Sayonara Sasebo!
- Katie Johnson
- May 31, 2023
- 11 min read
We are in the short rows! It's officially time to start the final preps for moving to Rota, so here's what the last month (ish) has looked like for the Johnsons:
April 22: Oogama Beach with Friends
After the dogs survived the pack out, we left our empty house for a day at the beach! Even though our beach chairs are in a box somewhere waiting to be shipped to Spain, we were sure to make the most of the two remaining beach towels we have (that double as dog bathing towels) and headed to one of our favorite places: Oogama Beach!
While the pups enjoyed running free along the sandy beach, Bryan and I enjoyed catching up with Nick, Bryan's third roommate, and his girlfriend, Kristin!
Living in an empty house can be quite depressing, so Bryan and I try our best to spend the least amount of time inside as possible! This leads to long daily walks around Hario with our favorite two pups! Hugo and Reynolds clearly love it too- I mean, just look at those faces!
April 29: Hasami's Annual Pottery Festival
April 29 was the start to our favorite Japanese festival: the Hasami Pottery Festival held in Hasamiyakimono Park! We weren't missing opening day....even if the skies opened up and it rained sideways! Which it did.
We did pick up a few small pieces that would fit in my suitcase to complete our Japanese pottery collection though! I also got Kelly a small Japanese serving dish as a housewarming gift as she prepares for her move to Florida to begin her pediatric residency! (Can you tell I'm a proud sis?!)
The days blurred into weeks and those weeks were filled with long walks (accompanied by Truly's and 7/11 chu hai stops), naps on our loaner furniture bed (that we converted into a day bed in the living room), and long, long, long nights on our air mattress.
Then May hit, and it hit quick and hard!
Learning that my Advanced Dependent Travel (ADT) request had been denied for June, Bryan submitted paperwork requesting an ADT for May. They may have denied our first request because "temperatures for flying dogs isn't a good enough reason to depart early," but we were told the May request would be approved because "being an overseas, forward-deployed ship is an approved reason for an Advanced Dependent Travel request." We received an email saying the ADT was being processed on Friday, May 5 and that I was expected to leave by May 17.
May 7: Goodbye Brunch with Darby Staff
So Friday morning, I went straight to Dr. Racek's office and submitted my official paperwork to move up my resignation to May 11. Word got around quickly and before noon, my work friends had planned a going-away Brunch at Harbor View Club for Sunday to wish me well! I truly work with some of the best of the best!
Back Row: Dr. Weatherhead, new EC secretary, Mrs. Jackson-Jones, Mrs. Dee, Mrs. Castro, Mrs. Rosie Settles, Mrs. Woods, Nurse Mary, Dr. Hecox, Mr. and Mrs. Selby
Front Row: Mrs. Christie Miller, Ms. McKean, Me, Mrs. Lelia Chaney
May 8: Goodbye Meal with America Friend Group
Bryan's ship friends (that have turned into family) also wanted to say goodbye, so we grabbed dinner at Syabuyo (しゃぶ葉 北佐世保店) for a final group dinner eating shabu-shabu! The boiling broth and quickly-cooking meats were enjoyed over tons of laughter!
May 9: USS America Wardroom Spouse Goodbye Dinner
In true USS America Wardroom fashion, I wasn't getting away without a Sayonara doll and one final dinner at Hanatsuzumi 花つづみレストラン, better known to all of us as Lisa's Place! It was great getting to see all of my Wardroom Spouse friends one last time before the true chaos of moving began!
Kerri Blazej, Kailee Arzadon, Jaime Doebrick, Me, Megan Ballester, Tomo Von Rembow, Yvonne Jones, April Niefer, Shanan Cutler
It's Time to Sell the Gino
On Monday, May 8 Bryan listed our Mira Gino for sale! As much as we have loved this car, it's not available to ship back to the States for a few more years so we knew we had to pass it along to the next military family. Plus, that lawn mower engine will only work on Japanese roads!
With no hits by Wednesday, I shared the ad to the Spouse Facebook group hoping for more traffic and eyes to see our post! So far, all our friends liked and commented on our post...but no interested buyers...
May 11: Katie's Last Day at Darby Elementary School
Thursday, May 11 came too quickly! Leaving during Teacher Appreciation Week really added a knife to my wounds, as students brought me all kinds of treats, heartfelt cards, and well wishes with my move. Leaving Darby was hard, but looking back on the last few months of my time at Darby reminds me just how lucky I am to have had this experience of being an international librarian!
At this point, our pack out was about a month ago and I have been religiously checking our AirTags to see if our things have moved at all. After a month of seeing our things sitting in Sasebo, I was happy to see that our Unaccompanied Baggage made it to Seattle! Our Household Goods....still sitting in Haiki about 10 minutes from our house.
We are going to just focus on the good. (That should be a mil-spouse motto!)
May 15: Moving out of Hario Housing
After an amazing weekend in Taiwan, Bryan and I landed in Fukuoka, caught a bus back to Sasebo and, as we pulled into our parking spot at home, realized the loaner furniture pickup truck was backing in beside us.
So, like a tornado, we threw all of our things in suitcases as the loaner furniture movers hauled out all the remaining items! Bryan and I crammed everything- including two dogs- into our car! I took off to check in to the Navy Lodge while Bryan stayed behind for the final checkout appointment with the housing office. When we say we crammed in one final international trip, we mean it! Taiwan was the perfect end to our Asia travels (for now) and we were just happy to enjoy one final trip abroad with Meg and Mike! (Even if it did leave us in a little pinch and stressful pack out of our Hario home!)
We no longer live in Hario and are now semi-permanent residents at the Sasebo Navy Lodge! Hugo and Reynolds were wonderful during today's whirlwind pack up, and made themselves at home on the (much more comfortable) beds!
Queen Kebab: クィーン ケバブ
To celebrate surviving the housing checkout process, Bryan and I walked the pups to one of our favorite restaurants in the Ginza, Queen Kebab! These Turkish wraps SLAP and made today's crazy day worth it!
Hugo and Reynolds are just happy to be out exploring the town with us!
May 16: Ikeda Animal Hospital: いけだ動物病院
Tuesday was Hugo's last appointment at Ikeda! You may remember from previous posts, that Hugo has had elevated liver enzyme numbers, and today we had more bloodwork ran. We are happy to report that Hugo's numbers have gone down even more (yay!) and Meg gave us 2 months' worth of medications to keep Hugo going until we can get settled with a new vet in Spain. I also snapped pictures of the shot he's been getting once a week that was described as "placenta" (aka "stem cells!") We are praying Spain has a similar treatment we can get Hugo on to continue our work with getting his liver back to health!
I freaking love Ikeda and their vet staff. They have taken such good care of our babies! Meg, our favorite vet tech/translator, even gave me a huge hug when I left saying she's going to miss seeing Hugo and I every week!
For dinner, we continued our Sasebo favorite foods tour and got delicious pizzas at Sasebo pizza! (Yes, this is the only place in Sasebo to get Pepperoni Pizza!) Wonder what Domino's Pizza serves here? Shrimp, corn and mayo on pizza. No thank you.
With no hits on our car, Bryan reached out to several Japanese Used Car salesmen to get quotes from them. The highest offer we got was $700...so we continued our efforts and continued to share the post in several military Facebook groups. Somehow it worked out because on May 15, after lowering the asking price to $1,500, we got a hit! A new family just moved to Hario and was looking for a commuter vehicle for the husband to get back and forth to work!
Hugo and Reynolds supervised Bryan's salesman pitch during his lunch break on the 17th! It must have worked because Bryan met them at the VRO office and officially sold the car to this family on May 18th! Whew! One big task is done!
May 17: Bingo Instead of Flights
May 17th came and went without any news on my flights. Bryan and I were pretty down about all of this, so we passed the evening with dinner at Harbor View while playing Bingo! We were off by one number TWICE that evening...leading us to doubt our luck. Hopefully, all our bad luck is gone with this evening and we get flights soon...
May 19: Finally Assigned Flights
Around 3:45 pm on Friday the 19th, I got the email we have been waiting for: our flight itinerary! Immediately Bryan and I both pick up the phone and begin calling airlines to confirm pet availability. By that evening, we confirmed pet spots for both dogs on all 5 flights. Bryan sat on hold with SATO for two hours trying to get them to pay for the tickets....but no go. We have to wait until Monday when the office opens back up. THEN we should be good.
While Bryan sat on hold, I went over to pick up dinner from (Bryan's request) Taco Bell. We both forgot that the USS Nimitz carrier was visiting from San Diego and the lines were absolutely crazy! So between my hour-long wait for fast food dinner and Bryan's two hours on the line with SATO, we were both over this day. Our nerves were fried.
May 20-21: Final Weekend in Sasebo
With flights in hand, we both knew this was our final weekend in Sasebo. With all offices closed for the weekend, we spent our time hanging out with Meg and Stego, eating at our favorite ramen shop, Doppo, one final time, and loving on these puppies! While they may not know of the stress ahead, we were sure to shower them with love knowing Bryan only had a few days left before leaving them for his final deployment!
We were also lucky enough to see a Japanese submarine leaving port during one of our potty breaks! Look over Bryan's right shoulder and you can see it sticking up out of the water!
May 22: Friends and Family Cruise
While Bryan and I spent these last few days holding our breath hoping everything goes well with booking our flights, we did get a break from it all when the USS America hosted a Friends and Family Cruise on Monday, May 22! I was beyond excited to join Bryan aboard his ship while it shifted to a different pier to prepare for deployment. Y'all, I actually go to "ride" Bryan's ship at sea (ok- just in the bay, but give me a little leeway!) It was so cool to see Bryan in action! I also didn't complain with one final day seeing all my spouse-friends who joined their husbands as well!
For just a few hours, we got to forget about all the craziness of moving and just enjoy some final time together. After enjoying a lunch of chicken tenders and french fries from the wardroom galley, we left the ship around 1 pm to head back to base to finish up our final preparations for the move.
May 23: Dog Day
Bryan's last day before going underway was spent running all over Kyushu, Japan's southern-most island, helping me with final preparations for the dogs to fly out! Our morning began with a 10 am appointment at the Hario Vet Office, where we received the dogs' Japanese Health Certificate for Export, EU Health Certificate for Import, and copies of all their records.
After saying goodbye to our friends at the vet office, we jumped in the car and made one final drive by our old home at 5016F Newport Ave in Hario. Seeing our home one last time was pretty sad- we have made a ton of great memories over the last two years in that second-floor apartment!
Then it was off to the Sasebo Customs Office to get a stamp on some forms. Bryan handled going in and requesting the stamps while I sat in the car with two pups. We had to "fib" and tell Japan customs that the dogs were flying with a pet shipper so they would stamp the final form. We weren't running the risk of needing that final stamp and not having it. Worth the white lie just in case!
Then we were off to Fukuoka Airport to have the dogs inspected prior to our flight. Animal Quarantine Service (AQS) required that the dogs be seen and their paperwork inspected before their flight out of Japan. Not wanting me to do this all on my own, Bryan and I planned to make this 4-hour round-trip drive to FUK together. I am beyond blessed with a good man.
When we got back to the hotel, we learned that our flight had been purchased so we split off again to begin calling all the airlines to reconfirm our pet spots.
All Nippon Airways- good.
Japan Airlines- good.
American Airlines- good.
Iberia Airlines...
Iberia notified us that they could not book our dogs on our assigned flights because the layover between Madrid and Jerez was over 4 hours long. They did NOT tell us that when we called a few days ago to confirm the pet spot availability. Set in the panic.
So the final night Bryan and I had together before he deploys wasn't filled with sorrowful goodbyes. It was filled with me having a full-blown meltdown that I may not be leaving with my dogs and a freakout session because I had no backup plan. Poor Bryan dealt with my manic behavior while mentally preparing to leave us for his final deployment with the USS America. (Have I mentioned I married a great man?)
May 24: Bryan Deploys
The morning of Wednesday, May 24 wasn't a pretty one. Between all the hectic scrambling of our departure, Bryan and I didn't really have time to process the fact that he was also departing for another sea duty. Sending him off with his sea bag and pillow was a hard thing to do- especially knowing I was on my own from this point forward.
After getting myself together and dawning my sunglasses (to cover up the puffy under eyes), I took the dogs on a long walk around main base. I cried some more when we got over to Bryan's pier and saw the giant empty spot where the USS America docked.
It's real. This is happening. And I have to do it all from here without my better half.
(Who said military life was glamorous!?! We tell you like it is!)
A few hours after Bryan was gone, we continued the chaos of figuring out how to get our pups to Spain via emails and DSN calls to the hotel room. At this point our flights out of Japan and to the US for layovers were good. It was just the final leg of the journey into Spain we were struggling with.
Bryan spent his time on the phone with SATO seeing about switching the final two flights, while I went back-and-forth with American Airlines on their in-app chat feature. Many arduous hours later, I ended up walking to the Sasebo NAVPTO & SATO offices and sitting outside until someone helped us. To say SATO was unhelpful was an understatement.
As one final hail Mary, Bryan called American Airlines and asked what it would cost to change the flight out of pocket. We were prepared to book our own flights from Miami to Jerez just to guarantee the correct flights with adequate layover times. At this point, money wasn't a factor- it was now or never to get these babies to Spain. The last email I sent to Bryan told him the flight is listed for $3,200 from Miami to Madrid to Jerez and to "just book it." So he called American Airlines and I (not very patiently or calmly) waited to hear what he found out.
$25. All the crying, fear, anxiety, and chaos with the military. It cost us $25 out of pocket to swap the flights to the earlier fly times with a shorter layover.
Commence the hysterical laughter! I think Bryan thought I had lost it but we did it. We have the correct flights, we have dog spots on every flight and everything is confirmed. We did it. Whew. And just in time for a 5 pm dinner with Meg as my last meal in Japan!
To say it was challenging to get to this point is an understatement. But I went to bed and slept decently knowing that in the morning, my dogs and I were officially PCSing to Spain.
Little did I know this was just the beginning of my heart-wrenching journey to our new home.
Buckle up! It only gets crazier from here!
--Katie
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