Family trip to Disneyland

2025/09/18

What is your favorite family leisure activity/occupation? What do you find good or valuable about it? How different is it from your family members’ other daily occupations?

My friend Kiriko told a story about her family trip to Tokyo Disneyland. Kiriko, her husband and two daughters have made a trip to Tokyo Disneyland once a year for more than ten years. The trip is the biggest event of the year for the family. They spend half of the year making the plan for the trip to Disneyland, organizing their job and school schedules, house chores, and daily routines, so all of them could go to Tokyo Disneyland together on time. Why are they so excited about this trip? Why do they work so hard to go on these trips to Disneyland together?

Kiriko is a woman in her 40s who teaches in a university. She lives with her husband, who is a health professional, and their two daughters, who are a middle school student and an elementary school student.

The family loves traveling and go on day-long trips twice a year. Their favorite destination is Tokyo Disneyland and they have gone there every year for more than ten years. They start discussing the next trip half a year ahead, organize their job schedules, school activities and house chores to be able to carry out the trip as they plan. Before the trip, they pore over Disneyland’s guidebooks, chat frequently about their memories of previous trips there, look at pictures and watch videos taken in Disneyland during their previous trips. Kiriko also likes watching her daughters enjoy packing Disneyland’s goods like headbands with Micky Mouse ears.

At midnight on the day of the trip, Kiriko wakes up her kids to leave. Her husband drives the car and the kids sleep in the back seats for 5 hours till they arrive at the destination.

On the way to the Disneyland, Kiriko enjoys chatting with her husband. It’s quite rare for them to be alone to chat in their hectic days and they make use of this time together. Arriving at the Disneyland, all the family are awake and moved, watching the beautiful sunrise view. 

After entering Disneyland as it opens, all the family are excited about what is going to happen. The kids can go wild. They can enjoy any rides they want! There are no rules for a healthy balanced lunch and dinner. They can eat and drink whatever they like, as much as they want. For example, they can choose to eat only sweets for their lunch.  Kiriko doesn’t worry if her kids don’t behave well there. All of her family, Kiriko, her husband and the kids strive to have fun as much as they can until they get exhausted in the evening, after walking around all day long, watching the parades, enjoying rides, checking out Disney goods and eating and drinking their favorite things. Finally, they move to a hotel near Disneyland to have good sleep and head back home the next day.

Getting back home, the kids still talk repeatedly about what happened in the most recent trip to Disneyland. They also want to look at the pictures and watch the videos taken on the trips. 

Usually, the kids seem to only talk to Kiriko to get help when they have problems, but now, they like sharing with her what happened to them during the trip to the Disneyland.

For the first time, Kiriko’s family doesn’t plan for a trip to Disneyland in 2025 because her elder daughter is too busy preparing for her high school entrance examination. But, instead, the family talks about their trip to Disneyland in 2026, while continuing to look at the pictures and watch the videos from their previous trips to Disneyland. All the family look forward to and are excited, imagining the fun of their next trip.