Instead of dramas, I figured that I should blog about my trip to Japan this time so that I'll remember what I did in Japan so that I will not make the same mistake when I go to Japan next time round.
So after Alevels, the day after prom on the 28th of November to the 7th of December, the Ang family flew off to Japan. I chose Japan anyway. I was so excited to go to Japan because its near Korea and because I really wanted to go to Japan anyway.
The last time we went on a holiday was to Vietnam in 2012.
28 November 2014
Day 1 was spent travelling. I think that I can actually say that I was in Bangkok for a good 5 hours and hence I've visited Bangkok for a while.
29 November 2014
We reached
Haneda airport (Tokyo) in the morning since it was a midnight flight and the first thing we went was to the toilet. Its really warm by the way and hence its really comfortable to sit on. After which, we checked out and took the train to
Shinjuku to get our one day JR pass so that we could travel around using the JR line while saving money.
Honestly, I felt that language wasn't really an issue because there is an English option at the ticketing machine. After which, we went to our hotel to put our stuff and wore our thick coats. We stayed at SMILE hotel at Asagaya station. I felt like I was in Pokémon for no reason. Besides the train station have malls and I love the vending machines on the platform. On the way to the hotel, we got stuck and was lost because we didn't know which platform to take the train. I'm really glad that this Japanese guy took the initiative to bring us to the right platform personally. He did not point here and there but he brought us to the right platform. What I learnt was I have to travel light because there's so many stairs and so little escalators that I almost felt like crying while carrying my luggage up and down. I was down with flu and my nose kept leaking. It felt really terrible. Thank goodness mummy brought medicine and with that, I recovered fast. So the first place we went was Asasuka temple and we ate really good noodles there. It was raining and hence it was really cold that I was shivering most of the time. I then ended up wearing 3 layers by wearing another jacket inside without my long Johns.
Well, we then visited
Ueno park. The leaves were really pretty but we unfortunately didn't visit any temples and museum there. Besides I was sick and I wasn't in the mode to do anything. We then walked
Ueno street and I absolutely love the street. Its bustling with crowd and the food there looks so good (while I kept taking free tissue to blow my nose).
After which at night, we went to
Harajuku. The train ride was really long back to my hotel and I didn't get to shop there. There were so many nice stuff (epitome of consumerism) and well, my parents didn't really shop. Visited Japan's diaso (Its cheaper there).
30 November 2014
Woke up really early to attend church. So we took the train to
Roppongi and went to
Franciscan Chapel to attend mass. Its around the same but the congregation was really small and it was really cozy there. They really welcome people with the fellowship. After which, we had breakfast and it was my first encounter with people smoking indoors. Nonetheless, breakfast was really good.
My mom then suggested visiting this spider structure which was there 10 years ago when she last visited. Well, it was still there and its at Roppongi station.
We then went to the
imperial palace and the garden which was really huge. Well, we were outside because we obviously couldn't enter the palace. Its so huge.
Well, and since we were in Tokyo, why not visit Tokyo station? Its a really complicated station that I've no idea what was going on in there. But its really old and really quite cool. 100 years old is really old by the way.
We then went to
Akihabara- anime and electronics street where my brother was really interested and started walking in every store available like how I was in Korea while I was a little bored, kept blowing my nose, was having a slight temperature and was just following my parents looking at electronics stuff. That was where the crowd was.
Like Singapore's pedestrian night, they closed the roads and everyone was just walking around there. My mom then went to meet her Japanese friend while my dad, brother and I went to
Shibuya to cross the messy cross junction that goes in any direction. Didn't take any picture there because it was really messy and we were busy crossing the road.
Went back to Asagaya after walking around Shinjuku and explored
Asagaya market there. The trains had heater. It was so comfortable. It was too dark to do anything and too early to return back to the hotel. The sun sets at 5pm. The stuff there are not only cheaper but there is a wider variety for Japanese snacks. ITS REALLY CHEAPER. And the market was sheltered, very long and just really nice. NB: go to the market there and buy cheap snacks and food.
1 December 2014
It was officially winter, I was feeling better and we woke up really early to travel to Shinjuku to take the
Romance Car To
Hakone to see
Mt Fuji. We didn't get to see Mt Fuji honestly. We were rather unlucky a
s the entire
Hakone was covered in fog so what we saw was fog to the extent that we couldn't take the boat to see Mt Fuji and everything was close. It was raining too and thus we couldn't see Mt Fuji. Well, at least we took the cable car and saw a volcanic fissure. (We bought the Hakone day pass)
My brother and I were running in and out of the center at the top of the mountain because the fog kept coming and going. We were like chasing the fog. When the fog, we could see the fissure. Well, we didn't get to see Mt Fuji though and so we left Hakone with slight regret. It was the first time I've been this close to a volcano because all my life I've been studying volcanoes and I've actually never seen a volcano before in my entire life. And so that's my first volcanic fissure that I've been close to. Unfortunately, we didn't go for any hot spring and we were not in time to eat the black egg unfortunately. Still, we got to see a rainbow after sulking on our cable car ride down which was all fog.
We then went back as the sun had set and there was almost no hope in seeing Mt Fuji. We brought our mom to the market near our hotel and had dinner there and bought really cheap bread. Well, you get bread, sushi and bento set at a REALLY GOOD PRICE after 8pm because there's discount!!! I had udon for the first time in Japan. Authentic Udon which tasted really good.
Well, that ends our trip in Tokyo.
2 December 2014
We checked out of our hotel and traveled to Shinjuku then then to Shinagawa. It was our first train ride with the morning working crowd and it was so crowded. Its so amusing as its very neat, quiet and that people basically don't push. They're really polite and people don't use their phones at all. We then board the Shinkasen to Osaka. (The bullet train) It was really fast. Well, I felt so blessed that we got to see Mt Fuji on the train. It was beautiful. (We didn't leave Japan without our beloved Mt Fuji that we kept complaining about).
Fast forward, we reached Osaka and checked in at Mariott Miyako Hotel. Initially, we were lost and couldn't find our way and again, a Japanese approached us and told us that Osaka station was different from Shin Osaka and brought us to Osaka Station. We then had lunch. Osaka's ramen taste really different from Tokyo's ramen. It is much quitter in Osaka but I then felt like I was literally living in Pokémon once again. People were travelling around in bicycles. We decided to walk to Osaka Castle. It looked really near on google map. But NO we took 2 hours to reach there and we were literally trying to beat the sunset. On the way, we stopped by a temple which I had no idea what was its name. Before reaching Osaka Castle.
We then went to Namba for dinner and had really good Ramen once again. It really taste different everywhere. We went to see glico man and tried takoyaki. Not only that, we tried Matcha icecream which tastes better in winter!
3 December 2014
We went to Universal Studios Japan. Actually I didn't really want to go to USJ because I thought that it would be like USS but I was wrong. Not only that, I also didn't want to sit the roller coaster in the cold and shiver instead of having fun. But well, it was in fact rather fun. I felt that USJ was much better than USS despite the slight outdated technology in some parks such as the screen was not clear enough. However, one of the main highlight was the harry potter land which we had to queue hard to go in. We basically queued for 3 hours to sit on the really awesome 4D ride which was really good. The roller coaster was really fun too. Except for the part that it was really cold. There, I could feel the Christmas spirit with Christmas songs played all over Hollywood(?) with the amazing lighting. Some tips I would like to remind myself was to never go into a theme park when its cold, go to the main attractions first then go to the rest. (Its worth going by the way. Just that everything is in Japanese.)
4 December 2014
Went to Kyoto. (I forgot to mention that my family bought an unlimited JR pass to travel to anywhere using JR lines in Osaka and the outskirts of Osaka. It was totally worth it because it we travelled to many places. The unlimited pass lasted for 4 days) upon reaching Kyoto, we bought an unlimited bus pass. Kyoto is so beautiful. But 1 day is not even enough. We barely visited anything. (Taking into consideration that the sunsets at 5pm). We visited kinkakuji (golden pavilion) which was golden. But in retrospect, we shouldn't have visited that golden pavilion first because it was far from the other tourist sites. (REALLY FAR). It was raining when we were in Kyoto, my nose was leaking and I was freezing.
Had good udon after at a nearby shop at the bus stop we alighted.
After which, we visited
Kiyomizudera temple after a ride around the city. The autumn view was really nice. But I believe that it would be nicer if we visited during the cherry blossom. The walk up to the temple was long but tiring. I totally love how the other Chinese tourists dress up/rent a kimono to visit temples. (so cute) The temple stands tall supported by a wooden stage (I think). How I wish it wasn't raining.
Well, we then spent too long at a desert stall tasting mocha that we forgot that the sun was going to set soon. So we immediately rushed too see
Fushimi Inari Shrine. (WHY DIDN'T WE VISIT THIS FIRST!!!!) We reached just before sun set, before we couldn't see any remains of the Shrine and hence explains this really dark photo with bad lighting. Looking back, we really should visit this first, finish the entire trail and visit other places. It was only 4pm!
After which, we went to see the geisha street, hoping that we would get to see one. After walking in circles, we found it and caught a glimpse of them. So pretty.
We should have went earlier anyway. We would have seen more.
It was followed by an extremely long ride back to Tennoji station.
5 December 2014
We woke up really late. (Maybe it was more like I couldn't wake up). So we travelled to Wakayama on the train once again and once again, we misjudge the distance between the attractions. They're all so far from each other that it was impossible to visit 3-4 in one day. Buying the bus pass, we headed down to the Wakayama Castle which was worth it because it was beautiful.
View of Wakayama from the wakayama castle.
15 degrees bridge in the vicinity of the wakayama castle.
Japan's most delicious ramen tasted SO good. (Its near Wakayama station).
After which, we were chasing sun set again. We couldn't see anything else such as the hotspring etc. We also didn't have enough time to travel anywhere else- to the southern city which takes approximately 1-2 hours by tain. Thus, we visited the Wakayama Marina City where we saw the guy cutting the tuna (we made it just in time) and actually ate it on the spot. We took 45 minutes by bus to and fro. (Lesson learnt: never underestimate the distance). We then took the train back to Tennoji. Tennoji is really good. We actually have direct trains to everywhere.
We had Japanese Curry rice at Namba station. IT WAS SO GOOD I REALLY WISHED THAT I COULD HAVE A SECOND SERVING IF I WASN'T FULL.
6 December 2014
It was the official last full day in Japan. So we took the train down to kobe. It was an approximately 45 minute ride from Tennoji. It was free and easy anyway. We then had Kobe ramen!
I must say that ramen from different parts of Japan tastes differently! We then walked in circles as we wanted to climb some hill/mountain to see the nunobiki falls. We should've taken the cable car because we were gear-less and couldn't see the other 2 falls. Before that, we spent a really long time walking in circles to find the entrance to climb up to see the waterfall. Its not the cable car side but the other entrance. (Note to self)
We then took the train ride back and for the last time, walked around Tennoji which we never explored, shopped a little, had a wonderful sushi meal before going back to the hotel to take our belongings to head to Kansai international airport and repacked our stuff and reached Singapore on 7 December 2014.
By the way, it took us forever to find a sushi place but the food was so good that I couldn't bring myself to eat any other Japanese food for the rest of December until last Monday (12/1/15) when I went to the standing sushi bar with my friends to eat sushi.
I know this was really late. Its been more than a month since I returned back from Japan and I took more than 3 weeks to type this because I kept procrastinating.
I really hope to visit Japan once again and if I were to visit Japan again, I would spend at least 4 days in Kyoto and 4 days in Wakayama because 1 day simply wasn't enough! In addition to that, the days were really short and we had to rush most of the time. Despite visiting very little places- we didn't follow tour- it was fulfilling as I really got to experience the trains, the bus and their well mannered culture (the lack of escalators make me appreciate Singapore).
This ends my blogpost on Japan and I really enjoyed myself. (:
