Sayonara, Tokyo!

Happy summer, everybody! My last five months were pretty full, so here's the quick run down.

In February, I went to New Zealand and Australia. I'll do a separate blog retrospective on that trip, but for now, suffice it to say that I had a wonderful trip! I spent ten days going all over New Zealand, and then I hopped over to Sydney, Australia, where I met up with my lovely Australian friend who I haven't seen since we lived in Brazil, seven years ago. It's such a blessing to have friends who you can pick right up with no matter the time that has passed!


In March, I enjoyed my final hanami in Tokyo. This year, a friend and I went to Nakameguro to see all of the cherry trees that line the canal there.  It was beautiful! 

April was the G7 Agriculture Ministers meeting in Niigata, Japan. That involved a lot of work and a lot of late nights. But it all went pretty smoothly, so that was great. Of course, at the end, I was so tired that I slammed my head into the baggage rack on the shinkansen and had a nice little bump along my hair line for the next three days. Oh well.

Ikinariya (Edo-era restaurant)

Pepper was there to give advice on tourist sites in Niigata.

The Ag Ministerial was the second of a whole slew of Ministerials prior to the G7 Summit is Ise-shima. So during the month of May, while I had a significant amount of empathy for my colleagues that worked on the many other G7 Ministerials/Summit, I have to admit to a certain amount of joy/relief knowing that my Ministerial was done. But I was also very busy sneaking in some last minute excursions, packing out, getting ready to leave, and saying goodbye to people. 

Mickey and Minnie!

There were two last minute excursions in May. The first excursion: I finally went to Tokyo Disney Sea! It has been on my list for five years, but I just hadn't done it. I particularly wanted to go to Disney Sea (rather than just Tokyo Disney), since Disney Sea is unique to Tokyo, and it's known for being a little more adult-friendly. So a friend and I picked a date that worked in our schedules, and off we went. Unfortunately, that was the only day that week that had rain. All. Day. Long. Fortunately, that also meant there were no lines! And since it wasn't cold, and we were able to buy Minnie Mouse rain ponchos - an excellent investment! - it made for a super fun day full of riding rides, seeing shows, and riding rides again.  

Rainy and windy. But still fun!

The mountain actually explodes!

The second excursion: Some friends and I hiked Mt. Fuji. To be more specific, we hiked the lower part of Mt. Fuji - up to the 4th station. Normally, people drive to the 5th station and then walk up to the summit from there. But people with asthma aren't supposed to go above 10,000 feet, and Mt. Fuji is taller than 10,000 feet. So instead, I hiked the bottom half. Again, I managed to pick the one day with rain. But again, it was a light rain, the temperature was good, and we had rain ponchos (Minnie Mouse rain ponchos, thanks to Disney Sea!). So off we went! We had a great hike up to the 4th station, stopped for lunch, and then hiked back down and went to an onsen before heading back to Tokyo. Due to the rain, places where we could have had great views of the five lakes, it was just a giant cloud. But it was still a beautiful hike. 

The 2nd station

Bridge just after the 3rd station

At the 4th station!

Pack out went fairly smoothly this time. I did the regular closet purge (just because you CAN zip it up, doesn't mean you SHOULD) and medicine cabinet purge (why did I take expired medicine on an international move (twice!)? and wow, I have a lot of medicine that expired in the last four years!). So that's always useful. The cat was somewhat disturbed by all of the purging going on, but got really upset when I started sorting the cat toys. She sat down in the middle of them and gave me a very stern talking to, all with a very worried look on her face. So I had to wait until she was out of the room before I could sneak some of her toys into the air shipment pile and some for the suitcase. The movers were probably the best I've ever had. Not only were they nice and efficient, but they would also ask questions on occasion - a very important point considering that I am only one person, unable to keep an eye on everybody packing in three rooms on two floors simultaneously, and had forgotten that the throw pillows for the government's sofa had been stored under the stairs. 

And around the excursions and the packing out, there were a number of sayonara parties/get-togethers (two involving karaoke!) and just regular life. I tried sweet potato kitkat and sake kitkat. (Liked the sake kitkat. Can live without the sweet potato kitkat.) I found a creme brûlée candy that wasn't as tasty as I had hoped. I discovered that Japanese face masks come not only in camellia and soy, but also in snail, snake venom and bee venom. (What we won't do for beauty!) And I decided that my final visit to a Japanese nail salon deserved nothing less than Hello Kitty.

I left Tokyo on June 2, and now I'm in the middle of home leave. It was a wonderful tour, and I'd be happy to go back there in the future, if that's where life takes me. In the meantime, I'm looking forward to a few months in the U.S. catching up on a whole bunch of training before heading off to my next adventure in the Dominican Republic!