Visa Issues
This week I got some not so great news. I will not get my investor visa before my 90-day tourist visa runs out on the 8th of October. Before we started the application process my lawyer mentioned to me the visa office was busier than usual and instead of ~4 weeks it'd probably take 6-7, but he said it would definitely be done before the 8th of October. However, it seems like they've been even busier than expected and it's still not here.
Considering I've already entered Japan 3 times this year, going to another country for 24 hours and coming back is not an option, because my lawyer thinks the chance of denial at the border is extremely high. So this leaves me with not much of a choice besides taking a vacation. My visa application was submitted on the 27th of July and they're currently working on an application that was submitted on the 2nd of July, so my lawyer believes I will get my visa somewhere in the middle of October. Fingers crossed.
I was already planning on going to Macau at the end of October, because of the Macau Poker series. This just means I have to leave Japan 1-2 weeks earlier than planned. I've decided to go visit my friend Vanessa in Singapore whom I haven't seen for about a year since she left London to go back to Singapore. Spending time with her and playing poker in Macau should be quite a lot of fun, but nonetheless I would've prefered staying in Japan. I have to miss an amazing lunch that was planned for the 17th at one of Tokyo's top restaurants. I also won't be able to see any of my friends and work on one of my projects is going to be quite hard, so I have to rely on my partner to take care of a lot of stuff for me. I guess I'll just have to work twice as hard when I get back to make up for it!
Overall unfortunate, but a good sign that I love life in Tokyo so much that I'm unhappy about a forced 3 week vacation and it should be a fun life experience seeing Singapore and playing poker in Macau!
Fully Furnished Apartment
As promised here's a video of my fully furnished apartment and my Home Cinema in action.
Fitness
Workout Program
Fitness has been going pretty well for the past ~5 weeks. I've gotten back on the 6days/wk program I used to do in London. It's really intense, but since I've done it twice already it's not that bad for me. The workouts usually take 100-120 minutes. I do abs every day, and the rest of my body parts I train 3x/week. Right now Days 1, 3 and 5 are Legs, Back and Biceps and Days 2, 4 and 6 are Chest, Shoulders, Triceps and also Cardio.
I definitely did not design this program myself. I'm pretty knowledgeable as far as fitness goes, but program design should be handled by a professional. I got mine from workoutbox.com. A fairly cheap online fitness website run by an entrepreneur/ex-personal trainer friend who really knows his stuff.
I'm already looking forward to Week 10, which is the start of the Breathing Squat phase. Basically for 8 weeks I'll be doing Breathing Squats which means only 1 set of Squats a day, but it is 1 set of 20 repitions with a weight you could normally only lift about 6-8 times. By breathing 3 times inbetween repitions, your legs sort of recover a little bit and you're able to perform more repititions. It's the single hardest physical thing I've ever done and I love it! Can't wait for weeks 10-17!
Diet
My diet too is courtesy of workoutbox.com. Based on a ton of information I entered, they estimate what my body needs on a day-to-day basis. Right now that means ~3300-3500kcal on workout days and about ~2300-2500 on non-workout days. About 20% of that comes from fat and I split the rest about 50/50 between carbs and protein, although I eat slightly more carbs than proteins.
In the morning before going to the gym I usually drink some milk, orange juice, iced green tea and multi-vitamins. After the gym I drink my big smoothie I posted about in my last blog. The rest of my meals are mostly brown rice and some sort of meat/fish with the ocassional smoothie, protein shake and salad.
Results
The results so far are not bad at all. I went up from about 70.5KG to 75KG in 5 weeks. I probably gained a little bit of fat too, but I definitely look much better and to be honest, I haven't been eating quite as well as I used to in London. I've eaten out more with friends, which is part of Japanese culture and lots of fun aswell.
Performance wise, I've gotten a lot stronger, but more importantly my cardio's finally getting up to a good level again. Over the summer I had a small issue with my knee and thus I didn't do any cardio for about 2-3 months. I had to start back at a pretty low level cardio wise, but I've improved tremendously over the past 5 weeks. I think I could run a 12 minute 2 mile again like I did about a year ago! I got pretty close to it the other day and I was only really doing H.I.T.(High Intensity Interval Training) nor was I that tired towards the end.
My best running performance to date was a 19:19 5KM christmas last year. I weighed only 70.5KG though and my cardio was in sick shape. I don't think I'm quite at that level yet, but I may try to do something cool again at some point. A sub 45:00 10KM could be cool, but that may be too easy. I'll think of something eventually.
Singapore & Macau
My next update will probably be from Singapore or Macau with a good old trip report and plenty pictures! If you have any tips/suggestions on things to do in either cities or if you're going to be there too in October, definitely hit me up!
Also feel free to post any fitness and non-fitness related questions in the comments box below!
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