Category: Blog Posts
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Merry Christmas!
I hope everyone had a great Christmas! We’ve had a surprisingly eventful one here – Japan doesn’t hold Christmas in quite the same regard as the States does, but it’s a very big deal in Hakodate, and all our church friends obviously celebrate it.
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Finally Back
I am writing this from our Airbnb in Hakodate! A bit later than we’d planned, but at least we’re here now.
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Old/New Friends
Well, I’d intended to write a couple posts over the course of our time in Korea, but we stayed so busy, it looks like it’s just a retrospective. But that should help tell you how great a time we had!
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Off to Korea
We’re currently packing for South Korea tomorrow! It’s funny how weird it feels to be going to another country – we’ve been traveling a lot in a foreign country up until now, but this is a new foreign country, and it’s strange to think we’ll be in a whole different place tomorrow night.
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Winter Wonderland
Hello from Sapporo! We’ve been here for a couple days so it’s past time for an update.
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To Sapporo and Seoul
We’ve picked a path! We’re finishing out this visa in Sapporo, the big city on Hokkaido, and then spending a week in Seoul before coming back.
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Looking Back, Looking Forward
We’re nearing the end of our tourist visa (about two weeks), so it’s time to reflect on everything we’ve seen, and time to start figuring out what comes next.
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More Scenic Vistas
We have been doing things, honest! Maybe not much… But here is the proof! First of all: It snowed! Alllll day on Monday. So we did stay in that day. Now what should have been first if I cared about chronology: we went to a wonderful church on Sunday. Like, this is our church. The…
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Accidental Adventure
We got off to a late start today possibly due to my chaotic sleep schedule… But this meant we didn’t plan to do anything big or be out long once we did head out.
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We Love Hakodate
We made it to Hakodate and fell in love before we had even landed. Honestly. A big part of that is that it is actually Fall here. FALL! When was the last time we got to experience that season??? 9 years ago when we lived in Virginia? Probably! It is beautiful. It is vibrant. Just…
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Hanging Out
If you’re wondering why there haven’t been any posts while we were in Osaka, it’s because we didn’t do anything while we were in Osaka. Cassie hasn’t been feeling well, and we didn’t have any specific plans in mind anyway, so we just chilled.
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Saying Goodbye in Hiroshima
I have my laptop again! This is still going to be a quicker post just so I can get some of the details down while they’re fresh, but I am still planning a larger photo dump sometime soon.
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Nintendo Day!
We’re back in Kyoto! But in a very different part of it, so it all still feels new. Our hotel is very nice and homey – as much space as a small apartment – and has been very comfortable. Also, we went to the Nintendo Museum!
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Traditional Hotels and Mountain Towns
While we’ve mostly been keeping with the fast pace, we’re staying a couple nights in the same place right now, so I have the breathing room for another post before Kyoto.
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Tokyo, Revisited
The McFarlands (and PJ, Lizzy’s sister) are here, and we’ve had a great time traveling around Tokyo with them, showing them some of the stuff we’ve enjoyed. I guess before I get to that, though, I should talk some more about our week before they got here. It wasn’t very eventful, but we did do…
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Cassie’s Journey with God
This is a blog post that I have been hesitating to write for some time. I have felt a specific call in the midst of our specific call (moving to Japan) to share my struggles. I have been trying to be diligent in obeying that call, but only in person, and only when prompted.
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Same City, New Hotel
We haven’t had nearly as eventful a time as our friends and family back in Florida, but we do have a few updates!
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Slow couple of days
As predicted, it has been more chill since Shaz and Dad left – though a little more chill than we were expecting, since I caught a cold. (And now that I’m feeling better, Cassie seems to have caught it from me. Of course.
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Dad and Shaz’s last day
Shaz and Cassie’s dad will be leaving later today; yesterday was their last full day here. After that, we have another week with Drew, then two weeks where it’s just me and Cassie, until our friends Micah, Lizzy, and PJ show up for two weeks.
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Our time in Kyoto
Here it is! A massive photo dump and summary of our time in Kyoto. You already know the basics, so I’m just gonna dive right in!
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Home Sweet Home
It’s funny; we spent almost as much time in Kyoto as we had in Tokyo, but we all agreed that coming back to Tokyo felt like coming home again. It’s a nice neighborhood and a comfortable place!
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We have phones again! Also Kyoto is nice!
So first things first: I should warn you to expect lighter updates for the next week. We’re traveling in Kyoto and I didn’t take my laptop, so all posts until we’re back in Tokyo are going to be written on my phone.
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I Love It Here
Tokyo has been fantastic. I don’t even know where to begin; it’s just great. I love Los Angeles, but Tokyo has everything I like about LA, plus the food is cheaper, the public transit is reliable, the roads are more walkable, there’s affordable housing, and everything is cleaner.
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Welcome to Tokyo
We are in Japan! A longer post will be coming soon (Wednesday?), but I just wanted to let everyone know that we are here and it is wonderful. Oh, it’s everything I wanted it to be and more.
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Cramming Everything In
We only had, what, four days in Hawaii? So we did what we could to do as much as possible in those four days. It was, to be honest, probably too much – but dang, we sure did a lot!
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Hawaii Is Gorgeous
Shocking news, I know. We’ve only been here for a day, but because we’re only here for four full days we’re trying to cram a lot in.
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Whirlwind Tour
Our time in Los Angeles may have been dominated by sitting around the house sick, but that just meant that our final weekend, when we were finally healthy, had a lot of stuff we needed to cram into it!
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Sitting Around in California
California has been lovely, but also not exactly what we were expecting from it. This is, in no small part, thanks to a fun little merry-go-round of COVID that we’ve been riding at the McFarlands’ house, which means we’ve not done very much during our time here.
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Tragedy
Hello everyone. We have been in CA for over 2 weeks now and have a little over 1 week left before we head on to Hawaii and then Japan. We are overdue for an update on here, I promise you’ll get one about the CA portion eventually. But for now, I have something else to…
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From VA to CA
It’s time. We had a fantastic time in Virginia seeing all our friends and family here, but today’s the day we say goodbye to everyone. Thank you to everyone here for making our time so great, and an extra big thanks to Candace and Tim for hosting us and for taking care of our cats!…
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VA Friends and Family
We’ve been having a lot of fun seeing all of our friends and family in the area, so I thought it’d be fun to tell you all about some of it!
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Virginia and Our Cats
We’re fairly settled in now in Candace and Tim’s basement, where we’ll be for most of the next month, so really, it’s past time for another update on where we’re at and what we’ve been up to!
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Hello Virginia!
The day has come! If you’re reading this, we’ve left the state. (This post is scheduled to go live after our flight has taken off.) We land today in VA, where we’ll be for the next month and change.
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Goodbye Season
As we are now only 4 days away from our big moving date we are officially into the saddest and most stressful part of our journey. (Hopefully. I don’t want to imagine a more stressful or sadder time is to come!) Once we entered the single digits before the big move pretty much every time…
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The Goodbye Tour
We have our tickets bought! Which is exciting, but made me realize it’s worth going into a little more detail about our pre-Japan plans, and when we’ll be where. So here are the actual dates!
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Cassie’s Take on “The Big Move” and “Why Have a Blog?”
Hey, friends! I have been a little bit embarrassed letting people know about this blog while there is so little on here. So, here I am contributing.
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Pre-trip FAQ
There are a lot of questions that we keep getting asked about our move to Japan, so we figured you might like to see the whole list! We’ll keep updating this list as questions keep coming up.
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Welcome to the blog
This is (going to be) our blog! We don’t promise to be particularly punctual about updating it, but since we don’t really do Facebook or social media of any kind, it seemed like a good way to keep in touch with people, and let everyone know what we’ve been up to.