Japan: a trip of a lifetime!
Mike Kraft is a former sports journalist and member of The Emilee Connection- Adult Eating Disorder Support Group. He is intelligent, witty, kind, and determined. Mike’s talents and attributes shine through and enlighten us as he openly shares reflections about his journey with Anorexia. Mike can be reached at: mkraft418@gmail.com
Since I was a small child, I have been fascinated by two locations. The first such location is Toronto, Ontario, Canada. I’ve always been obsessed with skyscrapers because I’m always fascinated by how buildings that tall could ever be constructed. So growing up, the tallest building in the world was the CN Tower in Toronto. Being just north of the border, my family and I would visit Toronto every few years, and every trip included a trip up the world’s tallest building to see the view from 1,815 feet in the air. Even though the CN Tower no longer holds the distinction as the world’s tallest building, it still is No. 1 in my heart.
I crossed off visiting Toronto and the CN Tower on my bucket list probably close to two decades ago. Being from New York, it’s quite easy to travel over the border. All one needed was an enhanced form of ID that took the place of a passport. Much less paperwork to fill out and much less time waiting for documentation. So that was not a difficult item to accomplish.
However, the other such location was much more complicated to visit. It requires a passport, roughly 15 hours of flight time, a language barrier to overcome and a completely different culture from that in America. That location is Japan – the home of the rising sun. It’s not just a single city of Japan that intrigues me; it’s the entire island nation. It may have started from my interest in video games and animation, but my love for the country grew as a learned more about their traditions and culture. Every country is different, but America and Japan just seem like two different planets.
I’ve always viewed a trip to Japan as more of a pipe dream than an actual reality. And for the longest time, it was just a pipe dream. For years I was not healthy enough to be able to keep up with a place like Japan. The country demands a healthy body from the amount of walking and stair climbing that is required to get around the area. My dad would dangle the prize of a trip to Japan in front of my nose if I were to get to a point where I was healthy enough to make the trip a reality. But anytime I would show some promise, I’d quickly revert back to old ways and I’d never get myself to the point where I could go. The only time I was healthy enough was right at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic where all international travel was grounded.
But this year was finally the year. We started talking about making plans for the trip in March, and by the end of June we were there. But a lot went on during those three months of preparation. We applied for our passports at the end of February and received them with plenty of time to spare in April. We didn’t go through a travel agent but thankfully some of our more travel-experienced family members wanted to come with us. My uncle loves to make itineraries, so we told him some of the places we wanted to see, and he built the schedule around that which made the most logistical sense. He researched the best methods of travel to take and how to go about purchasing them and my aunt scoured the Internet finding the best hotels in the area. In the end we settled on Tokyo, Hakone, Nagoya and Osaka as our travel hubs, with day trips to places like Ikebukuro, Hiroshima, Nagakute, Kanagawa and Yokohama to fill out our two-week calendar.
The only downside to the trip were the flights. They were long. The longest flight I’ve ever been on was to Seattle, and that was only about six hours. The travel time to Japan was about 15 hours. You can only play so many games on your Nintendo Switch or watch so many movies before you’re just staring blankly into space just wishing you were there already.
Everything else was incredible. I mainly wanted to experience modern Japan, but we also sprinkled in some more traditional Japan. There are experiences that you can only experience in Japan. Several come to mind. The first was in Hakone, where we stayed one night at a traditional hotel where you take your shoes off outside the door and you sleep on futons on the ground and have tea at a table that only sits as high as your shins. There was also a private hot spring where you bathed naked.
Other such unique experiences were more on the modern side with trips to TeamLab Tokyo, Studio Ghibli Park and the Gundam Factory. The best way to describe TeamLab Tokyo is an immersive experience that encompasses most of the five senses. You walk through knee-deep water as light illuminates the water to create an image of aquatic life swimming all around you. There is a room where the ground is nothing but bean bags that you have to maneuver from entrance to exit. There is a room where you lay down and watch as lights in the form of flowers surround you. And there is a room filled with hanging flowers that create a 3D experience. I’ve never experienced anything like it. The same can be said about Studio Ghibli Park, an amusement park dedicated to one of the most popular animation studios in Japan. It is full of nods and photo ops from some of the most iconic scenes from all of their movies. Studio Ghibli Park only exists in Japan. Also exclusive to Japan is a 60-foot robot in Yokohama that comes to life in front of your eyes. The Gundam is housed at the Gundam Factory, where fans of giant robots can also visit the Gundam museum where you can see how the large mech was constructed, from conception to the final tightened bolt.
Shrines and temples are scattered across the country, and it would take a lifetime to visit them all. There are around 100,000 Shinto shrines and 80,000 Buddhism temples across Japan. We obviously didn’t even scratch the surface, but we tried to see as many as we could. We even got lost in the woods for close to an hour looking for the Great Buddha Statue while in Hakone. Each shrine and temple are unique. Many of the temples offer history lessons on ancient Japan. Not a temple or a shrine, but the Osaka Castle devotes seven floors to telling the history of ancient Japan during the Tokugawa shogunate era. History lessons can be found in every city, including Hiroshima where we visited the Atomic Bomb Dome – the epicenter for the atomic bomb that the United States dropped on the area during World War II – and the Peace Memorial Museum, which was filled with stories and displays from Hiroshima from the months and years following the bombing.
There were no lowlights on this trip, but plenty of highlights. I could probably write a book on my two weeks in Japan, but the best experience I had was at Universal Studios Japan. There are few amusement parks in the world where you could have an amazing time without ever going on a single ride. Universal Studios Japan is one of those amusement parks. I must have taken close to 200 photos that day, as there is so much to look at and take in. The park has several different areas: New York City in the early 1900s, Jurassic Park, Despicable Me, Harry Potter,Super Nintendo World, Jaws, Waterworld and a huge kids area that included Sesame Street, Peanuts and Hello Kitty. These areas were more like small worlds than they were simply areas. You felt like you were transported into those worlds. When you’re in the Despicable Me zone, you’ll see familiar landmarks from the movies, like Gru’s house, the Bank of Evil and Miss Mattie’s Home for Girls orphanage. And, yes, the Minions are everywhere. I even indulged on a Minion cream puff from the Happiness Cafe. But nothing compared to both Harry Potter World and Super Nintendo World. I don’t know how they were even able to build such places. They are such a perfect representation of the two properties that any Harry Potter or Nintendo fan should take the pilgrimage to if possible.
As you approach Harry Potter World, you start to see Hogwarts Castle in the distance as you enter the area by going through Hogsmeade. Shops line the street, most of which are open. There you can buy memorabilia from all four houses (Ravenclaw represent!) as well as candy from the movies and a wand. You can also buy Butterbeer. The inside of the castle is part of the queue line for the Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey ride, which immerses you in familiar locations like the quidditch pitch, the forbidden woods, the Whomping Willow, the Chamber of Secrets and more. The ride can be a bit difficult for people with motion sickness. I learned that I’m not as young as I once was, and I can only handle a small number of roller coasters in one day.
Super Nintendo World – one of the main reasons I wanted to go to Japan in the first place because it only existed in Japan until earlier this year – was just as magical. You enter the area through a warp pipe and come out in Peach’s Castle. I felt like a kid playing Super Mario Bros. on my Super Nintendo looking out at the area. Every character and enemy from the early games in the series were there. You could get your photo taken with Peach, Mario and Luigi. Bowers’ Castle led into a Mario Kart ride. You could get a scenic view of the area by riding a Yoshi. There was a toadstool cafe that served up Mario-themed meals and desserts. It was incredible.
Also incredible was the Japanese food. I was nervous about the food portion of the trip prior to leaving because you get so used to your own routine and some things you’re used to eating on a regular basis aren’t so readily available in other countries. While I didn’t get as adventurous with the meals as I could have, I still tried many new foods. I wish American cuisine was prepared how the Japanese prepare their dishes. Everything just feels cleaner and easier on the digestive system. Japan has just as much fried food as America, but it has such a more satisfying taste because of how it’s prepared. The batter is light and non-greasy. It was amazing to pick up chicken wings in Japan and never need to wipe the grease and oil off your hands constantly like you do here. It’s like that with everything. You never felt uncomfortable or sick after a meal filled with fried food because of how light the batter was and how flavorful everything was with Japanese mastery with mixing spices and seasonings. I didn’t have a single bad meal. And the best restaurants are the ones off the beaten path. They tend to be located on side streets and are very small, seating no more than 10-12 people at a time. The best meal we had as a group came at one of these restaurants, where the chef prepares the food right in front of you. It was a tempura place where I got shrimp – with the head served on the side – fish, root vegetables and asparagus served over a bed of rice with miso soup on the side. My brother was a bit more adventurous and got eel.
So what did I have specifically? I had pork buns, pork cutlets, sushi from a conveyor belt, shrimp tempura, squid, crab, dumplings, miso soup, matcha-flavored ice cream, mackerel, lots of rice, sake and more. Pork and fish are the most common entrees in Japan. Other foods we’re more accustomed to like turkey and chicken are a bit more uncommon. I never saw turkey on the menu except at chain restaurants like Subway and chicken was only available at places that served everything on skewers.
One of the biggest adjustments for me was what the Japanese considered breakfast foods. The hotel breakfast buffets had things you would never see in America. Along with the common breakfast foods like bacon, eggs, toast, yogurt and fruit were items like pasta salad, rice, grilled mackerel, cabbage, seaweed, miso soup and fermented soy beans. And the Japanese favor the soft-boiled eggs over hard-boiled eggs. They like runny eggs. Also, the yogurt is plain and requires either strawberry or blueberry syrup for flavor.
Even though convenience stores in America get a bad wrap for their prepared meals, they are the real deal in Japan. We had plenty of prepared foods from 7/11 and they were all great. You would think that getting an egg salad sandwich from a 7/11 would be a one-way ticket to Upset Tummy Town, but in Japan it’s perfectly fine.
Matcha (green tea)-flavored items are everywhere in Japan. I jumped on the bandwagon and got some Matcha ice cream and Matcha KitKats and was pleasantly surprised by both. KitKats are the king candy in Japan, as they have over 100 different flavors there. They also have a place where you can build your own KitKat. The only other candy bar I saw that is also in America were Snickers. For as big as Reese’s is in the U.S., I never saw anything Reese’s in Japan.
It’s pretty well known, but I should also highlight just how nice the people of Japan are. They are extremely friendly and helpful. They keep to themselves, but if they notice you’re either struggling to understand something or look lost, they’ll come to help you. And that’s not just a city thing or a rural thing, it happens all across Japan. It’s just in their nature. They’re also not loud. There were several times when we were riding in a jam-packed subway and there was no noise outside of the sound of the subway on the rails. No one talks on their phone. No one eats. Most people put in their headphones and either listen to music or browse social media or sleep until they arrive at their stop. My favorite thing is most employees will wave goodbye to you with both hands. It always made me smile. Oh, and they still wear masks, not because they have to, but because they believe it’s the right thing to do to keep from getting sick. At least 50% of people were wearing masks in public and that number was closer to 80% in the subway. They care a lot about their health and they also care a lot about their skin. Even when temperatures climbed into the high 80s and low 90s – which it did most days we were there – a lot of people were still mostly covered up, wearing long pants and long sleeves. Even if they were wearing short sleeves, they would be wearing a separate arm sleeve that went from their mid forearm to the mid upper arm. They also used umbrellas to protect themselves from the sun’s rays and carried around portable mini fans.
Japan is also extremely clean. There are almost no trash bins in public places yet there is almost no litter anywhere in sight. There are employees constantly cleaning and civilians do their part as well. One day we ate at a food court and there was a wet towel area with a sign telling people to wipe down their tables when they are done eating, and everyone did just that. Nobody was watching to make sure they complied. It’s just engrained in their head to clean up after themselves and be respectful of those who they share space with.
If I was only allowed to describe Japan in one word, it would be “efficient.” Everything in Japan just works and is extremely reliable. The public transit is second to none. Trains, buses and bullet trains all arrive on time every time and leave on time. If a bullet train is due to arrive at11:43 a.m., it’s going to arrive at 11:43 a.m. It’s not going to arrive at 11:44 a.m. and it’s not going to arrive at 11:42 a.m. The subway system can be a bit confusing to navigate, especially when you don’t know the area, but Google Maps is a life saver and will tell you what line you should be on and when you need to make a transfer. The subways are packed during rush hour and at times you feel like a sardine, but it is the easiest way to get around the area.
I could keep going on and on about how much I loved my two weeks in Japan, but at this point I think you get the idea. I couldn’t ask for a better trip. While it was impossible to see and do everything that Japan had to offer, we did so much. I got to experience walking through Shibuya Crossing, the most busy crosswalk in the world with as many as 3,000 people crossing at once. I shopped in malls five-stories tall. I got my anime fix perusing down the streets of Akihabara at night. I ate food with chopsticks (poorly). I visited the home of the black egg – eggs boiled in sulfurous waters that legend says adds years to your life when consumed. I feel like I lived 100 years worth of happiness in just two weeks and took over 1,000 photos to preserve those memories. Even the weather cooperated. Outside of the first night and one other day, it never rained, and we went at the very end of the rainy season. It was hot and humid and I probably drank about 10 bottles a water a day, but I’ll take that over rain any day.
The trip to Japan was probably the first time in a long time where I was able to enjoy the moments as they were happening. So many times in the past I didn’t realize how much fun I was having until months or even years after. That was the case in college and while working as a journalist. I look back fondly on those times now, but in the moment I never stopped to take it all in and let myself enjoy the happiness those moments were giving me. But I enjoyed the moments as they happened in Japan. When I was in Japan, nothing else mattered. My only job in Japan was to have fun. And that’s what I did. While it does get old living out of a suitcase and not always having immediate access to laundry facilities, I was never looking forward to the end of the trip. In the past, I was always ready for vacation to be over after five or so days. But I probably could have stayed another few weeks without getting homesick.