Few seconds of fame

Call me a vain pot but I was happy to be in the newspaper and to experience a few seconds of fame in the television because of my volunteering event on Sunday. A few people that I knew were the official photographers and I knew when they were taking my photo but I was completely not aware that there would be media. On Monday, a colleague told me that she saw me in the news and I did not believe it. But in the evening, I saw the clip and I believed. I saw my photo in Chinese newspaper too and I don't know what the article is talking about. However, the caption sounds as if I am working somewhere else. Sadly, I have no friend and noone tags me in the photo or in the video lor :(

Work has not been kind to me recently and I really feel like fucking off. Once a year, when the error report from the previous year is completed, we will repeat the same discussion again which eventually will be forgotten after a month and only to surface again in the following year. Gosh.. It is like I do my reporting is wrong but I am also wrong if I don't do the reporting. In short, no matter what, I am always wrong. Similarly with ASEAN Para Games planning. It is not unexpected that there will be last minute changes but I am sick of 'begging' others for help. Gosh seriously I am just a middle man in everything I do. I have responsibilities but none of the authorities so please don't be mean or curse me. I am just doing my job. Haiz..

I am still a kid. I need to learn how to leave work at work and don't think about it once I leave work :(

God at play

Honestly, since I came back from Japan, I have always been feeling lazy to go to church. I kept making excuses for me not to go but amazingly, I still went for all the 3 Sundays. Not that I am complaining but everything that happened was not mere coincidence but God's work.

On the first Sunday after I came back, I still felt so tired. I was lazy to even go out for lunch and I went quite late for lunch. After done with my lunch and grocery shopping, it was close to 5pm and no way I would wait another 30 minutes for Mass. On my way home, I was stopped by ANZ credit card promoter. I actually was not interested in having another credit card but I was tempted with the unlimited lounge access in airports. By the time I was done, it was about 525pm and yup, just nice to walk over to the church for mass.

After that, I realised that the lounges which are accessible by the card is apparently not very nice :( I did not bother to pick up the phone call from the bank for the following 3 days after and I hope that my application is rejected :p Haha.. Seriously I am not keen on having additional cards for now.

I messed up my sleep cycle on last Saturday which made me end up on the bed only at 2am on Sunday morning. I decided not to set up my alarm clock and heck if I could not wake up to go for mass. I ended up cannot sleep well and was awakened at 530am!! So yeah, I decided to go for 7am mass, had my early lunch and then to have a long afternoon nap after that.

Today I had a volunteering event (but honestly I volunteered myself just to hit my KPI) which was planned to end at 1.30pm. I already planned to skip mass again as I was very tired. I woke up at 5am today because I had to reach Bedok by 715am. The event ended earlier than expected at 1230. The train ride to Bugis from Bedok takes about 14 minutes so I would still be in time for 1pm mass at the Church of Our Lady of Lourdes. Yay!! So I went for mass again this week.

Dear God, I appreciate all these that allowed me not to miss any mass for the past 3 weeks. But for now please fix my dripping my aircon:(

Attack on Titan: The End of the World

I watched the first movie and found it rather messed up with the plot. I know I cannot expect much with the continuation but I am really interested to know how they are going to bring the messed up plot to a closure. With ratings mostly of 1 or 2 stars, I was prepared to be disappointed and hell yeah, I am disappointed at the end of the movie.

With a run time of 87 minutes and the first few minutes are spent for recap of the first movie, they could simply combine both movies into one and spare us from the agony. There are no changes on how bad -over the top and inappropriate- the acting is while the other changes are for worse when compared to the first movie. The titans and the fight against titans are absent here and we just get CGI fights among the special titans: Eren's titan, Shikishima's titan, and the Collosal titan. Boring... There are still too much talking to explain what the heck is actually going on.

I admit that the background story is pretty cool: civilisation was actually very advanced and titans were actually the results of human's scientific progress. Things took a back turn when things went beyond control and chaos swept through the land. Few people ('the government') built the walls and labelled the titans as common threat to unite the people and there was peace. The government also banned all knowledge to prevent scientific and technological advancement to prevent similar horror from happening. After hundred years of peace, the younger generations take it for granted and starts to have an idea of exploring the lands beyond the walls. Thus the government let the titans attack humans -in the first movie- to remind humans of the horror out there and unite them once more.

Sadly, they kinda butcher the plot after that. There are so many hints given which leave audience with unanswered questions at the end of the movie. There are so many actions and decisions taken by various characters which are not explained well. Just to list a few (heavy spoilers ahead):

-We are given a glimpse of Eren's childhood but no explanation or connection of that scene to the present time.

-Before his death, Souda-san mentions about Eren's big brother. Eren does not seem perturbed to find out more about this which does not make sense.

-What exactly is Eren's motives? Initially he wants to take a revenge at the titans. After knowing everything from Shikishima, I am quite amazed that he is fine with just closing the walls and doing nothing towards the government who is the mastermind behind the titans attack a few years back. Everything that he does does not make sense.

-Who is Shikishima and why can he also turn into a titan? Who is actually the General Director who turns out to be the Collosal titan?

-Nothing is mentioned about Shikishima and Mikasa. Mikasa seems in a dilemma throughout the movie but nothing is mentioned about the cause of her dilemma and this totally undermines everything she does here.

-Armin and friends' decision to follow Eren seem simply because they are 'friends' with Eren and they do not know Shikishima that well. That is quite surprising, especially for Armin who is supposed to be the smart and sensible one. In end of the world situation such as this, I am pretty sure a sensible person will want to know more about everything before making a decision.

-Why does Shikishima change his mind and fight Collosal titan in the end? What is the reason of the change of his motive? What is the fate of both of them after the explosion?

The best surprise, however, comes after the end credits. The movie makers are nice enough to hint audience to stay until the end of the end credits for extra scene. The end credit reveals the one and only bird we keep seeing is actually a camera and a voiceover over Eren and Mikasa standing on top of the wall looking at the outer world states that 2 test subjects have successfully overcome the test field. Yes that shit is bloody similar to the first Maze Runner movie and leaves me with "What the fuck is everything about?".

Although the first movie is kinda rubbishy, I still enjoyed some parts of it as a standalone movie. But after this second movie, everything is out of the window: everything is crap. And seriously who is the idiot who thinks of Eren's line: I'd rather be free in Hell than be a slave in Heaven. That is the most idiotic statement ever after all the crazy things he has seen the titans can do to humans. I really think that is fucked up.

Tidying up

I still feel so tired after my trip and other than my luggage, everything has been as they are from Japan for the past 2 weeks. I am so lazy to unpack the stuff as it will mean that I need to arrange how I store all of my toys and honestly I don't think I still have a lot of storage space :( I am done with checking the anime books but Genie is still wrapped. A part of me is scared to find if Genie fails to arrive in Singapore in one piece.

Let's talk about money first. I initially changed 175000 JPY at a rate of 1000 JPY to $11.32 and at the last minute I decided to add 100000 JPY at a rate of $11.91. I came back with 185000 JPY which I just changed back to Singapore dollars at a rate of 1000 JPY to $11.68. Anyway my decision to use credit card to pay the hotel is correct as when I calculate, the exchange rate works out to be about 1000 JPY to $11.52 for that. However, the credit card use at Disneyland and Mandarake is at a rate of 1000 JPY to $12+. Of course I can always think that this rate is close to $11.91 and I actually make a profit as those I changed for $11.32 are worth $11.68 now. But for someone negative like me, the additional changing of 100000 JPY was a mistake.

I had been thinking of taking Japanese class after my trip but it was just in my head. I did not actually google to search for Japanese language school in Singapore. Curiously, a Japanese language school kept appearing on my Facebook newsfeed! I opened the page and saw a friend liking it. After checking with him, it is actually the language school that is set up by his ex-teacher. Oh great! Since there is a great testimonial from a friend, I am decided for it. The schedule for the beginner class is also just 'nice' to suit my schedule. It will start on 18 Oct and run for 10 weeks which means the class will end on 20 Dec. I actually will fly home on the 19th. I checked with the teacher and he is willing to give replacement class. Yay!! I am sold. I sincerely hope that my Japanese will not be as hopeless as my Mandarin so that I can travel happily to Japan every year.

I went for my acne follow up last Saturday which cost me almost $400. I am supposed to apply 5 different creams every morning and every evening now. Gosh!! Not that I am complaining as I seriously can feel and see the improvement. However, my face becomes very red now as I have to use Differin in the morning and Stieva-A in the evening. My previous regiment was only Stieva-A on alternate nights and I thought it was quite harsh for my skin.

I can confirm that the 3kg gained in Japan is really weight gain and not 3kg worth of shit. To make things worse, I have been eating like a junk since I returned: 8 packs of Kettle potato chips, 2 McD meals (the new Double Ebi Mentaiko and Cereal), KFC (the new Cheesy Crunch Burger), MOS burger (Osaka-yaki burger and rice burger). My face looks like shit right now and it basically proves that these things are really triggering my acne! Aarrgh.. October is coming and that is my aim to restart my good diet and lifestyle.

Maze Runner: The Scorch Trials at Gold Class

Honestly I don't know what I am going to write about as I am completely lost watching the movie. I watched the first Maze Runner without knowing the synopsis but the movie was able to carry the plot well and I roughly understood what was going on. That was not the case for the sequel Maze Runner: The Scorch Trials.

The Scorch Trials continued from where the first movie ended. The Gladers who just managed to exit the maze was brought to "safety" by a military group. On their journey, they were attacked by zombie-like creatures before being brought to their safe haven. While some cherishes the safety, bed, shower, and food, Thomas felt that they were brought to a prison with the limited freedom they were given. The Gladers learnt that there were many other mazes and those who survived the mazes were gathered at this place. Periodically, a few survivors are called and they are informed that they are transported to a different city where they can finally lead a normal life. Thomas' suspicions remain as all these while, Teresa is always kept separate from the rest.

There is a new guy, Aris, who is introduced as the first guy who arrives in this place until now. Aris shows Thomas the 'secret' on what happens to the people who are being called. They are kept in the room where they are kept barely alive with tubes running through their bodies. Thomas eventually learns that this complex is actually also part of WCKD when he sees the leader of this place communicates with leader of WCKD that Thomas thought had been killed when they escaped the maze. Just because of that, Thomas decides that he has to escape this place, go to the unknown world outside, to find the a group in the mountain which is resisting WCKD. I think that is a very silly thing to do when you have limited knowledge of the world outside and the group that you will be looking for.

Thomas, his roommates, Aris, and Teresa escaped the facility. One of the guys got bitten by the zombie and got infected by the Flare. He then decided to shoot himself rather than turning into zombie as well. With the only hint of a resistance group in the mountains, they cross the desert towards the mountains. When a storm strikes, they run into another facility for shelter and meets Jorge and Brenda. The facility is raided by WCKD but everyone manages to escape and eventually meet the resistance group in the mountain, the Right Arm. During the escape, Brenda was bitten by a zombie and got infected. After meeting the Right Arm, they come across Mary Cooper,an ex-WCKD scientist, who helps to stop Brenda's infection.

If you find everything is confusing from the first movie up to this point, Mary Cooper gives you all the answers. WCKD is looking for the cure against the Flare and the cure cannot be manufactured. The cure can only be harvested from the Immunes. That explains the tubes that drain something from that maze survivors' bodies that Thomas saw before he escaped the WCKD facility earlier in the movie.

The movie reaches the climax when the Right Arm is attacked by WCKD. When Teresa was separated from everyone in the WCKD facility earlier in the movie, something was done to her and she gained her memories. She feels that WCKD has the answer to all these and thus she contacts WCKD on their whereabout. Don't ask me how on earth she contacts the WCKD. The movie ends with WCKD capturing some of the Gladers back while Thomas decides to stay with the remains of the Right Arm to continue their fight in the next movie.

Fiuh... the first movie, which I thought to be so-so, feels so much better after watching this. At least after watching the first movie, I was tempted to read the book. I did not feel that with The Scorch Trials. The plot is very weak and it is just mindless running with everything only revealed in the last part of the movie. The worse part, however, is that it feels that there are no characters in the movie. There is very little character development that they can simply replace the characters and it makes no difference to the plot at all. After all the heroism of Minho and Newt during the escape from the maze, they are reduced to useless and nothing here. So yeah, what kind of movie when there is no plot and no character? Rubbish..

I am still in holiday mood so after knowing that this movie runs for more than 2 hours, I watched this at the Gold Class. Gosh.. What a waste of money.

And joke aside, with the haze back in Singapore, some people made a meme out of this: The Haze Runner. Lol.. A stroke of genius, I would say :)

Sayonara, Japan!

All good time must come to an end and here I am back in hazy Singapore. This morning we took a limousine bus to the airport but the nearest limousine bus was at Metropolitan Hotel. It was not that far from our hotel but we took more than 30 minutes on foot while dragging luggage and lugging the heavy Genie. It was a comfortable ride for less than 2000 JPY. Lucky I was not crazy enough to follow my initial plan to just take a taxi to the airport.

As expected, Genie was almost not allowed to enter the cabin. After a little argument, I was glad that one of the counter staff was understanding enough when he knew that it was a fragile figurine. He said "It must be something precious to you". The immigration officer was rather unfriendly, unlike the one during my arrival. The departure lounge is pretty good although it is still not as good as Changi. I decided to have my last meal in Japan: Japanese curry in the airport.

We saw Mt Fuji from the plane after take off. Great!! Weather was great after we left Tokyo. Huhuhu T_T I decided to finish watching Harry Potter (which hung during my flight last week), slept, and then ate lunch. When it reached me, I was told that the Indonesian meal was no more. No problem as I had been wanting the Japanese meal. Well, it sucked. It was terrible. During transit in Jakarta, I had to put on a pitiful face to ensure that Genie was allowed into the cabin. Haha.. The flight to Singapore was not full and guess what: I had a broken in-flight entertainment screen! What the fish!!

Some personal reflections after this trip:

1) I am not going to take Garuda for any medium or long haul flights anymore. I should have paid $100-$200 more to fly with ANA or JAL which I believe would be much better than Garuda.

2) I realise that when I am travelling, I enjoy sightseeing and camwhoring more than shopping. Shopping always leaves me with negative feelings such as: Am I going to run out of cash? Is my luggage enough? This is so damn bloody heavy and troublesome to carry? and many more. I feel much happier looking at my photos and reminiscing the good memories while camwhoring.

3) I have yet to find a suitable travel mate :( Yes it is fun to have someone with similar otaku-related hobbies but when it comes to shopping, I prefer shopping alone. My friend does not mind helping me taking photos but because he is not into photos as much as me, his skill is not as good as I want to be. Haiz.. And because he is not that into camwhoring, it feels weird if I keep camwhoring alone and ask him to help me take photos in funny places and inappropriate occasions.

4) Japan is great and I am confident to go there by myself subsequently. I went there with zero knowledge of the language and I survived. Yay!! Haha... Honesly, I can imagine going there for a few days just to hog anime/manga related stuff. There are so many cheap second hand anime/manga related goodies which are still in very good conditions.

5) Japanese customer service is really amazing and inspiring. Although I was unable to reply anything that they said (and I am pretty sure they knew I understood no Japanese), the service staff I encountered would still keep on saying those things that they usually say to the locals. In fact, it makes me want to learn Japanese language so that I am able to reciprocate their courtesy. Compare that to myself at work daily, when I am unable to converse, I will just cut short on everything, put on black face, etc. I am inspired to improve on my customer service. Let see how long I am able to emulate such excellent customer service.

6) Okay I can't believe that I am going to write the next paragraph but I am honestly glad that I work in Singapore. WOW!! Haha.. Yes Japan is great and I don't deny that I used to dream of living and working in Japan. This trip has been an eye opener. First, Japan is so big. Heck, even Tokyo is much bigger than Singapore. Being in tiny Singapore, train journey of more than 15 minutes is considered for me. Compare that to my stay in Tokyo, from my hotel at Ikebukuro, going to any major places (eg. Akiba, Tokyo, Ueno, Shinjuku, Shibuya, Shimbashi) takes me at least 30 minutes. In Singapore, that is comparable to travelling from Woodlands to Toa Payoh daily and I really think that is so far. Haha... Second, Japan seems to be a more stressful and workaholic place than Singapore. So yeah, I prefer having slightly better work-life balance and go holiday a few times a year in Tokyo to enjoy myself. Third, transport cost in Japan is much higher than in Singapore. I might not feel the pinch as I used JR pass for most of my transport. There were occasions that JR pass could not be used and each tap could cost anywhere between 200-400 JPY. That is expensive! In Singapore, I think from 1 end of the island to another island cost $3 at the very most. Not to mention that taxi is much more affordable in Singapore. So yeah, I can't really complain a lot about Singapore anymore.

7) I always think that those imported Japanese food or groceries that I can find in Singapore are expensive. Now I am a changed man after seeing the real prices in Japanese. The prices in Singapore, even after conversion to SGD, are actually comparable to the prices in Japan. It is a matter of mindset. I guess when travelling and holding a foreign currency, everything seems to be more affordable. Lol.

I have to unpack now. My room is like a mess not only with the things I bought from Japan personally but also with a lot of things that I bought from Japan online. Haha.. I am so tired to do anything right now..

Japan Trip Day 8: Ikebukuro, Akihabara

A few days ago, I still had the thought of going to see Tokyo Tower and Asakusa before shopping at Akihabara at the last day. I sort of changed my mind. I find Ikebukuro quite far from anywhere so I don't think I want to stay here again the next time I am back to Tokyo. Thus I asked my friend to split our ways today as I wanted to explore Ikebukuro area first before going to Akihabara since Mandarake only opened from 12pm.

I tried going to Ikebukuro north exit area and I thought the area was shady and sleazy. I know there are a lot of clubs and hotels around my hotel but this north exit area made me feel unsafe and uncomfortable. I explored Tobu shopping centre which has Uniqlo on the 9th floor. On the 8th floor, there was Hokkaido food fair from which I bought my dinner tonight.

I had lunch at the same curry shop that I had lunch on the first day and then I explored more shops in Akihabara. If I know how to read Japanese, I would definitely burst my wallet at Book-Off. Some mangas are on sale for 100 JPY each and the condition is still very excellent despite them being 2nd hand. Gosh.. There are opened Kuroko no Basuke Character Bible and Prince of Tennis 10.5, 20.5, 40.5 which I have been tempted to do. Now I know I won't buy them as I can read no shit.

I went to Laox which I promise to avoid. It is like a shop catered to tourists from China. They even have staff from China and when I was there, there was a tour group from China. Bleah.. I got irritated to get "Ni hao! Ni hao!" as I am not one of them for goodness sake!! Yeah.. I don't know what's wrong with my face. So far, the shopkeepers have been treating me as if I am also a Japanese. Mix me with tourists from China and suddenly the shopkeepers thought I am from China. But on a serious note, the shop is pretty good. They have COSPA items, they have kimonos for sale, they also have Conan plushies which I resisted not to buy because my bed is already too full of plushies. I am just being biased.

My main destination today was Mandarake and I just prepared to be thick skinned to get the Final Fantasy Chrome figures. I literally asked the person to open each box although in the end I only purchased 4: Cecil, Tifa, Magic Pot, and Terra. I asked the person if they could ship the items since I have online account and the person replied me something about not by ship but by plane. Okay I gave up! I did not want to offend him. Foreign credit card is accepted and the machine is quite cute. It displays the price in the currency of the credit card and asks customer if they want to pay using own currency or JPY.

I wanted to try Animate cafe but I was still feeling full. I went back to Kotobukiya shop but there was nothing new to buy. I went to buy some Nitro+Chiral artbook from Animate shop. I wanted to buy from the Kebab shop that I had dinner at a few days ago but I reminded myself that there are still so many nice food at Tobu Hokkaido food fair.

I really had fun shopping at the food fair. I bought a beef bento, sweet potato, stuffed squid, some bread from Vie de France bakery, and potato chips from 7-11. I overestimated my eating capability as I only managed to eat the beef bento and stuffed squid. I initially thought it was pregnant squid but it turned out to be squid stuffed with rice. I was famished!!

Finally this is my last night in Tokyo. Haiz.. I will definitely miss this place and I want to return. No wonder I have friends who never fail to come here once a year. There is just no end to eat. I am praying for a safe flight, especially for Genie. Although his box is huge, I measure the dimensions and they don't exceed the allowed cabin luggage.

Japan Trip Day 7: Tokyo Disneyland

I stand corrected about Japanese being workaholic that I thought yesterday. We went out early this morning and it was how Sunday morning should be: less people on the street and the shops which already opened this early on the other days were not open yet. So yeah, they still know how to enjoy Sunday.

Disneyland opens earlier at 8am on Sundays and we reached there about 830. There were already so many people which obviously dampened my camwhoring mood :( I entered the shop before the Disneyland entrance and I was excited to see so many Mickey & Minnie plushies with various exotic Halloween attires. I left a mental note to get 1 pair today.

Just after the entrance, we saw Mickey and Minnie at the public photo taking area. The queue was already snaking and I told my friend to go to Mickey's house first. Upon passing the World Bazaar area, I felt slightly disappointed as it really reminded me of Universal Studios Singapore. Everything looks so fake and man-made. Bleah..

The queue at Mickey's house at Toontown was already snaking and we queued for about 1.5 hours. It started to get cloudy and windy which made the queue more bearable. Sadly the photo taking opportunity was bad. In Paris, after queueing so long, at least we could take photos for few minutes with Mickey without limit whether we want to use our own camera or the official photographer. Over here, only 1 photo allowed per party. What the fuck seriously!! Not to mention that a group of 7 people entered the room at one time and it made the photo taking very awkward. So basically I only had 1 photo taken by the official photographer. At Paris, the official photographer took several photos that I could choose from. Really really big disappointment!

I wanted to take photos with Halloween decorations around the Toon Town area but it got even more crowded after we were done with Mickey. That dampened my mood even more. We decided to sit down and wait for the Halloween parade until it was announced that due to the weather condition, parade would be cancelled and only character meet and greet would take place. We had no idea what it was so we went to the shops at World Bazaar and then queued for buffet lunch at the Crystal Palace. While queuing, only then we realised what character meet & greet meant: it was still like the parade minus the songs and the dancers on the street. So the floats still went through the parade route and the characters still appeared. Due to concerns over the rain, the characters put on raincoat over their costumes. Lol.. We made the right choice of queueing now because after the parade passed by, everyone started to hunt for food and a lot of people started to queue behind us. The lunch buffet cost about 3000+ JPY which I thought very reasonable for a buffet at Disneyland. The food was pretty great too although my stomach really could not handle buffet anymore.

Raincoat over the costumes. Lol...

After lunch we went around each area and the shops were disappointing. I did not see any plush toys and only the shop at Cinderella Castle sell figurines. The Genie that I am hunting for is available. Yaaay!! After that we just spent our time waiting for the Happiness is Here parade and the afternoon Halloween parade. The Halloween parade is shorter than the Happiness is Here parade and I found that really disappointing. They make a big hoo hah about the Halloween special but the Halloween parade is that short. Bah!! 

My friend urged me to quickly buy Genie statue because the Castle area might be closed to prepare for the night show. The statue is really huge!! They did not have a plastic of suitable size and gave me a really oversized plastic (can fit like 3 of the Genie statue there) which made carrying difficult. We went to deposit that in the locker near the entrance. Wew.. thank God for the locker service.. I told my friend that I wanted to have dinner as there would not be anytime to eat after the evening parade and night show.

I don't usually take photos of food. This is an exception because the bun is shaped like Mickey's head.

According to the brochure, patrons are only allowed to start sitting down along the parade route 1 hour before the scheduled parade time. After my dinner, it was still 1.5 hours but people were already sititng down. We also sat down and we were already on the 5th row from the street. Madness!! Thank goodness for the great breeze to make the wait bearable. When I wanted to pee, I decided to walk around and took photos of the Toon Town at night.

Thanks to inconsiderate tourists who ruined my picture!

I did not even come across this at daytime

Halloween decoration in front of Goofy's house

Halloween decoration in front of Donald's house

Halloween decoration in front of Mickey's house

Halloween decoration in front of Minnie's house

The Electrical Parade Dreamlights were amazing!! However it was awkward to see the main Disney characters i.e Mickey and friends appeared on the first few floats. Usually they always appear on the last floats. That dampened the mood of the parade a little bit. I think the parade is amazing because it is really as what the name suggests: they really make full use of lights and light effects to make the whole parade grand and feels out of this world. Not that I am biased but I think the best float is Genie which keeps changing pattern on his body just like how he keeps morphing into other things/characters in the cartoon. Unfortunately, when he started to change patterns, his float already went pass where I was seated. Bleah...

Unfortunately, fireworks were cancelled because of the weather :( So yeah.. 2 trips to 2 different Disneylands and I never experienced the night fireworks. The night ended with Once Upon a Time night show which included some fireworks. The fireworks did not burst into flames in the sky. No wonder they cancelled the fireworks show earlier. Bleah..

Basically all the excitement and the anticipation turned out to be a huge disappointment at the end of the day. I was expecting something even better than Disneyland Paris but it was far off from my expectations. I prefer Disneyland Paris many many times over Tokyo Disneyland for the following reasons:

1) Tokyo Disneyland is too small and in 1 whole day, I circled the whole area at least 3 times. I did not even circle the whole Disneyland Paris once when I went there.

2) Because of the smaller area, human density is also much higher in Tokyo Disneyland. Bleah.. I can't even take a photo with the castle because other tourists are everywhere. Before you judge me crazy for wanting no other tourists in my photos when I am in Disneyland, let me tell you that I manage to have a lot of photos with no other tourists in Disneyland Paris!

3) In Paris, parents brought their children to experience Disneyland while in Tokyo, parents are the ones wanting to enjoy Disneyland. In Paris, it was so difficult to get empty seats for meals while in Tokyo, even during lunch or dinner hours, there were still empty seats at the restaurant. Yep, for the people in Tokyo, waiting for parade is more important than eating. In Paris, I still managed to get the most front seat half an hour before the parade. In Tokyo, I never even got the first row despite waiting >1 hour before the scheduled parades. Crazy!!

4) In the country where cosplay originates, it is not a surprise that the tourists here dress up as Disney characters. Earlier in the day, I thought this was an interesting experience. At the end of the day, I regretted coming during the time when Disneyland allows the patron to cosplay. These cosplayers took photos everywhere. I saw some pictures during other periods and the courtyard in front of the Cinderella Castle was relatively empty. When I went there, the courtyard was literally full of cosplayers the whole day!!

5) Despite the eagerness of Japanese to take pictures, ironically the photo taking opportunities with Disney casts are terrible. In Paris, the photo taking corners are "private" enough to ensure that the photos are taken against an empty background. There is no such dedicated corners in Tokyo and you basically can see other tourists crowding behind you. Terrible.. However, I have to praise the Japanese for their courtesy: they even form a queue to take pictures with the objects around.

6) The shops in Disneyland Paris are generally bigger and there are more varieties of items on sale. Plushies are rare to find in Tokyo while in Paris, they can be found in each shop. In fact, different shops may carry different plushies.

Sad :( But seriously I need to return to Disneyland during Christmas and stay over at the hotel at least once my life time! For now, I need to think how to ensure that Genie flies to Singapore safely.

Japan Trip Day 6: Osaka Castle, Dotonbori

Earthquake is a common occurrence in Japan but I experienced none since I arrived here until this morning when one struck and woke me up even before our alarm rang. The shake was quite strong and the sensation is similar to lying on a spring bed mattress when someone is bouncing on the bed. Come to think of it, I think humans have an innate survival instinct. Just a few seconds before the quake, both my friend and I just naturally awaken, we asked each other if the alarm had set off, and then everything shook.

It is going to be another tiring day with the trip to Osaka estimated to be 3 hours. I bought katsu sandwich (again!) and a colourful bento set which I did not like its smell (as I dislike cooked salmon) although I liked its taste better than the beef tongue that I had on the journey to Kyoto. One observation I saw on the journey is Japan is really more workaholic than Singapore as Saturday morning is equally busy as the weekdays with both working adults and students are already out and about. I felt quite poor thing for the boy sitting next to me in the train: carrying big sports bag (looks like going to school for his CCA) and falling asleep after reading less than 1 page of his English text book. That is coming from someone who is used to reading notes on the bus journey and falling asleep even until last year when I part-time studied on top of full-time work. Lol.

At Osaka, my friend's friend became our guide. Yay! We went to a post office first to ship my anime books, except for the super heavy Art of Gundam book. The total weight was about 5kg and it cost 6000 JPY to ship by EMS. It looks like my anime books will be in Singapore even before me. Lol..

Then we went to Osaka Castle. With the typhoon completely dissipated, the heat reminded me of the summer in Europe when I went there in 2013. I think there were some competitions going on as there were groups of students performing Japanese traditional dance and cheering. There should be a term for such thing but I don't know. I find it exciting to watch as we don't have such school activity in Indonesia or in Singapore.

One of the canals surrounding the castle

The back of Osaka Castle where we came from

Osaka Castle is definitely a place I have to visit again. Due to time constraint, we only went to the main castle although the are still other interesting things around the castle complex. I also felt awkward my friend's friend around and I did not camwhore as much as I wanted to :( There is a glass lift at the main face of the castle and it really ruins the facade. We went up to the museum which is smaller than I expected. But the highlight for me is the 300 JPY photo taking opportunity with samurai helmet and vest. Me being a peasant chose the grandest looking helmet with multiple horns (can't find any picture of it online). I don't know what the helmet represents. The helmet is so heavy and I have no idea how people would wear such things in the past. Sadly the picture taken by my friend's friend was bad with my foot being cut. Darn!! I did not know there was such photo taking opportunity and my choice of shirt did not complement the helmet and vest too. Bleah.. Next time.. Anyway I was also handed a real samurai to pose with but I was only allowed to unsheath it halfway. So imagine how boring the poses that I could make with an impractically heavy helmet la.

We had tempura for lunch and I made the right choice not to be so greedy and get the meal with 4 pieces of prawn. I ordered the meal with 2 prawns and the rest were vegetable tempura. Hohoho.. We then went to Dotonbori which is amazing and I really find those giant shop decorations impressive. I already kept my camera and it was too crowded for me to take photos. We passed by the famous Glico board but again because there were too many people, I did not take a photo. On our way back, we passed it again from the other side where it was less crowded but it was getting dark so I did not think I would get a nice picture anyway.

We went to Mandarake which unfortunately did not have Final Fantasy Chrome figures that I was looking for. Their used books sections were also appetising but I kept reminding myself that I still have Disneyland and Mandarake Akiba to shop for the next 2 days.

We had takoyaki dinner before returning to Tokyo. I saw people carrying Tokyo Disneyland plastic bags which made me really excited for tomorrow. Hehe.. And although I thought Japanese are workaholic this morning, it is not as bad as expected as in the evening, there are less people and the train frequency decreases too. These are signs of decreasing human activity as the day comes into a close.

Aaah.. Osaka is definitely a place that I will return and I will definitely have to stay for a few days to experience it fully. I definitely want to return to Dotonbori to see those shop displays in their full neon lighting and I want to explore Osaka Castle surrounding. Osaka feels more touristy than Tokyo as I saw tourists everywhere. That is not exactly a good thing as I hate coming across those noisy inconsiderate tourists from China.

Oh I almost forgot that at Osaka Castle, I got a souvenir coin with Mickey against Osaka Castle background for 500 JPY. It is a similar coin as those available in Europe tourists attractions. Minnie coins, surprisingly, already out of stock. What makes it even more special is that next to it, there is a machine for you to engrave something at the coin for 30 JPY. I engraved my name on the coin. Hehe.. The date is also automatically engraved. Based on what you want to engrave, the machine will adjust the spacing between the letters accordingly. How cool and genius!

Japan Trip Day 5: Hakone, Gotemba

Today is another disappointing day as I failed to see Mt Fuji. The weather forecast of sunny with 20% chance of being cloudy was accurate. Despite it being much better than the weather for the past few days, it was not good enough to see Mt Fuji. Sad :(

About the journey itself, my friend gave me 2 options: by Shinkansen or by JR which are not exactly 2 different options since from Ikebukuro, the total journey time with both options would be similar. Both options also end up at Odawara where we have to change to Hakone Tozan Railway. The platform for Hakone Tozan Railway was amazing: it was really huge and open. I could feel the cooling mountain breeze and I thought I was underdressed today. Lol.. I was wearing berms as the forecast for today was sunny with 20% chance of being cloudy and hence I thought it would be rather warm.

We went 3 stations away and then we changed to a bus. I could not remember the station where we stopped. I really enjoyed the journey. The sound of the train and the mountain breeze were really relaxing and I fell asleep. I would love to walk about and take pictures at where we were supposed to change for the bus but the bus arrived in less than 5 minutes after we reached there so I did not have the chance. Bleah..

We took the bus all the way up to Hakone-machi and the journey was not exactly very nice. The roads in Japan are typically narrow and just nice for 1 vehicle per lane. Coupled that with the winding road, I got somewhat giddy with the journey and I don't normally get any motion sickness. The sights along the way was not as good as expected. I always thought Hakone is a popular tourist attraction and I was expecting great sights along the way. So where were those beautiful pictures of Hakone sia??

Surprisingly, it was less cold and breezy at Hakone-machi than at the train station at Odawara earlier. Mt Fuji was nowhere to be seen and after a few pictures around Lake Ashi, I started to feel bored and disappointed. While waiting for the sightseeing cruise, I finally managed to figure out what wrong with my camera setting. I fixed one problem and I found another problem with the battery. Sigh.. The screen showed battery was full but after taking 1 picture, the battery would just drop. But when I turned off and on the camera again, the battery status was full again. Rinse and repeat. Grraaaah!! What did my sister do to the camera sia!!!

So cloudy that Mt Fuji was nowhere to be seen

Our destination was to Togendai and the cruise made a brief stop at Moto-Hakone. Mt Fuji was really nowhere to be seen. Huhuhu... I regret I did not disembark at Moto-Hakone. I thought Hakone Shrine (I am sure you have seen the famous torii facing the lake which I always thought as facing the sea) is not accessible on foot! Bleah.. I would love to take a picture at the torii. There was nothing special at Togendai. I initially wanted to take the cable car but it was closed due to some volcanic activity in the area. Sad.. At Togendai, we waited for about 40 minutes until the next bus which will bring us to Gotemba JR station.

That famous torii by the lake...

Even trees are interesting when I had to kill the time when waiting for the bus

There is a free shuttle bus to Gotemba Premium Outlets every half an hour. Gotemba Premium Outlets is the where the pictures of a street lined up with shops and Mt Fuji stands tall at the background are taken. Weather was too cloudy to see any shadow of Mt Fuji. Haiz.. If you like branded goods, you will enjoy shopping here. I am not a fan so I was not too excited.

Gotemba Premium Outlets

We decided to return to Tokyo from JR Gotemba. We reached the station when the train just departed. Gotemba is like a village far in a mountain and the train frequency is like once every 45 minutes. Great! We had to stone for 45 minutes at the station. Call me crazy but I ended up camwhoring at an empty train station to kill time. Haha... I think we were somewhere that was not meant for tourists as there was no English display on the train but there was English announcement. The train was stuffy (where is the mountain breeze when I needed them?!) and I saw scenes of villages/small towns in mountains. It was pretty but not as pretty as the lady who sat opposite me. Haha.. When she alighted, her umbrella fell towards my knees and she apologised. Kyaaa... I am so sorry I could not reply you that it was okay.

We took Shinkansen from Odawara back to Tokyo and we waited for close half an hour for the Shinkansen. In Shinagawa and in Kyoto, all trains stopped to pick up passengers. That is not the case for Odawara as some trains just blazed past the stations and there only I appreciate how fast and how ear piercing the noise when a bullet train passes by. Ziiing...

We ate ramen on our journey back to hotel and I really think the Japanese ramen standard in Singapore is pretty good that I find the ramen here normal. I bought more potato chips and drinks from 7-11. I really want to find a special or exotic Japanese tea drinks but so far I really never find one. In Singapore, I enjoy Ayataka green tea which has 0 sugar and I hate those sweetened tea. In Japan, most of the bottle tea has no sugar that makes me crave for a sweetened tea which I can't seem to find.

Aaah.. time really flies.. It is already Saturday tomorrow :(