Japan Trip - Conclusion (finally)

Last post about Japan. So after we got off our overnight train, we quickly got onto another train to go out to Kawagoe, a small city on the outskirts of Tokyo. After we got to there, it quickly became apparent to me that these guys scheduled another really tight trip. The visit to this town was sandwiched between the overnight train and another train out to the Alps of Japan. My friend and I were not going to go out to the mountains with them as I needed to get back earlier than what they had planned. And this part of the trip seemed much more rushed. I read about Kawagoe and decided that I wanted to spend more time exploring it so this was where we parted ways with the group.

Shrine at Kawagoe

We got out of the train station, and had some trouble with directions. After everyone realized that there was only an hour scheduled for this town, we found the tourist bus and got on that. It took us slowly through town and dropped us off at a famous temple where you can get buy a small wooden board, write a wish, and hang it up. Then we basically ran to the main street where there are a lot of cute little shops. The group ran off to catch their train while my friend and I strolled slowly. The group ended up having to take a taxi back to Omiya so that they can catch their next train. This town is known for sweet potatoes so there were sweet potato flavored everything. After we walked for a while, it started raining so we got lunch at a cafe. I had kind of wanted to spend the night in this town but it was hard to find accommodations online and there were a lot more choices in the big cities. We ended up booking a hotel for Nagoya so we left Kawagoe after lunch and took a train back to Omiya. We wandered around that city for a little bit too and then took train to Tokyo, then another one to Nagoya. It was cold and rainy when we got to Nagoya and it took a little while to find our hotel.

Sweet potato and taro ice cream

My friend had another friend who lives in the city and we had some small snacks at a restaurants with him. We walked around for a while until it got too cold and wet. Then we went to a place that featured grill-your-own food with an all-you-can-drink menu. I've never drank so much alcohol in my life. Good thing the hotel was right next door. Anyway, I was really looking forward to this hotel because it featured a hot tub. It turned out to be a really nice spa place where there are Japanese style communal showers, two jacuzzis, and sauna. There were also massage chairs and a relaxing area. They even had a vending machine where you can order real massages.

So cute

Nagoya castle

The next day, we relaxed at the spa again and enjoyed the free breakfast before heading out. We got to the main train station only to find that there are no lockers available because it's a big transportation hub and everyone in Japan is traveling. We ended up going back to the city subway station and left our things there. In hindsight, we could have just left our stuff at the hotel. Anyway, we then went out to see the Nagoya castle and then a temple. The castle was really crowded with other tourists and actually not that impressive. We went back to the main train station for lunch where I also got a Krispy Kreme doughnut. I recently found out that there Krispy Kreme had opened some stores in Hong Kong before but left because HK people apparently don't like pastries that are too sweet. Anyway, after lunch, we went to see another tourist sight and decided to walk back to the station. Along the way, we passed by the hotel. I booked a train ticket for Nagoya to Kyoto to the airport so at some point, we started running through the station to get me on this train. There was a lot of running after trains on this trip. It's really a good thing that we got this train pass and can just get on any train.

Krispy Kreme Easter special!

I met up again with my roommate at the airport and we shared stories about our trip. They definitely had a more chill trip. Anyway, really need to go back again! Japan is an interesting place. It would be nice to get the 21 day pass and just travel all over the place. I've found out that both Korea and Taiwan also have similar train passes. I'm a big fan of getting subway passes when I go on holiday. Don't have to think about buying individual tickets and adding money all the time. This train pass thing takes it to a whole new level! I think this trip has renewed my desire for a long trip somewhere.

Japan - Part 3 - Hokkaido

Snow park

So part 2 ended with the laundry fiasco where everyone ended up with wet/damp laundry. Some people resorted to wearing multiple pairs of socks or hanging them from their daypacks in hopes that they will dry. It didn't help that it was still pretty cold in the area so things don't dry very quickly, especially jeans. Anyway, we had planned to explore Sapporo that day and we did our usual routine of stuffing things into lockers at the train station and then setting off. Sapporo is known for having great parks so we walked around one of them that had really cool slides and lots of kids playing on them. Then I found a tourist center where the lady was really nice and told me that one of the parks, a garden, is free because it's Greenery Day. I would have asked about more stuff but someone rushed in and rudely interrupted. Didn't think people would be so rude in Japan! Anyway, I got enough information and took the group to this free park.

After being exhausted by touring parks, we went to a fish market for lunch. The unfortunate thing about traveling with students is that they don't want to spend very much, especially on food. So we basically looped around the fish market many times before settling on a place. The thing strange thing is that most of them are very willing to spend money on souvenirs and gifts but not on food. I think my priorities now are different. I've never really been into getting gifts for people, just postcards. And now I think it's important to try the region's specialties. Anyway, the place we went to in the end was not bad. I actually got something cheap off of the menu because I was all out of cash at this point. Getting cash was another ordeal (I'll save this for later).

After lunch, we headed to a chocolate factory. Sapporo is known for this White Lover's chocolate and the factory was highly recommended. You can see more about this factory here. We weren't expecting much and kind of just went because we had gotten a full day pass for the subway. Again, this was another one of those things were I thought the group would surely split up so that people can do the things that they wanted instead of going along with the group. There were some people who wanted to go out to an Ainu (native people of Hokkaido) thing but it's about an hour outside of the city, which practically means a day trip. They didn't go in the end because of some bad reviews. Anyway, we found the factory using our noses and the place was definitely worth the effort and entrance fee.

White lovers chocolate cookie

The factory

Minipark outside the facotry

Outside of the actual exhibits area, there was a miniature garden with lots of mini houses. I think kids can definitely spend the entire day there playing house, fort, or whatever. We stuffed the group into several houses and took videos of them coming out of the tiny houses. The actual chocolate museum was pretty small but we got to see the factory line. There were some random exhibits that we weren't really sure why they were there. But anyway, in the middle of the museum is a cafe with a good view of the garden. Every hour, the clock tower has a little dance with mechanical bears, rabbits, and owls. We splurged on desserts. Unfortunately since this was still the middle of the trip, I didn't end up getting a box of the chocolates. They would have been hard to carry back and they are actually available in HK. The wrapping is special since you can get the ones that say they come from the original factory. And, again, I was out of cash and my Capital One credit card expired right before the trip.

After this we headed back to the main train station for our second overnight train. This is where my friend and I split from the group. We had a couple of hours to kill and people wanted to look for souvenirs and such. My friend wanted to go up this tower that has an observatory level but the rest of the group wasn't so interested. Anyway, the observatory tower thing wasn't very high but I think they did a good job of presenting the place. The parking lot even had arrows pointing out the iconic things around the city in big letters. I think these observatory things are sometimes a hit-and-miss. They could be very good or not so good. And going during the day is very different from going at night. You see different things. And then, the big hunt for an ATM that works for me started.

I really needed to get cash at this point and tried out several ATMs only to be disappointed that they didn't take foreign credit cards. We finally asked someone at a help desk and she said to go to a 7-11. I had actually heard about this (that only the ATMs at 7-11 took foreign credit cards) but we couldn't find a 7-11. After the lady pointed it out, we realized that we had passed this 7-11 many times. Having cash makes buying things a lot easier and we got food for the train ride. I saw a booth selling Hokkaido cheesecake and got one for about $5 USD. It came in a box and was big enough to share. Really good deal. I shared this on the train ride with the group. I think they were really happy about this. Hokkaido cheesecake is not dense like the American kind. It's more like a sponge cake. 

Hokkaido cheesecake

The overnight train ride this time was better since we had reservations to begin with and the train was pretty empty. I was able to take up multiple seats and actually get some sleep. We arrived sleepily into the city of Omiya, which is pretty close to Tokyo. This ends the bulk of the trip.

[to be continued...]

Japan Trip - Part 2 - Snow!

Time to write about the rest of this Japan trip. This part is actually the more crazy part. After the long, loud, slow, 8 hour journey on the overnight train to Sapporo, we spent a few minutes in the Sapporo station to use the bathroom, brushed teeth, and quickly stuffed our things into lockers and hopped on another train. This train took us to Asahikawa, the mountainous region of Hokkaido. Even though this train wasn't a Shinkansen, it was a pretty nice train and I got some quality nap time here. We arrived at the very nice Asahikawa station feeling very groggy. The town must get a lot of money from people on ski trips because the train station and the airport are both very nice structures that definitely cost a lot of money to built. Anyway, we struggled to find food and this mysterious bus that is supposed to take us to the mountains. After everyone ate, got food for lunch, we were in a bit of a panic since we still hadn't found the bus. I finally convinced the group to go to the very nice tourist center where the staff was able to point us in the right direction. I wish we had gone to the tourist center earlier since they had wifi, more food options, and lots of information about the area. Anyway, we found the bus stop with no problems and made it onto the first of the three times that the bus leaves from the train station.

The bus ride was long and drove us through the sparsely populated town. The group commented on how similar the town feels to suburban America. The roads were wide, most houses were standalone ones, parks had baseball fields, etc. We even came across farmland. The bus took us to the airport which is small but had very nice architecture. The architecture is on par with larger airports so this part of the region definitely gets a ton of money from people coming to ski. Speaking of skiing, we saw more and more snow as the bus goes up the mountain. We found out that the name of this mountain range is "Big Snow Mountain". We had a small snowball fight in the snow after getting off the bus. After we all finished going to the bathroom, repacking, looked through the gift shop, we ventured outside to look at the hiking situation. We found ourselves in knee deep snow, couldn't see any walkable trails, and a good amount of people skiing.

We asked the lady at the ski lift about walking around the area and she gave us a very pessimistic response but pointed us to the visitor's center. We made our way over to the visitor's center where the lady on duty took one look at us and was like, "you guys don't look prepared." Seeing how eager we still were to do something, she slowly talked to us about our options. We could rent heavy duty shoes for the snow, take the lift up to the top, and walk around there. Or we could rent real snowshoes and hike up the ski trails. Of course we chose to rent the snowshoes and hike around, even though only one person out of the whole group has had experience with hiking in snowshoes. The first part of this hike went pretty slowly and we took lots of breaks. It wasn't very difficult and I think we all got used to walking around in these things after a while. After about an hour or so, we stopped for food and then the real adventure began. We had reached the point of no return. We needed to get back down to take the last bus out. We had a choice of either going back down the way we came or go all the way to the top and take the lift down. From where we were, we could almost see the top so some people were pretty keen on going all the way up. I didn't doubt my abilities to go all the way up in time but there were two people in the group whose physical fitness was questionable. But time and again, this group really surprised me by pulling together and we made a team decision to go up, slow and steady with short breaks. We actually made it up 30+ degree slopes with lots of time to spare.

We took the "ski lift" which is actually more like a large cable car that holds a lot of people at a time. We went back down and got food from the souvenir shop. We all fell asleep on the way back and made it onto our train, again with very little time to spare. We went back to Sapporo and went in search of our Airbnb accommodation. It was a good thing that I printed the map out because the place was really difficult to find. We're not actually sure any of us managed to look up the right place but we miraculously found it. This was the first time I had stayed at an Airbnb place and this one was a two story apartment with lots of rooms. There were lots of other guests since it was Golden Week. The owner told us about a few places for dinner and we basically stormed into the first ramen place we found. We made a shower schedule as we walked back to the house but annoyingly, the other house guests decided to shower late as well. It was getting close to midnight when we all finally showered.

And then the big laundry fiasco started. The group (except me) had planned to do laundry once on the trip. I actually had a really bad feeling about this when the person who booked the place explained that the washing machine is one of those 2-in-1 machines. I was like, uh, those don't really dry well and we're leaving early the next day. And after everyone piled on their dirty clothes, the owner informed us that it would cost extra to run the dryer. So of course, the undergrads were not cool with that and made a decision to just hang everything up instead of using the dryer. Everything was still wet the next day and ended up running one cycle of the dryer (which didn't do very much) and this whole ordeal stressed us out. I didn't participate in this laundry business because I knew it wouldn't work out and I had managed to fit everything I needed for 6 days in my backpack. I'm starting to think I don't really need one of those really big backpacks. It would just make me carry too much stuff.

[to be continued...]

Crazy Japan Trip - Part 1

The highly anticipated Japan trip has started! It took a few back and forths to figure out what which rail pass we wanted to buy. My friend in Japan has all variations of the rail pass and a group of people are going on a Hokkaido trip. Apparently this week is Golden Week in Japan where a few public holidays line up to form a nearly week long holiday. But my roommate wasn't so thrilled at the this whole city hoping business (and actually neither was I at first) so we ended up deciding to split up. I got the national Japan Rail Pass while my roommate and her boyfriend got only the Kansai Area Pass.

We still went to the HK airport together. I was trying to finish up some work and got back with just enough time to shower and eat something before we headed out. I packed a few days ago and managed to fit 6 days' worth of clothes and other essentials into a backpack. We checked in at Terminal 2 but actually flew out of a gate in Terminal 1. It was nice that they actually got a gate instead of one of those shuttle bus things. But maybe it's because the flight is late at night. We left at nearly 1am. As consistent with any other discount airlines, legroom was lacking and no food was served. They left the cabin lights on the whole time, which was unexpected for a red eye flight and didn't help with sleeping.

The obligatory photo

We got to the Kansai airport and got out at their Terminal 2. The structure of this terminal looked extremely temporary, with sheet piles as roofing. When we got out, it seems like Peach, the discount airline, was the only one using the terminal. I wonder if any other airlines will move into the space. This really goes to show that a discount airline does not necessarily mean the company has no money; they just want to make money off of being a discount airline. This is supposed to be the first discount airline in Japan. They have a lot of domestic routes so I guess they are trying to compete with the rail network too.

We took the shuttle bus to the real terminal (Terminal 1) and activated our rail passes. The best train to Kyoto gets into the city after 9am, which meant that it would be too late to meet up with my friend. We had planned to meet up at the station at 8am, before his 9am class. This also meant that I had to somehow contact him so that he wouldn't be waiting for me forever. The Japan Rail (JR) office that we were standing outside of advertised free WiFi. So I connected only to find that I needed to scan a QR code. But since I wanted to connect on my phone and the only device I had was my phone, this was a problem. It was a good thing that I was traveling with other people because I scanned off of my friend's phone. But the code wanted me to email something which was also a problem. I mean, if I can email, I really don't need to connect to their wireless network, right? Anyway, I realized at some point that we could just walk to the actual airport terminal to find free WiFi and we were successful. I ended up being able to get on the JR West WiFi network andade other plans to meet up with my friend right before leaving for Tokyo.

It wasn't until I was on the train to Kyoto that I realized I could have had a leisurely breakfast before rushing off on this 1.5 hr train ride that didn't seem to have a snack cart. So I was really hungry by the time I got to Kyoto station where I ate at a cafe inside the station. Then I still had 2 hrs before meeting up with my friend so I went to the Imperial Palace. It was the biggest thing on the tourist map but it turned out to be not very interesting. I got back to the train station and bought some rice balls and pastry for lunch. I waited around for people and they arrived in a panic about 20 minutes before the train left. So there was actually no need to panic. But anyway, at the platform, I realized that the rest of the group (with the exception of my friend) are undergrads from Stanford on a study abroad. Now it all makes sense why they wanted to do this all island trip. It's something that I definitely woke have wanted to do when I was an undergrad. Now I feel a bit old for this. Anyway, the group is pretty cool and people generally agree on things. I'm always wary of traveling in large groups since it's hard to make everyone happy. The group comprises of 8 people total, including me.

Tomagachi Store!

We got to Tokyo and wandered around the underground shopping area inside the station where there is lots of food and cute little shops. Two of the people in the group arrived late so we waited around in the station for them. We camped out at McDonald's for a while after we were all tired from walking. After we were finally together as a group, we went in search of our hotel. It was a good thing I printed out directions to the hotel because no one else had and trying to navigate using someone's phone is not so great, as we would find out on the next day. After we finally got there, I showered immediately and then we went in search of dinner. We found an Italian Japanese restaurant that had really cheap options. The food was decent. Some people wanted to do kareoke but places were closed and the neighborhood with all the night life is over an hour away by subway. So we toured the supermarket instead and went back to the hotel. I was really tired and went to sleep pretty much right away. Other people stayed up and made plans for the next day.

Really big vending machine

Day 2 was a whirlwind tour if Tokyo. We started the day with another round at the supermarket and ate in someone's room. I was surprised at how punctual everyone was. Anyway, after eating, we went to Tokyo Station and stuffed our bags into a locker and headed off to a department store that has a Kit Kat counter that sold special Kit Kat flavors. They sell different flavors everyday and apparently sells out pretty fast. You can get flavors that you don't get anywhere else. They're pretty pricey for what it is but weeks make really cool gifts. They have flavors like sakura green tea, cream cheese, chilly, and extra dark. I didn't get any because it's pretty hot out any I didn't think they could survive the trip. After that we headed to go find a sushi place that serves sushi from the famous fish market. We had decided the night before that we didn't want to get up that early up go see the auction. But we failed to find the restaurant but still had a pretty good sushi meal at another restaurant. It was a conveyor belt place but we orders off of the iPad menu because we were at the end of the conveyor. It was a good meal and I paid $15 USD for some really good stuff. Traveling with students definitely makes this a budget trip.

Sushi lunch!

We walked around the akihabari area after eating where it is supposed to be the center of anime and gaming. We really didn't know what we were supposed to see and waked into random arcades. We saw one where they have these capsules where you sit inside a pod with screens on 3 sides and team up with other people to fight virtually. They looked pretty cool. Some of the other shops had sketchy stuff though and we were generally unimpressed.

We headed back to the Tokyo station after this to get our stuff and to get ready for the long journey north. We had some confused moments after getting to the station of trying to find the lockers we left our bags in and the platform the train should be on. We made it to the right platform well in advance of our train and settled in for a 3hr ride to the tip of Honshu (the long island). Our overnight train journey started at the conclusion of this train ride.

We basically got to the station where our overnight train would depart 3 hours early. The reason that our trip is so well planned is that one member of the group is very into planning things ahead of time. This works well with being able to reserve seats and such but unfortunately for this important leg of our trip, the reserved seats were all booked out. So we basically had to fend for ourselves in the nonreservable seats. This is why we ended up at the platform 3 hours early. One member of our group basically planned the entire trip and is someone who gets really anxious about things. She ran ahead to the platform and put our stuff in line to wait for the train even though we were 3 hrs early and there was no one else around.

The train leaves from the town of Aomori but from the old station. Our shinkansen from Tokyo arrived at the new station where there where things were much nicer. Since it would be kind of dumb to go back, we gave up on the idea of finding showers and just went around the station for food. My friend and I went to a Yoshinoya after being unsuccessful at finding anything for more than an hour. Places seemed to all close as we walk up to them. So we finally ate at the Yoshinoya even though it's something that I can get everyday at work. It's much nicer though and we ate while talking about how old we are compared to these youngsters.

When we got back to the station, all members of the party had arrived and were joking around loudly about how we weren't going to let anyone else through, be they babies, elderly, or disable. They had separated the group into 2 so that we took up north doors of a train car. The plan was that we would coverage in the middle and take up 8 seats together. The plan worked, mostly because the other people waiting on the platform became scared of us and put a "no man's land" between us and the rest of the train. That space got filled up though. The ride was very loud and bumpy, not smooth like the shinkansen at all. I didn't get very good sleep and was awake for a lot of the ride.

The overnight train

Chiang Mai

Chiang Mai has been a really great trip. We did, ate, and bought a lot more than I expected. I got flights for this trip about 6 months ago after my aunt, uncle, and cousin moved here. I wanted this to be a longer trip (more than 4 days) so I booked it for the Easter holiday. But then they moved to China in January so I asked around to see if anyone else wanted to go. One of my college friends, Diana, is working in India and wanted to come too. One of her friends from church was also in the area so she showed us around for a few days. This was awesome since she knows the city and can speak Thai.

I went to work Wednesday morning and left for the airport slightly before lunch. It is a pain going to the airport from work via MTR since I have to transfer so many times. The flight was slightly early. They served a large snack. One of the choices was dim sum! Wish I took a picture of it.

The Chiang Mai airport is pretty small. There are a couple of booths with taxi service and you just tell them where you want to go and they call a taxi for you. No harassment or haggling with taxi drivers.

We started at the Eco Resort which is a cheap resort with a mix of dorm rooms, shared bathrooms, and single rooms. We got a double with shared bathroom. There is a really nice pool right outside our room, which is where I found my friend and her friend when I got to the hotel. I swam with them for a little bit and then we ate some snacks (mango sticky rice and papaya salad) that they got earlier in the day. After this, we went to the night market where we tried the feet cleaning fish, looked at a ton of trinkets, had fruit juice, got a full body Thai massage, and ate more food.

The 2nd day we got off to a slow start. I got up, went swimming, had breakfast, and chilled by the pool. Then we went for noodles, another market, followed by more shopping, ice skating at a fancy mall, and ate some really good roadside food.

Friday, we went on a road trip to a nearby park with a waterfall. There were 5 of us and we drove 3 motorbikes to the park, stopping on the way to get food. We picnicked after we got there. The three other girls have been in Chiang Mai for a while and they said that when they first started coming to this place, there were maybe 2 or 3 other Thai families. Now they have people manning the gates and trails. There wasn't a lot of water at the waterfall and we climbed up and down the rocks. There were a lot of other people and even some tourists. We all got soaked. I didn't bring my phone so will upload pictures later when I get photos from my friend. After this we rested and then had a BBQ buffet for dinner followed my karaoke. The karaoke rooms all had different themes. We chose the Ant Room.

On Saturday, we went to do a cooking class. The class was even more in depth than the one I did in Guilin. We got to choose from different dishes. I made green curry paste, green curry with chicken, pad thai, papaya salad, tom yum soup, and banana in coconut milk. We made and ate the pad thai and papaya salad first. Afterwards we were extremely full. The class was a lot of fun and the food was great. We even got a small cookbook with the recipes after. These cooking classes are really fun.

After that, we walked around the old city and found three Saturday walking street, which is another market. We ended the day with a trip out to a mall with a Big C, which is like a Walmart. We missed an over/underpass on the way back and went really far before getting off the highway and going back again.

On Sunday, we went to a 3D art museum, which is like the Alive museum we went to in Seoul, except that it is a lot bigger. Then we tried to find the Sunday walking street, which is yet another market but found out that it starts later in the day. So my friend went back to the hotel while I walked around the city some more. We finally tried the little place near our hotel that does pad thai for dinner.

We didn't much Monday morning and I got to the airport early to see my friend off. Trying to catch up on blogging! Will do the Seoul ones soon.

In Chiang Mai

Seoul, Part 1

Back from my first trip to South Korea. Seoul is a very modern city. I'll start by writing about my flight. I left on a Wednesday afternoon on Ethiopian Airlines. I spent the whole time at the airport being conflicted about whether or not I should eat a meal at the airport. Every time I go, I want to eat at fried chicken at Popeye's. But I usually end up gawking at the prices and walk away. I ended up getting a drink and muffin at Starbucks because I was worried that there wouldn't be food on the plane. I noticed the large amount of Hong Kong and Korean people at the waiting area when I finally got to the terminal. There even seemed to be a tour group. And indeed, the flight wasn't very full when we got on. In fact, I don't even think the first class/business class area was ever occupied. Anyway, everything was normal and they even served a meal.

I got to Seoul at around 8pm and walked around the airport and got money, something to drink, and found my way to the subway station. They had two different trains, one of which is an express train. This express train was not part of the research I did on how to get to the airport so I didn't take it. There weren't a lot of people around on a weekday night so it took me a while to figure out if I was entering the right gate. The train from the airport was really fancy and had blinking lights that show you where you are along the line. I had to transfer to another line and this second one was much busier and definitely not as new as the airport line. By the time I got to the station where Yalu and friends where staying, it was around 10pm. I saw a Dunkin Donuts as I was getting out of the station and they had the cutest donuts! I got this bear one.

I got to the hotel and the hotel guy was just showing me where the huge bunch of MIT kids went for dinner when I saw Mike coming down the street. So I had a nice Korean BBQ dinner with them where they basically took up the entire restaurant. The restaurant stayed open late for them because their flight was late.

The next day, they went on tours and I went around Seoul on my own. I was pretty lazy and didn't managed to get up until 10am. This is happens every time I travel on my own. I had a nice breakfast at a cafe across the street that roasts their own coffee. You can basically expect free wifi at every cafe.

Then I took the subway near this big park where the N Seoul Tower is. There is a cable car where you can take it to the top of the hill where the tower is located. But the cable car is kind of big and it didn't seem like you would have very good views if you were crammed in with other people. There weren't a lot of people when I went but I chose to hike up instead. There are many very well kept trails within the park. Many of them have concrete and stone stairs. Trees and flowers are starting to bloom.

View of the city:

N Seoul Tower:

Art pieces using cans and other recyclable material:

On the way down I took a small trail and it took me forever to find the nearest subway station after getting out of the park.

I was pretty tired after walking around all day and got back to the hotel just as the MIT gang was leaving for dinner. I found dinner around the area and read a book for the rest of the night.