GHP DAY 4

Breakfast

Shukshuka and coffee with coconut oil, stevia and almond milk

Yum!! Shukshuka is my favourite breakfast meal so far. Delicious.

Snack

White tea and two coconut lemon ‘cookies’

Lunch

I left my leftovers at home! Luckily I brought enough snacks. 

2/3 green smoothie

Half paleo bread slice

Two ‘cookies’ (Uh-oh, these are a bit dangerous. Morish much).

Snacks

Green tea with mint

Four Brazil nuts 

Dinner

Last of my lime coconut chicken soup

Made a variation of the Healing Kale Soup with chicken for meals over the next week. Added colostrum too, hope I can’t taste it!

Think soups are going to become my new ‘fast food’. I’ll have to have at least one meal of soup everyday to get my serve of bone broth if I’m not drinking it straight. 

Also made my breakfast smoothie as I forgot the rest of my smoothie and chia pudding in the fridge at work and I’m going to my course tomorrow so I need to stop by the office to grab those for snacks which gives me less time to make breakky in the morning. 

They always cater for morning tea and lunch at my course and it’s delicious and mostly locally sourced but tomorrow I’ll be BYO. 

More Paleo bread. I was still hungry. Not quite enough for dinner.

0 days to go! Just 1 night on a plane.

Dreamt it, worked hard at it, did it.

Homeward bound.

😊

1 day to go.

Woke up around 8.30, loving waking up with no alarm! Definitely going to enjoy this part of not working.

Job application.

Frozen duet to the video on YouTube with my little Sachi.

11.30am leave to pick up Sachi’s grandmother and take her to the train station to send her off on her big Australian adventure – a homestay in Brisbane for two weeks. She is so excited she said her heart is pounding in her chest. And a little nervous, mostly about not having Japanese rice everyday, in more than one meal. Bless her.

12.15pm sign “I love you” through the coach window to her pretty smiling face. Cry. Ride to lunch with my student. Delicious tempura soba. Love that dish.

2pm home, pack, sit, stand and jump on my smaller suitcase to get the zipper to do up. God damn I have so much shit. 40 kilograms of checked in luggage (purchased the maximum additional) and 15 kilograms among three pieces of carry on. 

Skype friend

5.45pm ride to Ida’s, amazing dinner at a Turkish restaurant with Ida, Kathryn and Joseph. Another emotional goodbye. I know Ida and I will stay friends, I can’t wait to see her again. Cry.

10.45pm Skype friend on 7-11 wifi. Will miss you 7-11. Actually not really, will miss my trusty old Family Marts more. But they were reliable for the internet on my mobile in the beginning and the end at least. Need to get a prepaid SIM asap when I am back in Australia so I am easily contactable and have a new number to give to job applications. Will get a new contract when I start my full time job.

After talking about Jetstar with Ida she explained the 40kg max means you can’t even pay for more if your carry on is over the 10kg so I am going to have spend $80 posting my backpack. More money gone.

Tomorrow before I leave I am just going to post some Facebook albums, apply for a couple of jobs, type my future project notes and email Cheryl, sort through my last ‘throw or give away’ box with Mitsuyo and go to the post office. Then it’s my last bullet train at 3.30pm, arrive at the airport at 5.30pm and fly to Cairns 8.25pm.

I’m comin home!!!!!!

I did it. One full year of living, working, travelling and enjoying life in a foreign country. May it not be my last.  Spain 2016 is the next dream and plan. Not only did I survive, I soared. It was not easy but the best things in life often are not. May this sense of adventure, freedom, self belief, open mindedness and resilience last a lifetime. 

Thank you Japan. Arigatou gozaimasu. Mata ne. We will surely meet again. 

2 days to go.

8.30 woke up before alarm, slept surprisingly well on Ida’s spare futon on the floor for about 5.5 hours. Pretty comfy, I’m used to anything after having wood 2 inches from my back for a year.

Luckily Mitsuyo messaged me to come pick me up from Ida’s saving me can money and time.

10am meet Mihoko at gas station, drive to Kasaoka to see the sunflower fields. The rain just stopped as we left the city, maintaining my reputation as Sunshine Girl, I worked my magic unawares and we had a beautiful (if a little hot), day amongst my favourite flowers. I love how cheerful sunflowers are. You can’t help but feel happy and positive in their presence. Was so relaxing to stroll through them, observing the way their ecosystem works with the bees, grasshoppers, birds and their due east reaching faces as if in worship of the rising sun. We were lucky to see so many out apparently. I am always so lucky. Mihoko says it’s because I attract it. What a lovely sentiment. I like to think so, some of the time. But I truly strike gold with people and weather these days! Let’s hope I can bring this good fortune home with me.

1.30pm drive back to Okayama, discuss the delights of FamiChikin as our pre movie snack/ lunch on the road.

3pm arrive just in time to enjoy my last movie in Japan at the foreign film Cinema Claire I’ve been wanting to go to for ages. Small and musty with cold customer service, just like Richmond Regent and just how I love my movie theatres. That brings me to four movies I’ve seen at the cinema here. I’ve missed my regular monthly sometimes more movie trips. It’s still one of my favourite things to do. So excited to go back home and have no subtitles, enjoy the ads in English and order everything without the assistance of my friends!

5pm drive home to Mihoko’s and chill, checked out her whole house for the first time – it’s so high like so many levels! People can’t build out here so they build up. Carrying laundry up and down all those stairs must be a punish!

6pm dinner, more like full on feast, held in my honour to fare me well with her mother, Aunty (my kimono teachers) and father. This family is a true joy to be around. I will definitely keep my promises to them about returning, hopefully with ducklings in tow. Her Dad speaks no English but drew this adorable picture for me with Mihoko explaining he hopes my wishes come true about having my own family and welcoming us back into his home. There’s a popular news story about a family of ducks that migrate through the streets of Tokyo ever Summer that this image is depicting and he said it’s a symbol of the Japanese way of life. The whole family moves together. The two small objects are gorgeous ceramic mini Mt Fuji chopstick rests Mihoko just presented to me. She’s so thoughtful.

It’s quite true actually, children usually stay living in their family home until marriage without any judgement of failure, newly delivered mothers and their babies come home for the first month so their mother can help take care of both, and children always take responsibility for their ageing or ill parents. Their sense of duty and obligation is admirable. As is the detail to which they pay the welfare of any and all dependents. Overbearing and obsessive, even neurotic at times, definitely, but full of love, care and the utmost respect.

9pm I was even given a cake with candles! More than makes up for the one I didn’t get on my birthday this year. My wish? Happiness. Love the deliberate Aussie twist on the message plate. Bless Mihoko, after living in Australia for years and keeping close ties with her host family, she feels half Australian herself. The perfect person to take my last little trip with. Almost like a transition preparation day. She even goes “I feel like meat on a barbie”, as we cooked in the sun. Lol.

10.30pm tears and more tears saying goodbye to this wonderful family who’ve welcomed me so warmly. I will definitely come back to visit one day. And I will send cards. Goodbyes are so sad.

11.30pm web check in & arrange earlier Shinkansen as my bulky luggage is going to considerably slow me down on the tight ten minute transfer. Mitsuyo suggested an earlier train and wider gap so there’s no need to rush and no risk of arriving to the airport late (as in early late – a serious problem in Japan). This time the concern is definitely appreciated, I want my departure to be as smooth as possible.

12.30pm I wanna read a little and sleep long.

3 days to go.

9am – finished adventure book, 30 adventures in 13 months!!! Pretty happy with that.

11-12 Skyped a friend

2pm met Kazuhiro at Okayama station (meant to have Kazuhiro Day all day as we planned a month ago but he forgot and has been working like a slave so only half. I was cut and started out saying forget all of it, but he was genuinely sorry and I love his company so agreed to go).

3.20pm Godzilla at Movix Kurashiki & caramel popcorn. Happy girl. Man I miss going to the movies regularly. One of my favourite things to do.

6pm dinner at well know Italian restaurant downtown Kurashiki.

As always he was the perfect gentleman, even paid for everything, great conversation, light affection, nothing more. Just a beautiful man, inside and out as I told him. I wonder if I’ll ever see him in person again? I’m sure we’ll
Skype.

8.20pm meet Ida behind her school, drinks at the bar Kazu and I went to last time, he showed us there before we said our goodbyes. Chatted and laughed and drank until 1.15am! Just what we needed. Walk 25 minutes home.

1.45am home but I left my fucking keys in my gym bag from yoga last night! Grrr. Walk to 7-11 to use wifi to message Mitsuyo, wait for reply, message Ida who kindly offered to have me at hers. No reply from Mitsuyo so cab to Ida’s. Silly mistake but all good. Sigh. Sleep time.

4 days to go.

So good to wake up without an alarm at 8am and go back to sleep until 9am.

Up, breakky and stuck into the job applications, concentrating on UWS. There are some great jobs going at Penrith and Parramatta. My littlest sister gave me the idea by sending me a link to a job on her campus so I could “stay with her forever”. Taww I wish I could be with her wherever I live. Maybe for a little while it would be nice to stick around anyway.

My old UWS mentoring program supervisor, who actually had coffee with right here in Okayama a couple of months ago also sent me another one through Facebook after seeing my status calling out for a favour in the form of a job hook up. Social media is so useful.

11am off to bank to close my account, final official errand. Well, you’d think that would be simple but no! My manager was wrong it wasn’t “easy” and I couldn’t to it by myself. And I didn’t only need my cash card. Even though I really didn’t want my friend I’m staying with to help me with anything else, because frankly I’m sick of feeling dependent and incompetent, it’s lucky I did because the bullshit the teller spewed at me (by that I mean she politely asked for something in Japanese that I couldn’t understand and because what I was trying to do was, once again, a complicated problem due to inefficient systems and the language barrier I was pissed off so anything she said I hated), I wouldn’t have been able to follow without an English translation. So ride home in the sweltering to heat to get not only my cash book that I never use but also my passport even though my ID here is always my resident card. Return, take a new number, wait again, fill out the same form, because of course there was an issue with my name. Finally after almost yelling and almost crying in the bank, we walked out. I feel so bad for being an impatient and uncooperative bitch to both the staff and to my friend but I simply have no tolerance anymore. I just want to do things by myself in English without anyone holding my hand, trying to do it for me or needing to translate. I’m really over it. Thankfully that should be the last situation like that.

Finished buying my thank you gift, bought luggage locks and went home by myself. Aaahhh I love being on my own. Glad I told Mum I want the back room again, she thought after missing everyone and being lonely I would want to be in the other spare room inside the house for the company. No, I really value my privacy and me time now. Hope I can live by myself again soon. Actually really missing eating my own meals. But I’m saving money so for now I have to take whatever I’m given. Not that it’s all bad but I usually don’t eat many carbs and Japanese families have rice or noodles or some kind of batter in almost every meal! I need to lose fat when I get home. I’m so uncomfortable with these extra rolls and dimples.

Online English teaching work application. That would be a great solution. Just Skype from home. Again a friend and a student sent across links through Facey. Good idea to post the call out.

Reading my book in the massage chair. What do you know? I am relaxing. So nice and calm. Even happy.

Write my thank you cards and put the presents together. Ready. Very happy with them. Should take photos tomorrow to remember them.

8:50 ride to gym, yoga class at 9.20. Probably my last one here. Looking forward to English instruction again. Wow everything is going to suddenly feel so easy and effortless once I get back. It’s actually been quite a lot more stressful than I allowed myself to admit, living here. I guess I was committed and I knew I had to make the most if it and put up with whatever difficulties there were, but now that I’ve passed my 12 month goal and all my original expat friends are gone I’m just annoyed by all of it.

Waxing done. I swear my life revolves around hair removal. What I would give to be a blond haired woman!

Going to read and go to sleep. Was meant to have an all day thing including a movie date tomorrow but my friend clearly forgot and didn’t write back to my questions about the details. Didn’t write back at all until just now, after I said forget it and gave him a little piece of advice for not letting people down. I had been looking forward to it for a month. Oh well, lots of job applications to do anyway.

5 days to go.

8.40am wake up

9am meet Ida at track, hour walk in blistering heat. Got to 36 today and humidity was intense.

Job application and search for couple of hours.

Korean style okonomiyake for lunch made by Mitsuyo. Man I’m lucky to be so well looked after. Back to feeling grateful.

1:30pm Offspring. Cannot believe the plot twist. You bastard Tomas! Poor Nina. Oh no!!! Billy & Mick’s reconciliation! Yesss!!! Love love this show. Will be able to watch finale at home, I think. Perfect timing if so.

2:30pm Post office for final run: gift by airmail and middle size luggage piece by ship, latter should arrive in 2-3 months and was half the price. Done. Purchased extra 5kg for my check in baggage for Osaka-Cairns and Cairns-Brisbane flights. Home flight already enough from what I can see but emailed to confirm. Transportation of belongings sorted. Bit over for carry-on though, by 4kg. Think that’s ok though.

3pm Went into my (old) school to collect final electricity bill, paid at convenience store. Chatted with new Emergency Teacher covering Tuesday to Friday. Met him before at few social get togethers. Nice guy, pleased someone I know who is good is taking care of my (old) students.

Shopping at good old Loft, man I love this multi level, got it all cheap department store! Bought thank you gifts. Strictly no more purchases for myself. Well, bar a matcha frapp from Starbucks – I have to make the most of this exclusive to Japan menu item! And it’s soooo hot I need to sit in the air con with an iced drink to catch my breath and attempt to relax.

Next stop, bank to close my account. Nope they’re shut at 3pm. Oh Japan you’re so convenient and practical.

Home, yes no one else is! Read my new book on couch with an ice block in piece.

Skype home, Mum’s throwing a welcome home barbie Sunday week! Yes!!!! I’m so excited. I requested a real meat pie, good sausages, Julie’s cob bread and cider. All the kids will be there, all but one sibling (of Mum’s kids that is) too. O.M.G. I cannot wait. Got to talk to my baby too 🙂 Mum has been telling him everyday that I’m coming home soon and said he gets so excited when she says my name. My little man. And she’s not cutting him til I’m back so and can see and cuddle him at maximum furriness and cuteness!

Caught up with my darling Cheryl on Line. She’s lining up job interviews and flat viewings in Amsterdam already! So happy for her.

Tried to apply for online teaching work on my phone while waiting for shower but really lengthy and requires attachments and voice recordings. Tomorrow’s job. As is my waxing and adventure book completion.

Then the weekend which is packed with fun outings, then Monday then half day and on my way outta here!

Got some great advice from a dear friend that I really needed tonight:

“There’s no reason to be stressed Riss. If you need to take a small job in the interim than so be it. U don’t have the pressure of a loan. You haven’t failed if you need to wait a little while to find what u want. Just relax, be happy to be home for a while, continue to put applications in, everything will work itself out. Take each day as it comes for the time being, stop looking so far ahead. U already know what you want and it will come soon enough. Staying at home will only very temporary for you. Be happy 😜😜”

Thank you. I have saved this as a note and will read it morning and night to shoo away my new mate Negative “needs-a-slap” Nancy.

Back to this great fiction then sleep. Oh no alarm feels great!

6 days to go.

7:15am Up and out to train station

2 hours and three trains later, breakfast with my lovely Fiona at Ikebukuro station. So nice to see her again after saying our goodbyes and thinking the next time we see each other would be in Europe in Twentysixteen!

Finally bought two of Haruki Murukami’s books; his IQ84 trilogy plus Norwegian Wood. Started Haruki is an internationally famous Japanese author who my Australian and Japanese friends have highly recommended for almost the entire time I have been here. I have been talking about wanting to read him for ages. So happy to start on my first novel of his in central Tokyo where the story is actually set! And continue reading on my most of my bullet train ride (nothing but the number one Nozomi N700 – 300kms an hour) home to Okayama. 

5pm Walked through the exit gates at Okayama for the last time, this is the final “home to Okayama” train trip for me. Next train will be bound for Osaka to board my plane home next Tuesday night! It always feels so good to return home after even a short time away to Okayama, seeing the familiar shops and buildings and signs. I can’t even imagine what seeing Sydney Harbour from the sky Saturday week is going to feel like! And then driving back into Richmond after more than thirteen months away – my longest ever time away from my hometown! I am pretty sure it is going to be the most comforting ecstasy I have even known. Oh my god, words just cannot describe how excited I am to come home.

I can’t be fucked to write the Can’t Waits and Gonna Miss sections anymore. I just can’t wait to get home, be with my people, speak English normally everyday, do any task I want by myself without needing translation or language assistance and I am surely going to miss a lot of things over time, many I probably won’t even know until I am not here but for now I just want to leave this country and return to my own!

Though today I am saying that feeling happy, not resentful or irritated or angry. More than 4 hours of consecutive sleep and deliberate positive thinking does wonders for one’s mood and the feelings of those around them. I am glad I didn’t lose it yesterday. I was teetering so close to the edge I was actually terrified. Managed not to fall. I just hope I can stay relatively upright for the long term. Or at least if I hit the ground, I can quickly get up and brush off just like I did coming down good old Mount Fuji. 

Just weighed all my ‘to check in’ baggage and I am almost 14kg over! Grrr, I knew I would be, going to have spend another 15,000 yen posting one bag home by surface mail in addition to the gift I have to send back at 7,000 yen. Damn it, after the Fuji trip and my last week here plus Cairns and Brisbane (even only buying food out etc) I am going to be dead broke. 

“I am going to get a job before I leave Japan”. “I have got a new job already”. I hope the all powerful and might Fuji-san grants the wishes I made as I passed through the torii gates on his magnificent and grand slopes. Onegai shimasu/ Please do this for me.

Going to skype my friend, then shower, then early night. Yes, a room by myself with no disturbances!!

 

 

7 days to go.

4am wake up (no wait, decision to get up and stop kidding myself each short snooze is going to become real sleep)

4.30am walk to vantage point for sunrise. Very special to see it slowly popping above the clouds while sitting on the edge of Mt Fuji. Quite magical.

5.30am breakfast – bento lunchbox again. I cannot wait to eat bacon and eggs back in Australia.

6am resume climb

8am reach summit. Oh my god. Can’t believe I did it. Not gonna lie, so glad that’s over.

Then I’m told we’re not there yet! What?! But seriously, what?! Oh there’s a weather station where everyone takes photos and is the actual measure of the 3776th metre. It’s just up that huge steep hill that people are puffing their lungs out on, just over there. No thanks, I said, but was told you haven’t climbed Fuji unless you do that bit. Of course I dragged my tired arse up that painful incline. And here is the result:

Then the ‘smile and make a peace sign like it was a breeze and I feel happy right now’ pose:

Walk around the circumference of the top for an hour (yes that meant more hills). Got to see the dormant volcano though so that was awesome:

9amish reach famous post office, address Fuji postcard to My Family and post to Mum’s.

9:30amish begin descent. Thank fuck it’s not another 7 or 8 hours like I thought (language barrier, or just not telling me because of it) but this down route is only 3 or 4 hours. Ok I can do that.

Noonish lunch. Curry rice again, (I’ve never eaten this much rice in one week before, not being converted either) and the worst coffee.

1.30pm finally we reach the finish line!!!
Last couple hours were quite fun actually.

2pm drive back down the mountain to the hot spring. I’ve never been so excited to shower and soak in a bath in my life. Thorough shower, hot pool, outdoor pool with massage bead things on the bottom (heaven on my sore swollen feet), sauna and salt scrub, cold pool, steam room, cold pool, hot spa, hydrate. Aaaah. Just what I needed. Probably my last onsen for a long time so I’m glad I left feeling satisfied with my visit.

4pm cab to station, train to Tokyo where we’re staying. I wish we were just going home, I’m completely empty and my lack of tolerance for the language barrier and patience with things that annoy me like unnecessary running or having someone micro manage me is showing and I think offending.

Brainstorm how I can get home so I can be by myself, have a normal conversation, relax and just sleep and quickly realise I can’t afford anything but a six hour train ride which I’ve probably just missed and I don’t have a home so not actually escaping. Feeling trapped, overwhelmed by my lack of connection (phone, wifi), money, job and house again. Fuck. Oh and now the two hotel rooms have become one, no privacy or sleep again, brilliant! I’m going to have a breakdown to someone who can’t even hear the words blubbering out of my mouth. Walk away before you yell or cry. I did. I used the hotel wifi to message my friend then call because this vent had to be huge.

10pm going to sleep, please let me sleep.

8 days to go.

So yesterday I couldn’t post my blog, because I spent more than 24 hours on Mount Fuji!

It was an epic adventure but completely exhausting.

6am, leave to catch Shinkansen

10am arrive in Fujinomiya, meet guide

11am drive up to the 5th station on the mountain, where most climbers begin their ascent.

12.30 Bento lunchbox

1pm begin climb

Tough stuff! Good weather and conditions but even with regular breaks, it was full on heavy cardio.

6pm stop for night at 9th station, curry rice for dinner (actually I bought a second “Hamburg Set” I was so hungry and depleted). Oh the Japanese think a meat patty or rissole by itself is called a hamburg.

9pm try to sleep. Key word try. As cool as it was to feel like one of The Lost Boys from Peter Pan in our little wooden hut, six to a bunk bed sleeping arrangements, the novelty wore off fast when the 6 degree temperature kept dropping, the wood beneath my back started to hurt my bones and a couple of my neighbours were snoring.

I sound precious but I didn’t sleep well the night before and after 6 hours of uphill, I needed my rest.

Incredible views though and a once in a lifetime experience, for sure.

Each time I decide to embark on one of these endurance testing physically challenges, I regret it one eighth of the way in – it’s frikkin hard! But extremely rewarding. Such a mental game. Even more so when you’re doing it with Japanese friends and a Japanese guide. Yeah unless my little Sachi translates, I miss the facts, directions and jokes unless their visual. That sucked more than I expected, sadly. Would have been nice to share it with some I could easily communicate with. But I’m being precious again. Feel terrible for having these thoughts when so much has been done for me but it’s very isolating and frustrating to not say as you think in your normal language for 36 hours straight. Oh we’re not up to today yet. Next blog.