Our Trip to Japan
Konichiwa! It’s 5am, and I’ve been up since 2am because JET LAG! Well, I woke up because of jet lag, but then I stayed awake because I got the Super Sunday Scaries. (Seriously, our Sunday was 30-something hours, and we were only asleep for three of those hours. Pretty sure that’s the definition of a Super Sunday.)
I feel so fortunate that we were able to visit my sister and her family about halfway through their stint in Japan. Although we only got to see my brother-in-law for a few minutes before he left for deployment, it was great to be able to give him a hug (and a sandwich) before he left!
We were able to soak up a lot of fun times in our short trip. Let’s talk about it!
Friday, May 24th (Sean’s birthday!)
Delta gave Sean the ultimate birthday gift: a text 22 hours before departure letting us know we had been bumped from first class to main cabin! For a 14-hour flight! Also, our seats weren’t next to each other anymore! Thank you, Delta!
I spent the next 22 hours assuring Sean that it would be fine since he was in an aisle seat, but Delta made sure to take that away too as soon as we got on the plane.
“Hey, folks. You mind scooching in? I have a passenger who’s demanding an aisle seat even though she’s a five-foot baby because she’s an opportunist who saw a desperate dad trying to get a seat next to his young daughter who doesn’t speak English and seized the opportunity to exploit that.” (The flight attendant said something along those lines.)
We scooched in, and then I made a point of waking up the five-foot baby every hour because, “Sorry. Weak bladder.” But I digress…
We left Tampa Friday at 8:25am and arrived in Tokyo Saturday at 2:35pm.
Saturday, May 25th: Raw Chicken & Craft Beer
Our first meal in Japan was, admittedly, not Japanese. But we were tired and hungry and lost, so when we saw a sign that said, “English menu available,” we jumped on it.
They had a beer wall with craft beer on tap. I had a strawberry gose (which was delicious!) and French fries because I’m a picky eater. Sean ordered fried chicken (which actually is a thing in Japan!) and ate a few pieces before realizing it was practically raw.
That night, we slept SUPER hard…until 4am, and then we were wide awake. We watched the Cubs game in Japanese and then headed for the train station to go see the fam!
Sunday, May 26th: Chuhais and Hi-Chews
Japan has figured out this whole bullet train thing, and – like everything else – they do it well. Most train stations have tons of restaurant options and convenience stores located throughout them so you can load up on alcohol and train snacks before a long trip.
Japan has also figured out the whole work hours thing, and most places don’t open until 9am or later, so we ended up at McDonald’s for breakfast. Yep! Two meals into our trip, we still haven’t experienced Japanese cuisine.
About five hours and two transfers (Kobe and Hiroshima) later, we were reunited with my favorite sister and her cute family!
That day/night, we took it easy because we were still pretty jetlagged (also, we had Subway for lunch – oops!), but we had a delish Japanese meal at home that night: poke bowls.
Monday, May 27th: Kintai Bridge & Cheesecake Ice Cream
Ohayōgozaimasu! (That’s how us locals say, “Good morning!”) We added this greeting to our small Japanese vocabulary after paying a visit to the kids’ school, which – like everything else in Japan – was adorable, clean and efficient.
After dropping off Iris, we made a little trip to the Kintai Bridge, which was absolutely beautiful.
Then we grabbed some ice cream from a street vendor, and it was probably the best ice cream I’ve ever had. The Japanese are total pros and put cornflakes at the bottom of the cones to avoid drippage. They seriously think of everything.
We spent the rest of the afternoon building forts with the kids and then went out for a fancy adults-only dinner in Downtown Iwakuni. Erica and Sean enjoyed some Kobe beef steak things, while I got pizza because I’m awful.
I also got some sake, and they poured it until it overflowed from the glass into the saucer, and when I was done with the glass, I drank it out of the saucer like a cat and probably appeared on Japanese Candid Camera.
Tuesday, May 28th: Deers & Beers
Day trip to Miyajima Island! This was one of my favorite places we visited while in Japan. Wild deer roaming around, a brewery, street food, shopping…what’s not to love?
And although it was a bit rainy, it actually felt really nice out.
That night we went out for ramen at “the yellow place,” and Iris got the cutest kids’ meal ever.
Wednesday, May 29th: Cranes and More Delicious Food
Next stop: Hiroshima! This entire trip combined two of Sean’s greatest loves: sightseeing and history. Oh, and me! Three of his greatest loves. Hiroshima was probably his favorite of our many stops along the way.
While here, a Japanese man spotted us and yelled, “You are American!” and we said, “Yes, we are from Florida!” and he said, “Miami?!” and we said, “Kind of!” And then he asked us how we felt about Trump following us to Japan, and we said that we hate him. So then we had a conversation about who the next president should be (the Japanese guy nominated Erica) before parting ways to go find…Okonomiyaki! Yum.
I also had the most delicious highball of the trip at this restaurant. It had freshly squeezed lemon juice in it and was superb. At first, I didn’t think it had alcohol in it (because I couldn’t read the menu), but I quickly realized it did.
Hold on a second. Sean’s sleep-talking again. He just said, “Oooo, big therapist,” in a very condescending tone. We’ll unpack that when he wakes up.
Thursday, May 30th: Fire, Stairs and Geishas – Oh My!
Leaving Erica and the kids was not fun, but I’m not going to cry about it. I already did that in the Iwakuni train station.
After composing myself, we hopped on the train toooooo…KYOTO! If we go back to Japan one day, I want to spend some more time here. This place was so. freaking. cool.
First stop: Fire Ramen! Just us and a restaurant full of other tourists. (The food was legit though.)
Before setting our bowls on fire, the chef read off the rules: 1) No yelling. 2) No running. 3) No touching the bowl. There was also this gem on the menu:
For now.
Next stop: Fushimi-Inari Taisha!
Fun fact: Inari is actually the kami of rice but has traditionally been worshiped as the patron of business. As such, each torii at Fushimi-Inari Taisha was donated by a Japanese business. (I guess businesses are more likely to make a donation than rice.)
I wore Jack Rogers because I’m an idiot (and also because I didn’t realize there would be miles of stairs), but we made it pretty far into the torii jungle. It was absolutely beautiful – plus, we got to meet up with some of our pals from the States!
On the way back to the hotel, we stopped at Family Mart and loaded up on Chuhais, got a nice buzz going and then headed to…the sushi go-round! I discovered something incredible: a creamed corn sushi roll. I ate about five of these before calling it quits. Dennis ordered a hamburger roll, which looked exactly like it sounds.
We all decided to call this the finale. At this point, we had seen it all. Plus, we had some geishas to find. We took a stroll through Gion, gave up pretty early, and started to head back toward the hotel and then…
A group of white people surrounded a cab and were snapping photos as a geisha scurried to her gig! For the record, I find it super weird that there are tour groups that literally exist just to harass find geishas, and I do not support them accosting her. I mean, even if you don’t have a lick of human decency, couldn’t you at least obey the signs, people?
But it was super cool to see a geisha, and then we saw another on our walk back!
Friday, May 31st: Bamboo, Meltdowns and Old Friends
Our last few hours in Kyoto were spent in Arashiyama – more specifically, the vast, gorgeous bamboo forest it’s known for. After walking in circles for a little while (the forest was surprisingly hard to find), we came across it and it. was. magical.
If you have the chance to go, make sure you go early. (Thank you to the woman we met at Fire Ramen who gave us this advice.) It was starting to get crowded around the time we were leaving – plus it was a lot cooler (temperature wise) in the morning, making for a nice walk through the bamboo rather than a sweltering heat fest.
After exploring the forest, we parted ways with Dacie and Dennis to hop on the bullet train back to Tokyo.
I need to make some brief statements before retelling this next part:
The bullet train is freaking awesome. It is the most efficient, clean, comfortable experience you could ever hope for on a train.
When you go somewhere as cool as Japan for a short period of time (8 days), it’s hard because you want to see EVERYTHING, but you also want to enjoy the things you’re seeing.
We were so all over that country that at this point in the trip, we had spent more than 24 hours sitting on planes/buses/subways/trains.
Included in our wedding vows was mention of the Great Philly Meltdown of 2013. I don’t want to get into the details, but this is telling of my Sightseeing With Sean history.
I drank two tall boy Chuhais and ate an entire pack of Hi-Chews in the brief time that we waited for our train to arrive.
I also had a pancake for breakfast.
We hopped on the train (at LAX, with a dream and my cardigan), and I fired up my movie, On the Edge of Seventeen, settling in for a short two-hour ride. About halfway through the movie, I realized my ticket said we were arriving at 16:02, not 15:02, as I had originally read it. I did the math on my hands a few times and then grabbed Sean’s arm the way you might grab someone’s arm before breaking the news that you drank the last La Croix.
Me: This is a three-hour train ride.
Sean: Yes.
Me: I thought it was two.
Sean: No, it’s about three.
Me: Three is more than I can handle.
Sean:
Me: I need to go for a walk.
I thought that I had experienced a sugar crash before. I had not experienced a sugar crash before. I always thought of crashes as that feeling when your blood sugar gets low and you need a scoop of peanut butter, but this was something completely new.
My vision blurred, I started sweating. The fact that I was watching On the Edge of Seventeen, a movie told from the point of view of a seventeen-year-old who literally feels like her life is falling apart, probably didn’t help my state of mind.
I stumbled to the bathroom car like this:
I couldn’t figure out how to open the bathroom door, so a nice Japanese man let me in and then gestured toward the “HELP I FELL IN THE TOILET” button. (I don’t know if that’s what it’s really for, but what else could a “help” button in the bathroom be used for?) I guess he was worried I wouldn’t be able to figure out how to use the toilet since I couldn’t even figure out how to use the door.
I splashed some water on my face and gave myself a little pep talk in the mirror and then went back to my seat to finish my angsty movie.
When we got off the train, there was a sign that said “PIZZA AND WINE!”
And before I could say a word, Sean was handing our luggage over to the hostess and getting us a table because he’s a smart husband who knew just what I needed.
We then made our way to the hotel and got ready to meet up with Chizuko, a friend of Sean’s grandmother, and her daughter, Yuki.
We had been writing back and forth quite a bit with Yuki to plan our meetup. She told us she’d pick us up at Ikebukuro Station and that she’d be wearing black pants and a pink backpack. I wrote back describing our outfits in some pretty serious detail, but I’m pretty sure the minute she saw a tall white guy and a blonde chick, she knew who we were.
We took a cab to Chizuko’s home, where she had prepared a beautiful feast, and we looked through photos from her visit to the United States.
Chizuko made some pretty red and gold cranes for us as a wedding gift back in 2017, and the presentation at dinner was just as beautiful. She created some gorgeous chopstick sheathes for us, and even the sake and wine had pretty packaging.
Saturday, June 1st: The Day that Never Ended
This was a fun day! The title might make it sound like it wasn’t, but it was. It was just literally a day that never came to an end.
First we went to breakfast at a Hawaiian themed restaurant where I got pancakes that had this much whipped cream on them:
Then we headed to the baseball game at Tokyo Dome Center. Let me tell you, the Japanese have figured out this whole baseball thing. Not only was there tons to do surrounding the dome – rides, water slides, shopping, restaurants, etc. – but the game itself was SO. FUN.
The Giants were playing the Dragons, so I decided to side with the visitors (because they’re freaking DRAGONS) and joined them in their chants. Unfortunately, my team did not win the game, but I feel like I did because I got to eat edamame and drink draft beer directly from a lady’s backpack keg.
After the game, we stopped at this cute…restaurant(?) that I had been eyeing every time we walked by. It was an interesting setup of all different types of food/drink experiences and had pretty twinkle lights and lots of seating, so it was pretty dope.
After that, we took a two-hour nap, and then it was officially Sunday and time for…
Sunday, June 2nd: Soccer
I wasn’t as in to this day. Not only were we running on two hours of sleep, but we were also in a crowded pub surrounded by people ordering fish and chips and yelling, “Bugger off!”
I should back up.
A few years ago, Sean made himself get into soccer (because he needed more sports to occupy his time??), and he fell in love with Tottenham Hotspur. (No clue if I’m spelling that right. They took my sleep from me, but they will not take my googling energy now.)
I don’t know anything about soccer, so let me explain this the way that makes sense to me. Imagine the Gators were playing in the national title game, and you had the opportunity to meet up with the Tokyo Gator Club. Pretty freaking cool, right? I thought that would be neat, so I was willing to go to an Irish pub in the middle of the night to watch this soccer game.
Turns out everyone who was visiting from England felt the same way.
The pub was PACKED. If your legs were tired, you could literally just let your knees give out, and you wouldn’t fall. That’s how crowded this place was. I needed a moment where I wasn’t touching other people, so I made my way to the front door to take a breather outside.
A man was standing in my way as I headed toward the door, so I asked him to shift forward a little so I could squeeze behind him. He told me to go in front of him. I told him there wasn’t room in front of him and that I wanted to go behind him. He told me to go in front of him and that his friend, “would help me get through.”
At this point, I was frustrated and tired and JUST WANTED TO GET OUTSIDE, so I kindly told him that I didn’t need anyone’s help. I just needed him to GET THE EFF OUT OF MY WAY and this can all be over. He told me to “bugger off” and then obliged. I went outside and watched a few episodes of Friends while I waited for the game to end.
The Spurs lost.
From there, we headed to the bus station to begin the journey home. I forgot to mention the whole part about our flight being delayed to the point where we would miss our connection and having to negotiate with Delta over Twitter because we didn’t have cell service, but ultimately it all worked out, and we actually ended up in upgraded seats on the way home.
Poor Sean ended up next to a missionary. Nothing wrong with being a missionary, but he was very into talking about it and wanted to know all about Sean’s religious past and why he doesn’t go to church anymore.
Sean said, “Oh, by the way, this is my wife, Natalie.” I waved, said “nice to meet you” and then put my headphones on because I’m no fool (also because I’m a bad wife). I ordered myself a Baileys and coffee so I wouldn’t fall asleep too quickly, and then I did this for the remainder of the flight:
When we arrived in Atlanta, my feet were HUGE. They had swollen to the point that I couldn’t put my shoes on and had to walk through customs with my heels hanging way off the back. I approached the agent wearing my “DEER BEER” shirt I got in Miyajima, and he said, “What’s deer beer?” And I said, “An island.” And he was like, “What?” And I was like, “Huh?”
The exhaustion was real.
As we went through the luggage transfer process, I noticed a man behind me wearing a shirt that said, “I’ll keep my guns and my bible, and you can keep ‘THE CHANGE.’” I turned to Sean and said, “Look at that stupid idiot over there. We’re home.” And then we both went like this:
(Side note: Someone should make a shirt for women going through menopause that says, “I’ll keep my predictable body temperature and comfortable existence, and you can keep THE CHANGE.”)
Don’t get me wrong, Japan was super freaking cool, and I am so glad that we went. But I’m always soooo looking forward to getting home after a vacation. There’s something about getting back to your own bed and your own routine that is so refreshing.
We spent the next nine days not sleeping and being super hungry in the morning and not hungry at all at night. (They say that coming back this way is a faster adjustment, but it felt worse. Probably because we had to be at work all day rather than being on vacay while we were adjusting in Japan.)
And then I spent the next month+ writing this blog post.