a. Waking up after only 3 hours of sleep
b. Leaving the house late
c. No reserve d ferry ticket to Japan
d. Don’t know where the Korean Consulate is in Japan
e. No reserved hotel room
2. Thanks to a super racing taxi driver and one massive cup of coffee I was able to get up, race out the house and make it to the KTX station on time for the 6am train to Busan. At Busan I then went to the Ferry Terminal where I was then told that they were OUT of tickets for the day… oh my gosh. Thankfully, as I stood there hoping that a miracle would happen, the teller told me someone just cancelled their ticket, perfect! Mind ya, there were no returning tickets for tomorrow and so I was forced to stay in Fukuoka, Japan till Thursday… cool.
3. Taking the ferry to Fukuoka, Japan was the coolest idea yet! It was nothing but our boat surrounded by nothing but water and the occasional dolphin… so beautiful. I was too tired though and so 20 minutes into the ride I totally passed out.
4. After about 5 ½ hours of traveling (train and boat), I finally arrived in Fukuoka, Japan. I had no idea where I was going and so I asked these random foreigners. They TOTALLY hooked me up… gave me printed out directions they had, a map, some translated phrases, and even change for the bus! Sweet! I guess foreigners aren’t that bad…ha, ha, ha.
5. At the Korean Consulate I was once again confronted with foreigners… a whole wack of them, wow!!! As they all talked about where they’re working in Korea and where they’re staying in Japan, it hit me… where am I going to sleep tonight and what about tomorrow night, too?! I listed off about 12 different places thinking it’d be easy to avoid dishing out mad cash for an overly priced hotel room but already I was noticing that things on my list didn’t seem to be in Japan. No random PC rooms, no love motels, no bath houses,… no luck!
6. Ended up hooking up with these three random dudes, Ryan, Bobby and Julian. We all were here on our visa run and so we got talking while waiting in line. With no other plans but to pick up my visa tomorrow, I decided to hang around with these dudes for the evening. We headed out for dinner and then did some walking and sight seeing. Nice… watched a romantic sunset… with these three dudes, ha, ha, ha. Even nicer was the subdivision we checked out… wow! The houses looked too perfect. It felt like I was in a movie set for “It’s a Wonderful Life”…ha, ha, ha.
7. My first impression of Japan: Japan is so beautiful! The sky is SO beautiful here, the country is incredibly clean, there’s no trash on the ground, everything is very modern and it’s super quiet. They drive on the other side of the road, the taxi doors automatically open, there’s no road rage, no one seems to use their horns. The men are cute but have NOTHING on Korean men, the women love the glamorous look with the big hair, lots of make-up, leather boots and barely legal short skirts, and everyone seems to be in their own little world. This is definitely not Korea!!! And, besides the foreigners here on a visa run, I really didn’t see any other foreigners! Japan supposedly pays foreign English teachers really well but where are these foreigners. I thought it ironic too cause in Korea, foreign English teachers are everywhere and yet many Koreans still give us the double look. Then I come to Japan, still haven’t seen any foreign teachers who live here and yet the Japanese could care less about us foreigners. No random kids tested out their English on me, no older men gave me smiles, no teenagers called me pretty, and no one gave us any double looks. Interestingly strange.
8. Ok… so one of the things we amused ourselves with, and it was rather weird too, were these hand statues (not too sure if that’s even the right name to call them). Near the stadium there were these statues of various famous people’s hands. Bobby was the only one who’d shake Michael Jackson’s hand. Billy Joel rubbed my feet and Frank Sanatra liked my face…ha, ha, ha. It was strangely amusing and actually really interesting.
9. Sweet… Ryan was in need of more yen (Japanese money) and I was in need of a bed to sleep in tonight… perfect trade off. Great… now I’m not internationally homeless, ha, ha, ha.
10. Well everything in Japan is supper expensive and we found out just how true this was when we got the bill. Turns out they charge you just to sit in the seats! Ouch!
QUESTION OF THE DAY...
Who wants to do a ghetto run?
QUOTE OF THE DAY...
Half the fun of the travel is the esthetic of lostness.
-- Ray Bradbury
2 comments:
Ah, yes--Fukuoka. I did the same visa run and also hooked up with random foreigners to share the very expensive accomodations. I also thought it was really strange how Japanese people could care less about foreigners and I found some of them to be downright rude. My friend and I were trying to get directions and even with our map wide open and helpless looks on our faces, it was really tough to get anyone to help us. The lack of attention was great but the lack of helpfulness--not so great.
I highly, highly, highly recommend that you return to Japan and visit Kyoto sometime. It is AMAZING! Fall is the best time to go because the maples are beautiful then.
Kyoto... cool, will do that! I really want to venture back this summer and hang out on the beaches of Japan but you suggest fall?! Hmm... maybe I'll have to do a couple of trips. Cool.
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