A winter hike in Nikko

I lapsed in my catch up blogs again ^^; but I am truly determined this time. I’m going to try and update 2-3 times a week, then I’ll finally finally be caught up. So this blog takes us back in time to January 5th, 2024. My friend, Morgan, suggested we go on a day hike to Nikko, so go we did, despite my being not at my healthiest for most of the day.

My alarm woke me up early on January 5th and I immediately had doubts about the planned daytrip. I was still somewhat in the throes of a GERD/Gastritis flare-up. I don’t think I’ve gone into detail in here about that diagnosis, but basically sometimes I get double whammied with tummy symptoms and it’s pretty rotten. The thing with living with a chronic illness, though, is that flare ups happen often and without prejudice, and sometimes you just really want to power through so you can live your life, y’know. So I took a deep breath and decided to push through.

I packed a lunch and met Morgan at the train station. I explained my flare up situation to him and he was still happy to go. So off we went to Kitasenju station to get the limited express train out to Nikko. We encountered our first problem here. The tickets for our desired train were all sold out, so we had to go for the next one, which I think was an hour later. I had a chance to back out again here, which I nearly took, but luckily I didn’t. So we bought our tickets and then set in to wait. I grabbed a chamomile tea from the Starbucks at the station and that helped to settle my stomach a little bit.

We eventually got on a train and we were on our way up to Nikko. The limited express train takes about an hour and a half. It’s a fun journey as you watch the urban landscape gradually change to fields and mountains. We arrived later than planned. It was already nearly midday, but we didn’t let that deter us. We immediately went to catch the bus that would take us to the start point of our hike. Now, the bus was the part I was most worried about re. my tummy, because it goes up these ridiculous winding paths. But, happily, it was okay! I even enjoyed the journey a bit.

We got off the bus at Ryuzu Cascades and found our first scenic spot of the day. We also went into the gift shop there to ask the owner if it was necessary for bear bells this time of year. She said it was safe since they were all hibernating, so from here we began our hike, taking many photos of the waterfall as we past it.

The early part of the hike took us through a very wintery, barren looking area. Bare trees, sad looking grass, and a snow covered path. But it all felt magical to us. Snow is a rare treat for us city dwellers. Something we have to travel to see. It was a bright sunny day and we soon shed coats and scarves as we walked. Also, the fresh air and exercise was doing me the world of good as my tummy seemed to finally be calming down.

At around 2pm we stopped for lunch. We found a little wooden seating area with a nice view (I’m sure the view would have been nicer outside the dead winter months, haha). I managed some actual food for the first time that day (onigiri).

The next part of our hike took us along a boardwalk, which was also partly snow-covered. We got to a place called Senjogahara Marshland. Apparently it’s known as ‘the battlefield’ because there was a legendary battle there between the god of Mt. Akagi and the god of Mt. Nantai. I’ll include a photo of the very informative board explaining about it.

After the brightness of the Marshlands we headed into the decidedly darker, colder confines of a thick woodland area. The coats went back on and we started making each other jump with the quiet, eerie surroundings. Then Morgan jumped for real as several monkeys suddenly crossed the path ahead of us. I was actually the brave one for once and led us on despite the monkeys (they just minded their own business). So we continued on our way through the dark dark wood, hehe.

And eventually we happened upon another magnificent waterfall. This was the Yudaki Cascades. This was more than 70m tall and crashing down into the river below. We heard the roar of it way before we saw it. We got to climb up the trail directly alongside it, which was really cool (and rather tiring, haha).

Our reward for the tough hike up the side of the waterfall was a ginormous lake that was completely frozen over. This was Lake Yunoko. The next part of our hike took us round by the side of this huge lake. We got some glorious photos of it. Also, with it now closing in on 4pm, it was getting cold, so even my hat went back on by this point. I was very glad to have brought all the winter clothes with me I don’t usually use in Tokyo.

Once we got to the other side of the lake, we reached the Yumoto Spa resort. We finally saw many other people here. On the way we had barely seen anybody. It was still pretty quiet though. Most of the spas seemed to be shut. Maybe because we were still technically in the New Year’s holiday period.

There is an area here that is the source of the hot spring water. It’s full of these little huts that I guess are pumping the water (I’ve no idea honestly). But it smelled very strongly of sulphur. Not a pleasant smell, I can assure you. We also saw deer and monkeys in this area, which was cool.

We took a bus back around 5pm. All the way back the long and winding roads to semi-civilisation. We then had a little bit of time to kill before our train back to Tokyo, so grabbed some yummy hot soba in this cute little restaurant near the station. Then we hopped onto the train, gratefully clutching hot cans of drink from the vending machine and settled in for the journey back home.

Overall it was a lovely if tiring day out. It started out not great for me but the exercise and fresh air really helped a lot. Since then I’ve realised that exercise is usually great treatment for many of the symptoms I experience, and this trip was the beginning of that. Thank you to Morgan for organising this lovely day out. Sorry it took me over a year to blog about it ^^;

Christmas 2023

I had a pretty sociable, busy Christmas in 2023. It was somewhat spread out on the days leading up to the big day. On December 21st, Shyam and I hosted a Christmas party together for the first time at our own place. He made most of the food, as always, haha. But I contributed with my usual mince pies, as well as the apparently popular apple crumble and custard. It was a very eclectic group of people and everyone had a great time!

I didn’t take many photos unfortunately, but above are Shyam’s charcuterie board and my mince pies. There were also two chickens, Shyam’s famous roast potatoes, carrots, etc. Always a good spread in our house! Hehe. Oh also, I made an origami wreath for our front door. I used to make them for my office door at my old job in the UK.

Two days later, we attended another Christmas party at a friend’s place. They lived in a nice, spacious apartment in Odaiba, with lovely views that included Mount Fuji. I might have stood out on their balcony for longer than would be advisable in the low winter temperatures, to admire said view. Many different people attended this party also. We had a good mix of food (I can’t remember what and I have no photos, alas). I do remember that one of the activities was gingerbread men decorating, which caused lots of hilarity, though I wasn’t very good at it, as referenced below ^^;

On December 25th, as we’d already had lots of Christmas food at the two parties, we decided to go out for Christmas dinner. There aren’t many options in Tokyo for traditional Christmas dinner, so we just went for something we wanted instead. We chose Sizzler because we knew there would be a Christmas atmosphere, we really like their cheese toast, and they have excellent apple crumble in the dessert buffet. I booked us a table at the one in Kichijoji, which allowed us to have a lovely walk around Inokashira Park before dinner. It was a lovely afternoon/evening.

And then on Boxing Day, we went on an amazing afternoon tea cruise across Tokyo Bay. It was one of Shyam’s presents to me. It was a 50 minute cruise, although we were boarded well in advance of the departure time. We had a table reserved in the Four Seasons lounge on board, where they served us afternoon tea with unlimited tea. It was so lovely drinking tea and eating cake whilst watching the view constantly change as we sailed around the bay.

After we had had our fill of tea and cake, we left our bags at our table and headed up on deck to see unobstructed views of the bay. It was cold outside but so lovely to feel the breeze on our faces and have a laugh as we took some silly photos of each other.

We had a nice surprise upon re-entering the ship from the deck. A lady was setting up in a kind of foyer area and she was going to sing some opera. We had no idea this was going to happen. She personally encouraged us to take a seat. There were about twelve or so chairs lined up, so we quickly claimed two. Shyam is a big fan of operas, and I definitely enjoy it, and she was fantastic! Many more people stopped and claimed the remaining seats or remained standing to watch her performance. It really capped off a truly brilliant hour or so on the ship.

This entry is nearly over. We didn’t do too much on New Years. We just met two of Shyam’s friends at the Showa era izakaya we like, Hanbey’s, and then were in bed well before midnight, haha. The next entry will be about an epic daytrip I took with my friend, Morgan on January 5th.

Autumnal trip to Karuizawa

On November 11th 2023, I took a shinkansen from Tokyo to Karuizawa to spend the night in the the mountains with (some of) the same group of friends I went to Korea with in the summer. BTS is a music group with the power to bring people together, and through them I’ve made so many great friends and get to experience so many things I wouldn’t otherwise get the chance to do. I’m forever grateful for that.

So this time we decided to rent an Airbnb for the night and enjoy the autumn leaves together in Nagano prefecture. I arrived a bit later than the others as I had a hospital appointment in the morning, but the shinkansen soon whizzed me there to join up with them. They had hired a couple of cars, so I got picked up from the station and then we went to a supermarket to go stock up on food for the night.

This was my first view after getting off the train:

After we’d raided the supermarket we drove to our accommodation for the night. It was a cute cottage halfway up a mountain. There was a wood burner inside and all the other amenities we needed. One of our members immediately decorated the room to make it fit for BTS ARMY, haha.

We cooked up a bunch of food, had some nice wine and a glass of soju or three, haha, and just generally had a lovely evening relaxing and goofing off a bit. It’s over a year ago already, so I don’t remember details well sadly. This is why I need to get up to date with this blog. I can’t even remember the sleeping arrangements in this place. But I do know we had a great time.

The next morning we had breakfast and then cleaned up and headed out. We got a bunch of nice photos from nearby the Airbnb.

We drove to the Usui pass and visited the Usuitoge Kumano Shrine. From what I remember it was a fairly typical shrine. Lots of stairs to climb, etc. But also, for some reason, a pink door in the middle of the woods, haha.

We headed into Karuizawa town centre after that, where we got some interesting food and visited a few more points of interest.

A lovely night away soon had to come to an end though and we all gradually parted ways. I took the shinkansen home, which in itself is quite a treat. I know in this blog and the last I took two shinkansen, but it’s not a regular occurrence usually because it’s pretty expensive. I hope I can spend some more quality time with this group of friends, but it’ll be difficult since one friend has moved back to the US, sadly.

Will be back soon with a blog for Christmas 2023. Getting there! ^^;

Trip to Shizuoka

So this post is about a wonderful daytrip I got to experience on October 31st 2023. I was idly scrolling Facebook one day when this post appeared about a trial tour. I’d seen this sort of thing before but never acted on it, but I thought why not this time since it looked interesting and the tour day just happened to be on a day when I didn’t need to be in school. They were offering a fully paid for tour to Shizuoka (shinkansen and full course lunch included) for free. All I had to do was write them a review afterwards. It kind of sounds like a scam when I write it like that, but it wasn’t!

So bright and early in the morning, I trekked across to Tokyo station to catch the 8:03 shinkansen to Shizuoka. (Yes, I have the itinerary from my email open in front of me right now, lol). It was a very pleasant hour ish journey. I don’t get on shinkansen very often because they are expensive, so I enjoyed it. I met the tour guides and other participants at the station. I can’t remember exactly how many people there were but around a dozen. They paired us off and assigned a guide for each pair. My partner was a lady a bit older than me, and our guide was a really lovely, enthusiastic, older Japanese man with pretty decent English ability.

Our first stop on the tour was Sengen shrine. We went there in private cars. The shrine was under reconstruction, so large parts of it were under scaffolding. We got a very long, informative explanation about what they were doing to it and why. We were also given special access to go inside, complete with hard hats, to see some of the work going on. It was very cool!

Next stop was lunch! We went to this very nice hotel called Nippon Daira Hotel. We had no idea beforehand, but they were laying on a full course meal and unlimited drinks! It was crazy! None of us could believe it, haha. We got sat in our pairs and quickly ordered our first drinks. And then the food started coming. I’ll share a photo of the menu below plus some of the dishes. It was all so good. I got to taste a lot of food for the first time.

After a very filling lunch and a few umeshus (plum wine) we got to explore the grounds of the hotel a little bit. It was so beautiful.

Next stop was Kunozan Toshogu shrine, via the Nihondaira ropeway. I love going on ropeways, so this was the major selling point for me when I decided to sign up for the tour, haha. From what I can remember (it was over a year ago ^^; ) this ropeway was similar to others I have been on and, of course, had excellent views on the way. The shrine itself was lovely. We got another exclusive here. This time it was a tea ceremony experience. My first time making matcha traditionally (and probably my last since I don’t actually like it ^^; ).

We got to see inside the attached museum after this but weren’t allowed to take photos, and unfortunately I don’t remember it at all ^^; Then we took the ropeway back and went to the Nihon Daira Yume Terrace, where you can sometimes see breathtaking views of Mount Fuji. Unfortunately it was too cloudy whilst we were there, but we did get nice dramatic cloud formation views.

And so we got a lift back to the station and I enjoyed the shinkansen back home again. It was an excellent trial tour. If you get a chance to do something like this, please go for it! I’ll be back very soon (I really do intend to catch up this year, like for real ^^; ) with an autumnal weekend in Kaurizawa.

My birthday 2023

Ahhh life has been a bit crazy the last couple of months, but I will never let this blog die. I’ve slipped to more than a year behind again, but I will catch up someday. Somehow ^^;

So this post will be pretty short cause it’s just going to be about my birthday last year, but I want to record it in here because it’s important to me.

My birthday fell on a Sunday last year, so Shyam and I got to spend the whole day together, which was nice. We did some shopping and then we went and got our nails done together. It was so nice (if a little embarrassing because I am a compulsive nail biter and the lady didn’t have too much to work with). I think the colours we chose compliment each other well, hehe.

Oh and just before we got our nails done, we had a taste of home in the heart of Tokyo, hehe. Costa is getting more and more popular here lately.

Then we headed onward to Asakusa. I knew we were going to a restaurant for dinner but I had no idea where and what kind of food. It turned out to be a rather fancy restaurant called ‘R Restaurant and bar’. It’s attached to a hotel and has amazing skyline views as you dine. Shyam had bagged us perfect seats out on the balcony with a good view of Tokyo Skytree.

It was a course menu that consisted of various dishes, which were mostly French cuisine, I think. There was caprese, onion gratin soup, scallops and mushrooms, and various other things. Basically anything I didn’t photograph, I forgot ^^; And of course there was a very lovely birthday dessert plate at the end.

And of course I had a cocktail to complement it all. It was a very lovely birthday and, maybe one day, you will read about the equally lovely birthday I had this year too, haha. Until next time!

TeamLab Planets

I am back! Only a few days later!! So this post will mostly just be photo heavy, but I’ll try and include any anecdotes I remember as well.

At the end of August last year, Shyam and I finally made it to TeamLab Planets. We had already done Borderless before it closed down in Odaiba (the new one has since opened, but I’m not sure how different it is and if it’s worth going to). Planets is based not far from Odaiba and has a very exciting water theme. You have to take off your socks and shoes and roll your trousers basically up to your knees.

So I just realised I never actually blogged about TeamLab Borderless. What?? So I better just say that TeamLab is a pair of digital art museums in Tokyo (they have other pop-ups, possibly permanent exhibitions in other places too): Borderless and Planets. I won’t go into what they are too much, it’s easy to find out about them online. But they are incredibly popular with residents and tourists alike. Both places are a fully immersive experience.

This post is about Planets. I’m not sure why I neglected to blog about Borderless, but Planets was my favorite, so ehh.

So when you first go in, you take your shoes and socks off and put them in a locker by the entrance. Then you head inside and immediately walk up a wet, fairly steep slope. It felt like going into a swimming pool. I don’t actually remember the details well other than that (it has been over a year ^^; ). But there were several distinct sections with various digital art displays. So I’ll just share some photos.

There was an outside garden area with these mysterious silver orbs. We had to put on slippers to go out here.

And, I think this was the last area, the artificial flowers that moved up and down and were super cool and made a great photos spot.

It’s too long ago and I don’t remember what part I deemed as my favorite. I just know I found the whole thing very exciting but also relaxing. 100% worth a visit if you are in Tokyo. And that’s another catch up blog done. Relatively short compared to the last one, lol.

Summer vacation 2023 part 2

As always I am way later than I hoped to be with this. I am very much over a year behind again. I shall, as always, strive to rectify this situation ^^;

So after an epic 3 and a half weeks back in the homeland, I had a short but sweet couple of days back in Japan before jetting off again, this time to… Korea! Last time I was in Korea was in July 2019 for quidditch, lol. This time I went for an equally geeky reason. I went with eight fellow BTS fans and we stayed in the same Airbnb they stayed at for their reality series ‘In The Soop’. It was epic!!

I caught a flight from Narita in the early afternoon and arrived late afternoon in Incheon. Everyone else was already there and I was to meet them at a restaurant (which BTS had been to before – yes this trip is very much going to be like that, haha). So after a little trouble getting my travelcard (the lady in the CU was very helpful and definitely didn’t laugh at my butchering of gamsahamnida – thank you), I was on a train and on my way to Gangnam to meet the others.

They were already inside when I got there, but quickly made space for me and started feeding me up on all the non-spicy food items they could get (this was mostly meat and rice, lol). After we had eaten a lot and also managed to temporarily move to the table BTS sat at for photos, we were on our way. We all decided we could just about squeeze in some dessert, so we went for a traditional Korean dessert called Bingsu. Basically shaved ice with a whole lot of toppings on. The one I shared with one of the others was red bean and kinako. It was sooo good!

After that we all parted ways to our various accomodations for the night. I was sharing a hotel room with one of the others, so we chatted a fair bit before bed, hehe. But we had to be up bright and early the next morning as we were catching the train out to Chuncheon where the Airbnb is, so we went to bed at a fairly reasonable time.

The next morning we all met up at Seoul station at around 10am, I think. Then we caught the train up to Chuncheon. I think it took about two hours on a fairly high speed train. Then we did a major shopping spree at a supermarket there. The Airbnb is in the middle of nowhere, so we needed to stock up on all the supplies we would need. We also grabbed some lunch here. Then the taxis that our Airbnb host kindly arranged for us turned up. They were very unimpressed with how much luggage we had between us (which was mostly grocery shopping bags) but hey ho they took us after some grumbling.

The taxis took us on a fairly lengthy journey, which involved many small, winding roads. The scenery change on the train was pretty dramatic, but in the taxi it was even more dramatic. We were really out in the middle of nowhere and it was beautiful!

Eventually we arrived at our destination and we were all immediately blown away. Seeing it on TV in the show was amazing enough, but in person? The views were incredible! I think we all got lost in a daze of staring and taking photos for a good while when we first arrived.

Eventually we went inside and it was very exciting to see all the rooms that we had seen on TV in real life. We toured around and then claimed our beds. I was in Taehyung and Hobi’s room with one of the other girls. The whole interior of the main and upper house is so nice. Also the boat house was cute, but far too many bugs down there for me to be brave enough to volunteer to sleep there, haha.

After a while, our host, Lisa, arrived complete with her famous doggy, Happy. Happy was in a commercial with Choi Wooshik!!

Lisa was so lovely! She brought us all Korean skincare products as gifts. She also gave us some fireworks that we could set off during our stay. And, best of all, she took us out on the lake on her speedboat! It was amazing!! She even showed us which lifejackets the boys used during the show. So I got to wear the same lifejacket as Taehyung 🙂

Then we took some commemorative photos of all nine of us (whilst Lisa was there to help us), including this lovely shot of us mimicking BTS, haha.

Next it was time to get the BBQ going, so Lisa showed us how to do that and then was on her way. We grilled meat, made salads, and laid the table outside, all whilst the sun was setting over the beautiful scenery. It felt very special.

We had a veritable feast of grilled meats, salad, rice, and lots of soju and makeolli, haha. We also had a couple of feline visitors who had clearly smelled our meat cooking, but they weren’t brave enough to get too close to us, sadly. Then it was chill time before bed. We played some old style party games and did a bit of karaoke. It was very fun!

The next day, our one full day in the house, we all did various things, much like BTS themselves did 3 years before. Some of us tried drawing/painting because that was a big thing in the show. I had a go at doing a crayon sketch. It wasn’t amazing, but I think you can see what I was aiming for.

Also, in the garden, there is a swing chair. So I partook in a swing a few times. One of those times I took a selfie and then took a photo of the view from the chair. I think you can see why it was one of my favorite spots.

When evening came again, the nine of us worked together to cook up another feast of various Korean food and drinks. We also toasted marshmallows over a bonfire and then set off the fireworks over the lake. In Korea the fireworks are the type that you hold whilst they go off. This freaked me out a lot considering how I was brought up to not hold any firework except for a sparkler. So I stood back and took videos whilst the others let them off. It was beautiful. I wish I knew how to upload videos on here.

The last morning was a combination of packing up, eating, and soaking up the last few hours in the house. Plus taking loads more photos.

We got the same taxis back to the station (the drivers were much nicer this time) and then took the train back down to Seoul. Most people were leaving, but I had booked an extra night in Seoul to make the most of it. So after many emotional goodbyes, me and the two remaining members went off on an adventure to see the Hybe building. This is the company headquarters where BTS and many other artists are based. It’s a huge skyscraper! It was very impressive (I didn’t get a good photo of the actual building so you’ll have to Google it if you’re interested).

After that we went to the BTS cafe that is behind the Hybe building. A random old man told us about it, haha. The front and inside were decked out in BTS pictures and memorabilia. They were also serving special themed drinks and food. We stopped in for a drink and some photos.

After that I parted ways with my two remaining companions as they were catching a train to Busan (hopefully zombie free). So I went to check into my hotel and drop off my luggage. I was staying in a budget hotel in Myeongdong, which apparently was really out of the way from everywhere, but still walking distance from Seoul station. After a quick rest in my room, I headed out again. This time I went to the old Bighit building, which is where BTS started out before they conquered the world. The building has turned into a kind of shrine for BTS fans with messages written in every available space. It was a pretty awesome sight.

From there I walked to the Han River. The sun was going down at this point so I got some more lovely sunset photos.

I eventually reached the Banpo bridge, which was my aim. I’d read that they do light water shows at night, and boy did they! It was so impressive! Water shot off the side of the bridge and was lit up in various colours. I got photos and videos from the bank and also from when I walked across the bridge. It was sooo good!

After a whole lot of walking, I was so tired, so I flopped into bed with rather minimal food. Whoops. Then the next morning I got up early enough so that I had about an hour and a half before I needed to check out. I went for a wander around Myeondong. Unfortunately a lot of things were shut. I’m not sure if it was a holiday or if it was just a typical Monday there. But it was still fun to just walk around and see what I could see. Including the flagship HBAF shop. Sooo many interesting flavours of nuts in there.

I bought a few bits and bobs as souvenirs, and then headed back to the hotel to check out. Then it was a train back to Incheon airport and the plane back to Narita. It was a rather stressful flight, but I shan’t write about it here because I don’t want to tarnish what an absolutely fabulous trip it was. I think it’s why it took me so long to update this. I really needed to devote a lot of time to write about everything.

Anyways, as always, I shall endeavor to come back with a new entry as soon as possible.

Summer vacation part 1

So last summer we finally got to spend a decent amount of time back in the UK. 3 and a half weeks, to be precise. The majority of the flights were very expensive, so we took a slight gamble and booked the much cheaper China Eastern flights that go via Shanghai. So many people online were advising against them, but it was really the only feasible way for us to get back. And actually, the flights were fine. Fairly basic compared to other airlines, but they did the job and were comfortable enough. Plus no major delays as far as I remember.

When we finally touched down in Heathrow, Shyam went south to his mum’s house, while I went north to my mum’s. I took an epic 5 hours bus ride up and arrived in Norwich at around 1am. It was some way to round out an already epic journey. That first cup of tea back at my mum’s tasted wonderful!

The first week and a bit was spent in and around Norwich, catching up with family and friends. Lots of dog and cat cuddles, walks around National Trust properties (including unwanted wasp encounters), introducing mum to Korean food at a restaurant called ‘The Kimchi’, seeing the Barbie movie with my younger brother and getting burgers at the legendary Zak’s afterwards, and attending Norwich Pride Parade. i also got to eat some of my favorite homecooked meals, including one of my faves, my mum’s amazing moussaka!

On my second Monday back in the UK, mum and I drove up to Manchester so I could finally see some of my friends based up there. I hadn’t seen most of them for 5 years! So I crammed in seeing several people in just one full day and two half days. It was hectic but I’m so glad I did it. It was so lovely catching up with everyone. Also very nostalgic to be back in my university city.

I spent the next four days back in Norwich, which included seeing more friends, plus having a clear out in my bedroom there as per my mum’s request, haha. I also went to the beach with one friend and we played crazy golf. It was so fun! Even if it was incredibly windy.

On the Monday I said a sad goodbye to my family and hopped on a train down south to go and spend the last week with Shyam and his family. First time to Brighton since I was a child. It’s a very cool place! Shyam’s family are all lovely and it was so nice to finally meet them and spend time with them. I got the grand tour of Brighton on the first full day, including walking the length of the pier and indulging in the arcades.

On the Wednesday we got the train up to London for the day. I finally got to meet one of Shyam’s good friends, who we had lunch with in China Town. Then in the evening we met up with Shabz after she finished work, which was amazing! We had Mexican food in this lively place near Liverpool St. station.

The next day we went on another daytrip, this time to Eastbourne. Where I got to meet another of Shyam’s good friends. It’s fairly similar to Brighton, but not quite as cool, haha. I got to have a rather expensive 99 ice-cream here by the beach, as was one of the things I most wanted to do during our time back in the UK.

The last two days were spent in and around Brighton. I got to meet and have dinner with another dear friend of Shyam’s, who I had been looking forward to meeting. She’s lovely. We also did a big shop in Tesco to get all the essential goodies to take back with us. You don’t realise how important some food items are to you until they’re no longer readily available, lol. Then on our last evening we, including Shyam’s family, had a fun meal out at Pizza Hut, rounding the trip out nicely.

We left Gatwick in the morning of Sunday August 13th and arrived back in Tokyo late on the 14th, via a rather lengthy layover in Shanghai’s very boring airport. It was a long, knackering journey, but worth it!

It was a wonderful 3 and a half weeks back in the homeland, but that was only part 1 of a rather epic summer vacation 2023. I’ll be back (hopefully) soon with part 2, where my fangirlishness will shine through once again, haha.

Late Spring/Early Summer

I’m back with another catch up blog from last year. This one will take us from April 29th to the beginning of July.

First up, I decided I wanted to try something a little different and when an opportunity popped up randomly on my Facebook feed, I just decided to go for it. It was an organization that runs English camps for elementary school kids. They started up after the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami in 2011 to help kids in the affected areas. So they recruit volunteers alongside some paid staff to run the camps. They cover your transport/food/board/etc. and give you a nominal ‘reward’ for volunteering. In return you commit to 2 days, 1 night looking after a load of kids, playing games with them, and encouraging them to speak English.

I took the shinkansen from Ueno to Utsunomiya very early on the Saturday morning. I met the organizers and the other volunteers there. A mix of people from the Philippines, Egypt, India, Indonesia, and maybe more countries, I’ve forgotten. Then all the kids came. There were a lot! Once they (and we) were all sorted into groups (I was in the pink group and got to wear a lovely pink bib), we got onto coaches and made the two ish hour journey into the mountains on the edge of Gunma. Lots of games of rock, paper, scissors, singing, arm-wrestling, thumb wars, etc. happened on the bus, lol. The kids were so cute.

We stayed at what was essentially a youth hostel/activity centre. There was a huge restaurant area, library, work centre, gymnasium, outside playground areas, surrounding woodland, a sento (communal bath), and of course lots of bedrooms. I can’t remember the course of events well over a year later, but basically we played games outside and inside the gym. There was a traditional raising of the flag outside at 5pm, which was interesting. There was a buffet dinner in the restaurant. We had a night walk in the woods. There was a pretend bonfire in the gym with dancing.

Then it was time to go to the bedrooms to set up the futons. I was then made aware that I was going to be solely in charge of seven girls for the night. It was a little bit alarming as my Japanese is still rubbish, but it mostly worked out ^^; So my seven charges and I set up the futons in our tatami room. It was very lively! They were 8-10 years old and full of energy still. Then we had to supervise the girls going to the sento, which took ages. Then finally I had to try and get them to go to sleep. It took forever!! Eventually they were settled and I was able to go to the sento myself. The most relaxing, most needed bath, haha. Then I crept back into our room and got to bed myself.

I did not get much sleep though! The girls woke up at 4:30am. I heard them chattering and moving around and tried to ignore them, but one of the delightful angels stood over my futon and shouted ‘Cathy, okiiii-masu!!’ (wake up), and my few hours sleep were done. They had folded up the futons, got dressed, and brushed their teeth by 6am. We were supposed to wake up at 6am, as the girls in the room opposite had done (I was so jealous of the volunteer supervising that room). Luckily I was able to take them over to the gym early and they ran around in there with some of the other early risers, whilst I sat on the floor bleary eyed.

We had a buffet style breakfast in the restaurant. Then there were more games in the gym. Then a million and one photos. It was at this point I started feeling sick. I had a terrible headache and had to rush out to the toilet to be sick more than once. I think the lack of sleep coupled with all the loud, rowdy running around didn’t work too well with my not-so-great health. This resulted in me not being able to travel back in the coach with the kids. I went in a car with a couple of guys because I was worried about being sick in front of the kids. I was really sad as I missed out on the last part of the camp and being able to say goodbye to the kids.

Overall it was a really fun, if tiring experience that got somewhat spoiled by my dodgy health. I would love to do another one, but I’m worried I’ll get sick again. Maybe later this year once the weather cools down again. I’ll see how my health is doing then.

May passed by with a mixture of school, game days at various friends’ houses, and other miscellaneous trips out doing various things. Then on June 2nd, a rather ferocious typhoon hit whilst I was at school. Two of my co-workers and I managed to get stuck at one of the Disney hotels whilst trying to get home. The trains had stopped and we decided to wait in the hotel until we could get a taxi to take us to a station where the trains were still running. Loads of people were doing similar, so it took a while until a taxi was available. But we were in nice, cushy surroundings at least, haha.

Later in June, Shyam and I went to an Ethiopian restaurant in Naka Meguro called Queen Sheba. It was my first time to try Ethiopian food and it was so delicious! The couple that own the restaurant are really nice too. They catered for Shyam being vegetarian and also helped me out loads with my spicy food issue. I recommend it very highly!

Then on July 1-2, Shyam and I went on another camping/rafting trip with Mike. This time with Zeke and Matthias. We packed into Mike’s car with all the stuff and headed to Kami-Nagatoro in Saitama. We had a cabin with bedding provided this time, so not quite as much gear crammed into the car, lol. Mike had also booked out the gazebo/picnic area in the centre of the camp ground for our stay. So we had lots of space!

We spent the Saturday down by the river. Lots of -terrifying- swimming (the current was pretty strong) and lounging about, chatting, drinking, having fun. Then in the evening we had a barbeque in our picnic area and then toasted marshmallows on the campfire, of course. It was really chill and nice (apart from the bugs that kept pestering me in particular, I swear!). Then we made our futons up and got some needed shuteye. The most funny thing was during the night, Matthias got fed up with a couple of the guys snoring and opted to sleep in the car instead. So when I got up the next morning and went out to the loo, I just saw his legs sticking out of the car, haha.

On the Sunday we had breakfast very early as we were scheduled in for rafting at 9am. It was an excellent rafting trip. I really enjoyed the one the year before, but somehow this one was even better. Our instructor was super fun and had us doing some crazy things. At one point we all stood on the side of the raft and just fell backwards into the water. It was hilarious! We also stopped at a waterfall and got some nice photos. It was a super fun time!

After rafting we showered and got packed up. Then we headed to a pizza place nearby that did yummy wood-fired pizza. It was just what we needed after two hours rafting. Then we had the drive back to Tokyo. All in all it was a super fun weekend!

And that’s that for this blog. Next time will be about the epic 3 and a half week trip back to the UK.

Spring flowers!

I’m back! Less than a week later!! So this entry is going to be photo heavy about a couple of trips to see some beautiful flowers during March/April last year.

So in late March last year, Shyam and I went back to Showa Kinen Park. We went there for the autumn leaves in the November before and decided we wanted to go back during cherry blossom season. So we did the same thing again. We got there early, rented bikes, and had an amazing few hours cycling round the huge park. Only this time the colours were varying shades of pink (plus some green, yellow, red, orange).

There was also a bit of a Dutch theme going on, with some big clogs and a myriad of brightly coloured tulips.

I really love this park. Spring or autumn, it is just wonderful. I’m not a fan of cycling since I had a bad accident when I was a child, but I love it here. Dedicated cycle lanes, amazing surroundings, and just a brilliant sense of freedom. I thoroughly recommend it to anyone that comes to Tokyo.

The other trip was one I made during the second week of April last year. I had a random day off school, so met with a friend and went to Nezu Shrine’s Azalea Spring Festival. If you go there on the weekend during the Azalea Festival, it is far too busy, so getting a random weekday off was perfect! It was absolutely wonderful! I’ve never seen anything like it before in my life. Apparently the azalea garden is over 300 years old.

There were still a lot of people there, but it wasn’t too bad. I loved how the azaleas seemed to be both uniformly positioned and not at the same time. It really was a wonderful sight and one my photos don’t really do justice.

So, nearly done with this entry. I just have a couple of bonus photos for you. I’m so lucky to live in a really green area friendly part of Tokyo. There is a manmade pathway that stretches around the whole of the ward, which has lots of trees, flowers, water features, etc. on it. I often go walking on it with my friend who lives nearby. We actually even had a regular jogging session along it for a while last year (until it got too hot). The bonus photos are from one of these sessions. I absolutely love the last picture, capturing three different colours of leaves at once on a warm spring day.

Okay, that’s all for today. Until next time, when I’ll have some tales and photos from late Spring/early Summer.