I recently returned from my first ever visit to Japan. Over the next week or so, I’ll be using this space to post pictures and stories about my trip. I know it isn’t Iron Chef related (and it’s likely to be boring as it is as much a simple documentation of my trip as it is storytelling effort), so feel free to ignore these posts until a batch of new episodes is posted in the coming weeks.<\/p>\n
Part 1 – I’ve Finally Arrived<\/p>\n
After many, many months of planning and saving, it was finally time to begin my journey to Japan. I went with a group from Bob Bavasi’s JapanBall.com<\/a>\u00a0on a Japanese Baseball tour. (See some photos<\/a> of our eclectic group at the JapanBall Facebook page<\/a>.) I can’t imagine a better thing to do on a first trip to Japan than seeing professional baseball games. It is something with which I am very familiar, baseball, presented in a way in which I’ve never experienced it. (I’ll write more later on what makes Japanese baseball such a fantastic experience.)<\/p>\n After arriving at Narita Airport, going though Japanese Customs and Immigration was a painless process. I picked up my suitcase, exchanged my Dollars for Yen, and found Bob, who got me a ticket for the train into Tokyo.<\/p>\n Here is a video<\/a> taken from the train.<\/p>\n It was starting to rain lightly when I arrived at the hotel and got checked in, so I didn’t do any exploring of the neighborhood until the next day. As is the tradition on the JapanBall trips, we all met at the JapanBall Hall of Fame<\/a> (also known as Cafe Noodle Roje) for a group dinner.<\/p>\n Tomorrow brings my first full day in Tokyo and my first Japanese baseball game.<\/p>\n I don’t have many pictures from that first day, but I have included some of what I took in the gallery below. (Click on any of the pictures to open an image browser. You can use the arrow keys to move forward\/backward through the gallery.)<\/p>\n