I am trying to make a list of things/experiences that we had in Japan, maybe it will give you a good idea on what to do during your trip. I will try to not repeat myself with the previous post, but we shall see.

1. Eat authentic Japanese food

I recommend trying different foods. If you go to Japan and live on pasta and tacos, then this is not an experience. I will make a list of my favourite things that I tried:

• Okonomiyaki
• Soba and tempura
• Udon
• Ramen
• Sushi
• Ddukbokki (Korean rice cakes in sauce)
• Yakisoba
• Onigiri

Here you can see my friend's cold soba with tempura.

I think I wrote most of the things down. Okonomiyaki was definitely my favourite, but others are all on the same level. There are a few things that I didn't try on this trip, but I would really like to - taiyaki and takoyaki.

At the same time on the last day in Japan, we went to have food in Hawaiian style pancake place and this was an experience! The food was amazing. So of course you can try other countries' foods, but don't do ONLY that. Food experiences are really cool.

2. Go to karaoke

I actually did hope that we get to go there more, but even this one time there was plenty of fun. 4 hours of karaoke cost about 15 euros, and there was free drink bar plus free soft serve ice cream (unlimited of course!). And four hours passed super fast.

Singing in Japanese was quite difficult, same with Korean which we also tried for a second. :D Which was cool, was to try these old English songs (like Barbie Girl. Yep.). We sang everything from Hard Rock Hallelujah to Eminem's rap.



Japanese karaoke is a lot different from Estonian one. You get a separate room wiht your friends to sing and go crazy in. It is not that you have to go in front of many people at the bar and start singing. Japanese karaoke is a lot more freeing and nicer. Also you get to use tamburines and this kind of stuff. :D Must go again next time!

3. Go to onsen

Going to onsen was an experience. I was super excited about it from the moment my friend said that we could possibly go. Onsen is natureal hot water spring (?) and there you go and bathe in this hot water (wow what an explanation, Signe, you go girl).

We went to a different town from Tsukuba and Tokyo and it was really nice, it was on the countryside. Temperature of the water is over 40 degrees Celcius and finally sitting in the water my cold bones got warm :D. And it was so nice after. Also, we went to onsen on the day before our last day there and it was perfect rest from walking around and carrying a lot of things. :D

4. Cross the Shibuya crossing

I don't even know why I am writing this down, but in my opinion, this is one of the most iconic things. Everyone has seen pictures of this crossing, it usually comes with articles written about Tokyo.



In reality this crossing is... quite small! This blew my mind, because I expected something grand. Basically it is just like any other crossing... but it did have a lot of people crossing it. :D It felt unrea to walk there, I felt like wow, I am really in Japan, huh. :D

5. Take purikura

So purikura is a set of pictures that you can take with your friends in a photo booth. We did it twice and I think they came out super cute. You can also edit them later and add different stickers and writings on them.



Purikura machines are definitely in all kinds of game centers. Here you can see one. There are a lot of different games and machines. So I suggest checking game center out as well!

Purikura cost about 400 yen (under 4 euros) and I think this was super cute thing and I was glad we did it. One of the printed out pictures is now on my fridge and other one is on my cupboard next to my desk so I can look at it if I want to. :D

6. Visit a temple

The first picture of this post is me in a temple.

I also recommend to go to a temple and pick yourself a fortune. It means that for 100 yen, you can take a stick and it has a number on it. Depending on the number you get a paper with your fortune written on it. I  got regular fortune and kept it. In case you get bad fortune, you can tie it up and leave it in the temple so it wouldn't affect you.



Here you can see how they are tied up and left here.

I also recomment to wash your hands and mouth and have incense smell come over you to get rid of bad stuff. Even if you don't believe in anything, this seems so traditional and is cool to try. Also the temples look gorgeous.

7. Buy something from a vending machine

We mostly had water :D and coffee. And well, we also tried melon soda and something similar to vitamine water named Pocari Sweat (which was really good). Of course you can get some green tea and... warm soup.

In Estonia there aren't many vending machines, so it was cool to test them. At the same time we wondered who is filling them up?! Sometimes they are in such random places, but they always have enough stock. How?!

8. Eat something from konbini

Meaning from a small store. I recommend trying onigiri, they have loads of different ones (with meat, with fish, but also veggie ones). There is a selection of lunch boxes as well as wraps and sandwiches.

They also have many sweet pastries, for example melon bread, which there are different ones as well. Regular one, one with chocolate chips and one with melon flavour and so on. I just love Japanese pastries, they are so fluffy and soft and just wonderful.


Commenst from my previous post:

Such a positive vibe post, super nice! It will be interesting to read however you write - however it is the best for you to make some posts. :) Did you buy some masks being afraid of Corona virus? Could you bring out something that for us is normal, but would offend Japanese people? Did you miss something while travelling?

I was not afraid of Corona, I think the flu is much worse. :D In Japan there are only about 163 cases of Corona as well and it is due to this ship. But actually I did get some masks. I used the one with a filter and also a normal one. I wore them at the airport, because there are so many people from so many different countries. Daily I didn't wear a mask in Japan.

I don't know if this offends Japanese people, but they usually give you stuff while holding it with two hands. I tried to do the same and accept stuff in the same way. I don't think it would offend them if I hadn't done it, though.

I guess if would be rude to make your way rudely in the queue or something. Or talk on the phone on a bus. Just normal things for us, but I think these would not be appreciated there.

I don't think I missed anything when I was travelling. Maybe only my routine foods and stuff dealing with my eating disorder. There were more things I liked and would have taken with me :D Okay, maybe one time I did want to use a bathroom, but it was only traditional Japanese one (meaning you have to squat :'D). I did miss my cat a bit, especially because this one bar we went to had a cat.