Japan Journals
photos and thoughts from 1 week in Tokyo
I have cried big big tears every single time I’ve visited Japan. The first time I came alone and traveled to Tokyo, Kyoto, and Nagano (to visit the onsen snow monkeys!!!). I stayed at a hostel in Kyoto and every morning ate two bowls of potato salad from the breakfast buffet. My brother flew from Korea where he was living at the time to join me for a few days in Tokyo. After I dropped him off at the airport I cried in the bathroom stalls and again in my bunk bed at the hostel. I was so totally alone that having my brother with me only for a few days reminded me of how nice it was to be so connected and comfortable with another person.
The second time, I came with my ex-boyfriend. We booked the trip months in advance but then broke up before. I know it sounds chaotic but since it was mutual we still chose to come together and it was one of my favorite trips to Japan. We were always better friends than lovers so we were able to purely enjoy the trip without the added pressures and extra baggage that being in a relationship can bring. We walked around pachinko parlors watching people play and not understanding the rules at all, went to the Osaka aquarium and were shocked because we saw a dead seal in the tank :(, and tried okonomiyaki for the first time after not being able to decide what to eat. I cherish those memories because it was a feeling that was so normal when we were kids and more rare as an adult: just have pure fun with someone of the opposite gender without it meaning something more. We reflected on the relationship and I cried knowing things would never be this way again and even though it wasn’t perfect, it was uniquely ours for awhile. I felt like we were really growing up.
Then I visited again with a different ex-boyfriend. A month before our trip my TikTok algorithm began telling me everywhere that I must!!!!!! eat and I became so neurotic about planning everything and finding the best places and how to maximize the efficiency of all of the viral places we needed to hit. It’s painful to reflect on. When we got to Tokyo I didn’t give us any space to explore and I’m sure I ruined the “vacation” for both of us and made things unnecessarily stressful. On our last night, he took a film photo of me and the flash wouldn’t go off so I started bawling. That pretty much sums up how badly I was spiraling on that trip.
On this trip, I came for work casting creatives in Tokyo for a new matcha business and shooting social-first iPhone and film content. The shooting and casting was simultaneously inspiring and very, very exhausting. As an introvert, the socializing aspect was hard and I was sleep deprived waking up at 5 AM from jet lag. I cried on FT with Brendan after feeling homesick and needing support from afar. There’s something really strange about how the energy in Japan mixes with my personality, I can’t put my finger on exactly what makes me feel so sad and introspective even though everything is beautiful and polished and perfect.
Before coming to Tokyo, I mentally prepared by accepting that it’s not for leisure which alleviated the pressure of needing to eat at the most hidden best sushi shop or going to every amazing heavenly vintage store (whatever any of those things mean anymore I don’t know. TikTok has overstimulated me to the point where I’m very happy with a decent comforting mid-tier bowl of normal ramen). I was given a much greater gift this trip: the perspective of Tokyo through the everyday routines of the creatives that have built a life for themselves here. With our work, we went into people’s homes and studios and visited their favorite places and walked through their everyday routines together. I much prefer this experience.
We took the train to the matcha fields near Mt. Fuji where the producers walked us through the process of farming tea leaves. It was beautiful and inspiring and my favorite thing to shoot because of the many, many personalities and the generations of farmers that make everything happen. I felt so privileged to see the insides of factories and going to the lunch spots where everyone converges for freshly caught maguro tuna and whitefish. They explained to us that the leaves take ~7 years from when the seeds are first planted to when it’s finally ready to harvest and showed us how they separate and determine different leaves based on their roasted outcome. They gave us baskets of various leaves to smell but the differences were too subtle for my untrained nose. But I appreciated that they believed we were expert enough to tell and they were passionate enough about the types of tea to continue offering us to smell the different leaves at each new stop along the way.
I cried at the airport when I finally took a moment and looked at the photos Yuri and Greg texted of me holding their adorable baby, Nara. And then I cried again as the staff on the tarmac bowed and waved at us as we began our take off. I’m a different version of myself every time I come here. Next time I come maybe I’ll be more prepared for the mysterious ups downs and sideways emotions this place brings out of me. Or maybe I’ll embrace it. Goodbye Tokyo. 🪽
omg the precious matcha farm workers 😭🌱 crying in japan is a rite of passage, i swear -- thank u for sharing the not to shiny bits with us
michelle this is perfect! totally relate as someone who has gone to Japan twice and cried both times. despite how beautiful it is, and how much i love it, it definitely brings out the melancholy in me too
this line encapsulates exactly how I feel - loved reading this: "There’s something really strange about how the energy in Japan mixes with my personality, I can’t put my finger on exactly what makes me feel so sad and introspective even though everything is beautiful and polished and perfect."