A private journal that stays yours

Set an alarm for 4:20 and almost talked myself out of it. So glad I didn't.

The lake was perfectly still. Fuji doubled in the water like the mountain couldn't quite believe itself either. A few other people stood along the shore, all of us quiet, all of us holding our breath a little.

I've seen this view on a hundred postcards. None of them tell you how cold the air is, or how the pink creeps down the snow so slowly you don't notice until it's gone. Best morning of the trip, easily.

Rented a bike and got pleasantly lost in the back lanes below the mountain. Out past the guesthouses the town just turns into rice paddies, the young green shoots standing in their mirrors of water.

There was a hand-painted sign for a cottage, a red vending machine humming away, Fuji sitting behind all of it like it was the most ordinary thing in the world. I love these in-between places more than the famous ones. Nobody here, just the frogs and the powerlines and me.

Walked the river at dusk when the whole sky went lilac. The water turns the same color and you lose track of where one ends.

A grey heron stood dead still in the shallows, waiting on something only it could see. Couples sat spaced evenly along the bank the way they always are here, an unspoken arithmetic. Kyoto does evening better than anywhere I've been.

Spent the afternoon doing nothing in particular in the old streets, just watching the neighborhood go about itself.

An older man swept past on a bicycle, fast enough to blur. The noticeboard of shop names behind him a wall of kanji I couldn't read. I like the days with no plan best, you stop chasing sights and start noticing people. He was gone before I could even nod.

It hit 30 degrees by noon and the city answered the only way it knows how: a cold drink every hundred meters, glowing in a machine.

Stood in front of one outside a shuttered tobacco shop, agonizing over melon soda versus cold barley tea like it was a real decision. Someone walked past mid-sip. Got the barley tea. Correct call. Osaka in early summer is loud and bright and a little sticky and I'm completely charmed by it.

Caught this on the way back from lunch and it made my whole day.

A taxi driver, fully reclined in the back seat, white towel laid over his eyes, gloves still on, having the most committed afternoon nap I have ever witnessed. The car immaculate, the little doily headrests, the GO sticker on the glass. Everyone here seems to have mastered the art of resting properly. I'm taking notes.

Dropped the bags, splashed water on my face, and went straight back out, too wired to sleep, too curious to waste the night.

The city is exactly as much as everyone says. Trains gliding in on the minute, a hundred tiny restaurants stacked up each staircase, the hum of it all somehow orderly. Ate standing ramen at a counter for six, pointed at a photo, got something perfect. Jet-lagged and grinning on a corner at midnight. Three weeks of this ahead.

Packed light, finally. One bag, good shoes, the little camera. Everything else I can buy or do without.

I've wanted this trip for years and somehow it's tomorrow. That funny pre-departure feeling, half nerves, half the kind of lightness you only get when the to-do list is suddenly behind you. Whatever the next few weeks are, I want to actually be in them. Writing it down so I remember to look up from the screen.

Followed my nose and a wall of neon into the market and just ate my way down the lane. Pepper buns straight from the clay oven, mango shaved ice the size of my head, a sausage-in-sausage thing I still don't fully understand and would order again immediately.

Scooters everywhere, steam everywhere, aunties running stalls they've clearly run for decades. Taipei is so easy to like. Sweaty, full, happy.

Rained all day so I gave in to it, ducked between cafes in the old hanok lanes, nursing one coffee at a time, watching the alleys shine.

Ended up in a tiny second-floor place with one perfect window seat, journaling while the city dripped. There's a particular comfort to being warm and dry and far from home, watching weather you have no obligation to fix. Galbi for dinner, fingers smelling of charcoal the whole walk back.

The heat here is a physical opponent. By ten in the morning I'd surrendered, found a plastic stool in the shade and let a bowl of boat noodles and an iced coffee put me back together.

Loud, chaotic, alive in a way that's hard to describe. Tuk-tuks, temple gold, a cat asleep on a motorbike seat. I'm worn out and a little overwhelmed and still wouldn't trade the day. Early night, ceiling fan on full.

First stop of the whole trip. Up early with the jet lag, which turned out to be a gift. The Old Quarter at six is a different city, all sweeping brooms and breakfast steam before the motorbikes take over.

Sat on a tiny stool with a bowl of phở and a glass of fierce iced coffee and watched the street wake up around me. This is the part of travel I love most: the first ordinary morning somewhere new, before you know anything, when it's all still in front of you.