The last 7 months were full of big events. I’d like to take a moment to review what we’ve done before our next adventure.
October: final preparations for our wedding
I thought I’d go crazy! So thankful for Jared, the family, and our wedding planner Sayo who supported me. I wanted to lose weight for the wedding but it didn’t really work out due to all the delicious Japanese food & sakes.
November: wedding & family trip through Japan
The wedding was absolutely magical. It was great to see everyone and have the best time together. After the wedding, we showed our friends & family around Japan – Tokyo, Yamaguchi (before it was ranked in the NY Times), Hiroshima, Kyoto, Nara, Osaka, Shirakawa village, and Kawaguchi Lake. The autumn weather was great most of the time.
December: Hakuba life has begun
We have decided to do the whole snowboarding season in Hakuba which has some of the best snow resorts in Japan. This season was relatively warm but we’ve got some snow dumps now and then. The area gets packed with tourists but it was great to get to know some lovely locals. It felt like we made our second home.
January: snowboarding & some kinds of virus
We spent New Years with the family. Super fresh puffer fish for dinner was definitely a highlight of that trip – it kept moving for 10 minutes after being served raw. Talk about fresh! After we got back to Hakuba, Jared and I both got really sick. It was brutal. We made all the powder days though.
February: turning 30 & sisters time
I turned 30! It is a big number and I feel it. Jared made the birthday super lovely and we also got to celebrate it with my parents & sisters in Tokyo on that following weekend. Later in February, my sisters individually visited us in Hakuba and we had a great time in our small winter wonderland.
March: family celebrations & traveling with friends from Sydney
One of my brothers got married and the other one passed the exam to become a doctor! The family all got together for a big celebration. Our good friends from Sydney visited Japan for the first time! We spent time together traveling and catching up. Great times.
April: F1 Grand Prix & …
Such an exciting weekend at Formula 1 Grand Prix in Suzuka with the family! It was the first time since 2018 in Singapore, so it felt unreal seeing all the drivers we’ve been seeing on TV for the last 6 years.
Now on to … HONEYMOON TIME BABYYYY!!!
We are currently in the Maldives, enjoying the beautiful island resort.
We have decided to take advantage of the round-the-world ticket with the OneWorld airline alliance, in which we can take up to 16 flight segments as long as you are going one direction around the globe with a very reasonable price. It is our honeymoon after all, and this is definitely once-in-your-life-time experience, so we chose the business class option. Planning our flights for the next 9 months was “interesting“ but soooo exciting!
A lot of people (mostly family) are asking where we will be so here we go;
| Apr 21 – Apr 26 | Maldives |
| Apr 27 – | Europe & UK We start from Budapest and will work our way to all the countries in Europe. |
| Sep 4 – | Greece, Turkey, Cyprus, Egypt (maybe UAE?) |
| Oct 24 – | Spain, Portugal |
| Nov 22 – | New York |
| Nov 26 – | Spearfish, SD We’ll visit the family for Thanksgiving! |
| Dec 7 – | Orlando, FL |
| Dec 11 – | San Francisco, CA |
| Dec 16 | Flying back to Japan |
We would love to see everyone who’s around, and any tips & recommendations are also much appreciated! We will be updating our travels here on this website, not to make you jealous but to inspire you 🙂
Love,
Jared & Emi
