Saturday/wormhole plane trip/magically Sunday

Time to head out! Got to the airport and everything went well for the most part. Got all checked in and got the crew together for a picture. Gowan's mom would not allow us to leave without taking a plethora of pictures.

SFO

Well that was by far the most uncomfortable plane ride I've ever been on thus far. Kudos to United Airlines thought for having pretty good customer service and feeding us three times in the 11 hours in the air. Nonetheless it's nearly impossible for people of our size and shape to stay comfy for that long in the air. The plane was a 747 and had rows of 3-4-3 and it was packed. Most of us sat in the last few rows of the plane so rows 50-59 of 60. I was in row 59 but luckily I had people I knew in my row.

Flying with 600 of your most distant friends

This flight gave me a true appreciation of what one can accomplish in half a day and also how much being in one small seat for so long can drive you crazy. Stir crazy doesn't even begin to describe how we felt from about hour five on. It was quite the predicament because we left at 11:30 AM UST and arrived in Japan at 2:30 their time so we tried not to sleep (didn't succeed) on the plane so as not to be up all night when we arrived. So 1. We're in a small space 2. We can't sleep 3. The in flight movies were in Chinese. I was extremely productive though. I had time to catch parts of three different movies, eat three meals, read two magazines, nap twice, and read about 300 pages of game of thrones. Talk about getting stuff done. All I need to do from now on is fly internationally and my productivity rates will skyrocket. Only problem is that I'd probably lose my mind in the process.

Universal communication

 Despite all of this we arrived in Osaka and set off on our journey. Immediately met the first hitch in the trip with the customs process. We had to fill out two different forms with our entry info but the people in the customs section of the airport had very little english speaking experience. It was basically equivalent to me cloning myself then asking the other me questions in English expecting fluent Japanese responses. Got through it thought and next thing you know we're on a bus to the hotel.

The bus ride took a while, in fact we drove for about an hour and it totally destroyed my notin of how big Osaka was. All we saw on the freeway to the hotel were ports, baseball fields, and industrial districts. We got to the hotel though and it looked really nice. Had some time to snag a few pictures in front of the hotel and despite the language barrier we made it to the rooms.

In front of the hotel

Can you say stipend?

 After getting settled, dreary eyed and stiff from the flight, we set off into the unknown with the Japanese head coach and two Japanese student assistants as guides. We trekked through a local shopping center and took in the local fanfare. The highlight of the afternoon though and helping me check off number five from my Japan bucket list was trying the fried squid. This delicacy was recommended so, when in Rome.

Fried squid. Pretty tasty. Won't be trying again I'm afraid

We ended the day with a dinner at a restaurant we found. We got lost on the way back to the hotel because by then our guides had left to go home. We found some missionaries from the States and talked to them for a bit. One was from Huntington beach but the directions they gave us didn't really help. We eventually found our way back to the hotel to call it a night. An eventful two days it was indeed. We have another day to to explore and I'm looking forward to it.

All Packed!

The title was just a little fun poke at the fact that the flight to Japan is around 11.5 hours. This will be my first venture outside the confines of the US of A and I'm getting pretty excited. I think that this will be a fun trip overall and I'm looking forward to getting a taste of life outside the Stanford bubble. If the views in Japan are anything like what I saw in places like Miami or Hawaii, then I'm in for a treat. I figured I would make a little bucket list of things to do in the next few sure to be action packed days. Hopefully I can fit everything in and I'll be sure to post every experience with a picture to accompany it.

Now about that bucket list:

1. Eat something weird/amazing (COMPLETED)

2. Take in the awesome scenery (COMPLETED)

3. Visit a temple (COMPLETED)

4. Meet some cool people (COMPLETED)

5. Eat at a traditional restaurant (COMPLETED)

6. Visit a shrine (COMPLETED)

7. Go to Mino Park (INCOMPLETE)

8. See the sky garden (INCOMPLETE)

This is just a preliminary list of things I've heard of/know to be cool destinations. Hopefully I get to do all of them but if not I'm sure other things will come up along the way. Flight is at 11AM and I think I'll land at around 2:30PM but with the time difference and the length of the flight, time zones, atmospheric pressure, Coriolis affect who know how long it'll actually take. I'm just sticking with the 11 and a half hours it says on the ticket. I've got a good book and my iPad, I think I'll be alright. Time to make some final preparations then I'm off. See you in Japan!

P.S

They call me "el Wasp Hunter"

Japan trip 2013

I feel like whenever you're with a new group of people doing an ice breaker or some other inherently awkward form of communication the question comes up, "Tell us something interesting about yourself." For this I frequently use "my uncle was in the little rock nine" or the fact that I've never left the country as my addition to the conversation. The Little Rock Nine are much much cooler than the second fact, but at the moment the second one is much more relevant.

I'm headed to Osaka, Japan this Saturday morning for a week and I had no expectation of my first venture out of the country to be at this destination. I'm not complaining! After an 11 and a half hour flight I'll be in a large cultural hub with over three million Japanese residents populating the city at any given time! It seems like it's an amazing place and I've heard from pretty much everyone that is has a big city feel to it. Not as grand as Tokyo, but still a wonder in itself. The trip is for a football game that occurs annually between some players from Japan and some from the states. I know very little about the game at this point in time, as of right now I'm gearing up for an adventure filled with sightseeing, exploring, and eating some strange new foods. I'll be sure to get some souvenirs and take in some sights as well. Oh by the way Stanford fits the bill for all of this so the football game part is just icing on the Osaka shaped cake. I'm looking forward to getting back in pads and toting the ol' pigskin around again. It seems like a long while since the Rose Bowl and staying in football shape is very difficult when you're not doing it EVERY SINGLE DAY. I feel ready though and can't wait to break out my new camera as well. This blog may very well turn into a vlog while I'm there but we'll see. That's all the info I have for now. Time to go relax on the day after my birthday. Then pack!

Already Feel Lost

Hope I get to see this place (I didn't)

the "real world"

So here it is. Finally. My blog that has been in the making for a few months (thanks in part to an old friend whom I will refer to as Hobey) now but I just now have the time to put pen to paper, or finger to key to be more accurate. That first saying reminds me of all the thank you cards that I really should get to before the people that sent them forget I even graduated. Anyway, this blog was originally titled something else that I can't for the life of me remember at the moment but I decided to change the name to The Wet Bean and Cheese Part II in honor of my brother J.T who passed away a few years back. Miss you big bro. I frequently read his blog because I feel like that's where I can get to know him best in the stead of time together we lost. Now I'm not saying we never talked or anything, but he was five years older and when you're 16 and they're 21 the coolness gap is just too wide. I'm getting off topic but to sum up I think my brother had a knack for writing and was doing a good job with his blog so I figured I could fill his shoes and attempt to capture the minds of people like he did with his comical yet analytical use of language.

Back to the present. Graduation! Ta-da. Here's to you Mom, Dad, J.T, family, friends, countless acquaintances, coaches, teachers, janitors, and everyone else that I associated with and had a hand in shaping the man I'm still growing up to be. I can't thank you all enough. Those thank you cards I mentioned before will count for a small percentage of the actual thanks given. 

And I'm off

College was a wild ride that included getting to study at one of the premier universities in all the land and meet equally amazing people along the way. I met people that were master's of their craft and were expert thinkers to boot. Let's put it this way, my freshman roommate could do chemistry in his sleep, upside down, backwards, or intoxicated. And oh yeah he's an awesome person too. As a member of the Stanford Football Team I was able to experience what grit and hard work can surmount flash and talent in big ways. The life lessons I gained from football have already forever altered my life timeline (no not the facebook one) and I think I'm a better man for it. There are some crucial lessons that I'm not sure everyone gets to learn the hard way which in some instances are the best way. For example I learned that no matter how hard you try some things you can't control so it's best to control what you can control. I learned that my body is forever adjusted to waking up before 7AM and boldly taking 18 unites freshman fall was a calamitous debacle. Yup. More so I learned that good people are important to have around you and that teamwork can accomplish great things. So yeah basically Stanford is amazing, all the other super adjectives in the world still wouldn't do it justice and ditto for the students there, and I'm glad I got to call it home for the last 4 years. Thanks Stanford its been real.

The World is a book, and those who do not travel read only a page.