Hokkaido - Tokyo 2007 [Chapter 4]

HAHAH LAST POST. THIS IS SO DRAGGY, BUT ITS DETAILED RIGHT XD

Okay, after Disneyland, we went for free-and-easy again (: The subway in Toyko is soo soo soo much complicated as compared to Singapore. I mean like, the map is just a scrawl of lines?! But it's done a fine job at linking Tokyo together. Thankfully, it was a Sunday and not many people were on the subway.

singapore MRT

TOKYO SUBWAY!

imagine how confused we were! But thankfully we still managed to get our way around. except for one station: Shinkiba, since there were lots of interchanges here and there O__O I think we went one big round around the station before finding our way out.

We set off to Harajuku, that was around 45mins from Shinkiba, nearest station from Disney land. Acording to my father's colleague, there are many cosplaying people at Harajuku ^__^ But perhaps we got there a little too late... So there weren't many people cosplaying after all. But we did see a few though hahaa, nothing too outrageous though.

We ate dinner there; ramen again. One bowl of my ramen is like, 800 yen, which is $10+?? Bahh, but nevermind. Anyway, there were many shops selling cute stuff, like this bag that was shaped like a converse shoe. I wanted xiuxian to get it, but it was too impractical after all -_-





I love this shop! It's Uniqlo, and the shirts they sell are really nice. The packaging is unique too-in a bottle. And the shirt were around... $15 each? My sister and I bought one (: I like the coloured winter jackets that they have!

we went to uniqlo in harajuku cos my mother wanted to get a winter jacket for herself. Not those colourful ones; just a plain long one, that looks rather classy and nice though (: The cashier in Harajuku told us that the next Uniqlo outlet is in Ueno, in a shopping centre called ABAB (abu-abu). Well, we got to Ueno... (for the third time), but we had problems finding the shopping centre :S My mother, being the very sociable person she is, decided to ask for directions! We met these university students that were very helpful; they decided to bring us all the way there! They even gave us a toy for a souvenir! It was this eyeball thingy :) They were quite prety too hhaha, and were trying to converse with us in English. Xiuxian had more common topics with them, since she likes J-pop bands, like them, like Kat-Tun and NEWS, and famous people like Yamapi (they say: kakoyeeeeeeee!~!~) Lol, their reactions are always so amusing.

She managed to get her winter jacket too. And i bought a pencilbox and fabric paint. HURHURHUR. xiuxian bought this... mirror?? For 500+yen?? just because there was DBSK on it. SO lame.

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and finally! IT WAS THE LAST DAY! i hated it, since we had to leave cool japan for good ): We took a picture with BROTHER Kenny, xiuxian's idol.



and then... off we boarded the train.... and made our way to singapore. it took some time for me to get used to Singapore :S since everyone is wearing spectacles and all, when Japan everyone wears contacts lol. The difference between Singapore and Japan are the toilets too.



LOL, I think Japanese Toilets are the most advanced ever. You know, the seat is heated so as to warm the butts of the people since winter is cold LOL. And there are some sprays that can clean your butt too, for I don't know what reason?? HAHAH THE FUNNIEST THING WAS, my cousin went to check it out! She was standing over the seat, and she pressed the button, and THE WATER SPRAYED ON HER FACE! Omg I burst out laughing upon hearing it. Furthermore, they have this sound system installed in certain cubicles too, that will produce the flushing sound. Perhaps to cover up the peeing sound i suppose LOL.

Anyway, taht is about it. Here are some random photos.

police on duty in Ueno in lieu for New Year
LAME TEAM
Calbee prawn wearing high school uniform!

THE END! FINALLY!

btw, I SHOULD HAVE REMEMBERD TO BUY PSP GAMES IN JAPAN! ITS MUCH MUCH CHEAPER THAN IN SINGAPORE. I realised this when I saw the game in this gameshop in Funan. It was $$45, but it was arond 3000yen in japan? about S$40. I bet I can get a better bargain in Japan.

Hokkaido - Tokyo 2007 [Chapter 3]

Chapter threeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee, too many pics, too many pics. getting v drowsy from runny nose medicine that i took just now, ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

FREE AND EASY DAYS.

We woke up even earlier on free and easy day, than other days. Well, we woke up at 6am -_- but the day was worth it i guess.

Our first destination was Tsukiji Market, a fish market that sells very fresh seafood and serves very fresh sushi! The place was full of vehicles that were transporting barrels here and there, so our life was at risk >__< Thankfully, they could drive well. The place was really dirty too, and my new Nike Shoes became black after that -__- Furthermore, the crowd wasn't helping much either.

The seafood was really great though!








the food there looked really fresh, and the smell was fishy too lol. We ate our sushi breakfast after that though, but we waited for around 45mins for our turn >__< The shops were small and could only accomodate a certain number of people. Japanese seem to have a tolerance for waiting too -__- I can't believe them.

The food there was not bad though, as said by my parents and their colleagues. To me, if the salmon tastes good, everything is good XD





after our hearty breakfast, our family proceeded down to shibuyaaaaaaaaaa XD The heart of tokyo, that famous crossroad scene that we see on many postcards and travel shows! Wheeeeeeee... Actually, my main objective for going to Shibuya was to look at exotic people O.o Those who cosplay and all that. Sad to say, I didn't see many of them. But I saw many Japanese who pretend to be Americans: fake tan, blone hair, short shorts, and heavy makeup. Whatever. They look weird.




I remembered reading an article in Life, saying that the starbucks at shibuya was good, so I went to try it out. I drank this Belgium Chocolate Frap for 450yen, around $5.90? About the same price as Singapore I guess... It was quite nice hur, but I'm not a Starbucks gourmet so I couldn't tell the difference.

And sad to say, the only thing that I bought at Shibuya were socks, and AN APPLE. HAHAHAHA! There wasn't the mood for shopping at all...


strawberries that I saw at a provision stall in Shibuya. Where I got my apple. The strawberries in Japan are goooooooooooood. Really sweet too!


Did a lot of window shopping in shibuya, and our whole family went into this electronic shop hahaa. The phones in Japan look so sleek and nice! I felt like geting one, but I doubt it would work in Singapore though -_- one thing about Japan is that all the people use clamshell phones. Weird huh.


Japan can really take care of their children! This is a special phone designed for children. It looks plasic though, yeeh this is because its waterproof! Specialised for children who have butter fingers. Generally, Japanese like to put handphone accessories on their phone. Softbank has made use of this fact to build in a trigger into this phoen for children. THe child can simply activate it by pulling the handphone accessory, which will send an emergency mesage to your parents! Pretty cool huh.


After that, we went to Ueno, this place which was like a pasa malam. Just that its much noisier, and had moreeee people. Seriously, we were all squashed like Sardines against one another in that place. Thankfully, it was winter, so it wasn't so bad. Imagine if it were in Singapore, oh man i would just die from the humidity and heat.

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The next day, we went to DISNEYLAND! Hurrah! We got there by this special shuttlebus by Disneyland from our hotel. Our hopes were high when we got there, but were immediately dashed when we saw the crowd there..!! There was a whole sea of people la! We had to wait for around 20mins? To get into Disneyland, and the first thing I saw at Disney land was...



Poohbear! I'm not a great fan of Poohbear, but I just thought it looked especially cute when I saw it. I wanted to take a picture with it but the queue was sooooooooooo long, I just gave up -_- Okay, so we roamed around Disneyland for a while... and finally! We saw an attraction that didn't have an insane number of people!

Lol, it was Mickey's Show (or something). The first part was a slideshow on Walt Disney in the past and advancing to the present. Even my mother recognised somee of the characters! And the second part was a puppet show; It was really cool, how the puppets are playing music and all. I'm assuming that they are actually producing the music since it looked rather convincing to me.



There was this rollercoaster ride that was great fun XD Even though the ride was rather short (not even a min), but it was fine waiting for it. The wait was 45 mins long -_- but thats considered short compared to the other rides! There was a ride which we had to wait 3h for! Naturally, we didn't ride that.



My mother says that Japan is smart, to positon its queue in a way that we get to see the rollercoaster ride at every angle. Lol, she's right. Throughout the wait, I was so excited whenever I saw a rollercoaster rumble past us.

After that, we went to this racing thing. Reminds me of go-kart in Escape, but yeah this one was more restricted -_- Anyway, the wait was also about 40mins, but the whole ride was fun XD




We watched this 3d movie after that, and our family entertained ourselves by playing this lame hand game that xiuxian taught us. More like the korean show taught her, but it was entertaining. Anyway, the 3d show was freakaye, something like "Honey I Shrunk the Kids", and yes it's the same one as 6 years ago -_-. It's the same one as what I saw in Primary Four la!

we got cool specs

Basically, that about wraps up my disneyland trip. There were far too many people for us to have a good time. Xiuxian did have a good eyeful of cool Japanese guys there too though HAHAHA! And I realise that even the children of Japan have better hair than us -_-

sunset that we saw on the train

Hokkaido - Tokyo 2007 [Chapter 2]

Okay, now here's part 2 of my holiday trip... I was too lazy to post them the past week. I've been sleeping a lot these days, and coming down with a sorethroat; felt really drowsy ytd and today ahhh... I hope I don't feel that way during orientation tmr.

Anyway, we left for Tokyo on 27th December, I think. Went to Haneda Airport again for our flight, but we didn't stay there for long though. We boarded the plane bound for Tokyo pretty soon. The flight was around 2h, and I didn't sleep the whole flight. That's good though, since I bet I'll get a headache when I wake up >__<

Before i continue, there was this funny incident that occured in Haneda airport. It was at the customs, and my father was being stopped by the security since the sensor beeped when he walked through the arch. he was a pretty young chap.

security: do you have su-pray?
pop: ...
security: su-pray? do you have su-pray?
pop: huh

*after some thinking*

security: this one, pssh pssh (makes the spraying sound)

omg I BURST OUT LAUGHING WHEN I HEARD THAT. maybe i didn't narrate it as funnily as what i heard, but it was seriously really hilarious. XD

Finally! We reached Tokyo airport! Yayyyyy... We took a bus to Ginza first, and the whole journey was around, 1h+?? I slept the whole journey though. Ginza was modernized, well considering that it's Tokyo anyway. We went shopping hahaha, and there were many shops sporting brands like: LV, Burberry, Prada etcetc. The only shop that caught my attention was that mega huge toyshop though HAHAHA! Bought lotsa stuff there.

OH, AND TOKYO HAS EFFECTIVE WAYS OF ADVERTISEMENTS! Totally cool man, moving advertisements XD



We went to this shopping centre for ramen. The difference between Japan and Singapore is that the models outside their shops are certainy trustworthy -__- Not like those Singaporean ones, with their food looking so delicious but actually looks crap in reality -_-



Japanese restaurants offer good service! This is a bowl for children (:

Anyway, here are some pictures of the shopping centres that we went to...


this is the toyshop!

sweet eh


went for dinner at ikekuburo and ate sukiyaki! There were many people there at night, and even more then, since it was time to knock off. Tokyo has many neon lights as well, and that remind me a little of Hong Kong.



There were many people at the restaurant that we ate Sukiyaki at. The place was pretty cramped too, with very little walking space. The waiters at the restaurant were very warm and courteous ("Girashaiiiiiiiiii, Girashaiiiiiiiiiiiii") But sometimes, it just gets very noisy -_-



That was a fine dinner, with lots of meat and vegetable. We did a little window-shopping after dinner. There was a Parco in Ikekuburo!



Okay, yeah, after that we went to our hotel at Ryogoku to finally rest. I forgot what was the hotel name though, sadly. But the hotel was much bigger than all the other hotels, and there was a cool LCD TV! They and unlimited movies for 24h for just 1000yen too ^___^ I watched two movies in one night: Music and Lyrics and The Lake House, HAHA

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The next day, we woke up at around 6.30 (again -_-) Our first stop was this Japanese temple, at.. I forgot where again :S The only thing I have of that place is this sign:



There was this monument constructed in memory of Sun Wukong hahaha.




look there are 5models :D


Our next stop was Tokyo Tower. It was 1500m, and the view was spectacular! There were many high-rise buildings in Tokyo, and the view was really great. We even saw a free soccer match from up there! Woohoo





we got a little bored of seeing buildings everywhere, so we proceeded downstairs to see the other exhibitions. there were actually some interesting exhibitions, like the guiness book of records one, and some wax museum, but we decided not to go since we had to pay. We went to play some arcade games, and take some lousy neoprints. There was this shop that was seling American stuff, heavy metal bands and such, and there was this 4D theater thing that was outside the shop, it was really freaky!

Don't let that little box scare you, I bet this little box is even scarier than a simulator. It caught my attention, when I heard people screaming from inside. And there were lots of special effects, like sudden movements and air being blown. I didn't try, I didn't want to try >__<
poser!

We went to the Toyota exhibition at Odaiba after that. It was an exhibition that showcased some of the latest cars under Toyota, and that included an exhibition on Lexus as well. Seems appealing to us? Nooooooooooooooooo

My sisters and I decided to ride the ferris wheel instead (: It was 1150m high i think, and we had a clear view of Tokyo! I think the view would be much better at night though.




after the ride, we went to try our luck on a softtoy machine. You know,those that you use a claw to grab a soft toy? Yeah some of them were really near the hole, and you know how these machines like to con us -__-. Well we lost quite a bit of money at that machine, so our day became shitty after that. It wasn't so bad you know, until I realised that SOMEONE ELSE got the soft toy in the machine that we spent 500yen on!!! Life is unfair -_- Well, I was so mad, I had to vent it out somwhere. Xiuxian tried her luck on another machine that was supposedly easier, but unfortunately she didn't get anything as well. So i hit the machine -__- And HURRAH, something dropped out! Although it was underhanded, but WHO CARES HUH. XD

The only model that caught my eye in the Toyota Exhibition.


After this, we had a delightful dinner at this Japanese-Italian Restaurant. It was a buffet dinner, but of course, it was the chocolate fondue that caught my attention the most! And the fake food too (:



of course there were other food at the other restaurants too (:



okay, more coming up!

japan is a sad country

xiuluns new ambition