upside-down. And to make matters worse, neither one was oriented with north at the top.
Awesome.
Thankfully, though, Shane set us straight and on our way to the hotel, which was actually 2 subways and one very brisk walk away from the main Tokyo station. We finally got there nearly 5 hours after leaving Yokohama. Anyone who has been to Japan should be laughing right now. Just sayin.
Our late arrival resulted in a moment of which I am not very proud. All of the restaurants in our sleepy section of Tokyo were closed, so we did the best we could and…
My first meal in Japan…
Was at a 7-Eleven.
Now, pick your jaws up off the floor and just hear me out for a second.
Yes, I’m disappointed in myself and yes, it wasn’t my best move, but dammit, the pork buns at 7-Eleven are some of the most amazing things I’ve ever eaten! I ended up having at least 10 more in the next 2 days. And, as an added bonus, they sell sake in juice box form.
WIN!
Needless to say, 7-Eleven’s, Family Mart’s and the like, became our go-to destinations for quick stops to ‘refresh’ or eat whenever we weren’t sure of our next move. Pretty clutch, if you ask me.
That night was relatively low key, although some people did decide to go out pretty late. I ended up at a shot bar in the Roppongi area of town, but went home early (2am… ya, that’s early) to get ready for the first day of touring the city. Before I left, I snapped a picture of the city lights, with which we would become all too familiar in the following days.
That was my first day in Japan. Some ups, some downs, all adventure, and all strangely comfortable, which was a feeling that I’m still trying to decompress.
The following days were all a bit of a blur, but I will try and make sense of them in the posts to come.
Question of the day: When was the last time you felt like a stupid tourist?
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