You Only go to Tokyo Once (Toyko: Part 1)

Chad and I spent the last week exploring Tokyo! For those of you who don't know, we live on Okinawa, which is just a small island of Japan. In order to get to mainland Japan where all the big cities are, we have to take a short 2 and half hour plane ride. Fortunately, there are several small airlines that offer affordable flights from Okinawa to Tokyo. We choose to go with Vanilla Air and have no complaints.


Once landing in Tokyo on Sunday, we had to find our way to our hotel. I had done some research beforehand and decided that the best option for us was to take the Keisei Skyliner. Purchasing tickets and finding our way to the Skyliner was fairly simple. The Skyliner is a fancy subway train, it went pretty fast and only made a couple stops. It took us to Ueno station and from there, we needed to find our way to Hibiya station. While on the Skyliner, we briefly talked with some other Americans who were staying in the same hotel as us. They had been to Tokyo before so they knew what they were doing. They told us about this subway/train card called Pasmo. You preload this card with money and then when you're using the subway and train system, you just scan your card and it deducts the correct fare. Without the card, you have to buy tickets at every station and figure out the fare yourself. Buying this card as soon as we got there was one of the best decisions of our trip! It made figuring out the subway system so much easier! I highly recommend it to anyone taking a trip to Tokyo who will be using the subway system to get around. Not only did they tell us about this card, they also let us follow them to the hotel. Chad and I both agreed that if we didn't have them to follow, we would have been lost. It would have taken us a long time to figure out what train line to get in and then to find the correct train. Those subway stations can be confusing! So after about an hour and 30 minute trip from the airport to Hibiya station, we had a short walk to our hotel, The New Sanno.

The New Sanno is a hotel strictly for military use only. If you're in the military or retired, you need to take advantage of this hotel in the center of Tokyo. I can't say enough good things about it. It was one of the nicest hotels that I've ever stayed in and the cost was so affordable. Since it's such a nice place, it's super popular so you need to book way in advance especially if you want to stay on the weekends. After checking in at our hotel and relaxing for a bit, we decided to check out what was around the hotel. We walked up the street to a 7-11. I was so excited to see 7-11 because I love slurpees! They don't sell slurpees in Okinawa so I thought I'd be getting my slurpee fix very soon! Unfortunately, I was let down because Japan's 7-11 don't carry slurpees, what?! We went in every 7-11 we saw while we were in Tokyo and never found one. I was pretty disappointed about that. After discovering about the lack of slurpees, we decided to eat dinner at McDonalds since it was fast and easy. Japanese McDonalds are not like those in the states. They carry different items and the Japanese workers actually seem to care about their jobs.

After getting ready on Monday morning, we headed out the door for our first adventure (alone) on the subway system. Our destination was Shibuya, which is a big shopping district and also home to the famous Shibuya intersection. I downloaded a couple apps to help us navigate the train system and they came in super handy our entire trip. You can enter your starting destination and ending point and it will come up with all the different ways to get you there. What would we do without technology? After having to make a couple transfers, we found our way to Shibuya without getting lost. Not very far from the station was the big intersection. This intersection is the one in Fast and Furious and a few other movies. It's known as one of busiest intersections in the world. We arrived about 9:30AM and most of the stores were not open yet so there weren't that many people. Don't get me wrong, there were still a bunch of people but I was expecting mass chaos! While waiting for the stores to open up, we tried to find the soccer field that is on top of a building that is shown in Fast and Furious: Tokyo drift. We googled and read that is was on top of a hotel. After getting turned around a couple times, we finally found the hotel and rode the elevator up to the 25th floor. We didn't find a soccer field, but we did get to sneak a pretty good view of the city. From there, we saw the building with the soccer field so we headed over there next. Once reaching the correct building and riding the elevator up, we discovered that you have to pay to go on the field since it's like a recreational place. Not wanting to pay, we ended our journey for the soccer field there and now can at least say we've been there!

On a side note, one of my best moments of the trip happened in the elevator ride going down. A couple older japanese ladies got into the elevator with us and Chad was standing by all the buttons so we kind of just looked at them to see what floor they needed to go to. They briefly discussed it amongst themselves and then said it to Chad. I was able to translate to Chad what floor they wanted! Last month, I took a japanese class. I didn't retain a lot but I know my numbers 1-9 pretty well. I think the japanese ladies were impressed that I knew what they said as they kind of laughed and smiled when Chad picked the right number. Proud moment!

Next, we found the Hachiko statue. If you have never seen the movie, Hachi, you must watch it. I saw it for the first time when we first got to Japan, and after seeing there was a statue of the dog in Japan, I knew I needed to see it one day! It's such a cool story and I love that they made a statue of Hachi where he always waited for his owner. Really neat to see! By this time, it was 11:00AM and all the stores were opening up. It was cool to go in to some American brand stores like Under Armour, Adidas, and a 6-story Forever 21. We don't have shopping like that in Okinawa, so it's always nice getting a little taste of home! All of the stores we went in had many floors. It's exactly what you picture when you imagine Japan... Everything is super close together and built upward. We definitely walked several hundred stairs and a ton of miles for our first day in Tokyo. We couldn't wait to get back to our hotel just to rest our feet and legs. This was only the beginning of a week's worth of aching feet. Whenever we complained or weren't sure if we wanted to go the extra mile to see the next attraction, Chad came up with the slogan, YOTO, you only (go to) Tokyo once, which became the motto of our trip.

Check out Tokyo: Part 2 to read about our 2-day adventure at Tokyo Disney!

Ie Island - May adventure!

April was a pretty boring uneventful month for us, but we started May off with a bang! On Saturday, we took a ferry to ie island. It was a short 30 minute ferry ride on this huge ferry. I was impressed by the ferry, it even had a little snack shop on the inside. After arriving on the island, we found a place to rent bicycles. I got a purple one! Unfortunately, it sounded like it was going to break down on me the whole time. I literally thought the chain would break and we'd be on the other side of the island. That would have sucked! The island is small enough to ride a bike all around it. Everything I read said that it was mainly flat so riding a bike wouldn't be a big deal. I don't know where they went but there were quite a few hills we had to go up, twice they were so big that we had to get off our bike and push it up (our bikes didn't have gears on them). But it was so much fun riding bikes around and perfect weather for it!

Our main purpose of visiting ie island was to attend the lily festival! We were a little nervous about going because it's Golden Week here in Japan. There are a bunch of holidays the first week of May for the Japanese, so they call it Golden Week. A lot of them will take off work and travel during this week which means traffic and all the tourist attractions become super busy! It turns out that we had no problem with traffic or crowds, it was a perfect day to go. The lily fields were beautiful; tons and tons of lily's. The smell was amazing as well!

Other than the lily's, we stopped at a few other places around the island. We hiked up Mt. Gusuku, which is the only mountain on the little island. It was about a 15 minute hike up; there were stairs so it was a pretty easy hike. Lots of stairs, straight up too, at times I felt like I was climbing a ladder. When we got to the top, we got a nice aerial view of the island!

We also stopped at Wajee View Point, Niya-Thiya Caves, and the Ernie Pyle monument. The Niya-thiya cave is where Okinawans hid as the Great Okinawan War was happening. There is a stone in the cave that is said to be a fertility stone. If you pick it up, supposedly you'll get pregnant. Don't worry, I didn't touch it! :) Our last stop before the port was the Ernie Pyle monument. Ernie Pyle was an American journalist who died in the Okinawan war.

Overall, it was an amazing day trip! If we ever go again, we agreed that we should take all our snorkel gear. There looked to be quite a few good snorkeling spots on ie island!

March Madness

Chad and I keep trying to find things to do to keep ourselves entertained! In early March, we took an aerial tour of Okinawa. It was a pretty cool experience! We booked our flight through the Aero Club on base. It wasn't a sunny day when we went, but the visibility was still very good! We all flew in this tiny airplane up the west coast of the island. The pilot was very informative and pointed out all these different landmarks on the island. I think one of the most interesting things that I learned is that there is a Leprosy colony on the island. Not many people live there anymore, but there are still a few older people who do! Overall, it was a great flying experience!


Myah had her 2nd & 3rd heartworm treatment mid-March. She had to stay overnight at the vet; we missed her! When she got to come home, she laid around in pain for a bit but before we knew it she was back to acting normal. We have to wait 8 weeks until we can take her on short walks. After 12 weeks is when she can resume normal activity. I can't believe we have to wait 3 months until we can take her on her normal walks again. She's going to be so excited when she finally can go for walks!

This past week, Thompson Square (a country duo) came to perform on our base. Chad was working swing shift, but he was able to take a long lunch to come to the concert with me! It was raining a little bit, but it was still fun. We wish more good concerts would come to Okinawa.

Like I said, Chad and I try to find stuff to do on the weekends so we're not just sitting around the house being bored. We've drove past this place called Ryukyu Mura several times, so we decided to stop there on Sunday. It's like a village that is built to resemble traditional Okianwan culture. It was kind of cool to see all the different houses and stuff but it wasn't the most exciting thing. I've heard they have performances there of traditional Okinawan dances but they didn't have any while we were there.


We tried a new restaurant on Saturday! When we take walks at the seawall, we always walk by this place called Transit Cafe. There always seems to be people there, so we thought we'd try it out. It's a really small restaurant. The first question we were asked when we got in the door, is if we had a reservation. We didn't, but they were able to seat us anyways. But note to anyone wanting to try it, it's probably best to make a reservation. Like I said, it's small, they don't have many tables. We were sat at the bar area. The restaurant is on the second floor and looks over the East China Sea. We ordered the cheese fondue, steak with garlic butter sauce, and a cheese pizza with honey. I thought the pizza would be a weird combination but it was actually really good! It was great food but just a little pricey!

Like I said in my last post, I started going to the gym at the end of January. I'm proud to say that I am still going! I have been going 6 days a week, each session usually lasting an hour or more. I am following a 12 week program, and I am on my last month! These last 4 weeks of workouts are going to be a huge challenge, but I can't wait to see where it takes me. The weather has been a little chilly here lately but it's going to start warming up soon. I want to look good in a bikini!

Picture on the left is February 2014 & Picture on the right is March 2014

Like always, I leave you with some random pictures from Japan... until next time :)

Sushi Vending Machine

Creme Brulee Oreo Bars

Okinawan Purple Sweet Potato Kit-Kats

February Adventures

February has been a pretty busy month so far! On the 3rd of February, I celebrated my 25th birthday! I had to work all day, but when I came home Chad had the whole house clean and he had drove an hour away to get my favorite Okinawan cake! He even managed to put 25 candles on this tiny cake. It was perfect! We went out to dinner to one of our favorite restaurants, Sams by The Sea. It was delicious! I started going to the gym at the end of January, so for my birthday I got a lot of fitness related gifts. I got a new set of ear buds that actually stay in my ear when I'm moving and my favorite part is on the cord there is a button where I can turn the volume up/down, stop/play the music, or go to the next song. I love them! I am still waiting on a couple of my gifts to arrive in the mail. Chad ordered me a Polar Heart Rate Monitor watch, which I am so anxious to get! My Mom sent me an Amazon gift card, so I bought an mp3 player with it. It's tiny and will just clip on to my clothes. It will be perfect to use at the gym instead of having to wear a big armband with my iPod touch. I can't wait to get all my gear, hopefully my packages will arrive early this next week!

The best part about my birthday weekend was Chad surprising me by booking a trip to go whale watching! It was an amazing experience! We've been wanting to go but I was hesitant to pay the money to possibly not see any whales or get sea sick. We took dramamine the night before and the morning of, and thankfully the water wasn't very rough, so neither of us got seasick! Plus, we saw a ton of whales. I was surprised about how much whale activity we got to see and how long we got to watch it. It was a beautiful perfect day for it as well! The only thing that could have made it better if we saw multiple whales jumping. I did see one jump for a split second but that was it. Regardless, it was amazing and I highly recommend it to anyone who has the opportunity to go!

My coworkers also made my birthday special! Blossom had my desk all decorated when I came in to work. And the day after my birthday, everyone from my work went to dinner at Chili's. It's nice to have coworkers that you get a long with and consider friends.

The first couple days post-treatment, Myah was being such a baby.

Besides my birthday and being extremely busy at work these last few weeks, another thing that has been going on is Myah's heartworm treatment. We had to drop her off in the morning at the Vet for her first heartworm treatment on Valentine's Day. We were able to pick her up later that day to take her home. For the heartworm treatment, they don't have to give her anesthesia but they had to put a big needle deep into her muscle so it was really painful. We could tell she was in a lot of pain when we brought her home. She would try to lay down but just couldn't get comfortable. She likes to hide from us when she is sick, so she kept trying to go in our spare bedroom or office. I felt so bad for her! The next morning though, she started acting more like herself and now 3 days post treatment she seems to be in no pain. The only tough part is for the next month, she pretty much has to be on bed rest. She is not allowed to exercise. The worms in her heart are going to begin breaking up and if her heart gets pumping fast then there is a higher chance that one of the worms will get lodged and then terrible things will happen. Myah LOVES her walks, so it breaks my heart that she can't go and there's no way of explaining to her why. We have to take her back on March 13th for her second and third treatment. She will have to spend the night that time, but hopefully after that she'll be healed. She will then have to be calm for the following month as well, so it's going to be a long 2-3 months!

I almost forgot... another exciting thing that has happened this month is Chad sewed on! For all of you who are unfamiliar with this slang, it means he ranked up. He is now a Senior Airman! As mentioned in one of my previous posts, he got BTZ so he got to sew on 6 months early! Woohoo! One of the traditions that the Airmen have is to have their new stripe "punched on," usually resulting in bruises. Chad only got punched by 2 people, but his bruise is HUGE! 

Other than that, Chad and I have just been trying to get out and explore on weekends. We just take off and drive with no end in sight. We usually find neat little interesting villages and get to see a lot of the culture. Today, we went for a walk and I snapped some pictures to show everyone back home a little bit of what Japan looks like, so I'll leave you with those.