Stop #14: Osaka & Tokyo, Japan

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Right now, we are on a flight from Tokyo, Japan to Honolulu, Hawaii (Lorenzo’s birthplace).  It has been an extremely happy day for us, but also a very sad day.  It was the last day of our international travels, and the beginning of the end of our 3-month journey.  We’ve had mixed feelings about going home over the past week… travelling the world has been a dream come true, but we do miss our friends and family, as well as our routine life in California.  We miss exercising, eating whatever we feel like, and working around the house, and at work.  Although I’ve been taking care of work emails almost every day, I do miss my employees, my students (customers), and just being a part of something that I’m incredibly proud of.  Being away from work for so long has drastically increased my desire to work harder and improve my business.  I can’t really explain it.  My work is not a “normal” job; my work is my pride and joy.  I started the company 8 years ago, and I’ve never been away from it for so long.  I am more motivated now than ever to work hard and implement changes for the better at the San Jose Learning Center!

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SJLC Crew

I miss my employees!

Besides being our last day in a foreign country, today was a very special day… it’s Lorenzo’s birthday!  One request that Lorenzo had during the planning stages of this trip was that he’d like to spend his birthday in Hawaii, with his friends and family.  Even though this meant that we had to cut our trip a bit short, and exclude Australia from our travel plans, I made sure to make it happen.  It’s been 18 years since Lorenzo got to spend his birthday in Hawaii, and I really wanted to fulfill his wish.  And it all worked out!  Today was our last day in Japan, and it’s also his birthday.  We celebrated last night with an incredibly delicious sushi omakase dinner, as well as with an adventurous day today.  Then tonight, we are taking a red eye flight to Hawaii… and since “time goes backwards” as we cross the ocean, we will wake up in Hawaii at 9:30am on Lorenzo’s birthday!  We already have a big birthday party planned for him in the evening, which he is so looking forward to.  What a lucky guy – he got a romantic birthday with me in Japan, AND a big birthday party with his friends and family in Hawaii!  I told him that he gets double the fun this year, but he also ages by 2 years 😊

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Happy Birthday!!

Birthday boy gets two birthdays this year

Our journey throughout Japan was absolutely amazing (as well as incredibly hectic) from the minute we arrived, til the moment we left.  Out of all of the countries we visited, we had the most extreme experiences in this one.  Our emotions and self-control were put to the ultimate test several times throughout the week, and I’m happy to say that we made it out alive.  Let’s start from the beginning.  First, the flight from Bali to Osaka, Japan was perfect.  The plane was half empty and I found 3 rows of 4 seats that were completely empty (except for one girl).  So I laid down in the middle row and had a very nice, long nap throughout the flight.  I woke up in Japan quite happy, although still a bit tired.  Since we arrived around 5am, we weren’t sure what to do until we were allowed to check into our hotel at 3pm.  One option was to drag around our 100+ pounds of luggage with us as we explore Osaka for the next 10 hours, or try to find somewhere to rest until check in time.  Since the option of resting sounded a whole lot better than the first option, I hastily booked a cheap hotel on Expedia.  But just as we were making our way over to that hotel, I realized that check in for that hotel wasn’t until 3pm either!  I stupidly thought that we could just rest in that hotel from 5am til 3pm, til we checked into our other hotel.  So dumb and such a waste of money… I guess that nap on the airplane didn’t really help.

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Best flight!

4 seats to myself?? Oh ya...

At this point, Lorenzo pulled through with an extremely awesome idea… let’s book a few hours at the airport capsule hotel!  For those of you who don’t know what a capsule hotel is, it is a “hotel” that provides super, super teeny tiny hotel rooms, which basically consists of a bed and 4 walls (that touch the bed).  You have just enough room to slide onto your bed and sit up if you need to.  There is no door, but rather a shutter that you can pull almost all the way down to the floor.  There is a public bathroom and bathhouse for women and men (separately), as well as all the amenities you’d need to clean and groom yourself.  I first learned about capsule hotels when one of the students I taught in my “Business Planning” course at San Jose State did his project on it.  He was from Japan and very familiar with capsule hotels.  His business plan was to bring capsule hotels to the US, which I thought was an extremely great idea.  Ever since then, I’ve always wanted to stay in one, so I’m so glad I had the chance to!  Even though Lorenzo and I had to sleep separately in our own capsule, I absolutely loved the experience.  And I still think it should be brought to US airports.

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Ever sleep in a box?  I have!

After about 5 hours of rest, we (tried) to make it to our ‘real’ hotel (aka: our AirBnB apartment).  We were really looking forward to settling in and putting our stuff down.  But, as you may know, the train system in Japan is kinda crazy.  It’s extremely good and very efficient, but it definitely takes some time getting used to.  With that said, Lorenzo and I missed our stop and quickly jumped off at the next stop with all our luggage… except the most important one!  It took a minute, but as soon as we got off that train, Lorenzo realized that he forgot to grab his backpack with our passports!   I can’t even explain to you the feeling of hopelessness when you realize that you left your most important possession on the train that was quickly leaving our sight.  Lorenzo cried out in frustration and punched his luggage, while I actually just laughed out loud!  I said “Well, THAT’S gonna be a tough one to solve lol!”   I mean… the situation was so bad that I just couldn’t stop smiling (which kinda confused Lorenzo).  Quickly, we made it over to security and tried to tell them about our bag.  But one, they didn’t speak any English, and two, we had no idea what train we were on.  Therefore, they couldn’t do anything for us except give us the lost and found number, which we called and made a report. 

When we made the report, the person said that the same train should be coming around to the same station every 20 – 30 minutes.  So what did we do for the next hour and a half??  We jumped onto every damn train that came by and searched for the backpack!  We looked like two complete psychopaths who jumped on and off every single train.  Lorenzo was on one end and I was on the other.  We had no idea what our train number was, or which cabin we were sitting in.  So we seriously just scouted as many trains and cabins as possible.  It was nuts.  Finally I just said “Hey, this is Japan… our bag will come back to us.  Let’s go”.  And with that, we left.

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Relax... 

Nothin' like a cold brew after stressing over losing your passports!

Our AirBnB turned out to be ok.  Definitely small, but nothing compared to the capsule hotel we just stayed in.  We quickly dropped off our stuff and got ready for the day.  No need to waste more time!  We headed straight for the crazy area of town – Dotonburi.  This is one of the most famous streets in Osaka, which is packed with street food, restaurants, shops, all kinds of novelty places and people.  The first thing we grabbed was a beer and gyoza!  And then it was beer and octopus balls!  And then it was beer and all kinds of great Japanese food!  As you can see, we were trying to dull our worries about our passports, and just enjoy the fact that we were in Japan.  We were already expecting to have to spend the following day at the US Consulate, so we were making the best out of this evening.  And a GREAT time we had!  We ran around the streets of Japan with big smiles and all laughs.  What else were we supposed to do, cry about the situation?  No.  Nothing was going to ruin our travels and our precious time together. 

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Dotonburi

And you know what?  Eventually we got a message that someone turned in our backpack and passports to the lost and found!  We could go pick it up in the morning 😊  More reason to celebrate, and celebrate we did.  We celebrated so much that we had a hard time figuring out how to get home.  There we stood, fumbling around the train station, when a Japanese businessman came up to us and said “Can I help you?”.  Eagerly, we said “Yes!  We are trying to get here (pointing at our phone screen)”.  Then the guy says “Ok, I can help you… but I’m sorry, I am drunk.”  Lorenzo and I started busting up laughing and said “It’s ok!  We are too!”.  And there you have it… two drunk people following this (more) drunk guy in a business suit all around the underground train system in Japan.  We seriously walked for at least 20 minutes!  At one point, Lorenzo and I looked at each other and reconsidered whether or not we made the right choice of following this guy.  But in the end, he brought us to the right train station and bid us farewell.  That was just too damn awesome lol

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Following a drunk guy...

Seemed like a great idea at the time!

The next day was a very happy one indeed.  After enjoying a nice lunch, we picked up the backpack and passports.  I can’t tell you how impressed I am with Japan and its honest people; it makes me so incredibly proud to be half Japanese.  If the whole world acted more Japanese, it would be a better place!  Of course I’m a little biased, but I believe it’s true.  Every person we know who has been to Japan has said the same, positive things about Japan and Japanese people.  No one doubted for a minute that we’d get our stuff back.  Anyhow, we were just so happy to continue on with our trip.  The next stop was Osaka Castle, which is always a beautiful sight to see.  Every time I come to Japan (3 times now), I visit this castle.  I think it’s just so pretty 😊  A couple hours later, we ended up in a fish market where we enjoyed extremely fresh sushi… yum!  You can’t come to Japan without eating sushi.  And that evening, we ate even more great food – an assortment of pickled vegetables, grilled stingray, fried fish, cod roe, raw beef heart, spicy Japanese pickles, and a few different types of beers.  What was with all the beer?  First of all, we had just been sick for almost two weeks and couldn’t really drink anything.  Secondly, the beer is really darn good in Japan!  We are definitely going home quite a bit heavier than before…

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Osaka Castle... hot at hell but still a great visit!

The next day we took a full day tour to Kyoto, which would have been about a 1 hour train ride from Osaka, and a whole lot of taxis in between sightseeing locations.  Since transportation is pretty expensive in Japan, we just decided to book a tour and let them drive us everywhere.  Plus, I really liked the whole itinerary of the tour we picked out – Fushimi Inari Grand Shrine, Kiyomizu Temple, Kinkaku-ji, and Arashiyama.  Out of these 4 places, I’ve only been to one of them before (Kinkaku-ji, or Golden Temple), so I was really excited to see the other places.  Fushimi Inari is the one with the thousand red tori’s – definitely one of the most picturesque places in Kiyoto.  Lorenzo and I got so caught up with taking pictures that we barely made it back to the bus, but it was fun!  Kiyomizu Temple is also very picturesque, but unfortunately they were doing mass reconstruction to it so you couldn’t see (almost) any of the main temple.  Kinkaku-ji (Golden Temple) was beautiful as always, and I was happy to get some pictures with Lorenzo in front of it.  Did you know that it cost them $80 million to cover this temple in gold leaf?  Crazy!  But it is beautiful indeed.  Lastly, we visited Arashiyama, which was basically a huge park with several temples to see, a river and a bamboo forest walk.  Lorenzo and I took a nice, long walk and enjoyed many different views.  It was the perfect ending to the perfect tour 😊

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Fushimi Inari Shrine

1,000 torii gates in the wooded forest...

In the late morning, we took a train to Tokyo, where we were going to spend the next 5 days.  It was the last international city from our 3-month journey.  It was exciting, but a little sad as well, so we were looking forward to making the best of it!  It took us several hours to train to Tokyo and check into our “hotel”.   But this hotel… wasn’t really a hotel.  I don’t know what the hell I booked. I knew something was very different when I couldn’t check in with a human, but rather with a machine.  It was a touch screen machine that took my name and passport, and printed out my receipt and room key card.  This was odd!  But the real shock came when we opened our hotel room door.  Oh my god, this room is not much different than our capsule hotel lol!  There was a bed pressed against a window, which touched two walls… this means the length of our whole room was as long as a ‘normal’ double bed.  There was barely enough space for one person to get dressed, while the other sits on the bed or in the (tiny) bathroom.  I thought our apartment in Barcelona was ridiculously small, but this was even smaller!  Luckily, Lorenzo and I have learned to live together in very tight quarters throughout this trip.  There is nothing we haven’t experienced in each other’s presence at this point… nothing else could surprise us, or embarrass us about each other.  I guess that’s a good thing??

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Tiny Japanese hotel room

I guess we've seen it all at this point

That night was an insane shit show.  I wish I could tell you all the details, but I really can’t put it on the internet lol.  It started off with a wonderful dinner with a very good friend of mine, Atsuko, and her husband.  I went to High School with Atsuko about 20 years ago, and very rarely get to see her since she moved back to Japan.  She took us to a couple delicious restaurants where we got to try all kinds of new foods, including natto mixed with raw squid.  Lots of great food, great company, and different types of Japanese beer, sake, and whiskey… we were good!  We were so good that we decided to head over to a club called Alife, where we met Lorenzo’s friend from Hawaii and her brother (who was DJ’ing there that night).  They walked us in, straight to the VIP area, and bar.  I’ll spare you the details, but I’ll just say that it was the best party night we’ve had in a very, very long time!  Personally, I stopped clubbing a long time ago… that was a chapter in my life that I just moved on from.  But this party night was one for the books 😊  All I have to say is that I am so beyond thankful that we made it back to our (mini) hotel, safe and sound.  I was so very happy, that I just opened up my wallet and insisted that the taxi driver take all my cash… he deserved it after dealing with the two of us!

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A looooong night out...

 The next morning, I quickly remembered why I stopped clubbing a long time ago.  My head was stuck in a 100 pound vise-grip that wouldn’t let me go!  I really hated life that morning, and so did Lorenzo.  So… we slept in til about 3pm lol.  At first I felt bad for “wasting the day”, but hey, this was the first time we really let loose in 3 months.  We’ve been so keen on making the most of every day, that we never really let ourselves go.  Therefore, no regrets!  When we finally woke up, we headed over to Harujuku – another very famous area with lots of shops, street snacks, and novelties.  For some crazy reason, I decided it was time to get my hair done.  Yup, I just felt like I wanted a big change.  And change I got!  I asked the hair stylist (who spoke zero English), to cut my hair in layers and color it a lighter brown (ie: take out the blond in my hair).  After a brief conversation, I felt that we understood each other.  But as soon as he washed my hair and put me in front of the mirror, I realized that I was dead wrong.  He had died my hair completely black!  I’ve never had my hair black!  I don’t want it black!  I was so shocked that I could barely nod in approval when he looked at me for feedback.  I was so. Damn. Disappointed.

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Black Hair??

That's the first.

But life goes on!  And life we live… to the max.  The next day was a very big day for us – we were going to climb to the top of Mount Fuji, together.  This is the 2nd time I’ve done this journey, and it is quite a feat!  There are a lot of logistics involved, and you have to be quite fit to complete the whole trip.  One of the main reasons why it’s so challenging is because we planned to hike up the mountain and reach the top by sunrise.  This means that you have to hike through the night, stay in a mountain hut, then continue hiking to the peak in the early morning, just in time to see the sunrise. 

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Here’s how it went:

12:00pm – Eat a big, healthy lunch.

1:00pm – Buy snacks, dinner and water to bring on the hike.

2:00pm – Catch a train to a bus for the 2.5 hour ride to Station 5, Mt. Fuji.

5:00pm – Start hiking / climbing Mt. Fuji.  Our mountain hut was located at Station 8.5, which was the very last hut you could stay in before reaching the very top of the mountain.

5:00pm – 8:00pm – Climb the mountain with full force and complete the hike to Station 8.5 in less than 3 hours, when it was supposed to take us 6.5 hours.  We were passing up people left and right!  I knew we’d complete the hike faster than average, but I really didn’t expect to do it in half the time.  The main reason why we hiked so fast was because we wanted to reach our hut before the sun went down.  The terrain on the mountain can be quite rocky and treacherous – something we preferred not to climb in the dark.

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Conquering Fuji-san

One rocky lump at a time!

8:00pm – Settle into our mountain hut and eat the dinner we carried with us.  Lighten the load!

10:00 – 2:30am – Try to sleep, but not actually ever sleep.  All guests are completely smooshed together, side by side, on a shelf.  Everyone is sleeping stick-straight, with their legs completely straight and arms stuck by their sides.  We all shared the blankets, so if you move, you disturb the person next to you.  There are probably a hundred people in the same bunk, so you can imagine all the weird sleeping sounds throughout the night – snoring, farting, burping, sleep talking, and other unidentifiable sounds.  It really felt like I was sleeping in a pig pen!  But it was no surprise to me, because I did this same hike just 5 years ago.  Regardless, it was a different kind of experience… especially for Lorenzo!  I could tell he didn’t sleep at all.  At one point I turned my head towards him, just to find his two big eye balls staring at me with frustration.  I couldn’t help by laugh 😊

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Mountain Hut

Definitely the oddest sleeping quarters we experienced on this entire trip

2:30am – Hike along thousands of other hikers to the top of the mountain.

3:30am – Scramble to claim a good spot to watch the sunrise.

4:00am – Witness one of the most beautiful scenes you’ll ever experience in your life.  Imagine this – you are far above the clouds, as if you are looking out of a window in an airplane.  All you see peeking out of the clouds are other mountain peaks, layered behind one another.  You can also see a gorgeous mirror-like lake in between the break of the clouds.  Then, the sky starts to turn light blue, light yellow, and streaks of pink.  It’s freezing cold, but you don’t dare to move because you don’t want to miss a minute of this spectacular moment.  Around 4:20am, you see dark pink, almost red, sunrays come shooting out of the clouds.  At first, it’s just one ray, aiming towards the left… then another one comes out next to it, and other one next to that one.  Before you know it, a half circle of super bright red peeks out from the clouds, and there you have it… The Japanese Rising Sun, with all its sunrays… The only word you have left in your mind is “Wow”.  Chills run up your spine, and your eyes sting a little with tears that want to come out.  But they don’t, you just smile.

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Heaven

All you have to do is climb Mt. Fuji to get there.

I know that Lorenzo thoroughly enjoyed this moment as well, but I think our experience was a bit different.  I know that he sees natural beauty, and appreciates witnessing something he’ll never get to see anywhere else.  He may feel a great sense of accomplishment, and happiness to share this moment with me.  But for me, it’s all that, plus a whole lot more.  For me, to climb Mt. Fuji is to be reborn.  It my purification process, similar to how the Balinese purify themselves at the temple.  Somehow, I feel that when I climb Mt. Fuji, I can close one chapter in my life, and open a new one.  Last time I climbed Mt. Fuji, I had just gone through one of the worst break ups in my life.  The person who I thought I would be with for the rest of my life, abandoned me with zero notice… he made a decision, packed up, and left me with no explanation.  I was absolutely devastated, I hated my life.  But then I went to Japan with my best friend Andy, and climbed Mt. Fuji with him and Atsuko.  It was very challenging, but when I finally reached the top, I felt that I could finally breathe again.  And I felt all the pain melt away from that horrible break up, and I could finally start a new chapter in my life – single, happy, and stronger than ever.

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Fuji-san... you always know how to heal me <3

Over 5 years later, I felt that I had to climb Mt. Fuji again.  I needed to be reborn again.  Why?  Because the day we climbed Mt. Fuji was exactly 1 year and 1 month since my father passed away.  Ever since he died, I haven’t been able to stop crying, inside and out.  For some terrible reason, I constantly think about his last few days in the hospital and how much he suffered… and how I couldn’t save him.  I really, really thought I would be able to save my father from dying, but I failed.  And I never could forgive myself.  Not only could I not save him, but I actually had to (medically) “pull the plug” on him, which was extremely traumatizing.  It took the entire night and morning for my father to pass away – I didn’t sleep one minute, and I never let his hand go.  I kept apologizing to him over and over again for not being able to save him.  Until this very day, I keep thinking what I could have done differently to save him.  I’ve seen a counselor, but it doesn’t help to make these thoughts go away.  I’ve kept myself extremely distracted for the last 13 months, hoping that I don’t have time to think anymore, but I still do… 

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I can't let go

I don't know how to let go...

So I went back to Mt. Fuji to help me close that chapter in my life.  To help me say good bye to my father and the beautiful life we had together.  Now it’s time to open a new chapter in my life, with Lorenzo.  The most important man in my life used to be my father, and although I will always keep him in my heart, Lorenzo is now the most important man in my life.  I have to move on and start writing this new chapter.  Lorenzo is the most amazing person, and I am beyond lucky to have married him. And I’m really looking forward to seeing what our lives have in store for us.  Careers, experiences, adventures, children, family… what’s going to happen?  All I know is that when our plane touches down in San Jose after our 10 days in Hawaii, our lives are going to be different.  Lorenzo and my relationship has reached a whole new depth that I never imagined was possible, and I can’t wait to share our future together <3

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AliZo Adventures

Conquering mountains together <3

That night, I took Lorenzo out for a birthday / victory dinner.  We enjoyed a mind-blowing sushi omakase meal, with a private chef.  He said he wanted to eat sushi, so I made sure to book an excellent restaurant in Shibuya.  Getting there was a bit of a hassle (the address on Trip Advisor was wrong), but it was completely worth it.  The restaurant was very small, and they had one chef per two couples.  We had 24 servings of the best sushi we’ve ever had in our entire lives – everything from salt water eel, to non-fatty tuna, to fatty tuna, to two types of uni, to fresh ebi, to cod roe, salmon roe, clam soup and so much more!  Every bite was “the best”, we were so incredibly happy.  So happy that we bought our chef a beer at the end to celebrate our happiness 😊

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A very happy ending to a long life-changing journey!

And this brings my story to today, our last day in Japan.  This morning we packed up, checked out, left our luggage at the front desk, and headed over to Akihabara.  This area is known for its electronics, anime, hobby stores, figurines, and (apparently) porn shops.  We had a great time running around, seeing all the things we never get to see at home.  Even though we aren’t gamers, it was still fun to see.  The most interesting part was when we found ourselves in a Japanese porn shop… I couldn’t believe some of the things they sell!  I wish I could tell you all about it, but some of you may not be very interested.  So if you’re curious, just ask us lol.  Overall, it was a really fun and funny day – the perfect last excursion of our international travels.  However, it wasn’t the last adventure we had in Japan…

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Giant Gundam Robot, Tokyo

It's life size! So they say.

Our big finale for Mis-Adventures happened today.  When we were at the hotel, ready to catch a cab, I checked on Uber to see how much the taxi ride would be to the airport.  It said about $35.  Then Lorenzo asked the front desk how much it would be – they said about 40.  We were pleasantly surprised with how cheap the ride would be, since the airport was about 1.5 hours away.  So we hailed a taxi and hopped in.  Traffic was actually fine, and our taxi driver was super cool!  So we just kept chatting away.  Then at some point, I noticed the meter, which read $98 and still going.  Ummmm what happened to $40??  I told the driver that the hotel told us it would cost about $40, and the driver was shocked.  He said maybe they thought it was the other airport, because this airport was much further away.  Lorenzo and I were both really disappointed, but there was nothing we could do but sit back and watch the fare keep going up.  By the time we got dropped off at the airport terminal, do you know how much our fare was??  $300!!!

Bye Bye Japan, we cannot afford you any longer lol

 

PHOTOS OF JAPAN