Tokyo

The Russell sabbatical blog has officially changed it's name to the Russell and Margie sabbatical blog! I am so excited to have Margie finally with me for fun and adventures in Japan, Vietnam and Thailand.

Tokyo is a lot like controlled chaos. There are over 22 million Japanese that use the subway system daily in the city. With this many people one would think it is chaoitc, but amazingly it is quite the opposite. Everybody walks in straight lines, there are designated areas to stand when the train arrives so you don't block the people exiting, using cell phones on a subway is a no-no, you could search all day and not find a piece of litter, and the trains arrive and depart on time to the second (By the way, Vietnam is the exact opposite fo this). You could spend hours if not days in Tokyo underground shopping, eating, drinking and never see the light of day.

I'd like to say we did a lot of sightseeing in Tokyo, but to be honest, we mostly saw whatever was next to the restaurant that we wanted to go to. Tsukiji fish market is the largest fish market in the world. There is a lot of fish in that place. But most importantly there are city blocks that are more or less all sushi restaurants. We almost missed our flight out of Tokyo because we wanted to hit one more lunch in Tsukiji before our flight!

So how do you order food in Japan when you don't speak Japanese? Most often, the point and grunt method works, especially when most restaurants have plastic models of their menu outside the restaurant. Or there is always technology to help you out. At one sushi restaurant, your meal went like this:

Step 1: Review the menu that was displayed on the ipad mounted to the table.

Step 2: Place your order on the ipad
Step 3: Recieve your food that is delivered to your table from the chef via an automated conveyor belt

Step 4: Repeat steps 1 though 3 as necessary.

Step 5: Have the waiter come over and scan your table with a magic wand that automatically calulates your total bill based on the embarrassing number of emptly plates.

What about if you want a drink and don't speak Japanese? Go to the vending machine bar for a beer or two. Located right on the street is a stall with about 6 vending machines filled with all sorts of canned Japanese beer with a small bar in front of them to drink and watch the craziness of Tokyo pass you by. Brilliant. Plus you don't have to tip anybody a dollar just for pouring you a beer.

What is that you say? You miss hearing about my VW van? Yeah, me too, but luckily we spotted a VW van in Tokyo that was converted into a portable espresso stand. Enraged with jealously. . . . I'll put this next on my list once I get the reverse gear working again on my van, except mine will be a portable Heineken and Jagermeister stand. Then again, reverse really isn't that important.. . ... .

While visiting the Imperial Palace we saw some rock climbers scaling the walls outside the palace. Turns out they were the palace gardeners picking out all the weeds between the rocks an throwing them down into the moat. They were about 3 stories off the ground without any ropes or gear. Looked like a lot of fun, but kinda made me second guess how impenatrible this wall was from invaders back in the day.

All in all our trip to Tokyo was great, and I think Margie proved she is now 100% Aoki as she gobbled down just as much sushi as I did!  

 

Hang Loose!

Sunrise? Living my entire life on the west coast and being somewhat of a nightowl I can't remember the last time I saw a sunrise. But in Kauai where I had a 3 hour time zone advantage and staying on the east coast of the island I got to see a couple great sunrises.

I went to Hawaii in hopes of continuing the development of my surfing skills. The first day I surfed Hanalei Bay on the north side of the island where there were a bunch of school kids also surfing (on a monday morning). I was quickly able to gage my level of skill . . . . . which is that of maybe an 8 year old girl. I couldn't believe how good these kids were, and how bad I was. . . .

The other thing I learned about surfing is that it is a lot like skiing and snowboarding where mother nature controls the conditions and there is nothing you can do about it. One day you could be having a perfect day catching almost every wave to the next day paddling around getting hammered every wave. On one of the days where there was little to no surf I rented a stand up paddle surf board which I found takes crazy amounts of balance.    

Oh and it turns out I look hawaiian. Everybody thought I was a local asking me which side of the island I was from. In one case I even got a the locals discount on the rental of the paddle board. The guy did not want to believe that I was not from Hawaii. Which side of the island are you from? I'm not from here. Oh, which island are you from. I'm not from Hawaii. Oh, which island is your family from? I'm not Hawaiian. Oh, you sure? Well you look local, I'll give you the locals discount. Okay.

 

Whether I look Hawaiian or not is debatable however I can say I eat like one. I ate about 12 spam musubi's and had loco moco at every chance possible. What is loco moco you ask? It is heaven on a plate. Plate of white rice topped with a ground beef patty, fried eggs, and lots of gravy. What a great breakfast!

I got back to Tacoma after 5 days in Hawaii for just enough to unpack, launder and repack. As hectic as it was, I couldn't be more excited to spend the next 5 weeks with Margie finally in Japan, Vietnam and Thailand (Believe it or not it was about $1000 cheaper for me to fly from Hawaii to Seattle to Japan than to fly directly from Hawaii to Japan). After working her tail off since starting law school, we were both looking foward to a sabbatical together!

Vegas, Van-xiety and heading home . . . in that order.

Las Vegas!! Kevin and I drove over to Vegas from LA and met my friend Scott, who was literally one of the first people I met in college, and Grant a great friend from Intel for 2 fantastic nights of gambling, eating and drinking. Losing money to the casinos is a drag, however when you are sitting at a blackjack table for 6 hours straight with 3 of your closest friends, it is money well spent. As always, we left never wanting to go back to Vegas again, but had a fun weekend experience that you could only have in Vegas.


Vegas was the terminus of the road trip and it was time to turn the van around and point it back to Tacoma. Grant and Scott joined me from LA back to the Bay area along highway 1 which took us about 3 days with stops in Ventura, Pismo Beach and Captitola. We played a lot of $1 Molkky on the beach and I made more money off of Grant and Scott than I did in Vegas for sure. We also completed the Capitola bar hop one night which I can't claim I remember 100% of but luckily or unluckily we have pictures to prove we completed it. I will spare you all from posting any of these pictures. . . . .


After dropping off Grant and Scott at the San Jose airport, the van told me it was time to go home by breaking down 3 times in one day. After a month and 3500 miles of good luck, it was time to get the full VW expereince.

 




VAN-XIETY!!

After 4000 miles, 4 states, in 30 days, we (Me and the Van- did I mention we were both born in 1974?) made it back to Tacoma. However, as you could imagine traveling that many miles in a car that is almost 40 years old there are going to be "experiences", some bad, some good with both being equally memorable.

• Who really needs a car that goes in reverse anyways? After mile 1500 or so, I couldn't get the van into reverse anymore, which really redefined the meaning of a "good parking spot".
• California has new crazy gas nozzles. Evidently the EPA does not require backwards compatibility of the new nozzle design with 40 year old technology. Many gallons of gas were spilled throughout gas stations across california. Ooops, sorry environment, it really was not my fault.
• Only needed my van pushed twice. First time was I couldn't back into a campsite, and secondly when it died waiting at a contruction zone because of my stupid fuel pump. Thanks to Grant and Scott for pushing!
• What is worse than working 3 hours under a hot engine, in a Redding, California McDonalds parking lot, when it is 110 degrees outside, replacing a fuel pump you ask? Answer: Doing it when you are completely hungover (thanks to Grant and Scott) without access to a shower afterwards.  That sucked, but got it back running and got it back home!
• 
• I figure my van is in about 30 peoples vacation photo albums from Germany to Colorado. It was fun to drive down highway 1 and see cameras pop out of sunroofs from oncoming traffic to snap a shot of the orange van.
• The drive was a large portion of the enjoyment for this adventure. From Cannon Beach to LA, I only traveled about 30 miles on I-5. The rest was along the coast or on picturesque 2 lane roads through Southern Oregon and Northern California.