Japan
A bite of Tokyo, Japan
From Seoul, I flew to Tokyo to continue my trip to the Far East. It was the Autumn of 2019 and the plan was to spend a month in Japan, volunteering and visiting the country. I visited Tokyo two times, at the beginning and the end of the trip. The first time I was there 4 days and two Japanese guys hosted me, the second 3 days and I booked a capsule host…
Volunteering in Minamata, Japan
From Tokyo, I went to Minamata on Kyushu Island in the south of Japan, where I participated in a 2-week volunteer camp. Minamata is known globally for the tragic environmental disaster that occurred in the mid-20th century. In the 1950s, the city became the epicenter of one of the most notorious cases of industrial pollution, caused by the release of me…
A Sumo competition in Minamata
During the two weeks of volunteering in Minamata, in the autumn of 2019, I was invited to a sumo competition. Because of the volunteering work, I became friends with the junior high school students and they invited me to see them competing on a Sunday morning sumo match.
One day in Fukuoka, Japan
After the volunteer camp in Minamata, in autumn 2019, I planned my way back to Tokyo stopping by some cities, but I didn’t have a clear program about which cities I wanted to visit. My friend Tami had to go to Fukuoka for her flight back to Jakarta, so I decided to follow her and visit Fukuoka.
Moved by Hiroshima
After saying goodbye to Tami, in autumn 2019, I took a 4-hour bus from Fukuoka to Hiroshima. In the early afternoon, I arrived at my hostel, a traditional room with a tatami instead of a “normal” bed where I spent only one night, and it was a mistake: Hiroshima is beautiful with a lot to offer; now I think that I should have rescheduled my plans and giv…
An origami in Osaka
In November 2019 after a four-hour bus ride from Hiroshima, I arrived in Osaka. From the central station, I had to take the metro to reach Takashi’s place, I was going to stay with him for two nights. It was late evening when I arrived so we had a small chat together before going to sleep. He is a nurse and he had to go to work in the early morning, but…
Nara and Fushimi Inari
In Autumn 2019 I travelled for one month in Japan, I volunteered for two weeks in a village on Kyushu island and, for the other two, I visited the most famous cities in the country. I left Osaka by train and in around 30 minutes I arrived in Kyoto. I had lunch in an Izakaya at the train station and after I went to meet Hiroko, who would host me for three…
My favourite city in Japan, Kyoto!
I was coming from Osaka, and Kyoto was the last city before coming back to Europe. I was there for three days and, as I mentioned in the post about Nara, Hiroko hosted me. She had just come back from a long trip to Europe. She started in Japan a few months before and went country by country (South Korea, Hong Kong, Thailand, India, Turkey, and more…) ti…
Some thoughts about Japan
I wrote a long series about my trip to Japan in 2019. I was there for a month, two weeks volunteering and the other two travelling around the country and visiting the main cities. It was a great experience, I met a lot of people and I learned a lot about this country. Here I want to share some of the things I learned, some fun facts, and my budget for this trip.