Sumimasen & Arigato

The day that felt quite far came quite fast. It was almost our time to bid farewell. Our day didn’t start with our usual breakfast, instead it started with a round of clearing food we bought for later, the later was now as we had to hand the apartment back to the owner for them to prepare and welcome the next group of guests. We scrambled to get everything finished up, cleaned and double checked to ensure we didn’t leave anything behind. In spite of it all, we managed to get ourselves out the door by 10.30am. Today there weren't any goals or plans as today was the day we would make our ways and travel back. However we did have a few things we wanted to do, to see or to buy before we left, our last bit of adventure.

We split into smaller groups as we had different goals for the day and went our way. For my group our first stop was Tokyo Sky Tree, to surrender to capitalism. We expected to stay here for about an hour or so, we couldn’t be more wrong. We ended up spending half a day here, supporting the Japanese economy. We grabbed a late lunch, shopped around for some last minute souvenirs and headed back to our apartment to pack our luggages and depart for the airport. We were scheduled for a midnight flight but left earlier as we were not familiar with the train system and language and didn’t want to risk missing our flight back.

We dragged our luggages past that familiar street one last time to our beloved Minowa Station. We took the subway, transitted a few times and made some mistakes but in the end made it to Haneda Airport. We checked in and went past immigration and were on our way home. As I sat along my peers waiting to board our flight, I stopped and had a good feel of the moment as this isn’t something that comes by often, it isn’t something that money can buy. It is however something I would cherish for many years to come, it is also something I will always remember, the streets I’ve walked with them, meals we’ve shared, debates on colours, learning simple Japanese and abusing the two or three phrases we know

Sumimasen & Arigato

* Sumimasen translates to excuse me or pardon me ; Arigato translates to thank you

Which is your go-to phrase?

• Sumimasen
• Arigato