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Category: Travel
TORONTO – Victoria Day Weekend 2018
TORONTO TRIP!!!
Here in Canada we have a long weekend to celebrate our late monarch, Queen Victoria, in May. This year, I decided to go to Toronto! I had such a great weekend, with a ton of great surprises! Spoiler: Victoria Day weekend is actually a really good weekend to visit TO!
DAY 1:
To start off Saturday in Toronto, we went to the Rib Fest they were hosting at Yonge-Dundas Square. There were tons of rib vendors, snacks, and live music. I bought an entire half rack of ribs for myself for only $15, and ate them ALL in the Eaton Center Food Court. Yep. They were really good. But this was only the beginning of the food filled weekend. 
After Rib Fest, we shopped around at the Toronto Eaton Center, before heading to our Airbnb on Charles Street near Yonge. It was a nice place for our money, and it was in a really good location near the corner of Yonge and Bloor. After dropping off our luggage, we set out to the ROM (Royal Ontario Museum)! Turns out, not only did they have a student admission price, but since it was Victoria Day weekend they were also doing a $5 discount for each ticket if you asked and knew the Promo Code (which I happened to glance at before we left). So good thing for us, we actually only ended up paying $11.50 per ticket to get in! Much cheaper than the regular price, almost half actually. So we got lucky there, and we spent some time perusing through the museum. I really like rocks. And gems. They also had a giant Dinosaur section, and an Evidence Room Holocaust Exhibit. 
Then we did some more shopping out our favourite place, Dollarama, and then went for dinner. Ramen!! At Sansotei Ramen, I had Miso Black ramen and it was pretty darn good. It was essentially normal miso ramen but with black pepper in it too. Also got in some Calpis, that I haven’t had since being in Japan. After dinner, we wanted to go dancing, after all it was Saturday night in the big city. We went to a popular place for students near the University of Toronto, with FREE COVER with a Student ID! It was called The Dance Cave, and they actually played good sing-alongable music, unlike most places recently just playing rap songs all the time. I didn’t get any drinks nor did I see any prices, so I can’t comment on drinks at the club but the dancing was definitely super fun! I would recommend it and I would definitely like to go again. It was also in a really convenient place, and close to our Airbnb.
DAY 2:
Sunday morning, we walked to Kensington Market. 
It is an interesting place, with a wide variety and fusion places. They have a place called Bacon Nation that sells everything bacon. They also had restaurants like Italian-Jamaican food, or Chinese-Indian, etc. For lunch we chose Chilean Empanadas, and I had a pulled pork, potato, cheese, tomato, celery Empanada, and it was the best Empanada I’ve ever had. The spinach, potato, and ricotta cheese one was pretty good too. I was still hungry, but more thirsty and I really wanted a smoothie, but they are all so expensive everywhere so I just went to McDonald’s and bought a $2 blueberry pomegranate smoothie, with fries. Then we strolled down Queen Street, and back to the Eaton Center. Dinner time, today was Indian Buffet! 
Actually though, the unlimited Naan and Butter Chicken alone made it worth it. It was only $16 for a dinner buffet on the weekend, and the food was actually really really good. I would highly recommend going here, it was called the Buffet Palace on Yonge Street. They also had dessert, and I was literally so stuffed it took us forever to walk back.
DAY 3:
Time to check out of our Airbnb, go to a video game store, and then have FUNNEL CAKE FOR BREAKFAST! We went to Funnel Cake Express on the corner of Yonge and Wellesley, which is apparently the only Funnel Cake restaurant in Canada. 
They were having a summer promotion, that if you bought a funnel cake you got a free twister (their version of a blizzard or McFlurry). AND you could get 10% off your purchase with an SPC card. So we got a funnel cake with caramel sauce, icing sugar, and apples, with a Reese’s Pieces Twister, for only $10! Pretty good deal! Then while we were sitting in the place a parade of Military Veterans went by with army trucks and an escort of police. I am assuming it was because of the holiday. Then we went to the CN Tower! We bought the Sea the Sky Promo tickets in advance online,
so it is a cheaper combination ticket with the CN Tower and Ripley’s Aquarium. I was honestly surprised at how not busy those attractions were for the holiday. We didn’t need to wait in line to go up the elevator, but they were doing construction on the observation deck so you couldn’t see the South side of the city. The glass floor was as terrifying as always, and it was surprisingly not windy in the outdoor observation area.
ALSO! Because of the holiday, it was complimentary for everyone to go up to the Skypod!! That’s the smaller and much higher deck that usually costs extra, and I can’t remember ever going up there so I was super excited!! But they had a timed ticket, so we had to kill like an hour and a half in the main level just wandering around and looking at the North and West sides of the city. We went to go 
check the prices for the 360 restaurant (the rotating restaurant in the tower), and it was like a minimum of $60 per person. So that isn’t happening on a student budget. Finally we went up to the Skypod, and there were like 10 people total up there. It was really really really high up, and you could see the Edge Walk people! They waved at us, and I don’t know how anyone cant bring themselves to lean off the edge of a 500m tower but that’s just me.
View from Main Observation Deck
View from Skypod
We went back down, the elevator takes 58 seconds to reach the top or bottom. Then we went to Ripley’s Aquarium of Canada! It was a lot smaller than I was expecting, but I literally love Aquariums so it was still fun! I saw Sea Turtles! 
I got to pet a Sting Ray, a Horseshoe Crab, and a Zebra Shark! There were also cleaner shrimp, and they were eating all the dead skin off my fingers and it felt really weird. Then we had Chipotle for dinner, and I am kind of sad that it didn’t totally live up to its expectations. Steak burrito was still pretty good though. And that concluded our long weekend trip to Toronto! Somehow, we managed not to use any form of transport, only walking everywhere. And now my feet hurt like crazy.
P.S. Victoria Day also included free parking on most of the Toronto Streets which is good for people driving to the city! I had a really really great trip!!! <3
Ume Matsuri (Plum Festival at Mount Tsukuba)
I went to Ume Matsuri, which is the Plum Festival at Mount Tsukuba! The festival runs every year from then end of February to late March. This year, the festival goes until March 21, 2018 so be sure to check it out! The flowers are expected to be in full bloom mid March. They have events running on the weekends including performances and tea ceremonies. You can go on the weekdays as well if you just want to enjoy the beauty of the plum groves and Tsukuba Mountain. I also highly recommend going to a hot spring / onsen / bathhouse while you are there, I will link the one I went to here. It is very relaxing and the scenery is gorgeous. There are many things to do at the mountain, including Tsukubasan Shrine, little villages, climbing the mountain, taking a cable car to the summit, a high ropes course, and a ropeway going up the mountain! I also suggest trying their Plum ice cream, it was delicious!
Directions: If you are coming from Tokyo, take the Tsukuba Express all the way to Tsukuba Center, then catch the shuttle bus to Tsukuba Mountain from platform 1 at the Tsukuba Bus Terminal. The Tsukuba Express costs 1190 yen from Akihabara and then the shuttle bus is 720 yen to either Numata stop or Tsukuba Shrine.
Akihabara / Skytree / Osaka Haul
I went to Tokyo for a weekend, and made travel diaries for both Akihabara and the Tokyo Skytree. I also went to Osaka (spoiler, video coming soon!), but I didn’t show what I bought, so this post will be a haul from all 3 places! In Akihabara, the only thing I bought was a 500 yen tripod, if you don’t count the 2 mini fake plants I got out of the Gatcha Gatcha machine (Capsule machine).
But I spent an entire day shopping at the Tokyo Skytree department store, so here’s what I bought. Zara had a large clearance section, so I bought this cute black and white polka-dotted dress, and it’s a soft silky material. Along with a black shirt with white pearls (obviously fake) sewn on. Evidently I have a thing for black and white polka-dots. I was also in need of a watch, so I also bought a rose gold sparkly watch in Osaka which fits perfectly so I don’t need to worry about getting it resized. Also got a red necklace tie thing that tbh kind of makes me look like a present when I wear it. But it’s cute so it’s fine.
I also got a pair of white low-cut Converse shoes since I don’t really have closed toed shoes that aren’t boots or running shoes. To match those I got a blanket scarf that I mentioned in my Skytree video, and like I said they had a sale life buy one get one free or something so I also got this pink shirt, and it’s reversible! As in you can wear it front or back, not inside out. I also got a necklace choker pair, which you’ve probably seen me wear in a variety of pictures on Instagram or in my videos.
To be completely honest, I thought this blog post would be longer since I usually have so much more to say. So for those of you still reading I will let you in on a little secret reveal! On my YouTube Channel, I plan on starting a series that I think I am calling my TLDR series, where I will be making short videos about tips, tricks, or hacks I’ve learned about travelling to places. For those of you who don’t know, TLDR stands for Too Long, Didn’t Read. I chose this name because for those people who either don’t have the time to read long articles about travelling or just simply don’t like reading much, you can just watch my short videos instead and they will give you some quick insight on the top 10 ish things that I learned from going to these places that maybe you wouldn’t find on the internet, just to help you out. Thanks for reading! Even though now it might be a little TLDR-esk itself. 😉
SNOW DAY!!
So what the heck?!? It SNOWED IN JAPAN?? That very rarely happens if you aren’t up North! Being Canadian, I’m used to a lot of snow. But Japan clearly isn’t. They really don’t have the infrastructure to deal with it. None of the roads were cleared, even all the schools were closed! Most workplaces had a snow-day, and the next morning people were also advised to stay home. There was about 2 inches of snow, with icy roads. Most people don’t have winter tires for their cars here, and biking on ice is pretty dangerous. But on the bright side, it was really pretty! Kids who have never experienced snow before were outside building snowmen and having snowball fights!
You can see how much it rarely snows given the flowers with snow on them. A unique combination, but the flowers are resilient and beautiful. It really wasn’t that cold, but I’m glad I brought some boots!
I wasn’t sure what to do on my day off, so I decided to go to JAXA, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency and take a look around. They had a Space Dome and a Planet Cube, and various replicas of Japanese satellites that have been sent up into space. They also had a replica of the piece of the ISS (International Space Station) that they built that you could go inside! I still had time left in the day, so I decided to also go to the Science Square, which is a gallery of emerging technologies.
I even got to hold a baby seal! It is a Therapeutic Seal that was developed by AIST, to cuddle and help people de-stress. It costs about 400,000 yen, and encompasses motion and touch sensors to react to people coming near them or petting them. And omg, they were so so cute! I went back to play with them like 3 times while I was there! They remind me of a high tech version of the FurReal Friends I used to have as a kid. They had a pacifier and they got so sad when you put them down. There is a video down below if you want to see it in action!
There was some other cool stuff too, artificial intelligence, bendable display screens, and much more. Personally, after the Therapeutic Seal, my favourite new tech was the robot, Mahoro, who can do precise, repetitive, and dangerous lab work in place of humans. He can even do work under vacuum conditions! This could greatly help researchers so they don’t have to do lab work, and new experiments can be performed with higher accuracy and lower risk. Even more, you could get a personal Audio Guide so you could listen instead of having to read all the signs. It was an interesting exhibit, new technologies are always on the rise!
This is the first snow-day I’ve had since 11th grade, and I think it was a day well spent!
All About Bicycles
So as I mentioned in my Instagram post, bicycle is the best method of getting around in Japan. The streets are narrow but nothing is further than a short bike ride away. Japan is convenient, and not just because they have a convenience store around every corner, but because anything you could ever need is accessible and close by. A car can be hard to navigate through the tiny streets, so everybody here bikes, including kids and the elderly. Not only is it great for the environment, but it’s good for your health too. It allows you to get in some of your required daily exercise without even thinking about it. Many people ride their bikes to work, so it adds a little movement to their static desk jobs. Did you know, Japan is one of the oldest nations in the world? And by that I mean it has one of the largest, if not The largest, elderly population in the world and one of the highest rates of reaching over 100 years old. In my opinion, riding bikes throughout their lives helped contribute to their ability to reach such high levels of old age.
One interesting thing about bicycles in Japan is that they are treated like any other vehicle. You must follow the rules of the road, and there are hefty fines if you break the law. Also, did you know it’s illegal to bike with an umbrella opened? I see people doing it all the time! But nope, not legal. You cannot bike in designated pedestrian areas (aka the sidewalk), unless you are a small child or an elderly person. I’m so used to driving on the right side of the road that when I went biking for the first time a couple days ago, instinctively I started biking on the right, and someone literally honked at me from their car!
Another thing that I don’t know why North America hasn’t adopted yet is the bike locking mechanism on Japanese bikes. There’s a key lock attached directly to the bike that doesn’t allow the tires to turn unless the key remains inserted. Also, it’s a steel rod which is waaay harder to cut than a regular bike lock. Now you might be thinking okay well someone could just pick up the bike and take it. Well at a lot of stores they have bike racks that clamp onto the front tires so you can’t just steal the bike without taking off the font tire, and even if you took the back part the back wheel still wouldn’t turn because of the built in lock. Like why can’t we have those? It’s so smart!
To be honest, I didn’t really think I would have this much to say about bikes, but I have one more awesome thing to add about Japanese bikes … Their Kickstands!! They go under the bike and hold the back tire completely off the ground to stabilize the bike upright instead of leaning it on a side kickstand! It is so much better and keeps your bike from falling over. And you can lock the kickstand too, so not only does the back tire not spin when locked, but the tire itself isn’t even touching the ground! Would make a bike either difficult or pointless to steal, right? Not sure why this “technology” hasn’t made it’s way to Canada and the United States yet, but we really need to get on it.
Anyways that’s my not so short spiel about bicycles in Japan! If anyone is really curious, leave a comment and I will upload pictures of all the different mechanisms I talked about or list all the rules about biking in Japan.
Hope you learned something!
Going to Japan!
Welcome to my first Blog Post! Today was a big day … moving to Japan!
Actually it was more like 2 days, because of the travel time. Anyways, after finally finishing packing my bags at like 5 in the morning I started heading to the airport, where I was set to catch my 1 pm flight to Tokyo! The airport was pretty empty since it was a Wednesday morning, so I had tons of time to relax and prepare for the long flight ahead of me.
So I really don’t like airplane food, so usually before going on long flights I will buy some food, and at the Toronto Airport I usually get some Tim Hortons before the flight takes off. But they changed it all around since the last time I had been there! Which was in April by the way, it wasn’t even that long ago! So I had to scramble to find something else, but eventually found where the Tims had moved to so I got a bagel. Airport food is so expensive omg.
The flight left on-time surprisingly, and the airplane itself was virtually empty. It was a massive Boeing 747 and my entire row (like all 10 seats across) was completely empty! So I was able to lay down and sleep since the flight was over 12 hours long. I also got a whole bunch of pillows since the Air Canada pillows are so thin otherwise. The mini TV screens were also lacking in entertainment, which was unusual since it’s normally pretty good. Good thing I brought a bunch of my own shows! I binge watched like half a season of Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., which was nice since I usually don’t have much time to watch TV.
So our flight was set to land at 5 pm in Tokyo on Thursday, and the time change kind of messed me up (Japan is 14 hours ahead of Toronto) and I totally thought that the sunset was sunrise looking out the plane’s window. We safely landed, but then I needed to get on a bus to get to the right town, and I missed the bus by like 5 minutes! It sucked because I had to wait like 2 hours for the next bus to leave. So I decided to go get some dinner at the convenience store in the Airport (btw Japanese convenience stores are exactly that, convenient), and the food was actually really good! Eventually I got on the bus and the jet lag was starting to get to me so I kept falling asleep on the bus.
After a long walk from the station (after stopping at the grocery store), I finally made it to my apartment that I will be staying in while I’m in Japan! And somehow I got really lucky by getting a double room, but with no roommate! I was exhausted after all that travelling, but I knew I needed to unpack and shower since I had to go straight to orientation in the morning!
Overall, the travel was one of the smoothest trips I’ve been on, minus the 4 crying babies the whole plane ride to Japan. That was super annoying. When one of them finally stopped crying, the next one would start for the entire. 13. hours. But I made it here safely and that’s what’s important.
You can see the video about the trip so far here.