Be the Change: Allison and Shannon Do Japan!

I think it goes without saying that when one of your best friends comes to visit to help celebrate the holidays in Japan, amazing things are bound to happen. Here's a glimpse into our Japanese holiday vacation. :)

The first night Allison arrived, we went to THE one and only bar that feels so like home to me...let's just say Best First Night Ever. Japanese guy sits next to us...and although he couldnt speak any English (and of course our Japanese is not yet fluent) he just kept giving us "presents." This was pretty much a foreshadowing of what the rest of our trip would be like. :)

LOVED this guy :)

We were lucky enough to participate in a half marathon just a few days into our trip...the weather was sooooo freaking beautiful and pretty sure we were the only foreigners. :) Although I think we missed the memo to dress up as a Japanese anime character....

Pokemon or Pikachu? I'm not sure...

We took a trip down to the Okinawa islands for a few days and decided to rent a car one day and cruise around. We somehow found what seemed to be a hole-in-the-wall car rental shop....which was perfect...spoke with a man who couldn't understand us and we couldn't understand him, barely showed any form of ID, signed a paper, and we were off! We may or may not have gotten lost a few times, somehow ended up in a random Japanese tiny town bus station in which 3 Japanese old men bus drivers drew us a map to a Sake Brewery we were trying to find, saw some amazing beaches and of course accidentally drove on a sidewalk. To sum it up, it was a great day with the rental car. :)

I have no clue what he's saying

Our "map" from the bus drivers

Zamami Island

The Japanese tradition for Xmas is to celebrate with, you guessed it, KFC. We of course decided this was the obvious choice for our Xmas dinner as well...but little did we know that we were supposed to make a reservation for the chicken literally months in advance! After about a 2 hour long ordeal with lines out the door, we FINALLY got our fried chicken. In search of KFC we stumbled upon a pretty awesome Xmas concert. Merry Xmas to us and the Colonel. :)

Xmas at KFC!

Please note the cow and pig

Our time in Tokyo was pretty hectic since there were millions of Japanese buzzing around for the holidays...especially at the Tsukiji fish market. It's the World's largest wholesale fish market with the World's freshest sushi....so this place is absolutely nuts. There are mini trucks everywhere blasting through people...pretty sure Allison almost got taken out more than once, fish guts and blood, and not to mention everywhere you look you see a poor little fish take his last breath. And the sushi here actually was unbelievable...fresh as fresh can be. :)

Gross

Typical day in the fish market

Our lovely place for relaxation in Tokyo was the capsule hotel we stayed in....this place was AWESOME. The capsules are pretty small, but yet big enough to sleep with your luggage in there if you want. They even had a TV and cute lil dimming lights....let's just say I was pretty much in Heaven in this thing...especially because I was falling asleep to Japanese Ice Skating. Allison loved the slippers here. :)

Cool slippers

Our time spent in Mt.Fuji and Kyoto were full of some spectacular world heritage sights....

Mt.Fuji at dusk

Kinkaku-ji -Golden Pavilion, Kyoto-actually made of real gold

We rang in the New Year in Nara which of course could not have been a better place for us. Started the night off in our hostel with some episodes of Sex and the City, beer, popcorn and a few other travelers. Ended the night at midnight with all the other Japanese at one of Japan's most famous temples. They all wait in line to go into the temple at midnight...we didn't realize there would literally be about 10,000 people in line...so we just observed the Japanese at their best. :)