Trip To Hakone and Kawaguchiko

Kawaguchiko

In April, Muis san who had a business trip to Tokyo asked me whether I would join to go to Kawaguchiko or not. He told me that he would go to there with Takahashi san. He has a good relationship with Takahasi san. Takahasi san was his neighbour when he took study in Japan long time ago. He still kept their connection until now. Sound's great!. Takahasi san was a warm person.

Eventually, I agreed to join his trip. We had a meeting point at Motosumiyoshi station at 4 pm. He brought his wife too. After say hello, we got out from the station and went to Takahashi san home. Takahasi san home was about 10 minutes from the station on foot. Once we arrived in front of Takahasi san home, Muis san knocked the door. Takahasi san welcomed us and we were introduced by Muis san.

Couple Swans

After preparing his car, Takahashi san letted us to get in. He drove his car by himself. We left Motosumiyoshi at 6 PM. We passed through a highway. The highway was not crowded. Along the road we saw a beautiful sunset with Fuji mountain as its background. Very beautiful! After almost two hours, we arrived at Takahashi san house at Hakone. His house was almost in the top of the mountain and located in very exclusive place. There were only three houses built in that location, one of them was Takahashi san house. Our car climbed up in order to reach that place. His house has been built 25 years ago. However, it still looked very well maintained. When we arrived, Michiko san had already prepared many things inside of the house. She opened the door and welcomed us. After short introduction, we put our luggage into a room.

Takahashi-san

The interior inside of the house was very nice decorated and designed by using mostly wood. It had two big bed rooms, living room connected with kitchen, and two bath rooms. Because there was a highland, temperature was cold. Michiko san turned on the heater. We also prepared our futon for sleeping at night. After finishing the preparation, we got together in the living room for dinner. While Michiko san was serving a coup of salad, Takahashi san served and cooked okonomiyaki. He cooked very well and delicious as well. During serving and cooking, we talked about many things. Michiko san shared her experience about many souvenirs that she had from her friend from Indonesia. She still kept in touch with them. One of his favorite was chili sauce. She liked it very much and stored in his refrigerator many bottle of chili sauce made in Indonesia. We went to bed at around 11.30 PM. 

We woke up in the morning and took beautiful scenery from the window. Even though there was a bit cold, we walked out around the house to get fresh air. Takahashi san told us that we had to have ready at 8 AM.

First place before we reached Kawaguchiko, we visited a restaurant to take breakfast. We took breakfast about 30 minutes at the restaurant. We continued our trip to Kawaguchiko. There was sunny day. We took many pictures together with Takahashi san. Kawaguchiko is a big lake. We drove our car to go around the lake. Often, we stopped at some place just for seeing the view and documenting it with our camera. We stayed over there for about 2 hours. Then we went back to the house at Hakone.  Before we arrived to the house, we stopped by a restaurant for taking lunch. Once we reached the house, we took our luggage and got ready for going back to Motosumiyoshi. 

According to the news at that time, the highway was traffic jam. Hence, Takahashi san decided to pass through a regular way. Its consequence was we would have 1 hour more to get Motosumiyoshi. However, the benefit was that we could see many sakura flowers along the road we passed through.

Hakone is the south of Tokyo (a blue mark).

At 7 PM, we arrived at Motosumiyoshi. We were very thankful to Takahashi san for his service and his hospitality. We very appreciated him and his family. Thank to them very much! Then, I, Muis san and his wife went to Motosumiyoshi station and farewelled. He and his wife went to Kanda station where his hotel was nearby. And I got back to the home.

In April and May, I did have any special moment for my study. It went as usual. As I mentioned at the presentation last graduation ceremony that my research was slightly changed. It was moved from Wireless Sensor Networks to Wireless Networks.  I put myself particularly in a topic of multiple input multiple output (MIMO) channels. According to this research,  my Sensei offered me that I could stay here three years longer for doing his new project. It was a nice offer, but I had to go back to my university as soon as possible after graduation. At that time, I did not reject but I did not accepted too of his offer. I just gave him a smile.

On 28 May, my Visa will be expired. Hence, I went to immigration office three weeks before expiration. I prepared many documents required for my extension. I had to pay 4000 yen for applying this thing. I submitted these documents to the immigration office located close to Shin Yurigaoka station. In the fourth week of April, I received a notification explained that my extension was accepted. I had to go there once again to take a new alien card.