Oysters, saké and Japan

What do you do when you miss the last bullet train back to your hotel 3 hours away? Food loving travel enthusiast Rakhi (26), shared what she did.

Instagram: @rakhi_gohil

Oysters abroad

I have ate a lot of food! But there was one experience I didn’t enjoy.

So, I have never tried oysters before and me and my boyfriend walked past a little stall when we were in Japan, which was literally just a table. They were serving oysters with saké. We were like ‘f*ck it… Let’s try it!’

At this stall, this old random Japanese man just started talking to us and said, ‘you look interesting.’ And we were just like, ‘thank you!’ Then he said, ‘you are going to enjoy these oysters.’ So I was like okay cool, we’ve got some good feedback from this random Japanese man who is old as well, so he must be knowledgeable.

Anyway, I basically ate the oysters and it was so slimy that I was gagging.

It was disgusting!

I managed to swallow it and then downed the saké. I was like I am never ever doing that again. My boyfriend recorded the whole thing and was just laughing at me.

Tokyo ‘street carting’

I visited South Korea and Japan in the same trip but spent most of my time in Japan which was my favourite because it was so different to any place I had experienced before. It was like you are in a different world. We started off in the South of Japan, which was quiet and travelled through, Kyoto, Hiroshima, Osaka and Kobe before reaching Tokyo.

I remember go carting in the streets of Tokyo with my boyfriend and a group of other random tourists, dressed up as Mario Kart characters, which was awesome. My hands were freezing but you’ve just got to embrace it even though you’re in pain. The cool thing was you get to find out what the other tourists have done during their trips.

It was such a fun experience overall, especially for me because I haven’t driven in so long.

Comic Con & bullet trains

We were staying in Shin Osaka for 1 night but my boyfriend wanted to go to Comic Con which was in Tokyo. So we had to get the bullet train which took 3 hours and it was pouring down with rain that day.

When we got there, we got to see loads of people dressed up which was quite cool and we got to see a few celebrities like Jude Law, Mark Ruffalo and an actor from the Vampire Diaries, who’s name I can’t remember.

It was quite fun even though I am not the type of person to go to these types of events but because my boyfriend wanted to go, I just went basically.

We got side-tracked listening to Mark Ruffalo and stayed to the very end even though we didn’t plan to. Then the whole of Comic Con went to the train station and there was only one train left at 9PM. We missed that train by 2 minutes. But as Japan is all about being on time, no one had any sympathy for us and told us the next train is a 6AM.

KFC & darts

So we were stranded in Tokyo till 6AM basically and it was chucking it down with rain. My Boyfriend and I were like ‘sh*t what do we do now?’ I was automatically annoyed because I didn’t even want to go to Comic Con in the first place.

We thought we would try to find a hotel but everywhere we went kept rejecting us because we didn’t speak Japanese. This made the situation even more annoying. Then we ended up in KFC until it closed at 2AM.

Luckily, next door to KFC there was this darts bar which was open till 5:30AM. So we played darts and drank quite a bit until it closed, then headed to the train station for our 6AM train. When we got on, we slept for the whole journey back and slept some more when we got back to our hotel. So we wasted a day basically.

When it’s happening you are really annoyed but when you think about it, it was quite funny.

Airport exercise

We nearly missed our flight from Japan to the UK just because we were being lazy. I didn’t want to leave to be fair and was hoping that we would miss our flight but I know that wouldn’t have been a good thing. My boyfriend was like ‘we need to get back. I have got work next week.’ I didn’t need to get back because I quit my job.

We were literally sprinting through the airport and got to our flight about 10 minutes before the gate closed. That was definitely the most exercise I have ever done on holiday.

Embracing culture

I am the type of person that when I go to different countries, I don’t have any expectations. I always travel with an open mind. I feel like if you have expectations, you are just not going to embrace the culture fully and you are going to compare it to where you live.

Personally, I really appreciate experiencing different lifestyles and meeting local people.

Bucket list

So the destinations top of my travel list are Bali, Malaysia and Singapore. I actually have a cousin in Singapore who I want to go and visit. Basically, I want to visit the whole of Asia.

Travel chance

If you get the chance to explore anywhere in the world, then take it! You can learn a lot from different places and different people. I think it also makes you appreciate your own life more as well.

What would you like to be remembered for?

I want to be remembered for being spontaneous and as someone who experienced everything that life had to offer.

Instagram: @rakhi_gohil