Wednesday, July 12, 2006
After this visit, we proceeded to the Universal Studios of Japan. Yeah! This is one place where you can have a taste of how hollywood movies are created, sit in a cabin following the adventures of spiderman, sit in a flying bicycle in the adventure of E.T. meet your favourite stars lives in action like woody woodpecker, elmo and friends, dine in a olden american style fast food restaurant, walk in the streets of "hollywood" and many more... See the steets? American styled! We sure had fun there and spend the rest of the day there. That night we stayed in the hotel next to the osaka airport. Last day The last day was nothing. We could wake up a bit later as the airport was just so near the hotel. Had breakfast and proceeded to the aiport. At there, we did some shopping in order to use up the remaining japanese yen.
Day 6
Here we are at Osaka.
We proceed to Osaka CAstle early in the morning.
This castle was onced stayed by the great warrior,
Toyotomi Hideyoshi of Japan
However, now it has already turned into a museum.
This was the american styled fast food restaurant i was talking about. One thing in japan is that you have to clear your bowls and plates and rubbish by yourself regardless in food courts or fast food restaurants. There are no cleaners to clear your rubbish.
The flight back was about 1 hour lesser than the flight to japan as osaka was nearer than tokyo. Finally, we are back in singapore (below) carrying many baggages with relatives welcoming us. This is the end of the 7+1(in spore changi village hotel) day tour.
Clemz walked through the seasons at
Monday, July 10, 2006
In case you have missed the world cup finals
or missed the famous zidane headbutt,
here's the link
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IVBqQXwgTo4
Below is the link for the magial moments of zidane.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IVBqQXwgTo4
I was totally amazed by his skills and tricks.
Clemz walked through the seasons at
Tuesday, July 04, 2006
Just by looking at the kimonos, you can tell if they are married or not. Those with ribbon knots behind the backs were not married, while those with a box shaped were married. After this geisha visit, we were brought to see a golden castle. That is the castle were gold plated. Other than the castle, the surroundings also had nice views with ponds and trees. A vending machine selling disposable cameras at the entrance of the attraction. Vending machines in japan sold a lots of things other than drinks, i.e. soups, cameras,cigars, and so on.. After this golden castle visit, we went to yet another temple. However, this temple was very big and we had to walk up a slope with shophouses along its sides. I think some of you might have seen the above 2 pictures before. If i'm not wrong, it was shown on tv, some variety programs, introducing japans, by bryan wong and xie shao guang. This is the love stone. It is said that if you close your eyes, walk to the other end in a straight line, and still able to reach the other stone on the opposite end, your proposal to date the person you like would be successful. In the above picture, some japanese school gals trying their luck. The japanese tied their unlucky draws ( xia xia qian) onto strings centered by a wooden plank. (1st half of pic). They believed that they should not bring back the unlucky draws with them. So when the wind blow away their draws, their bad luck would be gone. I think many would also have seen the 2nd half of the picture before. It is very common in Tv dramas and variety shows. It is sort of a place for people to hang their small blocks of wood(sort of wooden keychain where people write down their wishes in such wood) hoping that their wishes would come true. I'm drinking some well water shown in this picture. It is believed that the 1st stream, 2nd stream and 3rd stream ( strating from the right) depicts wealth,beauty and health. But you are only allowed to drink from 2 of the streams. I choose 1st n 3rd. Hee hee.. As evening approached, we were brought to the most popular streets of Osaka. It is equalvalent to orchard rd of singapore in osaka. Most of the people in osaka shopped there. For instance, a part time sales assistant could earn about $14/hour. If you work for about a month, you could easily earn about $2000 ++ a month. That is only for the part timers, think of what the full timers are earning. However, their expenses are also very high. At the end of the day, where everyone would be tired from the day's journey, we returned to our hotels for a night of good rest. The hassle was we had to change hotels everyday. However, the good thing was being able to watch the world cup at the hotel every night. 3 more days to go...
7 days in japan
Day 5
After breakfast, the guide brought us to a building to view some geishas.
It was sort of a mini 2 leveled shopping centre.
The 2nd level was selling souveniors while the 1st level were restaurants.
We had our lunch there before the show started.
People have to throw their coins into the centre "bowl" surrounded by statues. I was successful in my 2nd attempt and managed to throw the coin in. However, other than me, none of my family members could do it.
Their shopping centres or shops closes very early in the night. Around 9pm local time (8pm singapore time). Only selected shops near major hotels would only operate till about 10pm local time. I found out that their part time sales really earn a lot. Around twice the amount of singapore part timer's salary.
Clemz walked through the seasons at
Monday, July 03, 2006
Vehicles looked like toys, while people looked like ants. After this, we will proceed for something the gals might like. A visit to hellokitty land. This 3 level building is the best place for all the hellokitty fans out there. It compromises of hellokitty attractions and a whole level of hellokitty merchandise seldom found in singapore. As evening approached, we got back into our coach and proceed to the next destination. It was to spend the night at some traditional japanese hotel( tatami) with a view of some lake. It was also at the foot of mt fuji. Late that night, we had our best dinner ever. Those japanese dishes were good. Furthermore, we also had sashimi.. wooh... but that you have to pay for it of cause. Such japanese suits were at the cubboard, so my brother and i decide to try them out. The guide taught us the correct way to wear it. The other way of wearing it was for the dead. Day 4 We were supposed to go up to mt fuji for an early morning climb. However, there were some cycling contest going on and the trip uphill was cancelled. What a disapointment. No chance to view the magnificent mt fuji. So the next destination was to go to some other mountains near mt fuji. So we went up to this particular mountain and view the hot spring. The cold was getting more intense as you went up higher to the mountain. In addition, it was raining, this made the temperature even lower. Once your hand was out of your jacket, it was like putting your hand in the freezer. We also tasted some eggs that were cooked by the hot springs there. 6 eggs costed 700 yen which was about 6 eggs for 7 sing dollars. After this climb, we went to some park with buddhist statues. I will end here and i will touch more on the next few days next time.
7 Days in japan
3rd day in japan.
the guide brought us to some famous guan yin temple in tokyo early in the morning.
he told us that despite having an earthquake many years ago,
the temple collasped, but the guan yin statue still remained unharmed.
After this early temple visits, we were brought to the highest building in tokyo,
some goverment buildings,
to view the magnificent scenery( not much scenery actually) from the top.
The last pic was taken from a view from the hotel's window.
After this visit, we took a very long bus road to take the bullet train. This is the bullet train, the fastest train. It is used to travel around states in japan. We took the train which took us only 12 mins to get to toyohashi while the bus needed 1 1/2 hrs to reach the same destination. Just imagine the speed and compare it to our MRT. Incomparable.
Due to the cancel of the mt fuji trip, we still had time to go shopping at the nearby shopping mart near our hotel before our dinner.
Clemz walked through the seasons at
