As I explained before, we left concluded our 3 months in Saigon with $5,364. Now, we just had to get to Tokyo…here, our paths were to diverge: Rob would fly back to the U.S. for 3 weeks for important personal matters and join Brian and I in Tokyo in January. We knew we’d desperately need our cash from Vietnam to survive for awhile in Tokyo, so we decided that Rob would fund his flight ($1,400) and the money he spent while home ($500) on a credit card, to be paid off with future earnings. So Brian and I had to spend as little as possible relocating to and getting set up in Tokyo. Flights from Saigon to Tokyo were discouragingly expensive, but luckily we found a $510 round-trip flight from Bangkok to Tokyo, so our journey to Japan would take us through Thailand.

Originally, we were going to stay for a solid week in Bangkok to rest, relax, and ready ourselves for another 3-month sprint. However, this plan was quickly thwarted when protests shut down the Bangkok airport and our airline suddenly became unresponsive to our inquiries. For about a week, we thought we’d lose everything we’d spent, make our way to the coast, and start building a raft – effectively postponing Tokyo for Season 3 and making Season 2 the “Rafting the Pacific Ocean to Tokyo.” Luckily, all’s well that ends well: the airport opened up, flights were resumed, and we were able to enjoy just a couple days in Bangkok.

Here are our major expenses:

	2 Flights to Bangkok: $350 Budget airlines have incredible prices; they also have incredible weight restrictions for checked baggage. So we ended up bringing around 35lbs of carry-on luggage each. >
2 Flights to Tokyo: $1020 We had to haul all our luggage through security *again* but luckily most it went into the belly of the plane…
	Taxis: $35 Taxis in Thailand are slightly more expensive than in Vietnam. Also, farting was prohibited…
Housing: $35 4 people, 2 “double” beds, one cramped smelly room – ah, the money-saving hostel experience…
	Food and Drink: $60 The street food was delicious: Pad Thai, mango and sticky rice, chicken skewers, and grasshopper and cockroach. It’s pretty easy to eat well cheaply.
Cafes: $15 We still had to do some work, so we enjoyed some iced coffee, fruit shakes, and cheerfully fast internet.

All in all, getting from Saigon to Tokyo cost us $1,550, leaving us with $3,844 when we landed in Tokyo – not even $4,000 to survive the holiday season, secure jobs, and set up some kind of lifestyle in the second-most-expensive city in the world…