I WENT ON MY DREAM TRIP TO JAPAN | Asakusa, Kyoto, Osaka [WEEK 1]

I WENT ON MY DREAM TRIP TO JAPAN | Asakusa, Kyoto, Osaka [WEEK 1]

And we’re off to stay with my in-laws. And also some family is going to take care of bubbles. You practicing. It’s 4:00 a.m. Saying goodbye to bubbles. I’ve never been so nervous but so excited for a trip before. I had really high anxiety and I just couldn’t believe that we were going to be able to go on this trip for some reason. But off we check go. The travel took an entire day from the early morning when we flew out on our first plane. Our first plane was an hour and a half ride to Toronto. And then after we got there, we had about a 3-hour layover where we had some pretty good meals actually that I was really glad I had because wait until you see the food that we had on the plane. There was also a bird at the airport and I just felt so bad for that bird. And now we’re walking onto the big plane which is going to be a 13hour plane ride to Tokyo, Japan. That’s so big. Holy crap. This was the biggest plane I’ve ever been on. The rows go three, four in the middle and three on the side. But in the very back of the plane, there are three or four rows that are just two seaters. And we had two of those seats. Here is the plane taking off and lifting into the air. I checked this thing like every 5 minutes to see, are we there yet? And this is me checking it again. We’re actually so close to landing, but it felt like it took forever to be able to see anything out the window. Finally, I could see something. And I was just like freaking out because I thought this was a pretty beautiful view. But I also just like I don’t know. I couldn’t believe we were actually going to be there in Japan. [Music] Wow. Welcome to Tokyo. Local time is 3:47. Please remain seated with your seat belt fastened and all of your luggage stowed until the seat belt sign has been turned off. Smoking is not for you guys. This is no time at all. But for me, this was 13hour plane ride. And we headed down to the train station, which was so easy to get to. And this was our first train or subway or whatever you want to call it. And it wasn’t super busy, which is great because later on when we’re on the trains, they’re so packed. And we are arriving in Asaka, Tokyo, our first stop. We stayed in a Rioin and they literally gave us a whole tour and a gift and it was so sweet. We’re at our hotel and we just got to Tokyo. I just put a little bit of makeup on. It doesn’t look good at all. And we are in Asaka. We’re going to go out on the town a little bit. It is our first night. It’s 7:21 p.m. here. It’s 6:20 in the morning there. Yeah. So, we’ve been We slept a lot on the plane. So, y’all are waking up. We’re about to go get crunk. Just kidding. We’re getting dinner and then going right to bed. Yeah, we we’re trying to stay up so the jet lag doesn’t hit us. I’m feeling really good. So, I think going out and walking around a bit will help. So, let’s go. It’s our first full day and you can see I feel pretty I feel like myself and I’m excited to go explore and do something. And we woke up pretty early, but we slept pretty well. And here we go. My first Todoro spotting. And then we tried the egg sandwich from 71. Of course, here’s me giving it a try. We had to do our little Van didn’t like it. I did. I don’t think he even likes egg sandwich, so I don’t know why he tried it. I also tried this macaron and I realized why people don’t like macarons. It’s because I didn’t make it for you. This was like a prepackaged one. It felt stale. It felt wrong. We walked around the shrines and the little park. And this is Sama Park, which wasn’t that cool. It was just like any other park really, but it was nice to just get out, walk around, and we saw the Tokyo Skytree from afar and took some pictures. It took us a while to find a place that was open for coffee and a little breakfast. So, we got this coffee and it was so good. And then we walked around Asaka. It was starting to get busier, but all of the little booths were starting to open. So, I was really excited about that. There’s food. There’s all sorts of just cool trinkets and things and we bought some stuff and I was excited about that. If you know me, then you know I love strawberries. And they were selling strawberry candy on a stick. It’s hard. It’s like yum. There were these cool Studio Ghiblly fans. I really wanted one, but I didn’t think I could take it home with me. And then we made it to the Sanrio store. The first one I got to visit on this trip. It’s so cute. It’s literally a giant Hello Kitty holding an apple. And I did ask if I could film in here. I was really proud of myself for using my Japanese, but it was very, very busy and crowded. As you can see, my favorite Sanrio character is Hongan, and I found the cutest Hongan stuff. You could see tiny little clip of those hair clips that I found. And there was just so many cute like merch items. I didn’t really know all what I wanted to get, but I got some stuff for my friends. I got some stuff for me. But then we headed to something that was on my Japan bucket list per se, which was to go to Hat Coffee where they will make a custom foam drink like latte for you where they literally build a character on top of your drink. And I chose photo and something kind of crazy happened. I have a popsocket that like is magnetic to the back of my phone case and I took it off to put it on the phone stand that they provided so you could record your latte being made and it got stuck to the counter cuz the counter was magnetic. But I didn’t know that and I felt so bad. They helped me get it off and they were like trying so hard. Everyone there was so nice and they were being so so sweet about it. But I just felt so bad. But yeah, it was really hard to get it off. It was really stuck on there. They had to slide a bunch of stuff under it, use a spoon. Like it was the whole thing. But here’s my adorable Todoro drink. And then here’s her trying to help me get the thing off. That was only the first attempt. But look how cute our drinks turned out. Van got bubbles on his and I got Todoro. And there’s him eating bubbles. Oh my goodness. After our lattes, we headed back over and shopped in Asaka for a bit. And then we tried some takayyaki, which is octopus. And honestly, it was pretty good. There’s me trying the octopus, and it was pretty good. Too hot. And then it was time to take a walk to the Tokyo Skytree because we had reservations to go to the very top. So we were walking over there. It was like a 20inut walk and the closer we got, the higher we could tell it was. This is us getting there. And I found a Studio Ghibli store. These stores are called Dongare and I saw so many of them everywhere all over Japan, but this is the first one I saw and it was awesome because it had a giant cat bus and it had a Toro sleeping. So, I was just like so happy. I actually got one of these teacups with Todoro on it and it’s beautiful. Then we headed to Jump Shop in the mall nearby and once we were done there, we went to our Sky Tree appointment and it was wild. You had to like stand in all these lines and elevators. This is the glass floor which I hated and I was avoiding and I they were like basically forcing me to walk over it and I’m like no, no, no, no, no. There’s also that glass floor over there that you could just like have your own picture in front of but you have to pay for it. Then we went to the mall again and I got a bunch of um blind boxes. And then we walked home over this bridge and the sky tree was all lit up. I feel like I’m very bad at vlogging. There’s a cow picture in the hotel. But then we went in and ripped our little shoozies off and crashed. Starting our second day in Japan. It is what? 7 a.m. It looked like you pooped that out. What time is it, hun? Uh, it’s 8 8:00 a.m. 8:00 in the morning. We woke up a like we did better sleeping in today, but I still struggled to sleep a little bit. I woke up at 4:30, checked the Eagles game, and I told myself I couldn’t wake up for another hour cuz I didn’t want to see the score until it was over. That didn’t happen. And now we are going to be checking out of our hotel room. So come along in the day with us. Now, while we were at breakfast, we had stored our luggage at the hotel and we came back to get it because we were moving out of that hotel. When we first got there, we couldn’t check in until 3 p.m. So, we actually went to the Lawson and we tried to get tickets to the Ghibli Museum at a different time because I accidentally double booked the museum and the park, Studio Ghibli Park and Museum. And I couldn’t do both. And I’m so sad. But especially on this day, I was really bummed. And I was like, I don’t know what how to make a decision on it because I’ve never been to either. And I don’t know if I’ll ever be to Japan again. and like it was this whole thing, but you know, at least I got to go to one or the other. So, I ended up just doing research and going to Jibli Park, which you’ll see at the end. But, you know, I did end up getting over it. So, I’m kind of glad that this happened at the beginning of the trip because, you know, if it was at the end of the trip that I was trying to figure it out, I would have been sad. But why we were looking at the Lawson is because you can actually go on the computer and you can get tickets that are local for the Japanese people, you know, different than getting tickets overseas. And sometimes there are available tickets to the museum. There actually were tickets available to the park um different sections of the park, not the full park, but you could go to some areas of the park if we wanted to, which was cool. but it just didn’t work out for us to get different park tickets because we did have the premium for the day we were going. That’s what we ended up doing and I actually felt really happy with that decision. So, we were able to drop our suitcases off at our next hotel which is by Tokyo Station. So, here’s us walking down to Tokyo Station to check it out because I heard that there is a character street down there to check out. Underneath the station, you can go shopping and it was really, really cool. It was very important for me to go to this specific Pokemon store at Tokyo Station because they have this plushy which I needed to get for my friend Katie. And that plushy you can really only get there, but I think you could get it at the airport. But yeah, there was really cool character things. The Kirby Cafe Van got something from there. And then we headed to get lunch, which I was kind of cranky cuz I didn’t want Italian food in Japan, but it was still good. I really liked being the tourist that tries the viral stuff. Um, so I got this viral banana smoothie and it was really good. [Music] Then we took the train to a very pretty park nearby and we just kind of walked around and talked and enjoyed the scenery. It was really cool cuz it’s literally just like in the middle of the city and it’s really pretty and even the park bathrooms had a bedet. Like what the heck? That’s crazy. Um and then later that night we went to Ginsa. There’s a apparently the biggest Sanrio store there and some other stores like this fivetore Uniqlo and just a a richer area for shopping. But it was really crowded in that Uniqlo and I hated it. And we ended the night with some all you could eat sushi. And it is day three. This was one of my very favorite days. Every day was amazing. But on this day, we had a reservation and we needed to head over to Uneno and I saw this Sanro store there and we looked around a little bit cuz we were early, which was good because we weren’t late to our reservation. But we went into this building and on the first floor there is the Sanrio Character Gardens Cafe. We sat at the PMP pom purin couch. You could order all sorts of themed character foods from Sanrio. Chicken egg salad um soup and even Gudetama curry. And it was really fun. Certain things you could customize. Hongon was sitt by himself over there. But don’t worry, I ate him. But no, no, no. That’s not actually him. That’s supposed to look like him. But yeah, we did have so much fun. The food was really good. And I’m really glad we got to do this. This is an overview of what it looked like in there. You could get photos. So, of of course, we went over. We got some props. There was like no one in there, by the way. And um we got some photos. And then we headed over to a market that I had seen and that was really fun. There was some fun shopping there. So, if you happen to be by this market here, I’m not even going to try to pronounce it, then I do suggest checking it out because it was really cool. They had a little bit of everything from produce to clothing and all sorts of stuff. Then we went back over towards Tokyo station, got some coffee, and we met up with a tour, a walking tour, 2hour walking tour to be exact, where we got to see the Imperial Palace. And I got to learn so much, and Van was really excited about this. He loves to learn about history, and I didn’t expect to love it so much as well. Our tour guide was named Dylan. And I’ll just put a little clip here. Exactly. You got it in one. Uh it is to intimidate and strike fear into their opponent. Hopefully by doing so they would force the enemy to make a mistake. Uh so it’s a very important part of Kendo and in fact in the official competition now this tour was of the East Gardens and you could not see the actual imperial palace because the royal family still lives there. So some days of the week this tour is completely closed to the public because the family uses that park that you know that part of their palace and their gardens and they walk through it. So it was really cool to see that and learn about it. This is where I got my very first stamp and fan also got a stamp. I had to buy a stamp book here though and it was a little bit pricier than I wanted cuz I wasn’t really expecting there to be a stamp here and I forgot to bring my own book. So that’s okay. But we loved doing that. And here are all the different trees and plants that were planted to represent all the different parts of Japan. and of course our day doesn’t end there. We went back to the hotel for a bit, I think, and then we headed out to get some dinner. Um, we got some tonkatu. And they had this sign about how to say different words in Japan for when you’re eating. And this meal was so so good. The salad was good. The rice was good, but especially the meat. You yourself cook it on that little stove. And it was just so fun and so cute. And it was such a hidden gem place. And we were in Aki Abara. Akibara. I got a Hello Kitty Bayaki. I was so excited about this. [Music] A and then a picture. Take a bite. This is an area where people come to shop for anime and figures. And there were blind boxes galore. And looking at this footage, I’m like, I wish I bought more of them. But I didn’t have any room to bring those home. And Van had a great time shopping here, which is good because most of the places we went, I was the main shopper, but this place was just great for him to find some awesome anime stuff. And I was really happy that he was happy. But honestly, my feet were hurting so bad because we did so much on this day. We had trouble finding a breakfast place on day four. This is what we ended up with. And it was okay. I had a milk tea that was good, but then I needed a coffee. So, we went to a Starbucks reserve and we got some. And we are headed off to Keyoto. So, we got to go to the beautiful train station once again. And we were getting on the Shinkansen. But before we could do that, I was determined to find the stamp for Tokyo Station. And so, that’s what we did. And I was so excited to go on the train. It’s nice because it’s like one of the only times we’re sitting down and like relaxing. I watched Netflix and all of that. Um, but my favorite part is coming up and that is the views. The views on the train. Beautiful. I’ll show you them soon. [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] The views were better than watching Netflix and you can see Mount Fuji on the way to Kyoto. We were sitting on the correct side of the train that we could get a view of it and just every view like seeing houses, seeing everything was stunning. But look at Mount Fuji. I’m just so glad we got to see it. I just think it’s such a cool site and it was definitely a highlight of my trip. Just seeing the views on the train later on when we go on the bus like I just loved it and it makes me so emotional because I just find this country so so beautiful. Once we arrived to Kyoto we had about a 20inut walk and we were pleasantly surprised by a cute little dog. This is something we found on Booking.com and it was one of our absolute favorite places to stay. They were so accommodating, so so so nice. And they had a dog, so that’s pretty amazing, too. But this is what our hotel looked like. We had a shower and then separately there is a bathroom over here. And those are our beds. And I just loved it. And you know what’s funny? when they put the sink on top of the toilet. Like, look at this. I just think that’s funny. And I showed it to my brother cuz he’s a plumber and I thought this is probably interesting for a plumber. I don’t know. Then we headed out to explore and we got some oyakadon, which is chicken and thigh and soy sauce and eggs, and it’s so good. And then we went exploring even more. And all these sites were really pretty to see. I only filmed where I was allowed. There was a lot of really cool areas that said no photos, so I will just keep those memories in my brain cells. There were a few shops open that we were able to go into and when I was walking out of one, someone said my name and I’m like, what? How could somebody here know me? But they did. We know each other from Twitch and now I’m so glad this happened to me because we’ve become good friends and you might see them again later on. I don’t know. But this is my friend Moy Neco and this was so much fun to be able to meet her. Heat. [Music] Heat. [Music] [Music] Day five in Japan. and our first full day in in Keyoto. Mhm. How has the trip been so far? It’s been really good. What has it been your favorite part? Um, probably just randomly seeing people that know you. Oh, yeah. We I didn’t get a video of that. Bless you. Bless you. Don’t take that out. You got to keep it real. We got to like explore a little bit. We ran into somebody who recognized me and I got to meet them and I knew them from from snacks and they used to stream too but it was awesome. Now we’re waiting for breakfast cuz I want pancakes. Mhm. And I just won this little thing. We got a video of it. Wait, where’d it go? I just want a Pikmin and I love him. And then we’re going to go shopping today. We’re going to go looking at some cultural sites. What else? Um, and eat more food. Watch more food. More food. And there’s a dog. Yeah, there’s a dog at our where we’re staying. And her name is Sheen. Sheen. And she’s Nikita. And she’s so fluffy. She’s so fluffy. She’s adorable. [Music] [Music] out. [Music] Heat. [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] I really want to open this blind box that I got today. It’s a pendant and there is little twin stars. We’ve got Maro Maron Cream Hangon which is the one I want and Hello Kitty as well as My Melody and Po uh Pohat can never say it. Found this at a bookstore. All right, it’s the Hello Kitty one. I also got this shirt today. New pants from Uniqlo and Strawberry Milk Candy from 7Eleven. Oh, I got this out of a Gotcha and it’s so cute. It’s the one I wanted, too. We’re going to Osaka today. I like this one. It’s a big moat. We went to see the Osaka Castle, and this is one of the things that kind of gets me’d online as um a boring thing to do, but I really enjoyed seeing it. I think seeing the architecture and the history of Japan is really, really cool, and I just really enjoyed seeing it. So, here’s some clips of us walking up to it. And I have some closer clips as well. And then later on, I get my Osaka stamp. And then we head out into other areas of Osaka. So enjoy these clips. [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] We will soon be making a stop at [Music] So, I bought one of these famous viral cheesecakes, but it was the most bland thing I’ve ever had in my life. Van said it tasted like egg. Um, I don’t know. It was really fun to get it, but I wouldn’t really recommend it unless you really want to try. And that little layer on the bottom is raisins, which I also didn’t like that part, but it was a fluffy texture. another Studio Ghibli store. And this one I went to specifically because you can get pictures with Todoro and a picture with no face. And I’m really glad I did get the picture with no face here because at the Studio Ghibli Park, which will be in my second vlog of the trip, had a huge line. I’m so glad we’re not here in the summer. [Music] Today was crazy. We did I did 22,000 steps. Vance is 24,000. We went to Osaka. We were there all day. In the morning, we went to the castle. Um, and the travel to get there was rough. And then the travel to get to the Don Bon what was it? Don Buri area was a little it was better. And then once we got there, we had a couple things we wanted to do. And you always get sucked into the shops. Um but yeah, it was just such a long day and the travel home is pretty long. The travel back to this Kyoto hotel is pretty long, but I want to try the macarons. We got Van got a cotton candy. I picked the raspberry. Pretty good. Oh. Oh, try yours, honey. It’s good. It does taste like it’s maybe a couple days old of a macaron, though. But it’s also been warm in our bag all day. Why is the wind blowing? Why is the wind blowing? It’s day seven of our trip and it’s officially the end of our first week in Japan, which is amazing. It’s also our last day in Kyoto. We have to leave in the afternoon. So, we did some lastm minute tourist things and then we headed out and had such a wonderful day. We were headed to Knazawa. [Music] And so and family back to here and that is good timing. I can bring you to Nintendo is uh Mr. Yamano. Yes. Yeah. Okay. And the uh still Yamano family is still here. We just saw the original Nintendo building because Van told him that I like Nintendo. Our the guy who posted us, he was not only super kind, but when we got checked out, he was like, “Oh, I can take you to the station.” I was like, “Are you sure?” He was like, “Yeah, what time?” And we told him. He was like, “Oh, yes. We got in the car and he said, “Oh, Nintendo.” And I was like, “Oh, yes. You love Nintendo.” And he goes, “Wait one minute.” I thought he was saying, “Wait one minute.” Because there was tight streets. He was saying, “Wait one minute.” So that he could show us the original Nintendo that was like two blocks away. Insane. Insane. [Music] [Music] Hey, [Music] hey, hey. [Music] behind. Hey Tanuki. Tanuki. Oh my god. I didn’t get to see it yet. That’s one place. That’s storage. Oh, here’s the shoe. Take it off. Should we wear slippers? No, we can wear just socks. Are you sure? Yeah. Are you ready? Okay, I’m ready. Oh, it smells good, too. Oh. I don’t do it. I don’t want to break it. No, let’s let’s try not to. [Music] I’m not going to open it though. But bubbles. says we need to call them and wait for them. What else is over here? Nobody’s here. That’s the kitchen. The kitchen over here. Wow. And we ended the night off with a really nice dinner. Stay tuned for week 2 vlog coming soon on my channel. Make sure you subscribe if you want to see it. And I can’t wait to show you what else we do in Japan because some of my favorite things haven’t even happened yet. Bye.

My husband and I travelled to Japan October 3rd-17th of 2025! This vlog highlights week 1. Week 2 vlog will be uploaded soon!

Become a YOUTUBE MEMBER to get access to perks:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCasg5Ydwz-U0XXWrogp4fyQ/join

Join the Discord: https://discord.gg/gkbJHsJPhF

Follow my other socials:
MY INSTAGRAM: https://www.instagram.com/minsmeadow
MY TIKTOK: https://www.tiktok.com/@minsmeadow
WATCH ME LIVE ON TWITCH: https://www.twitch.tv/minsmeadow
Link tree: https://minsmeadow.com/pages/links

#MinsMeadow Min’s Meadow
Japan #japan2025 #japanvlog

Mailing:
Min’s Meadow
P.O. BOX 114
Akron, PA 17501