I've saved up and planned for more than a year and finally made it to Japan; after about a eighteen hour long and grueling plane flight with two layovers. Our group of nearly 30 arrived 22:00 Japan time, nearly at the breaking point of physical and mental exhaustion. One can only play a Tetris rip-off, and be beaten by the cruel chess computer for so long.

Once we arrived at Asahiplaza Capsule Hotel in Osaka we knew that it was all worth it. Everyones plans were to see if the manga store was open (it wasn't), find food without getting lost (I went with a group of guys and shared Takoyaki), and end the day by taking a bath. We were all so tired that we hardly even cared that it was a public bath. After we spent our first night in our capsules, which contain a futon, pillow, bamboo shutter door, TV, radio alarm clock, a shelf, mirror and lights. Everything else was a community facility.

The first morning we gathered together in the lounge and had a very thick slice of toast, juice, a small side of pasta and hardboiled egg. Afterwards we headed out to the coach bus, where we would be spending a quarter of our trip, to our first destination: Arashiyama. We were given two choices on how to spend our time there, most of the group chose not to go the kimono factory but up the mountain to see monkeys. That's the downfall of time constrictions you can't do everything, but the hike up to the top was enjoyable by the time I made it to the top my camera already died. There were monkeys everywhere at this place, one has to keep a constant eye as not to step on one or have the little kleptomaniacs steal something from your pockets. We fed the monkeys at the gift center, we were the ones in the cage however. On the way down since most of our group being high schoolers we had to stop a goof around on the playground. Lunch that afternoon was whatever we could find, my brother and I wondered around till finding someone in our group sitting down at a restaurant. After a delicious meal in the awkward seating we wandered a little more eating ice cream and buying batteries that only seemed to last for twenty photos.

The second destination of our day now seems as it were a completely separate day. I almost forgot about it perhaps because I don't know where my pictures for it went. All in all I took nearly 1,800 pictures, of course most of them inconsequential. Anyways after a nice hike up hilly area covered in tourist shops, we when through Kiyomizu Temple in Kyoto. One thing of interest were these monk instruments made of solid iron one weighing in around 200lbs and the other much more than any human could seem to lift, but that was it's intended purpose. The temples were large elegant, and numerous, everywhere we went in Japan there was another temple or shrine on the tourist map. Heading back my brother and I broke off from the main group because a Totoro caught out eyes. We found a Studio Ghibli shop which was an alright compromise for not being able to visit their museum. It had every Ghibli product you could imagine from hand towels, cards, and figurines fashioned from most of Miyazaki's masterpieces. Although some seemed to be missing perhaps because of licensing or they had been discontinued, most exciting was the Ponyo merchandise. At this time it hadn't been release to the US theaters and was just about to make it to DVD there. After filling up our bags we went for food and met up with the rest of our group. The stall we chose to eat at were making giant crepes with so many different flavors, since it was lunch time we had pizza crepes folded into slice shape, they were delicious. While waiting for the coach we all gathered around the pond then a street performer showed up, he was great, the funniest part was his reaction to all the Gaijin showing up for his performance, he was like, "who here speaks Japanese?" I suppose it made his show interesting. Unfortunately at the near end of his performance we had to leave. That night we hung out in the city, I was disorientated and clung to those who knew their way around trying not to get lost.