| I finally wrote my japan report.. i had it saved on microsoft.. i still havent finished it yet though.. i still have to do the tokyo report but ill do that later. I made this just for my sake.. but if you guys care enough to read, go ahead.
JAPAN TRIP 2006 REPORT:
DAY ONE- LAX to NARITA AIRPORT: Our flight was sometime after 1 pm so we planned to leave at 9 am from Glendora. I did my last minute packing and headed to Andy's house. Then we picked up Chris from his house and left to go pick Vivian up from Diamond Bar. Sooo I was pretty nervous and excited cause it was my first time going to Japan without my family and going with friends. When we got there, we checked in and did all that stuff. We waived good-bye to Mr. Wang. We ate at the airport and just waited for our flight! I really hate airplanes cause i get motion sickness very easily and i found out chris does too. So i asked for some pills to help me on the flight. And we both hate airplane food so we both avoided the nasty food they served... blegh. They didnt have 4 close seats available soo me and vi sat together and the boys sat somewhere else but not far. OH and this big white guy was sitting next to us (since theres 3 seats in a row) and me and vi were grossed out but turns out he was sitting in the wrong seat! So this really kind japanese lady took his place haha. And this same lady had the same flight as us when we came back to LA too! & She remembered us :D OH and Xavier and Aiden had the same flight as us too, so during the ride, we all went to go say hello to them haha. Anyway, it was a long 13 hour flight. it was dreadful!! So we arrive in Japan and.. its humid and really gloomy. Vivian and I tried to find the boys but didn’t see them when we got off the plane so we waited for them for awhile.. but they still didn’t show up so we assumed that they already went to the luggage claim area. Soo we went on the subway to the other side of the airport.. and waited for them again.. still no show. So we tried to find our luggage. I don’t remember how long we waited for Andy and Chris.. we thought they got lost or something but they eventually showed up and they said that they were looking for us andd stuff anyway we got over it. So we found our luggage!! Then we went to the Midorinomadoguchi to get our JR Pass. Then I think we took the metro to Tokyo Station then from there we went to Jinbocho Station and walked to Sakura Hotel. BTW, the subway stations in Japan are way confusing.. we kept walking back and forth and getting lost.. it was horrible. Anyway, we arrived like around 5 pm so there were bright lights everywhere! Once we got out of the station, we were like OMG PICTURE!! So we took bunch of pictures at an intersection and stuff. So we get to the hotel lobby.. it was full of foreigners.. or otakus idk. One tried hitting on Vivian and that same one tried hitting on me too but Chris pretended to be my boyfriend, so I got saved lol. When we thought this was bad enough.. omg we got to vi and my room.. holy crap it was SOOO SMALL!! It was impossible for even one person to survive in that cell. Anyway, we tried to make it work. We met the guys down in the basement cause that’s where the were staying. We were all hungry so we decided to go eat. We ate at this relatively small soba restaurant that was run by this one old guy so we started calling him dad. We had an early train ride to Kyoto the next morning so we went back and slept.
DAY TWO/THREE- KYOTO: We left early in the morning to leave for Kyoto and we bought bentos and small snacks for our trip. We arrived at the Kyoto Station after 2 hours. The Station was amazing! The buildings and architecture was unbelievable! You gotta see the pictures to believe it. So anyway, we took bunch of pictures and stuff then we took a taxi to get to Utano Youth Hostel. It was located farr away, away from the city life. I really like Kyoto cause it still preserves the traditional Japanese feel. So the hostel didn’t look great in appearance but the rooms were a lot better than Sakura Hotel.. The shower room was one of those public Japanese baths which meant naked women in one room! Eek, but I survived. We dropped off our luggage and since we couldn’t check-in yet, we decided to go out in the meantime. Chris found this pamphlet for Kyoto Studio Park and we asked the receptionist lady what it was and she kindly gave us information. It’s an entertainment park where old traditional movies are shot. There’s restaurants, rides, people walking around in kimono, and such. It seemed really exciting so we decided to go. Since it was raining, the lady was so nice that she let us borrow umbrellas! Because she was so generous, we started calling her “mom” haha. So we arrived at the entrance that looked like a huge castle. There were so many students there.. I think they were going on a class trip or something. We ate at this one restaurant and I had the BEST ramen ever! Then we walked around the inner part of the park then we went outside and there were sooo many old traditional houses. They were basically made for movie backdrops and such. Anyway, we took a whole mess of pictures… and we all got soaked :( Then as we were walking around.. we started hearing little kids crying while walking out of this one place… and it turned out to be a haunted house! And of course we had to check it out so we all went but we were really chickening out and fighting over who gets to stand in the middle haha. Of course the girls should be in the middle, right. Lol Well it was our turn to go in.. but we were all reluctant to go hahah. You see people younger than us walking in like its nothing!! We seemed really pathetic haha but we eventually went in.. Vivian and Andy had their eyes closed the whole time so I me and chris had to drag them through the whole thing lol. There were so many dead bodies and blood spilt everywhere. Chris nearly hit one of the workers because he jumped out towards us lol. We we all soo scared that we were stumbling lol. There was this one small room that had a dead woman right on the floor and since we were so f’in scared we tried to run across to the other side but I lost my shoe on the way and I wasn’t going to leave my SHOE so I had everyone go back and get it lol. Anyway, so we finally reached the end.. and of course it was going to be the creepiest part of the house so we were like eff this so we literally ran to find the exit and when we finally got out, people were looking at us like wtf hahah. But I must say, it was really entertaining lol. Then we went inside the park and went upstairs.. it was like a toyland or something. There were lots of life-size Power Ranger collections and stuff like that. Anyway, we went back to the hostel, checked-in, settled in then we went out shopping. Us girls and the guys split and met up afterwards. We took a LOT of purikura when we were at the game center. We went to OPA and to the small shops. Then we met up with the guys and headed home.
The next day, we took a self-tour to see the temples and shrines of Kyoto. We first went to the famous Kinkakuji. That place was unbelievably gorgeous. We ate this really good green tea ice cream. Took lots of pictures. Saw bunch of high school/middle school kids. There were a group of guys that kept looking at us.. they probably figured we were foreigners.. so we asked to take pictures with them. They were really cute haha. Then we went to Nijo Castle and took an inside tour with the squeaking floors and of the life-size figures of shoguns and daimyos. Then I believe we went to the Imperial Palace then to the Chionin Temple. It was such a peaceful environment. Since a lot of the temples looked.. the same.. we figured it was enough for the day so we went back to the shopping district again haha. We went to the Kyoto Station at night and it was soooooo beautiful!! They had an escalator that takes you like1785 stories high. There were these pretty lights everywhere and at the very top, there was a little garden area where all the couples were.. holding each other… making me a little jealous lol. It was a romantic place. They had glass windows that showed the view of Kyoto.. me and Chris took a nice picture together with the view. For some reason, each of us was at one point off on our own. I was walking up the stairs to the garden area and I hear this one couple laughing and pointing at someone saying “what the…is he going to be alright??” and I go and check to see what theyre talking about .. and it was Andy.. sitting on the bench.. slouched over like a depressed old man and I couldn’t help but laugh and when he heard me, he looked up and his shirt was unbuttoned …. He is such an odd person. Andy of course was whining that he wanted to eat.. he did this through out the trip.. And me and chris actually timed him to see how long it would take for him to whine again.. it was only a couple seconds lol. Anyway, we all headed for home. Every night, me, Chris, and Andy would stay up pretty late and hang out in the lounge… we would just drink/eat and talk and just laugh at the stupidest things possible lol. Things happened that I shouldn’t share with the public lol but basically it was our relief from the trip as a whole. I really enjoyed those moments :)
DAY FOUR- KYOTO to OSAKA to FUKUOKA: We were running pretty late for our 9:36 am departure which was my fault for listening to the receptionist! A 10 ride to the Kyoto Station took us 30 minutes instead so we were late. We got to the station and we just missed our train by a minute, so we re-reserved our seats for the next departure at 10:21 am. It took 30 minutes to get to Osaka. We were only gonna stay there for couple hours so we decided to go eat TAKOYAKI and OKONOMIYAKI! We were just strolling around.. Osaka has the hottest people, hot gyarus and sentaa guys everywhere! We took so many stalker pictures of them hahah. Anyway, we found this really cool and tall Ferris wheel that we wanted to ride. We were dying to get on it but once we were on it, we were dying to get off of it cause it was soooo damn slow!!! The view wasn’t that great except the two guys that were dancing on the roof top kinda made up for half of it, but damn.. it was horrible. Anyway, after a waste of money, we went to this Osaka Food Theme Park which was inside.. it was like a traditional small town of Osaka where they had small restaurants and ramune stands. It was really cute! We ate takoyaki and okonomiyaki like we planned. Then we had to catch our train so we headed to the Station and took a Shinkansen to Fukuoka.
So we get to Fukuoka!! This is where I usually go when I go to Japan with my family. I was pretty excited about it. We walked to Sunlife hotel since it was right next to the station. It was an extremely nice hotel compared to the other two we’ve stayed at lol. The guys were playing with the toilets that had those different buttons to wipe your ass and they were dumbfounded by the automatic water spray hahah. Anyway, my uncle was going to pick us up to go eat so we got ready and left. I saw my aunt and my cousins too. I’m surprised by how much they’ve grown since the last time I saw them. They also had a new baby girl so I got to see her too! She looked sooo adorable! Gahh I wanted to squeeze her to death >_< So they took us to eat Kaitensushi at Diamond City. It was going to be a 30 minute wait so we waited in line for awhile and just chatted. My aunt is an English teacher so she was able to talk to them. Then they told us that we can go look around the mall that was right there. So we did.. went to the Comme Ça store and did some gift shopping.. we were actually running a little late so we tried to rush and stuff but the workers took 15 minutes just to put 3 freakin shirts into bags!!!! Uwah, that’s how all the stores are though.. -_- Anyway, we ran back and we got there in time. We sat at a different table than the rest of them cause we couldn’t possible get close seats for 12 people. Well we ate A LOT I think more than how much my cousins ate all together… lol. After we ate, I wanted to take pictures of the family so we took some.. then decided to go karaoke! It was only my aunt, Yuri, Mai, and the Four, the guys decided not to go haha. Karaoking is 235x better in Japan!! OMg, the place we went to had a really cute theme and stuff. So we got a room and we ordered drinks.. I think Chris and Andy sang first then Me and Vi.. it wasn’t pretty lol… then Yuri and Mai sang Sakuranbo next and totally OWNED us lol. They sounded really good and just totally made us look horrible hahah. And then my aunt sang too. We all basically took turns singing. Yuri and I sang Voyage and Glamorous Sky together but I couldn’t keep up with her lol and me and my aunt sang Puffy’s Asia no Junshin hahah awesome! I don’t know why but stupid Chris decides to sing MC Hammer’s Baby Got Back -___-;; The further we got into the song, the more awkward it got.. esp with my aunt there who knew English lol. Andy got harassed by two drunk Japanese guys in the bathroom lol. Anyway, after we were done, they took us home :D
DAY FIVE- FUKUOKA: I wanted to take them to Canal City which is a really popular shopping center. We went to go eat at a gyoza restaurant then afterwards decided to meet up with the guys later. It wasn’t the best day to go cause it was raining ;/ Anyway, we did some more shopping! They had OPA there too and I bought a set of 3 tops from On the Couch. We went to a Comme Ça store again and one of the workers, not so cute-looking, started talking to me and asking where we were from and stuff. He thought it was cool that we’re from LA. Vivian tried on some shirts and decided that we’ll come back later.. so we came back and when we were at the cash register, that same worker came up to me and handed me his business cards.. he told me to call him up when I come back to Japan again… hahah awkward. I gave him a smile and said thanks lol. Ok, so we shopped some more then we met up with the guys and we all went to Matsuya Ladies and shopped some more. After that, we went back to our hotels.. I think we just dropped off our stuff then headed out for dinner.. I really don’t remember what happened haha. I think we went to a game center and took more purikuras.
DAY SIX- FUKUOKA to HIROSHIMA to TOKYO: Before we left for Hiroshima, I had to go to my Uncle’s work to pick something up. Came back, we were running late again but it was fine cause we took the next train. We were planning to stay in Hiroshima for only a couple hours. We saw the A-bomb Dome, the Children’s Memorial, and the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum. I really enjoyed the museum. The way they designed it and the artifacts they had were breathtaking. I can say that this experience renewed our minds. After that, we went to go eat Hiroshima-style Okonomiyaki then headed back to the station. It was a long 3-4 hour ride back to Tokyo ;/
DAY SIX- YOKOHAMA/TOKYO: We went to Yokohama to check out their Chinatown. All the restaurants there were REALLY expensive omg. But we found a decent restaurant, a buffet. So we ate there and they gave us their English directions on how to order their food… and they basically used an automatic translator for it cause the English made NO sense what so ever lol. Anyway, the food was pretty good and they had all you can eat almond tofu!! After we ate, we just walked around.. then we went to CosmoWorld which is an amusement park. When we were there, there were a couple photo shoots going on in the park and we tried taking a picture of it but the managers said “no pikuchas.” Boo. OK, so the reason we wanted to come to Cosmo World was for the HUGE ferris wheel but we ended up not going on it.. but we did go on a roller coaster. After that, we ran into another haunted house and me and chris were like YEAH! Lets go! But Vivian and Andy didn’t want to.. but I didn’t want to unless they came with us… then eventually Andy gave in but then I chickened out at the last minute so we didn’t even go at all lol. Lame. So we basically spent most of our time (and money) at the arcade. We played the basketball game and chris won 2 toys. And we all played this one game where thee animals pop up and you have to try and hit them before they go down.. yah.. andy won all 3 times lol. We won these huge inflatable Mickey Mouse hands… three of them.. hahah. Anyway, we decided to head back to Tokyo. Chris really wanted to check out Tokyo’s night life before he leaves, so we went to Shibuya of course. Shibuya was one crazyyyy place! Lots of people everywhere. At the main intersection, a mass of people just start walking and running to get to the other side and they don’t even follow the cross walks.. they just walk in the roads! This last for like couple minutes too. +__+ insane I tell you. It’s so alive in Shibuya though! I love it! Theres lights everywhere, loud music playing, young people talking and hanging out.. this is a place id go every night. We saw lots of ganguros and sentaa guys there.. especially at the game center. We took more purikuras since it was our last day with Chris! Then we tried to find a good place to eat and we found one place but it was closed.. but the lady told us that the restaurant above is still open so we walked upstairs.. and we find this tiny restaurant. We decided to eat here. We had a REALLY REALLY cute waiter. Everything there was in kanji so I asked if they had English menus.. but they didn’t.. so we were kinda having trouble deciding what we wanted to eat.. the cute waiter was so patient with us lol. He asked us what they felt like eating so they can see if they have it or not but aht still failed so.. then out of nowhere, they brought out a paper with translations on them.. I think they wrote it out for us lol. But this really helped us a lot. We ordered some drinks and pasta and chicken stuff. Then the food finally came.. and the portions were soooo small! Like 800 yen for 4 pieces of fried chicken -_- Well the food we ordered was really good though haha. We were all out of it that night.. we thought they drugged us because we were extremely tired but it turned out that it was the light that was effecting us. After we were finished with the food, we took a group picture with the waiter haha cause he was so damn cute lol.
DAY SEVEN- CHRIS LEAVES FOR HK: We were all going to drop Chris off at the Narita Airport together so we tried to get to the Tokyo station early enough to make his flight. Buut, we were running late.. again… we had to wait for the next train coming so that killed a lot of time.. so when we got to the narita airport, we all ran to find the check-ins. We all got separated but me and vi stayed together. We eventually found chris and andy but we found out that chris just missed his flight… but he was able to go on the next flight to HK so it wasn’t so bad. So we said our good-byes and he left! So it was now me, andy, and Vivian together for the next 7 days… haha.
DAYS EIGHT- FOURTEEN coming soon... |
