34 days in Japan

By Matthew Smith — 03 Sep 2025

Welcome. I'm traveling through Japan for 34 days. It's my third trip, and I'm pushing into new territory geographically and personally. Let's get started.

I landed in Tokyo around 4:30pm on Friday, August 29. My body was barely upright after the 14 hour flight from Greenville. I dragged my bags onto the metro, immediately took the wrong train, and had to recalibrate. I blame the flight 🤣. Finally stepping out of the station for the few blocks to my hostel, Tokyo air greeted me like I was walking into actual ramen. Instant soup.

By the time I checked into CITAN Hostel in Nihonbashi, I was running on fumes but forcing myself to stay awake. As any good nerd would do, I created a timeline using AI for how to dominate my body and avoid jet-lag. It worked like magic. Too tired for anything fancy, I got some onigiri (rice balls) for dinner from the konbini (convenience store — which are generally better than many US restaurants). I walked back to my room, kicked on the AC, sat back in bed and enjoyed thinking about what might come tomorrow. Japan was seeping back into my system.

Here’s a thing I’m noticing: I don’t have to make a single decision for anyone but myself for the next 24 days. That’s new. At home, most choices are a negotiation—family, colleagues, schedules, moods. But here? I can do whatever I want, whenever I want, however I want. Even though I'm a veritable preference engine (as anyone who knows me can attest), it's very rare that I actually practice making a decision, rather than editing on one. The muscle is weak. Freedom feels a little like vertigo. This is going to be interesting.

Meeting Brett & Omotesandō

Saturday morning, I took the metro to Omotesandō to meet Brett. We’d only met online until now. In person, Brett looks like a casual triathlete, dawning his cycling cap with brim rolled up, and a sporting a tank top like someone who's lived in Japan for 24 years (which he has). But you can still feel the pacific northwest neo-hippy, dumpster diving liberal oozing out of him. Beard, a few constellations of tattoos, and a backstory about nudist parents, one of whom I think he said was a Unitarian minister. It fits.

We wandered Omotesandō, Harajuku, and Yoyogi Park. Hopped between cafés: Switch Coffee (cozy, tiny, modern), and Mameya Coffee (formal, experimental, detailed), both delightful. Switch even roasted decaf; very little decaf in Japan (yet 😉). Each with its own texture, its own version of ritual.

Brett and I talked like we'd known each other for years. AI, religions and the absence of them, politics in America (and how disorienting it is right now), and what it was like to be part of the first wave building the modern internet in the early 2000s. Back then you had to be a generalist, figuring out HTML, CSS, and javascript on your own, duct-taping sites together, and using FTP to load it up. We didn’t invent the web (that was Al Gore, remember), but we were there when it started turning into the thing we all move around in now.

It was one of those conversations that’s both energizing and grounding. Finally meeting a friend in real life who already felt known. Brett's married to Maki, raising their daughter Isla. Watching him navigate Tokyo like it was second nature reminded me how long I’ve been just dipping my toes here. He embodies what I wonder about — living in Japan.

Yoyogi Park

Brett took me through one of Tokyo's biggest parks, Yoyogi. Among the joggers and couples, we passed something new to me in Tokyo, a few homeless encampments. These were very Japanese, in that even the homeless seem to have a bit of order in mind. These weren’t flimsy tents, they looked like crafted spaces. One in particular had a curved frame, maybe tent poles bent into shape, scalloped like a seashell. Inside were clothes hanging neatly. Outside, potted plants, a bicycle, and a smoking spiral of insect-repelling incense. It was five feet tall at the highest point, barely enough to crouch inside, but it felt cozy. Intentional.

I felt myself slip into the usual questions. Mental health, poverty, stability. Brett proposed that maybe this was chosen. What if it’s freedom? No screens, no cultural expectations, no optimization treadmill. Just a hut in a park, a bike, some incense, and air.

My time with Brett was unique and special. I walked away buzzing. Curious, unsettled, full of imagination and possibility.

Kuumba incense shop

Later that day I found Kuumba Incense Shop. No photos allowed, which felt on brand. They had more incense than anywhere I've ever seen, they kept huge leather bound journals of it like scrapbooks at the back of the store. When my own Japanese was insufficient, the shopkeeper and I laughed our way through Google Translate — which is abysmal. At one point he suggested a fabric spray, which cracked me up because I was drenched in sweat, but I think it's just because it was a new product they were trying to move. I am bringing home a bunch of new scents. Incense and I get along very well.

Outside, I met Jay, another employee. His dad lives in San Francisco. We swapped stories about tattoos and music, exchanged Instagrams. Nothing earth-shattering, just one of those small cracks of connection that opens up your day. Hey Jay. You're a badass dude. Hope we can reconnect again sometime.

Sunday! Family day with Brett & Co.

Brett and Mika invited me to join them for a day out of the city in the river. I jumped at the opportunity given the heat and a chance to spend more time getting to know my new buddy and his family. When we arrived the river was quite dry from low rainfall, but just enough to dip our legs in while Isla (much smaller at 4 years old) splashed and played like a dream. Her energy is uniquely refreshing. I want to be Isla when I grow up.

Mika told stories about growing up on an island with a single stoplight, and I wanted Brett be at home in both languages, both worlds. It was good to just sit inside the rhythm of their family including sitting for lunch and donuts afterward. A different window into Japan than I could find alone for sure.

I wonder if this trip will be a lot about noticing. Ribbed light poles that maybe exist to keep stickers from sticking. Old metal shacks tucked behind alleys. Is that storage or a home? Faded signage from the 1900s that looks like it's got a story to tell. Every detail is a question mark.

This is my third time in Japan. It's interesting to me to inquire how much of what I love here is simply novelty, and how much is truly something unique to Japan. I chase the pleasure of curiosity. But why does Japan wake me up in a way that no other place ever has? Why does it pull me more than anywhere else I’ve traveled?

Being married to a Japanese woman, I have a first row view into Japan’s beauty and the prices that are paid for it. The adaptations that make a culture what it is. I feel deeply drawn to know Japan like a person, a complex amalgamation of stories, beauties and horrors, cultivated from actions and reactions.

Taking photos

Shinjuku in the afternoon was pretty brutal, but there’s something exhilarating about being forced into the extremes. I'm carrying a Fuji XT50. Fun new lightweight machine. I"m trying to take more chances with what I shoot. Being more experimental. Looking for ways to grow my hobby. A hobby I've chosen not to pollute with monetization. Trying out a neutral density filter, slow shutter speeds, quarter-second smears of people moving under kanji billboards. It felt like college again, when I first learned photography and everything was alive and possible. Somewhere along the way, I got too busy building businesses to play like that. This trip is giving me the margin to see again.

That said, I'm noticing I'm kind of tyrant with myself. Street photography is hard. Safe photos, I can do. Motion, fleeting expressions, moments that vanish? It's humbling to try to capture this. I want to be excellent at this now, and when I’m not, disappointment kicks in. Today I had to keep telling myself: this is supposed to be fun. Play. Fail. Fuck it up. That’s the work. See what happens.

Japan and phones

On the train, nearly every young and middle-aged person stares into a phone. Most of the older riders don’t. They just sit, gazing out. I want to meet their eyes, start a conversation, talk about their lives. I've been studying Japanese now for 18 months, and it's nowhere near the level to be able to have those conversations and I'm not sure that any Japanese man or woman would ever want to have that with me — they're notoriously private, even with one another.

Today, at Tsukiji Market I asked an older man smoking a cigarette, Shashin o totte mo ii desu ka? (May I take your photo?). He nodded, I snapped the shot, bowed in thanks. Small, fleeting, human. That's about all you can ask for really. I've got what it takes for that. Arigato gozaimashita (Thank you for that), and I bowed.

Three days in, Japan is a swirl of dizzying freedom, awakened curiosity, and stretching discomfort. I’m awkwardly practicing choice like a toddler in a wide open field. I’m bumping into my perfectionism. I’m sweating through multiple shirts per day. I'm talking to strangers with the best language skills I have. Nihongo wa jozu ja arimasen (my Japanese is not good), and they often reply: Nihongo ga jōzu desu ne! (Oh no, it's very good!), shooting photos, seeing in new ways, buying incense I don’t need (I do need it!). And it all feels right. Like home.

I asked myself the other day what I would want my 70yr old self to remember about this trip. I'm still thinking through that, but I think he’ll be grateful I chose this. That I took the time to break free for a moment from the traps of work and hustle and urgency. I think he'll remember the oddity of the ribbed light poles, and asking strangers for photos. I want to look back and think of this as a kind of turning point, where I began to be more at ease with myself, more permission to be curious and clumsy in play.

More soon.

Thx for reading. I'm glad you're here. Reply with questions if you have any!

Here's a link to the photo album I'll be updating along the way.