4/6 ? 4/7: Kobe, Japan

Day 1: A long morning. We woke up early for breakfast but we had to wait to get off the ship because Japan’s customs is really strict. So after breakfast, the diplomatic briefing and the temperature checks, we had to wait around for each hall to be called to go through customs. Our hall didn’t get called until almost 11am and then we had to wait for our passport to be scanned and our photo and finger IDs to be entered into the system. Once that was done we took off to the center of the city by metro. We walked around and through the central plaza for a while and found somewhere to eat. The woman working didn’t speak much English so we basically ordered by pointing at pictures; it worked in our favor because it was all delicious. After lunch we took off looking for the tattoo studio we had heard about. It didn’t take us long and after talking to the owner for a while, Rhina decided she wanted to get it done; I wasn’t willing to pay the exorbitant prices they had so I told her I’d wait until Hawaii. The girl was really quick and Rhina’s anchor was done in less than 30 minutes; it came out cute. After that I had to go back to the ship for a welcome reception I had signed up for. Got back and met a few Japanese university students, saw some performances, did origami, gave them a tour of the ship and that was that. Then dinner and out we went to enjoy the night life.

Well you can imagine the night life on a Monday night but we made it work. We all bought drinks and just sat in a park to drink. I tried ginger flavored Smirnoff and something called Strong beer which tasted nothing like beer; it was 8% alcohol, lemony and delicious. We made friends with 2 new SaS kids – Shannon and Jordan -- that were hanging out in the same park as us. We got harassed by someone who wanted our booze. Then we ended up finding a karaoke bar that was decently priced and spent over an hour screaming songs at each other in a tiny room. The drinks I had did me in and I was gone after 3 of them but I kept drinking; mistake number one. During karaoke I managed to chip a tooth (just a small chip) when my friend Graham shoved the mic in my face and I wasn’t looking. After karaoke we went to McDonalds because what better drunk food is there? I apparently started crying because I felt bad that I was so drunk and making a bad impression on Shannon and Jordan and in general. I think after McD’s is when Shannon and Jordan took off and the rest of us headed back to the ship. Apparently I told a boy from the ship – that I didn’t know – that he was cute and we bonded over having girlfriends. I eventually got to my room and passed out.

Day 2: And the next morning I was reminded of why I don’t drink often or a lot because I was either still drunk (after only having 5 drinks) or I had the world’s worst hang-over. Needless to say I skipped out on any adventuring and spent the morning sleeping it off. I woke up in time for lunch, showered and went out hoping to at least see the Himeji castle before I left but I couldn’t find a bank to exchange money in and I didn’t have enough to cover the metro fair (which was $20 roundtrip) so I ended up just walking around a little and then coming back to the ship to wallow in Grey’s Anatomy and the stupidity of my decisions. Once again I swear off drinking for a while. I don’t understand how most of the kids on this ship get drunk every day that we’re at port; I couldn’t do it nor would I want to. Ugh.

What I’ve learned:
*Drinking things in Japan that say ‘strong’ in excess equals bad; and apparently I’m now a light-weight. Thank goodness for great friends.
*Japanese people all have impeccable fashion sense; everyone looks like they walked off the pages of a magazine including older women and the young men. 
*Their Haagen Das ice cream parlors have green tea flavored ice cream.
*All the girls here wear knee socks, leg warmers or leggings and crazy cool high heels.
*There’s an entire section of the plaza mall area dedicated to cards and gamer stuff; it made me giggle.

Now we’re off to Yokohama, Japan where my friends and I are going to Tokyo for a day and then I have a trip to Mt. Fuji. And there will be no drinking happening at either. Love and miss you all.