Tag: Train

day nine: bits and bobs

today wasn’t really all that eventful. like, sure we did things, but it also somehow felt like we did nothing. maybe it’s because i didn’t have that good of a night’s sleep, and also like an idiot had forgotten to eat like all day. so i was also probably kind of hangry too tbh.

nevertheless i decided to utilize my last morning in kyoto by sleeping in. that’s right. i don’t think i woke up until like 11. i took my time getting ready, i finished packing, and began to map out what the upcoming week would look like. we headed to the station and began the two and half hour shinkansen ride to akihabara.

i managed to snag a window seat and took a bunch of cool photos of the countryside and various towns and cities. once we arrived at the station our hotel was literally a thirty second walk, it was awesome. by the time we got checked in we had an hour to kill so i think this is where things kind of went a bit downhill. i was exhausted so i decided to nap, except i couldn’t actually fall asleep so i was essentially just tired and horizontal.

then we were summoned to the lobby so we could all head as a group to mandarake, a really cool old manga and other types of media store. i went off on my own and managed to snag romance dawn, which is the first volume of one piece, as well as a book with snoopy comics. then we left for super potato which had a bunch of retro video games. i didn’t buy anything, but it was super cool to see all the old stuff they had. there were things for every nintendo console, every playstation console, games, merch, add-ons, there was everything.

after that though we were free to do whatever, so me, jess, and jas decided to do the most sane thing one could do in our shoes, and go to a maid cafe. and not just any maid cafe, a catgirl maid cafe. it was… an experience. if we wanted to order, we couldn’t say “excuse me.” no, we had to go “meow meow.” we also had to wear cat ears during the duration of our meal. jess got this really cool drink that came with a face so you could take pictures with it.

the food itself was actually pretty good, i had beef curry and rice. classic. you really can’t go wrong with that tbh. but after we finished eating, it was time for dessert. jess got this chocolate ice cream parfait thing, whereas me and jas shared a bubblegum flavored unicorn parfait. and it was not that good. it’s okay though, because in order to make up for it the three of us got to take a polaroid picture WITH one of the catgirl maids! it was awesome.

after that we went back to the hotel where i promptly went to my room to pass out. it was probably one of my least favorite days i’ve had so far, but that’s not to say that i didn’t enjoy it at all. there were genuinely moments where i was having a good time, like the train ride and dinner, but i think just overall i was having an off day. tomorrow’s our free day though, so i have high hopes!

day eight: gameJAM pt. ii and osaka

the end of the gamejam was a mad dash of last minute additions and changes that i can’t even remember everything. kiri and takato were stressed until the very end, and honestly me, cam, and jas, were just happy that we finished. i was a bit disappointed that my ui didn’t look as good as i wanted it to, and i could tell that cam wasn’t necessarily all that happy either, though jas seemed to be having a good time. takato and kiri were clearly unhappy at how it turned out, but i’m glad we got to spend that time with them.

we got to see everyone’s games and they were all so cool and unique. i really liked group one’s where you had to beat a fusion of godzilla and big foot using one player that could switch between eastern and western superhero identities. i also really liked group five’s (i think? it might have been group three) game where you had to take the customer’s order in your native language, but had to actually make their order in the language you were trying to learn. everyone had such different ideas that tackled the them of bridging the gaps of culture.

once we took our pictures and said our goodbye’s, a large group of us headed off to osaka. it was a thirty minute shinkansen ride, so before we knew it we were there! we immediately embarked on our quest to this mall, because it had several shops all on one floor for all of us to weeb out at. for me, that was the one piece store.

i went in all starry-eyed and amazed as if i was in heaven, similar to a toddler in toys r us (rip ✊?) around christmas time. it was magical. needless to say i spent several thousand yen here, and i hadn’t even been to the other stores yet. next up was the nintendo store where i exhibited some restraint and didn’t buy anything. however that restraint was all but thrown out the window when i got to the pokemon center. what? i bought a chouchou plushy from the one piece store and he was lonely, so i bought a ditto plushy as a friend. i had to.

me, belle, skyler, and jess got dinner at an italian place, and their four cheese pasta was alright. like it definitely could have been worse, but it also wouldn’t have been that hard to make it better either. after that though we headed to the shinkansen station so we could take the train back to kyoto.

deciding to not let the party end there when we got back to the hotel most of us decided to hang out and play some jackbox, while also sipping on some beverages(those of us that were legal, that is). it’s hard to say which i preferred between friday and today, but they both definitely give the other a run for its money.

i look forward to tomorrow because i actually get to sleep in oh my GOD. it’ll be a travel day, so not too much on the agenda, and after the brutal nonstop pace of kyoto i can’t wait to have more breathing room in akihabara.

day five: hiroshima

today was a lot both mentally and physically. mostly mentally, though. wow what a day. it started out with a two hour shinkansen to hiroshima. it was pretty cramped because i was sat in the reversible section facing cam, megan, and fabian. but the company was companionable and i enjoyed chatting with them.

when we actually got to hiroshima we went to a little center to get lunch. i got gyoza and rice which was really good. then we headed to the a-bomb dome. it was really surreal to see, especially considering how close to the epicenter of the blast it was. it was so close, within 600 meters, and yet there it stood still relatively intact. once we soaked that in it was time to go into the peace museum.

wow.

it was heavy. really, really heavy. reading the letters that parents wrote to their children, or older siblings to their younger siblings made me cry. they were such mundane letters, people expressing love and a wish to see each other soon, and yet it’s the knowledge of knowing that they never got to meet again. it’s such a tragedy, and seeing the horrors and atrocities that these people had to live through —less than eighty years ago, mind you— is insane. the suffering they had to endure, not only during the bombing itself, but for decades afterwards too is just-. i really can’t put it into words. and the fact that the u.s. decided to drop another bomb on nagasaki too??? horrific.

it’s weird to say that i ‘enjoyed’ the museum, because there definitely wasn’t joy involved per se. but it was an experience i’m glad i did, and it genuinely did make me stop and reconsider things. it offered pieces of history that i wasn’t even aware of, as well as modern history. i didn’t know that biden had been doing nuclear tests, but apparently the mayor of hiroshima wrote an official letter and implored him to rethink things, so that the atrocities that were seen in japan were never recreated elsewhere.

on a more lighthearted note though, following dinner me, belle, liam, esther, brody, vincent, megan, and skyler all went to the pokemon center. i managed to snag a really cool mug that had a bunch of dark types on it, as well as stickers of ditto and magikarp, a small dewott plushy, and a relatively large dragonite plushy for my older brother. but time was quickly running out and we didn’t have enough time to get a cab back to the station so all of us had to absolutely haul. ass. to get back the shinkansen station on time. it was rough not gonna lie, but so incredibly worth it.

the train ride back was a quiet one as we all kept to ourselves. i mostly reflected on the day’s events, and listened to my music. overall i did have a good day, but like i said by the end of the day i was both mentally and physically exhausted. tomorrow should be fun though since it’s our free day, and i can finally start spending a bunch of money!

day two: electric boogaloo

i started day two off on a much better foot than day one, not only had i gotten nearly 12 hours of sleep, but we had free time to do essentially whatever we wanted. so after hitting up the 7/11 for breakfast with katherine, checking out and storing our luggage, it was off to the races! a big group of us —jess, belle, liam, skyler, cam, megan, and i— went to the aquarium which was conveniently attached to the hotel.

once we got inside a few of us went on a pirate ship ride, which was pretty fun all things considered. after that though is when we really started looking around. there were so many cool fish to see; i really liked the ones that could camouflage to look like coral, the fluorescent ones, and the silly looking guys. after the tiny little fish we went to the jellyfish room, and i felt kind of bad for them since the tank was so small, but they looked really cool. especially because there was blue, pink, and green lighting that highlighted the jellyfish pretty nicely.

after the jellyfish exhibit we moved on to the larger sea creatures, like sawfish, leopard sharks, stingray’s, and a bunch more that i don’t even know the name for. and for some awesome reason they also had capybara’s which was actually sick. following that was an otter show which was potentially one of the cutest things i’ve ever seen. he did so many cool tricks and listened to his instructions so well!!

once we were done with the aquarium it was time to meet up with everyone and head to the bullet train so we could travel down to kyoto. the train ride was nice because i got to chat with those around me —jas, cam, megan, fabian, and jess— and also enjoy looking out at the scenery we passed by.

when we arrived in kyoto it was time for dinner, and i was pretty excited going into it. i knew that they were probably going to serve things that were outside of my comfort zone, but i was willing to give things a go. the first plate they brought out was… interesting. there was tiny raw squid, fish, collared greens, vegetables, and beef. i’m proud of myself because i ate both of the raw squids, but the best thing on the plate in my opinion was the beef. after that was raw fish, and i gotta be real, i am not a raw fish fan. next up was pork and vegetable hot pot, which was probably my favorite thing the whole night. following the hot pot was a salad which was standard, i enjoyed it. after that was shrimp that were in some sort of fried batter, and that was pretty good too. next up was this tofu gelatin thing?? i’m honestly not too sure, and frankly the texture was just not it. we had sushi after that, and since i’m not really a raw fish person, i wasn’t too keen on that either.

all in all it was a really solid day. i had fun hanging out with everyone, and despite the fact that dinner was touch-and-go, i still really enjoyed it. kyoto has very cool architecture from what i’ve seen so far, and i’m excited to go on the bus tour tomorrow!

Day 9

For the free day in Tokyo, I traveled solo to Shibuya to see the Hachiko memorial statue and the famous Shibuya scramble crossing. I remember reading the heartwarming book Hachiko when I was around 10 in school. At the end I found out that there was a statue of the loyal dog in Japan at the station he would wait at for his owner after he left for work. His owner ended up passing while at work and never came back; so the dog never left. After reading about it, I always wanted to get to see it in real life.

Another place on my Japan bucket list was Shibuya crossing. I’ve gotten to see it in so many different movies and television shows. Fortunately for me, it was right next to the Hachiko memorial statue. Right at the crossing’s peak, it has up to 3,000 people crossing at once. I got to cross it and got to see a birds eye view of the crossing.

Afterwards I walked thirty minutes to get to the Gotokuji temple, known for holding hundreds of lucky cat figures. I knew heading into the country, I wanted to buy one of these figures as well as one for my friend. It was almost overwhelming seeing all of the figures and I enjoyed finding hidden figures that other people left.

Food in Day 8: Traveling Back to Tokyo

After waking up early to pack all of my things, Maddy and I went downstairs to have breakfast before the long train ride back to Tokyo. On the train ride, I wrote as much on my blogs as my stomach could handle before taking a nap while listening to music. After getting to Tokyo and dropping off our bags in our hotel in Akihabara, we speed ran as many floors of Mandarake as possible, went to Super Potato to look at their retro games, and looked around Animate before having dinner and going to sleep.

For my last breakfast at the hotel, I was given toast with prosciutto, spinach, tomato, and parmesan. Although I was not a big fan of how hard the crust was, the rest of the toast was delectable. I also grabbed more fried fish because I’ve enjoyed all of the fried fish I’ve had here along with some egg, another croissant, some mushrooms, and yogurt with soybeans and brown sugar. I also got another glass of apple juice because I cannot resist its call.

After our long train ride, Maddy, Brody, Vincent and I went to a food court near the hotel and got some ramen. I got ramen with shrimp tempura in it because I love ramen and I love shrimp tempura, and I have already had the two together, so why not get it again?

For dinner, we decided to go to a sushi restaurant that Toshi recommended to us. I got this rice combination bowl with various different things in it so I could try a little bit of everything. It was absolutely delicious, and I would definitely recommend going there if you like sushi.

Tomorrow is our last free day on the trip, so let’s make the most of it!

The Way Home :)

June 3rd: Finally it’s time to go home. Liam and I were on the same flight so we planned the whole day out. We both checked out around 10:30am and left our luggage at the hotel for a bit to do some final shopping.

We went to BookOff first where Liam got a book for his Mom and I found 2 DS games ( Pokémon Mystery Dungeon Explorers Of Time/Darkness) for like 990 yen!!! In the US these games are worth like $300. Since I’ve come home I have played them and I realized DS games don’t have language options so the whole game is in Japanese… the summer of immersion!


After BookOff we walked to 2 other stores where Liam was looking for gifts. We ended up walking to Ueno and walking through a popular street so that was cool! After shopping it was about 12 and we took the train back to Akihabara. This is where we found out our JR passes as well weren’t working through the scanner.


We also saw some ads for the new Spiderverse movie on the trains! We grabbed our luggage and headed back to the station to head to Narita airport. We took the train to Nippori then transferred to the Skyliner straight to Narita Airport. It was about an hour train ride.

Once we arrived at the airport we took a walk around. This airport is crazy it’s like a mall plus an airport. We saw a Marvel pop up store, Lego store, Gucci, Versace, Chanel, and many other high end stores plus souvenir stores. We went to McDonalds for our last meal in Japan. I got some nuggets and Liam got a shrimp burger.

After eating, we attempted to find where security and bag check was. I was nervous because of my tax free goods but it ended up not mattering in the long run. We checked out bags, saw some Pokémon, went through security ( which was very relaxed compared to the rush in the US with shoes and putting things in Bins), and looked for our gate.

On the way to our gate we saw a store with Pokémon merch, Ghibli merch, some gunpla, and souvenirs. I had some extra yen so I got some sake KitKats, a magnet for my parents, a snow globe for my grandmother, and a crystal puzzle of JiJi from KiKi’s delivery service! We also stopped by a vending machine to get so much apple juice before leaving the country.


We sat at the gate for about an hour before boarding the plane. We were lucky that the storm was south of Narita so we had no delays. I was surprised that the bathroom in the airport ( I only know the women’s room) had a little holder in the stall for a baby and a sink with handrails. It was really interesting to see that.

We got on the plane and while Liam and I weren’t next to each other, we were the same row at least. The flight was about 12 hours so we got a couple meals. Most of the flight I watched movies like Le Mis, Soul, and Spiderverse. Meal 1 was some chicken and rice with chocolate chip mochi as a dessert. I skipped the middle meal as I was trying to nap, and breakfast was an omelet with tomato sauce, a sausage, and hashbrown. Meals were overall ok.

We landed in the states to see Newark NJ, what a grey city. We deplaned and headed to customs with took FOREVER. I don’t understand how you can have 9 booths to move people through and only have 3 open for a couple planes worth of people. It took probably an hour to get through customs and to get our bags. It was about 5pm EST and we left Japan at 5pm JST which was fun.

Liam and I split at baggage check as my parents were in the airport looking for me. I grabbed my bags ( all safe and sound ) and headed to meet my parents. I gave them a hug and we headed back to my hometown.

I got home, had a pork roll and egg on an English muffin, took a quick shower, and passed out. Since then my sleep schedule has been messed up and I’ve been trying to fix it. I’ve also been telling stories of my trip to my friends and parents.

Overall this trip has been a life changing experience for me and I’m so happy to have been able to experience everything with a fantastic group of people. I will always look back on this trip with pride, joy, and happiness. It has even inspired me to apply to the Fullbright program and have to chance to live in Japan for 10 months for research.

Thank you everyone for making this trip amazing. Love you all!!!

Day 7/8

Day 7 was the remaining part of the game jam and I stuck with my new group. We worked on adding the audio, the art, and backgrounds, as well as bug fixing when we got lunch. During lunch, I wanted to try adding a boss attack. So within the last 30 minutes, I started and finished adding fireballs to our game so the boss can attack the player.

Then we had two industry professionals review our games. One had started his own studio, and the other worked in the education outreach division of Epic – the makers of Unreal Engine. They seemed to think our game Hero Duo was funny – which was the goal, but gave a critique on our lack of player feedback; particularly when the player gets hit.

The next day, we took the bullet train back to Tokyo. I still think the bullet train is so cool, how it uses magnets to make the train as frictionless as possible. Although I’m bummed I wasn’t able to see Mt. Fuji due to the clouds. We went shopping for a while at some second-hand stores (although I mostly remained in the video game sections) before getting ramen – for the first time – and heading back to the hotel.

Embarking to the Tokyo Continent

Right outside of our hotel in Akihabara, Toko

Today was the day we said by to Kyoto and bullet trained back to Tokyo. It was really sad leaving Kyoto because we did so much there together, but I was reallly excited for Tokyo. We bussed to the train station in the morning and then rode the bullet train for about 2.5 hrs to Akihabara. After getting there we walked literally 30 seconds to our hotel, which was connected to the train station. This hotel was located in the perfect spot possible. There were so many cool places right next to it. We had a little bit to set our things down and eat before we met up outside the hotel to go to Mandarake, a second-hand anime/games/comics/manga/NSFW store, and Super Potato, a retro games store. Both of these stores were really cool. Mandarake was a bit overwhelming and we didn’t have all that much time in there, but I wish I had gone back later because it was super cool. One of the floors had straight up hentai though which was a bit odd.

Super Potato was also sick and had lots of cool little nick nacks, not to mention the immense amount of old games. I bought lots of candy there. After Super Potato we were pretty much free to do whatever for the day, so I went shopping with some others. I got some really cool HxH figures I had never seen before at this small little figure store next to Super Potato. After that we looked up the best anime stores nearby and decided on a place called Animate. It was like a 5 minute walk and was absolutely loaded with stuff, but not stuff I really wanted. It was really interesting because they didn’t have any figures or shirts really, but a lot of anime school supplies, stickers, and keychains. Unfortunately there was ZERO AoT merch, which I still can’t wrap my head around.

After Animate we went to this really cool store called Volks Hobby Shop, which did have figures. There was some really cool stuff there, even though most of it was outside my price range for a single statue. I did find this really unique figure series for Jujutsu Kaisen, and ended up getting the Sukuna one. They were like old button-eyed doll versions of all the characters, detailed with stitches and everything. I also got a funny Gojo figure sitting in a chair, he looks stupid :). After shopping we dumped our stuff at the hotel, chilled for like an hour, and then went to this sushi place that Toshi-sensei recommended. It was soooo good. I got some grilled fish, octopus, scallops, and fried diced squid. One of my favorite meals of the trip to be honest.

Gojo being stupid and dumb

Game Jam… but day 2! Plus Osaka!!!

For day 2 of the game jam, I work up at a decent time and grabbed some breakfast. Got my carbs for the day. After eating, the RIT students packed onto the bus and headed to KCG. For the final day of the jam we only had 3 more hours of work. I was done with my portion for the jam and helped Fabian with GitHub stuff. We did some pair git hub work and finished out our side of the project. Around noon we had omurice for lunch! Omurice is a Japanese dish that has typically fried rice topped with an omelet and maybe curry sauce. It was quite yummy in my tummy.

Once our 3 hours of time was up, we did presentations of our games. I think everyone did really well and a lot of interesting ideas came out of the theme. To reiterate, the theme was collaboration across cultures. Our game was about 2 aliens that meet on a deserted planet and had to work together to survive. One character was strong and one was smart. It was a 2D coop puzzle game.

Once our presentations ended everyone got a big round of applause and we cleaned up. After some time of socializing with the students and eating snacks, we left KCG. We didn’t have a bus back to our hotel so we had to figure that part out. We took the weirdest way to our hotel through many trains and stops. Thanks to Toshi sensei for dealing with us!

After having some time to relax, a large group of us went to Osaka! Osaka is another large city about 30 minutes by bullet train from Kyoto. We walked to Kyoto station, got out tickets, and headed to Osaka. Our plan was to go to all the character shops in this mall since it had a Pokémon center, nintendo store, capcom store, one piece store, etc etc. Osaka was described to us as the closest to NYC that Japan can get. It was weird but if you removed all the Japanese from signs and told me I was in NYC I’d believe you. However, there was this really pretty building with greenery.

Across that little bridge was this giant mall that had all our stores on the 13th floor. Once we got up there it was insanity. Literally crazy. I went to the Nintendo Store first and got some Kirby merch and some Zelda candy. They had some really cool statues in the store though!


After walking around like a bewildered child, I checked out the Pokémon center! This must be a new one cause the statue was of the new legendaries in the series. I didn’t plan on getting anything but I found these really cute stickers and they had pins of my favorite Pokémon so I had to.

I checked out and the gang walked around for a bit waiting for all of us to quench the thirst for merchandise. We gathered everyone and split up again for food! I wasn’t super hungry so I opted for a fancy cake. I was so excited to eat it but they didn’t give me any utensils and I couldn’t find them anywhere. So I sadly had to carry my delicious snack home to wait.
While waiting for people, I did get this eclair knockoff from 7-11. It was the size of a breadstick that had a chocolate covering and a single bit of whipped cream inside. 6/10 tasted like an ok Swiss roll.

After everyone finished eating we headed back to Osaka main station to head home for our last night in Kyoto. We got on the bullet train and headed back. The ride was once again uneventful.

We got off the train and walked to a family mart so I could buy an ice cream to get a wooden spoon to use for my dessert that I still have not eaten. I got my wooden spoon and we went to the hotel to pack then hang out. I also ate my dessert! It was really really yummy. It was like a tiramisu layered cake. It had a lot of cocoa powder on top though. 8/10


As a greater group, we decided to get some sake and have all of us ( who are legal to) have a shot and try it. We’re in Japan anyway! Honestly it wasn’t too bad in my opinion, kinda good actually.

we played some games and around 1 we all went to sleep to get ready for the next days adventure.

That’s about it for this one but I’ll catch ya soon! Bye bye!