First blog post!

First blog post! Hello to whoever is reading this! Let me say a couple of interesting things about myself. I have studied abroad in Tokyo, Japan before through a program called LABO, and if you are under 18 years old I HIGHLY recommend it... Even if you don't know much about Japan. It is a very affordable program and you have 2 options from a month homestay  or a month long homestay in Tokyo with Japanese language classes. I stayed a little over 2 months and did both the plain ol' homestay and the language classes. The grand total (with loads of spending money calculated in) it came to about $6000... I know at first that sounds like a lot of dough, but with the experience, the classes, AND airfare... It's the best deal you will ever have. Because of this program I became extremely close to my host family, and even 2 years later I talk to them at least once a week. Last year I returned to Tokyo and spent another month with them! (I'm telling you guys MAKE FRIENDS IN JAPAN it saves you LOADS of money because you can visit them and usually stay and visit for free and not pay ridiculous amounts of money for
A hotel). 

Alright so I went to school in Tokyo, but I lived in an adorable little town called makuharihongo in Chiba. Everyday I had to take an hour train ride (which I strangely miss) to school. I LOVE Chiba, I don't think just anyone will like Chiba though, it's not a tourist location aside from Tokyo Disneyland is located there, it's Just authentically "Japanese" and it allowed me to  experience Japanese culture without all the gaijin (foreigners) around and about. I also lived in another small town called Shiga, it was about an hour from Kyoto. Not going to lie... I HATED it. It was too rural for me. My house was surrounded by rice fields with not much to explore after a month. Kyoto was okay, but it is a lot of sightseeing and not much to actually do. I went to Osaka twice and enjoyed it, I seem to quite like the city atmosphere since I adored Tokyo so much. 

The place that I loved the most was probably my trip to Hakone... It was so breathtakingly beautiful. I got to experience a true Japanese hot spring and it was amazing. I also had the opportunity to go to some really awesome museums like the Hakone open air museum and the Venetian glass museum. I actually might just do an entire post on my trip to Hakone and add bunches of pictures. Anywho, it's a wonderful place to visit just 2 hours
Away from Tokyo.  

Alright, here is my probably very shitty first blog post... I hope to get the hang of it soon. I plan on posting a ton of pictures from my past trips and some good travel advice. I had to learn the hard way on some things. But to whoever reads this, if you have any questions feel free to ask! Thanks for reading! (: