i woke up this morning and felt a wave of nostalgia seep through me. i realized it’s almost five years since raj, bong and i made our journey to the sleepy town of beppu (in my opinion), which ironically enough is in the land of the rising sun, japan. five years since then and yet many of those fond memories remained vivid in my mind.

i remember the 24th of september 2005, the day we traveled to japan for the first time. we went to the centennial airport very early anticipating the problems that we could run into checking in our oversized luggages. despite the fact that we were only allowed 20 kilos of luggage, we brought more than we should, hoping that they would go unnoticed. unfortunately, the airport officials noticed how heavy our carry-on baggages were right before we entered the immigration area. all three of us had to re-pack the last minute and we ended up paying USD200 for all the extra baggage that we had combined. bong also had to turn over the forks he brought from home. funny how he could have just thrown them away but as we were expecting a hard life in japan (with buying forks as an added expense), bong thought it best to turn them over and to collect them when we arrived in japan.

because of all the last minute rush, the plane had to wait for the three of us and so when we finally boarded the plane, the faces of irate passengers greeted us and we just had to sink low on our seats and hide ourselves from embarassment.

the flight from manila to fukuoka took about more than four hours. the airport was small in comparison with the other international airports we had been into. the three of us decided that we didn’t need anyone from the school to pick us up so we just waited for the bus that would take us to beppu to arrive. we bought food in a convenience store at the airport for our dinner. they were actually snacks as we were still converting from peso to yen then and we thought that everything was expensive. with my little knowledge of japanese, we were able to send some of our luggages via courier.

it was a two hour ride from fukuoka to beppu. we slept mostly in the bus as there was nothing else to see but trees and mountains. we arrived at the university almost 6pm. at the bus stop, we were greeted by the RAs. thankfully, we had decided to have our things sent by post from the airport because we had to trek down a long path of stairs (later on, we counted them to be about a hundred steps). under normal circumstances, i would have kvetched about the whole thing but  the novelty of being in a new place and experiencing new things won over.

the first thing we did was to check in our residence which would be our own sanctuary for the next 6 months. we found out that bong was in AP house 1 while raj and i were placed in AP house 2, the newer and better building. julie, the floor RA ushered me to room 521. it was a small room which had a single bed, a closet, a desk with my own phone and a fridge. i also had my own WC in the room which made it a bit convenient. she showed me around the whole building. all five floors had their own communal kitchen, showers and laundry areas. julie also informed me how to borrow a vacuum cleaner and iron. i remember that  one of the questions i asked julie was where can i get drinking water. she told me i can get it from the sink in my bathroom. growing up in a third world country, i thought it strange and unsafe to do so but later on, i learned that tap water in japan was safe.

after roaming around the building, i managed to locate raj. we lost bong as he was in the other building but we managed to find him too after one hour. we had dinner together. our first dinner was an instant cup of noodle for each which wasn’t really fully cooked because we didn’t have boiling hot water. the meal was a disaster to say the least but we were just happy being there after all the preparations that we took which lasted almost a year. (we were actually scheduled to start march 2005 but due to financial setbacks, we deferred our attendance to september). we parted ways that night with a pact not to wake each other up early the next day. it was actually more of a reminder to me as i was the early riser among the trio and both bong and raj wanted to sleep in late. but i was also exhausted that day and i wanted to relish my first night in japan. my first time to be truly away from home.

now that i think about it, i regret that i didn’t keep a journal of my first few months in japan. it would have been nice to have something tangible to read and see how much life had progressed since then for the three of us, and to have a testament of how we survived the test of time. our stay in japan wasn’t a bed of roses as some people would have imagined it to be. it was a humbling experience and an eye-opener.  and something that i would truly cherish forever.