Hiroshima

Sunday, May 29

This day began early as we had a nearly 6-hour train ride from Tokyo to Hiroshima. Experiencing the Shinkansen for the first time was something that I’d really been looking forward to. You hear a lot about the bullet trains: how fast they can go, how smooth the ride is, etc. It was everything I expected. The ride was long, but very relaxing. Also, we finally go to see Mt. Fuji! Albeit, far in the distance and mostly obscured by cloud cover. 

Once we arrived in Hiroshima, the rain still hadn’t let up. Luckily we bought umbrellas earlier in the week, because well, it rains a lot in Japan. It turned out that the rain was sort of fitting for somber mood of the day we’d have, because after we arrived, we visited the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum. Here we experienced an in-depth walking tour all over the surrounding park, visiting some of the very few locations that managed to survive the atomic bombing. Our English-speaking tour guide showed us how the bomb still impacts life in Hiroshima. 

One of the things that stood out to me the most was the fact that none of the plant life was older than ~70 years. So many trees and everything that makes up the beauty of the city today had to be entirely reconstructed. We ended the tour back at the museum where we were able to look around the indoor exhibits and learn more about the immediate aftermath of the bomb. As an American, it’s always something about our history that you learn about, but to see everything first hand was very powerful and unforgettable. I really loved the perspective that the Museum has on it, because it’s very forward-thinking. War is a horrible thing and it’s very hard to point fingers and lay blame. Dwelling on the past is dangerous, so the Museum’s goal in educating visitors and preserving the city’s history is to make sure that nothing that devastating and unthinkable ever happens again.

After leaving the Museum, we spent the rest of the night walking around and exploring modern Hiroshima, reflecting on everything we’d learned. We visited shops and had okonomiyaki for dinner, which was my absolute favorite new Japanese food I tried so far. It’s sort of like a savory pancake covered in all sorts of meats, veggies, and other toppings, then grilled. I need to find somewhere back home where I can get one, because they were amazing.

Our night was quiet and relaxing as we made our way back to the ryokan where we were staying. Tomorrow we leave early as our very short stay in Hiroshima comes to a close.

Kamakura

Saturday, May 28

So this was the day that we were originally going to have to freely explore Tokyo, but the students of Rikkyo had other plans for us which turned out to be way more fun than anything we could’ve thought up. We’d briefly explored what they wanted to do with us on Thursday, but I was sort of burnt out by that point so I was only half paying attention while they were planning in rapid-speech Japanese that I could only barely keep up with on a good day. It turned out that we were visiting Kamakura, little tourist villages with big shrines and torii gates. We’d met up with one student outside our hotel who led us to the others by way of a few trains. After taking some pictures in a goofy photobooth, then half of us missing the train to Kamakura, it was a hilariously disastrous start to the day. It was actually kind of nice though because it gave us some time to get to know the students that also got stuck waiting with us for the next train.

Over the course of the day, I got to at least have some 1-on-1 conversations with almost all of the students. At varying degrees of English and Japanese on both sides, it was mostly shared laughter and shared experiences that transcended the language barrier. The shrines at Kamakura and Enoshima were beautiful and the green mountains surrounding the areas felt surprisingly like the movies and stories I’ve grown up watching about Japan. We had dinner with the students at a little restaurant on Enoshima and learned more about each other over the course of the day. I learned a lot of new words today, probably the most of the whole trip. I guess that happens when you are trying to get to know people who you only kinda share a language with. Overall it was a really incredible experience and I feel grateful that they took the time to bring us out there and share their Saturday with us. I don’t think I would have been so hospitable as a 19-20 year old, but these guys were so patient and thoughtful with us. I’m just really thankful for the opportunity to get to know some new friends in such a fun, casual atmosphere. I hope I can keep in contact with at least some of them for a long time. We even have plans to meet back up when I return to Tokyo after the program ends and explore some more neighborhoods. I’m really looking forward to more adventures after I get back!

Meanwhile, after we all departed, Owen and Andrew and I decided that, with our last night together in Tokyo we wanted to make a trip out to the Akihabara neighborhood. This is a pretty well-known area as it’s a kind of nerd mecca. Akihabara, or Akiba for short, is full of 7-8 story arcades, anime and video game shops, pachinko palaces, and all manner of other strangeness. Sadly, we only had a few short hours to explore since everything seemed to close up around midnight and the trains would stop running shortly thereafter. We still managed to find plenty of sensory-overload to indulge in and enjoyed a quiet train ride home late at night. Tomorrow we leave early for Hiroshima on the Shinkansen bullet train. I understand it’s going to rain…

Odaiba

Friday, May 27

Today started with a trip to Odaiba, a man-made island in Tokyo and popular tourist destination. After talking with the students the day before, I formed some expectations of what this area was supposed to be like but I was surprised to find out that it was much different than what I’d conceived. The area had a sort of industrial feel to it, much more open than the compact, busy areas of Tokyo we’d explored already. Our first destination was Sona Area, a “Disaster Prevention Experience-Learning Facility”. We were physically walked through the steps of surviving the first 72 hours of an earthquake. This is the most crucial time to survive until help finds its way to you. After 72 hours, chances of survival drop dramatically, but within the first three days, if you can take care of yourself, you are more likely to be found alive. We learned how to re-use common trash and recycling for first-aid and other survival uses. All of it was really useful, life-saving information that could apply to any sort of disaster, not just earthquakes. It was really interesting to explore the very real possibilities of natural disaster and prepare for what kinds of courses of action we’d need to take in a serious emergency.

After the Disaster Prevention center, we stopped for some lunch at a mall food court, then made our way over to the Miraikan, the Future Museum. This place was really cool and had a number of fun interactive exhibits demonstrating cutting edge research and technology. They focused a lot on questions and helping make the world better through science and knowledge. We got to see a demonstration of the robot Asimo who’s pretty famous online for falling down stairs a lot. He didn’t fall down and was actually pretty impressive. It was a cool place to conceptualize which kinds of tech might become the new standard in the near-future world and how our world will change with these kinds of developments.

We walked from Miraikan over to a pretty famous giant Gundam statue and took pictures. Then we walked past the gorgeous FujiTV building and I felt the urge to run up the huge flight of the stairs. So I did and it was great. It turned to that there was a One Piece themed restaurant at the top. Only a few of us went up so we couldn’t stay but it seemed like a pretty cool place, if a bit touristy. But that’s one of the things I’ve noticed so far here. Even the touristy places actually seem fun and interesting in their own way.

After taking the train out of Odaiba, we stopped by the Ginza neighborhood because Owen, one of our group members, wanted to stop by a really fancy pen and stationary store called Itoya. Immediately it was clear that this was a high-class shopping district. We looked around the store but eventually left Owen to his own devices since the rest of us just had a casual interest in the products. We had some delicious desserts at a nearby café while we waited and wound down from another busy day. After we returned to Ikebukuro, we stopped by the Pokemon Mega Center shortly before they closed. This was one of my big indulgences since I’m a huge nerd, but it was really cool and totally worth going. I’ve always loved those stupid monsters so it was a nice thing to check off the list. Plus I got some cool toys to remember it by.

Exploring Tokyo

Thursday, May 26

These first few days in Tokyo have been quite a whirlwind so I'm going to try to cover everything that's happened so far in this initial post. So. I'm in Japan! I honestly never really expected this to happen. I've quite literally had recurring dreams of coming here, but it seemed like such a distant possibility. Luckily, this trip came at the right time and here I am.

We arrived Wednesday afternoon after flying for a combined 14 hours and an International Date Line transition. My travel partner, Monique, and I were pretty burnt out when we arrived in Ikebukuro, but that didn't stop us from joining the rest of our group for a huge meal at an izakaya 居酒屋. These are basically bar/restaurants that serve a ton of small plates of various different foods that you can share with your group while chatting and drinking. Here we learned that there's a distinction that you make when ordering between the words for water and cold sake. They're quite similar, おひや for water and ひや for cold sake. 水 is also acceptable for ordering water and is preferred pretty much anywhere else　outside of the izakaya. We tried a ton of different foods. Many of which were fish based things that I expected to dislike but were actually quite delicious. Afterwards, we called it an early night since the majority of our group were all pretty jet-lagged.

Speaking of our group, there's five students here in total, and, of course, Takahashi-sensei leading and teaching us along the way. Everyone is really fun and interested in very different things. It been nice so far to have such a varied group of people because we each contribute important roles to our little travel group. Together we manage to explore and adventure on our own without any troubles. As we get more accustomed to the country and the layout of the cities, I could see us maybe splitting up a bit just to cover more ground, but so far I've really enjoyed everyone's company and the process of learning about each of these people who have come so far with me.

The second day we all met up in the morning at the small Cafe Sakura across the road from our hotel. We get breakfast there as part of our hotel package and it's light but filling enough, usually coffee and some of the most perfect, flawlessly cut slices of toast I've ever seen. From here, we walked over to the Rikkyo University campus where we were going to sit in on an economics class taught by Takahashi-sensei's friend and old college roommate. We were given a tour of the campus first. As we walked down, I noted a lot of similarities between UWM. Everything here is smaller, more compact, but they fit roughly the same number of students within the campus. We learned about some of the clever modifications made to the old buildings to help prevent damage from earthquakes, a very real and prevalent threat in this country.

After the tour we sat down with the Professor and took a brief crash-course in international economic/business theory. He taught us the SWOT analysis tool for assessing whether or not a product or service would be transferable across cultures and societies. This stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats. We were tasked with identifying one product or service that was popular in either America or Japan, but not the other, and brainstorming some ways to repackage it in a way to expand the market. Each of the American students were teamed up with three to four Japanese students to come up with ideas and make a presentation. It was fun getting to know other college students and also seeing how they view their culture and know which marketing techniques might work or fail. Ultimately, it was a short exercise but we got a good view of some of the strong differences and various unique elements of pitching to a Japanese market versus an American one.

Once the class wrapped up, we spent some time planning with a few of the Rikkyo students about what to do with our remaining days in Tokyo. They gave us suggestions for our Friday trip to Odaiba and also laid out some plans for where they want to take us on Saturday. I think our group was a little overwhelmed at that point so we were just absorbing all the things they presented to us. Personally, I don't have a lot of specific things I want to do, I just want to see as much as I can and get as broad of a scope as possible on all the things Japan has to offer. As such, I'm fine with following the local students' lead. If they think we should do something, I'm sure I'll find it interesting. Everything here is new and different so I just spend a lot of time soaking it all in, trying to process it all.

I forgot to mention, during our lunch break we went to a delicious, yet tiny, ramen shop called 油そば. We had to wait to enter as there were only about eight seats in total and it was a busy lunch rush, but it was so worth it. One of the most delicious meals I've had here so far. After this we took a quick trip into an earthquake simulator. Maybe not such a good idea after lunch, but we were pressed for time. Here we were all seated around a table and when the earthquake started we had to duck under and hold on for dear life. It was kinda fun to be perfectly honest. I mean, I understand the gravity of the earthquake threat and I'm quite sure in real life, it would be a lot more terrifying. But all that being said, I like when the things we take for granted are shifted and we're forced to look at things in a different way and there's nothing we take for granted more than the ground beneath our feet. I thought this was a really interesting and cool experience, but I still would rather not have to live through it for real.

The rest of this day was open for exploration around Ikebukuro. We spent a great deal of time ascending the nine or ten floors of the Tokyu Hands department store. Space is extremely limited in Tokyo so everything is built upwards. Each floor of this store was devoted to different categories like any kind of department store in American, but the levels of depth in the specific kinds of gadgets and tools were mind-blowing. We easily spent nearly two hours in here and could've spent more but we needed to go get some food. One of our group goals was to find a cat cafe since we'd all heard a lot about them beforehand. Luckily there was one very close to Tokyu Hands so we stopped in to see what it was like. It was partially exactly what I expected, cats and tea and lounging, but it was surprisingly relaxing. The atmosphere we extremely laid-back and I think it was a much needed decompression from such a long day of over-stimulation. After the cafe and stopping for some とんかつ at a corner restaurant, we headed back to the hotel.

Each day has been a wild adventure and I expect a lot more to happen as we progress. There's so much to cram into each day so I'm pretty excited to see where we go from here. Again, I'm still just trying to get my bearings so everything is kind of a blur right now. We're swept up in so many new things that I can only share my immediate reactions and descriptions of the events. As we learn and see more and we can reflect on each experience, I hope to better understand these people, their culture, what this all means to me personally.