Japan Rocks!!!

Japan was amazing! I really had no expectations for Japan. I’m not sure why. I just had nothing that I “had to do or see” and I wasn’t totally pumped about it. But, I had a fabulous four days. Japan is definitely ranked among the countries I enjoyed the most and definitely want to come back to. After three days of being entirely sea sick and doing little more than puking and sleeping, I was initially torn between being completely drained and being grateful at being on solid ground.

Weeks ago some of us had decided that we were going to go to Nara and Kyoto on the first two days in Japan. What was there to do and see in Nara and Kyoto? Why were we going there? I actually really didn’t know. On this one, I had just taken everyone’s word that it would be neat. Not my normal style, but like I said, I really had no expectations for Japan, and I’m starting to run out of steam.


Day 1 – To Kyoto

So, on the first day, we (me, Noel (our Japanese expert and translator), Patty, Lauren, Kristen, Shar, Jackie, and Tiffany) got off the ship, practically right in the Kobe train station, and paid approximately $30 U.S. for a two day rail pass. In the train station, I had my first encounter with something that would haunt me throughout my stay in Japan – the smell of fresh, warm chocolate chip cookies. There were never actually chocolate chip cookies, but anywhere you went in Japan, there were always masses of sweets of every imaginable type on display. The first thing that I treated myself to was a chocolate covered waffle.

Public transportation in Japan is amazingly efficient and even with practically everything in Japanese, we easily navigated from place to place on a montage of trains, buses, and subways. So, that first day, we ended up taking the train to Kyoto about an hour from Kobe. The train station in Kyoto was amazing. I believe that it was fifteen stories high and filled with trendy and fancy shops, restaurants, hotels, and any sort of service that you could possibly need. It was so cool. It was really our first taste of Japan since we had gotten on the train directly off the ship. I probably could of just stayed there for the full four days and been perfectly happy. We immediately went to a travel agent and booked a ryokan (traditional Japanese Inn) for the night. We were lucky to get it as it was a holiday weekend and the travel agent at the train station in Kobe had insisted that all the inns in Kyoto were full.

Then, we decided to split off into two groups and have dinner at the train station. Noel, Jackie, Lauren, and I went to a traditional ramen restaurant. After a couple of minutes we figured out that you had to chose from the plastic food in the window and chose what you want and pay through a vending machine type thing. Then you give your ticket to the waiter and he brought your food. I ordered some ramen in a pork/chicken broth with ramen noodles, some pieces of pork, and chives . It was good. It was similar to ramen at home except homemadeish. I’m sure that the majority of people would say that it is much better than the cheap store bought stuff, but, I hate to admit it, I prefer the cheap store bought stuff. In any event, I enjoyed the experience. For dessert, I couldn’t resist stopping at a nearby sweet shop and getting a raspberry covered Sunday.

After dinner, we had agreed to meet at a huge Christmas tree that was at the bottom of a huge staircase outside the front of the mall/station. Yes, a Christmas tree! It was a bit surprising to me to discover that they celebrate Christmas in a country where 90% of the population is Buddhist. But, it’s a big deal there. There were beautiful Christmas decorations everywhere. Apparently from what I have gathered, they celebrate Christmas in Japan like a Hallmark holiday – just for fun. That’s how the Japanese roll. They really like to have fun! Anyways, we had seen the tree from inside and wanted to check it out. We arrived before the other group, so we ended up sitting by the tree for about an hour listening to the American Christmas songs filling the air and reminiscing about the past three months. The weather was cool, like fall at home. It was fun wearing and seeing people in jackets (although we had done it in Beijing too). Before China, I hadn’t experienced cold weather since last winter. I forgot how much I enjoyed changing seasons. There were lots of Japanese people congregating in the area as well. There was a stage set up under the Christmas tree where people waited in line to take photos under the tree. The four of us waited our turn and took a photo while we waited for the other four. When they arrived, we took a couple group photos. The atmosphere was a beautiful ending to our time in ports. It made me miss home and got me excited for the holidays and time with family and friends. It also made me sad that I’ll be leaving all my new friends in the blink of an eye.

Finally, we decided to head to our inn. We had arrived in port at 8 a.m. and never made it outside the train stations until around 5 p.m. So, we navigated the subway system out of the train station and found our way through the streets of Kyoto to our Inn. Our inn was so neat. We had one huge bedroom for all eight of us. There was an entry way for our shoes and then three separate little bathrooms off to the sides (one for a toilet, one for a sink, and one for a very odd looking bathtub). To the right was the entrance of the room. When we arrived, there were two tables set up with little cushioned seats on the floor and all the supplies to make tea. So the eight of us sat around one of the tables and had tea, really good little cinnamon pastries, and good conversation. Then we decided to put on the traditional robes and shoes that they had left for us and go to the traditional bathing room that they had in the basement. Kristen got great delight telling me that I was dead because I put my robe flaps on the wrong way. There is so much tradition and superstition in Japan. Just in our inn room we had three different pairs of slippers. One for in the room, one for outside the room but in the hotel, and one for the bathroom.

Apparently group bath houses are a big deal in Japan. The inn that we stayed in had a nice little bath room. It basically consisted of a changing area and a bathing room. The bathing room had one large wooden tub filled with very very hot water. On the sides of the tub, there were little stools with hoses, faucets, soap, shampoo, and mirrors where you sat to clean off before you got in the tub. Now, I am not one for public nakedness. If you remember, in Mauricus, I didn’t participate in the skinny dipping. When I sit in the Jacuzzi or the sauna in the gym locker-room, I always wear a towel, but I thought that this was a perfect opportunity to get outside my comfort zone. So, I stripped down and joined the other ladies in the bath. It was so relaxing and fun, and I felt very proud of myself for going outside my comfort zone. Yeah me!!! After the bath, we got dressed and headed out on the town.

Kyoto was so cool. It had all the venues and energy of a big city but it was clean, quiet, and traditional feeling. We ended up at several different bars. They were all very unique places with drinks for exuberant amounts of cash (at one place, a mixed drink was around $12 U.S.). After a while, we had no choice but to start going to the 7-11 (yes, they are all over in Japan too!!!) and buying bottles of liquor to mix in juice and soda bottles between bars. We finally ended up in a restaurant where we ordered several bottles of sake. This was my first sake experience. I don’t hate it, but I think that it’s an acquired taste. I also had some epimamas (sp?) (soy beans with salt and soy sauce), which I was first introduced to in Vietnam. Our last stop of the night was a karaoke bar. In Japan, they give you a little private booth for your group and you have a karaoke machine and a book to chose songs from. We had a blast. We sang “Girls Just Want to Have Fun”, Spice Girls, Brittney Spears, and all sorts of other silly songs. We closed off the night with a screaming version of Bon Jovi’s, “It’s My Life.” When we rolled into our Inn around 3 a.m., they had moved the tea tables and put down eight little futon mats with huge down comforters. It was heavenly. I could have stayed there all day, but . . .


Day 2 – Kyoto – Nara – Kobe

By 7:30 the next morning, Patti was up and nagging us to get out of bed to head to Nara. So, we reluctantly got up, got ready, packed our things, and checked out of our inn. After a quick stop at the post office and a ride on the subway, we made it back to the Kyoto train station. At the station, we decided to split into two groups because some people wanted to have breakfast/lunch before leaving. I stayed and had lunch at the station with Lauren, Noel, and Tiffany. Then we caught a 45 minute train ride to Nara.

In Nara, we navigated the buses to the deer park. The deer park is a park with a lot of deer roaming around everywhere and some interspersed temples. The deer are not cute little deer galloping through the forest. They’re more like stray dogs. They’ll come right up to you and let you pet them and they cross the streets and everything. Lauren nicknamed them “city deer.” It was actually really neat. We mainly just wandered around but we visited the main temple in the park that is one of the largest wooden structures in the world and contains a huge Buddha. It was really impressive. There were also some huge wooden statues of scary looking guys that were the protectors of the temple. Those were really cool.

After a while, we took a couple bus rides back to the Nara train station and hopped a train back to Kyoto. It was early evening by the time we arrived in Kyoto and were set to go out. So we decided to just go to a different part of town that was supposed to be very pretty and more traditional. It was like what we’d seen of Kyoto the night before (crowded and bustling with lots of restaurants and shops) only more so. It was really pretty and fun. Anyways, the girls were dying to go for sushi. Anyone who knows me will know that I absolutely HATE HATE HATE seafood. But, I didn’t want to be a brat, so I said that it would be fine and hoped that they would have other food for me. When we arrived at the restaurant recommended by the hotel, it was a real sushi bar. There was an open kitchen where you could see all the ingredients and watch everything being made and then there was a counter with stools across the length of the restaurant to sit at. That was it. There was nothing without seafood as far as I could tell. I was actually a little “bothered” at first because I would have liked to sit down and have a nice meal. But, I told the girls that it was fine and that I’d eat after. They promised that we could go wherever I wanted and they would sit there while I ate after. Even though I was a little “bothered”, I was totally cool and decided to just make the best of it. So, I ordered some tea and a big beer and tried to learn about sushi. Hey, at least I could say that I went to a sushi bar in Japan. Well, after a little of the beer, I got brave and decided to give the sushi a try. I know my mom and step-dad would be so proud of me. They always made me try lots of seafood growing up. So, I ate a whole tuna roll and I didn’t make a gross face (I don’t think) or spit it out or anything. It wasn’t too bad. I think that I’d actually prefer eating a tuna roll over a piece of cooked fish on a plate. I was so proud of myself. And, when we all left the restaurant, we were all really happy and laughing. And, I was so glad that I hadn’t been a brat and cried about going to a sushi place and proud of myself for trying some. So Kyoto was a place of firsts for me – first time getting naked in public, first time drinking sake, first time eating sushi.

After dinner we wandered down some more streets for an hour or two. We tried to go into a few restaurants, but they always told us that they were full even though they never were. The Japanese are very polite and will never tell you no. So, we aren’t sure why they were telling us that they were full. Noel said that she asked later and they said that it was because at some restaurants you had to be a member to eat there. That sounds a little weird, but it’s the only explanation we have. We eventually found a little tea shop up the second floor of a building that was empty and open. We ordered ice cream Sundays. They topped them with tons of fresh fruit which they cut up just for us. They were fabulous!

After that, Tiffany, Lauren, and I headed to the train station and took a train back to Kobe. Noel stayed in Kyoto for another day. The three of us did a great time navigating our way to the train and subway without our Japanese speaker, Noel. We occupied ourselves on the train by playing madlibs and making up silly rules/tips about shiplife. We made it back to the ship around 10:30 in the evening and decided to get a good night’s sleep because we all had SAS trips the next day.

When I got to my room, my roommate, Courtney, was there watching “Sex and the City.” So, I ended up staying up until around 1:30 watching with her. We’ve become obsessed since the last crossing when I was in the room sick 24/7. I also got my last mail of the voyage – a package from the family, and letters from Grandma Aggen, Veronica, Danielle (2), Cassie, and Aunt Debbie. I really enjoyed reading them. I am so ready to come home and see everyone. The news from home makes me happy and homesick at the same time.


Day 3 – Hiroshima and Our Last Night in Port, EVER . . .

Then, at 5:15 a.m. my alarm clock went off. And, I was up again. I got ready, ate breakfast, and ran to the buses. I had a day trip to Hiroshima with SAS. It was a ten hour round trip bus ride. Kristen and Lauren had also signed up for the trip. Kristen showed up at the last minute, and by the time that I realized Lauren wasn’t coming, it was too late to go get her. I felt awful that she missed it. I had brought my pillow so I basically passed out for the five hour ride and it just flew by.

When we arrived, we visited the Hiroshima Peace Park and the museum. Hiroshima was one of a series of Japanese cities that the U.S. had chosen to bomb during World War II. The reason that it was chosen on that particular day was because it was a clear and beautiful day. The park was one of the most beautiful, peaceful places that I’ve been in my life. The fall foliage was beautiful and the natural beauty and cool air created a gorgeous serenity. Again, it made me homesick. In the park, we saw the bridge that was the target for the attack and a shell of a building that had been the only surviving structure in the area. We also saw a very touching monument to a little girl who died ten years after the bombing from Leukemia. She had folded over 1,000 cranes from her medicine wrappers in the hopes that they would bring her good luck and she would recover. She died but her memory didn’t. Ever since, people make strands of cranes in her honor. There is now a statue erected for her and some glass rooms to place the cranes you bring. I made a crane on the bus, so I added it to the collection. It’s actually very moving and really personifies the suffering experienced by the victims of the bomb.

Another touching experience in the park occurred when an older woman came up to our group and told our group leader, who translated to English, her personal story of the bomb to us. The woman had been a 9 month old fetus in her mother’s stomach when the bomb had hit. She told us how her mother had been trapped under rubble and had been rescued by a strange man. The strange man had been her father, but she hadn’t recognized him because he’d been so badly burned. She went on to describe the suffering that her parents endured and the things they had seen. She concluded by telling us that the reason she was telling us this is because she had had breast cancer and had recovered and so she felt it was her repayment for becoming well to share her story with others. It was clear from her story that the bomb had affected so much of her life in so many ways. She told her horrible story with a peaceful smile. If we hadn’t had a translator, you would never think that she was talking about such a horrific event. Somehow, like park, the embodied a peaceful acceptance and hopefulness.

In front of the museum, there was a stone arch erected to the victims of the bombing. There is a book contained in a concrete box that is updated yearly with the names of victims of the bombing that have passed away. To date, there are over 230,000 names. These include people who survived through the bomb and its aftermath but were affected. The shell of the building that was left standing after the bombing can be viewed in a distance symmetrically with the monument. There can be no doubt that the monument was specifically placed in this location for that reason. It’s just too visually dramatic.

The museum itself was fascinating. It seemed to be broken up into three major topics – facts about the actual bombing, information on nuclear weapons, and stories of individual victims of the bomb. The museum was very moving. Maybe I’m too optimistic, but in my opinion, there was a big emphasis on spreading peace and avoiding the use of nuclear weapons. The stories of the bombing and the victims seemed to be told not to assign blame but as a way to teach others and prevent such tragedy from happening again. Some of the more interesting exhibits to me were: two models of Hiroshima, one before the bombing (with lots of houses and structures) and one after (with only rubble); a huge wall full of copies of letters that officials of Hiroshima had written every year since the bombing to discourage countries with nuclear weapons to get rid of them; and, of course, the sampling of individual stories and artifacts of victims of the bombing that had been killed or been so strongly affected by the event. After seeing the entire museum, there was a video that was focused on the victims of the bombing. It was very very hard to watch. It showed live video feed and photos of disfigured people and then came back to tell what had ultimately happened to each of them. Some had recovered and lived, but others had died or committed suicide. Even those who didn’t die on impact, sometimes faced years of suffering before dying of causes related to the bombing, such as cancer. Those who had lived, had always retained their physical and mental scars. I don’t think that there was a dry eye in the place.

After the museum, we spent about an hour wandering a nearby Japanese garden. It was really beautiful and serene. Then we hopped back on the bus for our five hour ride back to Kobe. We had an hour long dinner stop where we picked food out of vending machines again. I had a vegetarian ramen dish that I added a lot of hot spices to. There were also tons of sweets in the shop, of course. So, I ended up having some Maple Nut ice cream, a huge chocolate chunk scone, and an apple pie tart. I know that’s horrible, but the sweets were all just so good and abundant in Japan.

We made it back to the ship around 9 p.m. Luckily it all worked out and Lauren, Noel, Krystal, and Sarah were all there waiting for us to go out for our last big night on the town in a foreign port. So, we all got ready and headed out. First, we went to dinner at a little restaurant that reminded me of a Japanese Denny’s. It had cheap, fast food and the crowd was all young. We ordered some fun purple and pink cocktails (I felt like I was drinking a “Hello Kitty” drink) and lots of different food. It was really funny because we were basically ordering based on what the pictures on the menu looked like. So, there were several times that we ordered thinking that something was one thing and it turned out to be something entirely different. It was really fun.

After dinner, Krystal and Sarah went back to the ship and Kristen, Lauren, Noel, and I headed to the area with the bars. Surprisingly, there weren’t that many SAS people around. I think that everyone must have been out of town still. I was really surprised because I thought it would be a crazy SAS party everywhere. We had a crazy crazy night anyways though that concluded with a screaming session of karaoke around sunrise. I think that we made it back on the ship a little after 5 a.m. but we all ended up staying up until at least 6 a.m.


Day 4 – Kobe – Our Last Day in Japan

Then at 9:30 a.m., the captain’s voice came over the PA and announced a crew drill and sounding a loud, long horn. Gerrrr. That wasn’t a pleasant experience. But, we all (Kristen, Noel, Lauren, and I) got up and made it off the ship by 11 a.m. We went and had a nice Kobe beef lunch. It was really spectacular. Kobe beef is so good because the cows drink beer and are given massages. We could have easily paid around $50-$100 for a good Kobe steak, but we ended up each having a “small portion” Kobe steak lunch for just $20 each. I don’t know if I could have eaten any more than what we got anyways. It was really good, and I’m glad that I got to try it. I can just imagine what the $400 Kobe steaks taste like.

After lunch we just explored Kobe and did some shopping. It was the first time that we’d walked around Kobe in the daylight. Kobe was a lot like Kyoto, only a bit more metropolitan and more condensed. You could really feel the population crunch there. It was actually really frustrating trying to walk through the masses of people anywhere. There is a plethora of neon, shops, advertisements, and people, and yet, through all this disorder, there is complete order. The cars don’t beep, the people wait in ques for trains, and they all wait to cross the street until the walk sign shows.

The young women dress beautifully. They wear expensive designer clothes and accessories. The standard uniform seems to be tall boots, short skirts, and cute jackets. There were expensive designer shops everywhere. We looked at some of the clothes in the shops. They were so expensive! I mean, a simple, normal dress that would cost maybe $35 in Chicago was anywhere from $100-$400. Apparently, the young women in Japan are in a cycle of waiting to marry until their 30s and spending their 20s living with their parents and using all their money on shopping, vacationing, and pampering. They call these women “Single Parasites.” Apparently, this situation is actually causing a national crisis since women are waiting longer to have children and the population rate is decreasing at an alarming rate.

We did get to stop at a 100 yen store. Everything is 100 yen (about 89 cents). I found a lot of neat glassware. I ended up getting myself some really neat plates and bowls. We ended up back on the ship about an hour before on-ship time. I was so tired that I passed out in my bed for the night at 9:30, forty five minutes before we even pulled out of port, and slept until my alarm went off at 7:40 that next morning.

I absolutely loved Japan. It really came out of the shadows to become one of my favorite countries. It is modern, interesting, beautiful, historical, polite, and fun. I had a really great time sort of bumming around and doing things as they came with some of the best girlfriends that I’ve made on this trip. I’m glad that I got to spend so much time with so many of them in this final port. I will definitely be coming back to experience more. There is a lot that I didn’t get a chance to see and traveling in Japan, while somewhat expensive, is very easy. I know that Noel plans to live in Japan for some period of time sometime in the next few years. So, I’m already making plans to come visit her.

So, that’s it folks . . . It’s been an amazing journey, but I’m on my way home. Don’t worry, my adventure’s not quite over yet . . .