Hello from Tokyo!
My husband got a deployment to the U.S.Embassy in Tokyo, Japan for 3 months starting June - August 2013 and I'm so blessed to travel along with him and explore around the globe. We arrived and settled down at the Oakwood Residence in the heart of Tokyo, financial and embassy district area Akasaka. We were happy with our upscale condo, the staffs hospitality is so nice and they are so helpful to us. It's such a convenient area to us with the metro is right on the corner. I studied and scouted where to eat, to shop, and places to visit for both of us during weekends and for myself during the day. I enjoyed sightseeing, learning the metro system which I can say that I was so expert with. Shopping is also a pleasure in Ginza, Omotesando Hills, Shibuya, Shinjuku, Roppongi Hills, Tokyo Midtown, Harajuku. I also found out that there's so many good restaurants in our neighborhood. In my opinion, living in Japan as an expat is not that easy if you want to try authentic Japanese food especially in small local restaurants. Husband & I were struggling to order food many times (English doesn't help us) and laugh at each other because of the body language. At some point we were just done with Japanese food and went for salad or pasta or cheese plates with wines instead for the last month.
We visited many special sites including the Sensoji temple which is the most famous Buddhist temple in country. The temple is in Asakusa area which a little Edo era and can be seen by the buildings, women wearing Kimonos and men wearing Hakamas (traditional outfits). The Imperial Palace was also visited and we experienced the residence of the Emperor of Japan. Our good Japanese friends took us to tour Kamakura and Hase, the countryside of Tokyo which is a deep part of Japanese history. We were so impressed and started to appreciate the Edo era. We went to the famous volcano Mount Fuji at 5th station and the ice cave Narusava formed by lava Mt.Fuji. I went to Odaiba with my good Japanese friends from Arizona (They had a summer vacation back home in Japan while I was there, how neat!!)
And then we finished our 3 months tour in Japan and headed out to visit Bangkok, Thailand for 2 weeks before we went back to our home sweet home in America.
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