Persuasion - Go to Japan!

Japan is a country filled with many beautiful sights and places to visit but why should you, a person enjoying the comfort of your home, decide to go visit there? Japan is a country with such an amazing culture and background and being able to visit this country is just an amazing experience to go through and will be a permanent mark in your life if you decided to go visit this country. Last year a record of 19.7 million overseas visits were recorded last year which is a massive number and just goes to show that Japan is truly remarkable and that it isn't uncommon for people wanting to go travel there to gaze upon the sights this country holds. Have you ever just went outside and just marveled at a beautiful garden you saw or even just a single flower you saw in your yard? Well, imagine seeing a country where everywhere you turned was a beautiful garden with beautiful trees like the Sakura Tree (Cherry Blossom Tree) with petals that floated in the wind just giving off a sense of belonging and that that's where you are supposed to be. Maybe you don't care much for flowers or trees and the beauty but Japan is also highly advanced in technology also. Japan has been making a lot of prototypes for robots and artificial intelligence which is something amazing to just experience and see. The technology in Japan is one of the most iconic things about Japan so if you are into computers and technology that is years ahead and only seen in the comic books then you should go to Japan to make what you believed to be unreal actually real.  Japan isn't just a country or just an island, it is a stunning world beauty that can only be experienced first hand and not by some pictures on the internet so if you are planning to go somewhere where the culture is booming and filled with many vivid colors and technology you could only imagine to be real that will make your eyes swell up with tears of just pure beauty and leave you in a state of just pure awe then Japan is the place to be.

August 15th - Fly back to USA - Travel

On the morning of August 15th everyone woke up and decided to pack up immediately (except for Zuhare because he was too busy looking at how to be a Genji main because he's bad). As we finished packing up we decided to just chill for the rest of the day because our days in Japan were coming to an end so we decided to just chill this day and enjoy the scenery of Japan near our hotel room. Chase proceeds to go to the bathroom (which takes him about 30min) and we decide to go and grab some breakfast. As we come back with some breakfast Chase is finally out of the bathroom and as we finish eating breakfast we put on our fire Js and head out. It was a hot day at around 90 degrees Fahrenheit but it was still a beautiful day nonetheless. Everyone wore shorts and short sleeve shirts (except for zuhare who wore some baggy skinny jeans) and we just walked around admiring all the sights around our hotel that we stayed at, The trees were a vibrant green and just reminded us of how amazing this whole experience in Japan has been with all the beautiful flowers and gardens around with all of the diverse culture we have experienced with the businessmen all around the streets and the women in the kimonos walking along with them showing just how the culture is in the new age as well as keeping the traditional Japanese culture with it. We decided to go into a Japanese souvenir shop to get a piece of the culture to take home with us. Chase decided to get a Mt. Fuji snow glove, Shamyl decided to get a Japanese lantern, Kush decided to get a Japanese sweatshirt with the Japanese flag on it, Zuhare decided to get a Genji bobble head, and I decided to get a cool pen. We headed back to our hotel room to finish packing and to add our souvenirs to our suitcases and bags while Chase left to go get our rental car back. As we waited for Chase to get back we decided to share our favorite moments in Japan. Shamyls favorite part was the Awa Odori Dance festival because he really enjoyed all the dancing and music involved, Zuhares favorite part was visiting Edo Castle because he really enjoyed the beauty o fit and all the segments in it, Kush's favorite part was the Rakuten Tennis Tournament because he really enjoys tennis and his favorite player was Kei Nishikori who participated in the event, Chases favorite part was the Tokyo Tower because it was just a beautiful sight to see at night, and my favorite part was visiting the Ueno Zoo because of the Giant Panda and the wide variety of animals to see inside. After we recapped our favorite events in Japan it was finally time to leave this amazing country so we got our bags and loaded them in the SUV and drove to the airport. In the airport we got a final glimpse of this amazing culture we have been surrounded by for two weeks and have indulged ourselves in. We finally boarded the plane and all agreed that Japan was the most amazing and beautiful country we have visited. Goodbye Japan, till next time.

Weather: 82 degrees

August 14th - Awa Odori Dance Festival - Culture

It was 10:00 at night we had just arrived in Tokushima and took a cab from the Awa Odori Airport to our hotel, we were all exhausted. Kush and Zuhare were sleeping, Chase was quite drowsy, and Mohir, as usual, was busy watching YouTube. We were all quite excited about our next day in Japan, the day almost all of us, especially me were waiting diligently for, attending the world renown Japanese Awa Odori Festival. We slept as soon as we stepped foot into our hotel room which as any other hotel in Japan was utmost comforting and relaxing, almost everyone other than Mohir slept at the same time, we all wanted to wake up early so that we could get up early have a good breakfast and leave for the festival which normally isn't that crowded in the mornings as the main events are always held during the evening from 6 all the way to midnight. We all woke up at 6 o clock in the morning, Zuhare like always didn't have a shower as he likes to have them at night, while Chase took nearly 30 mins in the bathroom, even Mohir who slept way later than us took only 10 mins to take a shower. Kush also had a shower at night so he didn't feel like taking it in the morning. As soon as we got out of the hotel, we all asked Kush to find a good restaurant that all of us could eat in. He found an Indian Restaurant in Minamishowacho which was like a downtown suburb or county of Tokushima. The food was great, and it felt really good to eat another countries food in Japan.


While throughout the day many small dance events took place, we were preparing more for the big event that would take place at 6:00 and were starting to learn more about what we were going to be getting tonight. We learned through some research that the festival basically in English translates to a fools dance, as according to the legend and facts, in 1587 when the Feudal lord Hachisuka Lamesa in celebration of his newly built Tokushima palace, offered sake a Japanese rice wine to all his people, and his citizens got so drunk at night that started dancing in an unregular and unsteady gait. So we figured out that this dance isn't some practiced dance that took months in preparation, but an every day drunk dance that the Japanese people and over 1.6 million tourists have celebrated yearly. Once the clock hit 6 in Tokushima, the entire city became a massive dance battleground as the city got divided into 6 different stages that were showing both the free dances and the paid dances. For the most part we weren't very worried about our seats, as we had booked our seats for the paid dances nearly a month ago, but we were in a hurry to get good seats for the free performances that took place at 6, because as a lot of Japanese citizens told us that if we didn't arrive at least 1 hr or 2 before the performance started then you wouldn't have any good seats or even any seats left, especially if you're here with 5 of your friends. So we did arrive at 5 and even then we had to look at least 2 rounds before we could find 5 seats for all of us.


The time during dance was honestly both one of the frustrated and exciting parts of the day, as you couldn't even hear or see the folk song and dance clearly, because of the fact that we had to stand up through the nearly ecstatic and exuberant crowd that wouldn't stop cheering and clapping for at least 2 to 3 hrs, but at the same time the dresses and the unique yet common method of dancing that the locals had managed so well made even the free dances completely worth the watch. Once the dance ended, we were really tired and wanted to do something else that didn't involve dance, so we started to go on the lookout for the food and game stalls present in the festival. We could spend enough time playing in the game stalls because our next show would not start until about half an hour later, so we had time to play some of the card and arcade games present during the half time break we had. Once our break time was about to get over, we started to rush towards our paid performance which was about to start in a moment.


The Paid dance that takes place at 10:30 at night was the one we were all looking forward to, all that tension, discipline, and trouble we went through all that day was completely worth it for this performance and the others that took place that night, it was almost jaw dropping as you could literally see Japan's rich culture and history right before your eyes through these simple yet memorable performances of all sorts of demographics in the population, the old, young, middle-aged and the woman. The preparation and dedication that the dance members had to go through was clearly evident by how much me, chase, zuhare and mohir enjoyed it, You would have to see it in order to believe how these absolutely stunning performances have made Awa Odori become one of the most visited festivals in the entire world.

Weather 87

August 13th - Island Shrine of Itsukushima - Culture

When we woke up from the hotel in Hiroshima we had already visited the memorial so we then needed to know if we should go back to Tokyo or go to another place in Hiroshima. Shamyl started to look for places on his phone when he woke up and found a place called Itsukushima Island. The website said that this was a very significant place for the Shinto religion which is a religion in Japan that believes in the worship of ancestors and that life is all around us in everything. It is a Shinto shrine on the island of Isukushima which is why the name is why it is. It's best known for its "floating" torii gate which is in the water and coming out from it. During ancient times many people thought that it  was impossible to build things up from the sea so that's why it is deemed floating. The island is located in the city of Hatsukaichi in the Hiroshima Prefecture in Japan. That was all that the site said and so Shamyl went and woke us all up. Mohir was to tired to get up so Shamyl woke him up with a water bottle by pouring it on him. It didn't take us long to get ready and it didn't take long till we were in the car. We googled the directions and we were on our way. Once we arrived at Hatsukaichi we took a boat tp the shrine and got on Itsukushima Island it was a very congested with trees and so we had to ask the man who took us to the island to help us. He accepted and we were on our way, Once we arrived the man said that he had to go because his boat was still on the island and that someone else could have helped us. The new man that we found told us more about it like how the shrine was designed and built on pier like structures over the bay so that it would appear to be floating on the water separate from the sacred island which could be approached by the devout. This fascinated all of us except for Mohir who was playing Clash Royal on his phone the whole time. When we followed the man to the sacred chief shrine for the Shinto religion it kept getting more and more crowded. Mohir ended up bumping into someone which made him ask why it got so populated all of a sudden to which the man answered that the shrine is one of Japan's most popular tourist attractions and is classified as one of the 3 views of Japan. We then finally got to the edge of the building and probably for 10 minutes looked around,even Mohir. Chase asked if we could get a boat ride so we could get even closer but the man said that since we were just tourists and didn't even practice the Shinto religion that we couldn't since it was a sacred sight. Later we were getting tired and decided to go home, when we were on the boat on the way back we saw a fish after Kush turned on the flashlight on his phone. We eventually got back to the car and had to drive all the way to Awa to get there in time for the Awa Odori festival. We all took turns driving like always and that was the end of our day.

August 12th - Hiroshima Peace Memorial - History

It was an over 8 hr drive from Mt Fuji all the way to Hiroshima, we were all utterly exhausted and tired. We hadn't had sleep for over a day, as all 5 of us kept switching gears in order to reach our destination faster. Zuhare and Chase were arguing about how choosing to drive in Japan was of utter waste, and that the decision made couldn't have been worse. Me, Mohir and Kush said that through driving we could explore so many more aspects of Japan that we couldn't explore through Bullet trains or even Planes. Overall even though the car trip was long and tiring, we were witnessing Japan at an eye to eye level that we couldn't have seen from any other means of transportation.

After leaving from Mt Fuji at about 3 am, we drove directly with only 2 short breaks to Hiroshima which was about 443 miles to the west of Japan. The two breaks we took were in the city of Kyoto and Osaka which were two big cities that we absolutely needed to see in order to fully experience  Japan as a whole rather than just some parts. Once we had arrived in Hiroshima it had already become about 11:30 and we desperately needed to find a hotel just to rest in and we found the Hotel Sunroute Hiroshima to rest in for a couple of hours and booked it for the night. After spending some hours sleeping, we started our preparations for leaving for what we had come all the way to Hiroshima for in the first place; the Hiroshima Peace Memorial.

The Hiroshima Peace Memorial was one our most awaited sites during our entire trip, because ever since we were young in school we had been taught about the Atomic Bomb that landed on Hiroshima, and the destruction and mayhem that it had caused for not only the surrounding areas beyond Hiroshima but the entire Japan. The Memorial is the only structure in Hiroshima that was left standing after the onslaught of the Nuclear Bomb. Ever since the attack, on 1949 with the enactment of the Hiroshima Peace Memorial City Construction Law, the new Japanese government decided that the entire district surrounding the memorial would be devoted to peace, and would later on become known as the Peace Memorial Park.

The Park or the Memorial, in general, was quite haunting to look at for all of us in our group, whenever I looked anywhere in that city all I could think of was the destruction and atrocities of World War II both in and out of Japan. There were actually times where I felt like we were in some sort of horror movie environment, with the kind of dark and grayish visuals that was present throughout the memorial. The memorial as said by the UN was retained in order to help cut down nuclear weapons in the world, by reminding us about the horrors that this deadly human weapon could cause any day to day citizen in life.

The entire memorial was overall an absolute marvel to look at, behind all that darkness and destruction that the memorial represented we could peek at the small tiny message hidden beneath all the layers of the memorial, that of world peace and an end to nuclear proliferation. Zuhare was the one who noticed the subtext of why the memorial was retained for so long, before Chase and the others caught on to the message that was so blatantly obvious but we could not see it. Hopefully, no one country has to ever witness the horrors of a nuclear bomb ever again, and just like what the memorial represents can finally achieve world peace.