Solo Travel Japan (2013) – Stupid Australian Embassy! (Part 4)

Originally Posted: March 8, 2013

Thursday started off with me needing to visit the Australian Embassy to vote (due to not being able to do it when I left). I got up fairly early, I think it was around 8am and headed out on my way. The Australian embassy is really out of the way… In the middle of nowhere. It took around an hour to get there through the train system, which kind of sucked, but I spotted a nice temple along the way so I guess I got a little sight seeing done too. Once I got to the Embassy I was amazed, literally stunned, it looks like the building would of cost millions of dollars to construct, it was freaking unbelievable (this around the time where budget cuts were all the rage). I didn’t take a picture because I wasn’t sure since it’s a government building. The last thing I wanted was to be detained by the guards and/or police, given my string of bad luck.

Walking in I passed all the passport checks and continued through. After walking half aimlessly, due to poor to no signage, I went to a counter I presumed was correct (which it was) just to be informed that they do not host voting for state elections anymore and that I would not be able to vote. Great. I just spent a good chunk of my morning getting here and walking a hell of a long way to find out that I can’t even vote. So I used there PC and sent the electoral commission an email, as per their advice, letting them know I’m not in the country and the embassy won’t allow me to vote. I also ticked off all the boxes to let them know all of my options where exhausted so I won’t be able to vote at all (mail voting had closed too). They were adamant I’d be fined if I didn’t vote, however advertised 24/7 voting booths at all international departure lounges which wasn’t a thing. Regardless, I tried and wanted to just move on with my trip.

Once I had done that I made my way back down to the train station again (a good 15-20 minute walk) and made my way to my next destination… eagerly… Studio Ghibli museum!!!

Once again, like most things I wanted to visit haha, the museum was about a 20-25 minute walk from the train station. I set off on my merry way and took in a few sites to try add some adventure and excitement. It’s amazing how completely different everything is over the other side of the world, you would think there would be some cultural similarities between Australia and Japan but there really is very little.

After what seemed like forever I arrived at my destination with much excitement! Only my bad luck strikes again, they do not sell tickets on site and they only sell a limited amount of tickets per country. Apparently you have to buy them through your respective countries liaison (which are in Sydney and Melbourne). Seriously what the hell is with my luck. I did research this too, so maybe they changed the way they sell tickets or maybe I read bad advice. Since this was one of my major reasons for going to Japan, I was more than a little saddened by the realisation I was standing outside a building I couldn’t go in, and would take me years (a decade) to return. So tail between my legs I made the 25 minute walk back to the train station and went to my next planned destination, ‘Oh Great and Powerful’ giant Gundam.

At this point I was fairly sweaty from all the walking and tired too so I was not in a great mood at all. I had to spent hours on the train to reach my destinations so far (which was nice for the most part, especially crossing the bay in Tokyo) but I thought SURELY… Surely my luck can’t go triple bad in one day.

I arrived at Daiba train station, made my way out to the walkways that lead to 90% of the shopping malls around, and went straight to the one with the Gundam out the front. It was as beautiful as I imagined! So big, so epic, so graceful! Something went right.

After I gazed upon its beauty I made my way inside the shops and had a look around, everything looked pretty nice and very new. I decided to have a look at this one store and check out some of the prices and, oh crap, I almost had a heart attack. A jacket… Nothing fancy, no designs or anything jut a normal jacket… ¥60,000. *bangs head against wall* so much for Tokyo being cheap in any way.

Needless to say I just left and walked around window shopping for a while since I never planned to spend $600 AUD on a jacket on my vacation. I got a few pics of the city at night and it was all nice and pretty, but again, making me a little home sick and a little lonely. It once again felt like it was something you would do with someone. After this I spent the next hour on a train and 15 minutes walking back to the hostel, didn’t really feel that great after my day so I just crashed and hoped the next day would bring more delight.

At this point solo traveling was opening my eyes to my reliance on other people to feel comfortable. I was working through it and slowly getting accustomed to doing things without help/assistance of others but it was very different to any experience I’d had up to this point in my life. Definitely a defining moment, something I think everyone should experience and push their boundaries at least once in their life.

That’s all for now, I’ll see you next update.