Tokyo Disney, Tokyo Sea Life, and Odaiba

This weekend I planned a surprise last minute trip to Disney Land, Tokyo Sea Life, and Odaiba. Robert came home Friday afternoon and I said "Your not working tomorrow right? I planned a big adventure this weekend I need your help to hurry and pack." I clicked accept on our airbnb and we started packing. As we packed I explained what I had planned for us and showed Robert where we were going to stay. We ended up leaving a little after 6pm from our place in Yokosuka caught 2 trains and then a bus. We finally arrived at our place in Edogawa where our airbnb was around 8:30pm. It has been quite cold in Japan lately, so adventuring out with a baby, with all of our gear in 2 backpacks, on public transportation can be a bit of a challenge. Managing public transportation as a foreigner in Japan in general is a little difficult...some signs are only in Japanese (which makes reading them near impossible), if you happen to have the Japanese writing for the location you can try to match them up, if you are lucky you can find the Japanese name which is spelled out in plain characters. When both get a little too confusing I tend to ask a random person, usually something like "Sumimasen, (point at name of location and attempt to pronounce it properly) Edogawa? (followed by me pointing at a train or a specific bus I think we are supposed to get on)" Usually they start speaking Japanese and I tend to get the basic idea of what they are saying. A lot of the time we hop on a train/bus we think is correct and hope for the best.

The bus stop by the Airbnb

Our airbnb

Our airbnb

Disney Land was tons of fun, Kora got to ride on a bunch of rides. She kept yelling "WAAAWW" and would point her tiny little finger at all sorts of things. There food was very impressive, it not only looked amazing but it also tasted really good. When it warms up a bit more we are planning to go to Tokyo Disney Sea which is the adjacent Disney park. All of the voices for the rides and all of the songs were in Japanese. There were some signs in English, Japanese, and Korean. A lot of the workers knew some English which helped a little.

Tokyo Sea Life was incredible. There were tons of fish, a tank with stingrays and a bunch of different sharks. They had sea turtles, octopus, penguins, different birds, and a whole bunch of other sea creatures. There was also a special area outside where you could pet the stingrays and a few sharks. I have to admit I was a bit sad by how small their cages were....Oh and ironically you go to their food court and all of the food is seafood...which sort of made Robert and I a bit sick to our stomachs...

Odaiba we didn't get to spend as much time at as I wanted (because we had spent most of this day at Tokyo sea life). We saw the Gundam monument and walked around a huge mall. There were all sorts of cute little shops and cafes. We plan to go back to Odaiba during the anime convention in march. Hopefully we will get to explore a lot more then.

Life in Japan so far

Things are great here, really great I am so in love with Japan. All of the "gadgets", even just the basic basic living style. It reminds me a lot of being in the Netherlands. Japan feels comfortable and safe; I truly have enjoyed every minute being here. I think people wonder how difficult it is here, and I would have to say the hardest thing lately has just been being a mom. I miss having other moms I could share my difficulties with, and although my mom friends are just a skype call away sometimes you just need a hug ... Kora is getting 2 more teeth which will be a total of 8 teeth (6 on top and 2 on the bottom) ... She is active and very stubborn (just like her parents) ...She wants to walk but can't, She wants to stand but can't. She also gets frustrated when she can not eat what we are eating, for example: this morning she lunged at my peanut butter sandwich which then quickly turned into her whole face covered in hives ... (we are pretty sure she is allergic to nuts ...) Sometimes I just want a break, and lately breaks are hard to come by. When you do not have anyone you personally know or necessarily trust with your child, handing over part of your soul to a stranger does not sound appeasing ... Jet lag for her has been a bit challenging. She has done well for the most part but she still gets really cranky around 5-6pm and wants to sleep. Overall just the whole parenting thing is hard ... because of course being a parent is difficult but it is especially difficult with all of the change.

If you are not friends with me on Facebook or do not follow me on instagram you can add me and see some of the "Interesting" videos of our house and some basic things here in Japan.The short quick things are easier to post on there then on blogger during the week. I will do my best to keep up with the updates! 

With the internet here my posts automatically come up in Japanese its weird (it might be because of my auto translate thing) but sometimes the sentences get a bit mixed up or punctuation is weird (so I apologize in advance)

Update: things with our house purchase back in the states has been a bit crazy the last few days, but yes we are still buying our house! So another post about that later :D

I figured my airport/flight experience deserved its own blog post....

Well lets start with the fact that we had to get up at 2am. We decided to rent a van the day before we left so we could move the rest of our crap to Robert's family's home; making it easier the morning of our flight so we could just drop the rental at the airport and ride the shuttle to the terminals. ***Oh I almost forgot Robert's work booked him on a completely different airlines departing 20 minutes after my flight*** So we get to the airport and through security robert helps get us to our gate and heads to his own. Things are going great until I hear an announcement that my flight had been delayed nearly 3 hours making it highly likely that I would miss my connection in SFO which would take me to Narita. My 2 hours of sleep brain starts to panic....I go up carrying my sleeping baby and ask the airlines what they can do, I ask if its possible to transfer me to a direct flight they assured me it would be fine and that the Narita flight would be delayed as well. So I wait...I fall asleep for an hour and wake up to them annoucning its delayed even longer, now I will for sure miss my connection. I run over to the line of people which is now at least 40 people long (not even exaggerating) and wait and wait and wait. They start to board the plane and I am still in line panicking I get to the front of the line and everyone is boarded except for Kora and I. I ask the woman what the plan is now because she assured me she would call me up and adjust my flight if I was to miss my connection. She quickly books me on a flight and tells me to go on blah blah blah flight when I arrive which would send me to LAX and then to "Narita". I am sobbing at this point....This flight was set to arrive in "Narita" at 10pm...more than 10 hours after Roberts intial landing time (this complicates our ability to get to our housing or have any information in Japan for that matter because the liaison is set to meet him at 11am...I am panicking also because Robert is in the air flying to LAX at this time. I cant call him or inform him of anything. The lady assures me I will make it just fine and when I arrive in SFO someone will be waiting there to help me get to my gate.....Well on the plane I buy wifi inform Robert of the changes via FB and ask him to see if he can jump on my now Delta flight to "Narita" at 4pm instead. He then informs me that the flight number is saying my flight will arrive at the other Tokyo airport Hanida....not Narita. I panic she told me that was the last flight available to tokyo. *reminder I have a very very squirmy 9 month old who likes to have my attention...and I am tyring to deal with a crisis* Robert tells me its alright he will adjust things and get on the flight and we can sort out how to get from Hanida to Narita later and to just catch my LAX flight. So I arrive in SFO run out of the gate with 20 min to get to my connection, to find no one waiting for me at the gate, I run to a United desk and ask for help. She rudely informs me they booked me on a different airlines and she "couldn't" help print any boarding passes and wouldn't give me any more information, she proceeded to tell me I HAD to walk all the way to the other terminal to talk to customer service. I run (with 2 backpacks a baby strapped to my chest my coat and a huge baby carseat) *reminder if you don't remember I have major back problems....so i am in excruciating pain through all of this* I arrive at customer service to find the line of 40 people from my old flight in line waiting to talk to a representative... I run up to a representative cut in front of everyone and beg for help the guy says he can't help me I they booked me on Alaska airlines and now I have to run through the airport get out of security go back through security and head to the international terminal....I now have 10 min until my flight is set to leave. I start running and I am sobbing when my rolly stroller carseat carrier tips over and my bags and all of my stuff goes flying ***again Kora is strapped to my chest*** I drop to my knees and start sobbing in the middle of the airport. ---if it wasn't crucial that we arrived at the same time as Robert or if I happened to know where we were staying I would have just carried the burden of dealing with it all. I would have flown into Narita a day later, would take a train and find my apartment...but of course I have no information and no way of getting to where we are supposed to be without Robert... and Robert has to be there at the specific time.---
A very nice united woman runs up to me and asks what she can do, I try my best to quickly explain and she demands an agent help me. They sit there and tell me all sorts of things mainly that there is no way to make it to Narita when I have to be there, but that they can put me on a later flight to LAX and I end up getting a new flight to Narita for the following morning. At this point Robert missed his connection in LAX which allows us the ability to have a "redo" the next morning....still on seperate flights but this time hopefully no delays. So now a nice airport gentlemen helps me get my things to my gate. We hang out for a while when we find out our flight is delayed to LAX....and nearly 3 hours later our plane arrives...

Kora was a trooper. For the most part she cooperated with me, although she rarely let me put her down, she did a great job. Pooped on the toilet on the airplane, and at the airport. She ate tons of snacks and was smiley most of the time.

We were able to get some rest and start our journey again. We are currently on our nearly 11 hour flight from LAX to Narita; Kora wont let me put her down. I am exhausted but I have 2 amazing women around me helping out anytime I need something. Allowing me a chace to eat and use the restroom. I am grateful for the kind souls who have helped me on this insane journey to Japan. Soon we will be eating katsu and drinking saki in Japan. Things always work out.

I am strong, I am brave, and I know I can do this.

(also excuse the terrible run on sentences, misspelled words, and overall errors....lol)

Photos to come :P