Well my long circuitous trip has ended. I finally made it home. The flight to Seattle was just as expected, or better. Same amenities as on the way over, but this time there was no one sitting next to me so I could lay down while I watched my movies. And the flight back was only 8 hours, so I got to Seattle around 7:30am local time (after leaving at 3:30pm the same day!). Before I left Japan, there was a flight listed as leaving from McChord to McGuire on Friday. I thought it would be perfect! I could spend the [View Full Entry]

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The spontaneous adventure is drawing to a close. Today we said goodbye to our host family and headed (ran) for the train to get Mike and Nick to Tokyo in time. Turns out that the schedule we were looking at was for a train we can't take with our passes. Despite the crunch, we made it with time to spare. We were a little worried since we were going right around rush hour (7-10), but turned out to be no problem at all. We mostly slept through it and I tried to power through the rest of the book I was [View Full Entry]

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Our last day in Japan. It was a good day! We headed out early to go back to Kyoto. At first it was a bit of a buzzkill to have to go back to the city we thought we finished yesterday, but it turned out to be one of the nicest days of the vacation for me. Once we got there, Nick headed off to the Kiyamizu temple (to buy something for Megumi) while Mike and I ventured out to visit the golden pavilion (Kinkaku-ji). We all started by buying a $5 all day pass for the bus. I'm actually starting [View Full Entry]

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The title refers to the joke we've been working with for a few days now. Japanese people often seem like robots -- there is so much conformity that what I thought was a great fashion sense is actually everyone trying to conform to the boots and tights look. You can't cross the street against the light even if there are no cars coming because everyone else will follow you without even looking and might get hit. Our robot is Mayumi, but she's not quite as effecient or conformist as the Japanese robots. So everytime she does something a little flighty (which [View Full Entry]

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So the prior entry was titled by Mike as I was getting ready to leave Fumi's apt this morning. It was in reference to how crazy the Japanese language is. Mike said he thinks that's what he sounds like to the Japanese while everyone else just sounds normal. There were also a few things that were pointed out to me that I forgot to blog about yesterday. One was a guy on the subway who I actually have some video of (if I can figure out how to post it). He was this unfortunate 20-ish year-old, dressed in a suit with [View Full Entry]

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Sunday was pretty laid back. We're finally in one place for a few days, and we enjoyed a total chill day. Mike's host brother (his host mom's son) and his wife and 2-yr old son visited. We got up in time for late bfast and early lunch. Pretty much just chilled out. I finished another book. We went to the park nearby. Beautiful weather! It was so sunny and warm. I wanted to fall asleep in the sun on the grass, but it was so hot in the sun that that didn't work out so well. After a couple of hours, [View Full Entry]

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We started off our voyage to Tokyo with an exciting morning consisting of a kitchen fire and my toiletry case as the only casualty. Japanese apts don't come with appliances, so Nick's prior roommate bought a typical Japanese stove -- it has a little drawer for broiling (the closest thing to an oven that anyone has in Japan -- no ovens! Can you believe it?) While I was in the shower, Mike made some toast for breakfast. This led to the igniting of the stove, and since my toiletry case was sitting on top, the flames that were shooting up through [View Full Entry]

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Our last day in Sapporo was mainly about beer. As Nick doesn't drink beer, Mike and I ventured out alone for this one. But first, a stop at the dollar store -- just out of curiosity. It was actually pretty impressive. Definitely better things at their dollar store than at ours. I got a few needed and unneeded items (including toe socks!). Mike and I headed out for the Sapporo Bier Garten, but first stopped for lunch at a famed ramen place. All over Japan, ramen shops are well-known for a good lunch. It's essentially ramen noodles (but theirs start off [View Full Entry]

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This morning, Mike surprised us with his new look. Nick's first comment of the day (at noon -- yes that was his first comment of the day) was that he looks like the Village People. Commence the gay jokes. Even Megumi said he looked gay. haha He became Freddy Mercury for the day. Our day began with one of the only few movies/tv in English in Nick's apt -- Tomb Raider 2 (it's a box set, so we still have entertainment for tomorrow). We actually intended to go to the beer garden (Sapporo factory) but got waylaid on the way. First [View Full Entry]

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Our fun-filled adventure for today was a trip to the zoo. The adventure part included renting a car to get there -- Megumi's car is in the shop. It was a pretty nice honda rental though, and allowed us to fit more people (Matt and Yo-ichi came too). Nick and Megumi had donuts for breakfast (I snagged one) which were way better than donuts in the states. Very fresh and a little crunchy. It was like the best donut you've ever had (hot Krispy Kreme excluded). Nick's looked like a plain ring with chocolate frosting, but inside was chocolate (not cream, [View Full Entry]

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