December 20th 2023, was when we booked our upcoming holiday to Japan. It was over 8-months away, scheduled for us to depart on the 29th of August 2024. The countdown was on. I had not been on a proper holiday for over a year at this point (yes, we went to India in December 2022 and no that was not a holiday, it was hectic) and this vacation was still a little while away.

I immersed myself in learning all things about Japan. We planned a cruise and 95% of the holiday was going to be us getting our dose of vitamin sea (sorry I cringed too). But what about the remaining 5%? How could I make the most of this? TikTok algorithms kindly helped me out with every single “What to and not to do in Japan” videos popping up on my #ForYouPage.

It showed me winter wonderland. It showed me cherry blossoms. It told me where to eat, how to navigate the subways and how I should plan my must dos. It was the first time I truly realised how big Japan actually is, well even just planning for Tokyo. I learned that Tokyo is actually just a small subsection of a city and all of the neighbouring areas such as Yokohama, where we based ourselves pre-cruise, aren’t suburbs within Tokyo but rather independent cities themselves. Yokohama is 20 miles southwest of Tokyo. I could still be wrong on this but that’s the vibe I got.

The videos I saw on TikTok or Facebook reels or even Instagram, were just cleverly edited snippets only showing the most beautiful parts of Japan. In my mind, I thought I was going to this wonderland. I wasn’t quite sure what I thought I was going to get.

But I’m writing this blog, as I sit in my hotel room, the night before I embark on my cruise. I plan on writing one at the end too, just so I can compare how different or maybe similar my viewpoints might be before and after a holiday, I yearned for, for so long.

As our date to depart on our holiday came closer, we were threatened by the news of Typhoon Shanshan. We knew July and August are typhoon seasons, but as part of our planning we pushed our holiday to the end of August as articles on the internet suggested that would be wise and this cruise that we purchased was the last for the 2024 season. In fact, about 10-days before we departed, there was an earthquake. We were scared. Should we still go? Should we cancel? What is the right thing to do? These thoughts clouded our judgement.

I found solace in revisiting videos that I saved on TikTok. A part of my brain thought, no it doesn’t matter what the news is saying, THIS, is where I’m going to, this wonderland. The day for our departure soon arrived, after what felt like an eternity. We packed and left for the airport and boarded our flight. We booked exit row seats thinking we won the business class on an economy budget lottery. We did not. The seats felt smaller than normal and I felt like an art exhibit as I managed to catch some shut eye only to wake up and find some passengers who were waiting by the loo staring at me. I’m not sure if they were just trying to look out the half window that I got but it’s unnerving waking up to 4 pair of eyes on you.

We landed. It was hot. But we knew that. We made our way out through the air bridge. But it didn’t feel like I was in a new country. It felt like I had arrived in New Delhi. Maybe this was the exhaustion talking. I was made for business class but my bank account can only service economy class tickets and along with it comes the body aches caused by sitting in one position for too long. It didn’t matter, it’s just the air bridge. We walked out  and cleared customs and made our way to the bus tickets counter. Our bus was due to arrive in less than an hour and our drive to Yokohama was about 2 hours.

It was raining heavily, but on and off. We boarded our bus and off we went. I thought I was going to see an electric view of all of the lights that light up Tokyo. It was dark. There were the odd (what seemed like) apartment buildings that had lights in the corridors turned on. But I didn’t see the lights that I had pictured. Driving through the highway which felt like the backroads of Tokyo took me back to the drive home from the airport each time we arrive in New Delhi. Where am I? Again, I think that was the exhaustion talking.

We entered Yokohama and then it truly felt like we’ve entered a city. Pouring with rain as Typhoon Shanshan’s wrath unleashed in the south of Japan and its trajectory moving northward. I see the beautifully lit up ferris wheel from our window and my heart is full again. I call it a night.

The next morning, we are woken up by emergency alerts on our phones that are written entirely in Japanese. We panic. We aren’t sure what to do. My event manager skillset kicks in and I use the Google translate app. We learn there are landslide warnings and evacuation warnings in the south of Yokohama. The hotel reassures us we have nothing to panic about as we are not anywhere close to the impacted area.

Our plans are changed last minute. We had planned on experiencing the Shinkansen (bullet train) and make our way to a city at the bottom of Mt Fuji called Hakone. That wasn’t going to happen. Even our re-purposed plan of experiencing the Yokohama Air Cabin (or what we in New Zealand call a gondola) felt distant as we didn’t want to risk being above water in the middle of a storm. We went to the nearby mall instead.

It’s a massive multipurpose mall. There are stores. There’s a train station. There are restaurants, and cafes. We walked around the mall keeping an eye outside to see how the weather is tracking. Whether there was hope to walk through the city of Yokohama and explore. We found a dessert parlour instead that has the same name as my niece, Nina. So, the obvious choice was to get vanilla soft serves. We continued our quest of exploring the mall further.

I come face to face with a name that I’ve seen endless videos of hauls, and mukbang videos from the food. If you haven’t already guessed it, it’s Family Mart. But this was a smaller Family Mart. It didn’t have all of the goodies I had hoped for but it did have the quintessential egg sandwich and the fried chicken that you need to put together to form the kind of carb and protein goodness that is customary in Japan (not an official thing but it should be). We came back to the hotel. I devoured every bite as I filmed my own mukbang video. Will that make it live on TikTok? Only time will tell.

Finally, at about 4pm there was relief. The rain had stopped. We quickly make our way out again and try our luck with the Yokohama Air Cabin. We get distracted midway and head into the Cup Noodle Museum. According to my research, this place was a highly recommended activity and it potentially might have been had we had the time to participate in making our own noodles. Maybe if you have kids this could be fun, but this is something you could do if you have nothing else to do, or are restricted due to factors out of your control such as a typhoon causing havoc.

We made our way to the Yokohama Air Cabin, which was a nice way to get an aerial view of Yokohama. A roughly 4.5mins one way flight, and you come out by the Sakuragicho Station. Nestled with many places to eat or perhaps continue walking by the water or enjoy a coffee at Starbucks situated at the foot of the Air Cabin entrance.

The Yokohama Air Cabin is a nice experience for all. I can only imagine how beautiful it would look to do once the sun has set and Yokohama is lit up.

Overall, one-day into my trip, I haven’t quite had that wow experience yet. But I know I still have 16 more days and I know Japan is going to prove me horribly wrong. Just you wait and read this on my Reflections of Japan blog.

Until next time,

MiliG