Day 2 was a very cold day!!! we puffed vapour out when we breathed. it was quite fun at first when it was still novel. but it was raining as well and soon all we did was to huddle around and stomp our feet to get rid the cold.
buffet breakfast was rather good. they had sunny-side ups in mini tin foil cups which were rather cute.
went to visit the todaiji temple. think it's famous because the statue of buddha inside is huge. and they sort of made the statue first then build the temple itself..something like that huh
miz BEE! jap students crawling through some hole in the pillar..think your wish would get granted or something..not very sure..
and people bought these small wooden thing to write their wishes (i guess! cause i don't know jap) and hang it up on this board
and right outside the todaiji temple was the nara deer park..where all the deers have their horns shaved off so all is left is a stump.
the deers were so cute! they kept coming to us cause they thought we had food for them. i wonder whether they were cold too..i was shivering under my coat...
i can't believe i see bernice touching a deer.
the outside of the temple also had this scary looking statue. you had to donate some money and make a wish. the red coat itself pretty much left me gawking at it.
bernice and i coming in from the cold...brr..
the funny thing was after we visited the nara deer park, the very same night at the hotel they had this documentary about the deers. but i kept missing the deers on tv cause i was either in the toilet or packing my stuff or just not looking at the screen at all. every single time bernice shouted 'nara deer nara deer!' i looked at the tv and saw this metallic green dung beetle eating the nara deer's poo. damn pissed..
lunch was at this touristy building where they sold souveniors and had this kimono fashion show..
i forgot whether this shows you how silk is made or whether it's to be eaten..most probably the former yeah?
we had tempura for lunch..
this and all sorts of keychains and stuff with jap prints were found in the touristy place.
after lunch we headed to the kiyomizu temple which was just breathtaking-ly beautiful and tranquil.
maple leaves were everywhere...
and it's one of the candidate of the 7 wonders of the world...
because it looked like this..the main hall of the temple is supported by just logs..and this was built like centuries ago..
i don't know what significance this has..but it's something like the word of the year or something..
when i took this picture, i didn't know the man was praying so fervetly..
i guess this is something like the write your wish and tie it here sort of thing
a waterfall flows through the temple since it's up on a hill and you can drink it through this erm thing here..
this seems like a really cute version of the red-cloaked scary thing earlier on in the todaiji temple
here's bernice and i with some jap girls all dressed up for a trip to the temple
more maple leaves ooooh! i really love them maple leaves oh so pretty
Beneath the main hall is the waterfall Otowa-no-taki, where three channels of water drop into a pond. Visitors to the temple collect the water, which is believed to have therapeutic properties, from the waterfall in metal cups or commemorative plastic cups. It is said that drinking the water of the three streams confers health, longevity, and success in studies.
Miz bee with the maple leaves..
on the path down from the temple, there are lots of street side stalls..and they sell the green tea ice cream that we can find in singapore too..they have the sesame version which is pretty good too
more touristy stuff
had dinner at our hotel for the night at this restaurant called Le Mage
they had pictures of witches on broomsticks everywhere..nice!
that night we headed to the supermarket beside the hotel and shopped a ton! i bought rabbit food for S$1.34 and guess what..Bitbit loves it to bits...we also bought makeup and Asahi beer and jap snacks!
here's me with my newly-bought hair-curlers and a yukata..
kay i know i look chunky in the yukata so no laughing! the scary thing is that the next morning the tour guide told us live people were supposed to wear the right flap under the left..and i did so the other way!!! only dead people wore it the way i did! ARGH!!!!
Japan Trip (15 Dec 06 - 24 Dec 06) - DAY 1
Japan was really great. so great i got japan withdrawal pangs right after i got back all the way 'til now. my sister swore that she'd be heading back after her A's once she earned enough dosh to do so. With my new addiction to travelling, i do wish i'd have the money to follow her as well! The 7 days in Japan was really short but sweet so here goes....
After feeling a little mournful leaving dear Bitbit at the bunnysitter place, the flight details board showing our departure time made me feel a little better. After all, it's been 3 years since i've last been outside of Singapore. Moreover, it's Japan we're heading to!! A totally new different culture that's 5 hours away for us to get immersed in.
While waiting for check-in, our family went to Macs to wait out the time til boarding. Here's bernice with my dad's ray-bans.
I really love travelling around Christmas. what with the festive mood and everyone being a tad bit more relaxed.
saw this during check-in. so apt!
we had lots of luggage security checks during check-in. this was a first for us. we were thinking it was because of 9-11 and all the increased terrorists threat UNTIL i spotted lee hsian loong. turns out he was on the same plane as us!
bernice going crazy in duty-free!
smiles all round once we reached osaka airport
bernice and i our bus for the next 5 days!
my daddy at the entrance of universal studios!
universal studios was designed to be like an old english town. see the huge spiderman montage thingy in the background. that was the only ride we took that day. the queue just went on and on and on. we walked at least 1km from the back of the queue til the actual ride. it was good and thrilling though!
we were not feeling very experimental that day so we just had pizza and pasta for lunch.
we also sat down on the cold pavements to watch this grand procession that had lots of jap kids and parents queuing since the early morning just to get the best seats for. we didn't bother queuing so early so we had to watch the procession from one of the alleyways through which the floats would pass by. and sitting on the pavement in the cold weather is no joke man. my butt could feel the cold through my jeans the moment i plonked my butt down. i had to sit on my coat to keep warm. just think what all the people queuing from the morning had to endure. owells! i did rem them sitting on mats..for all you know they may be electrical heat-generating mats. we were in japan afterall!
the queue for the rides that day were just pure madness. we queued 3 hours just for one spiderman ride. after that we didn't have enough time for any other rides. my mum's knee was giving her problems as well so bernice and i left our parents to explore the rest of universal studios. since there was no time for rides, we did the next most interesting thing - PHOTOWHORE!!
then we found the souvenior shop with all the funky hats and just went crazy trying them on!
bernice soooo cute!!
i can't believe macs sold the shrek headband for 2 bucks. it was at least 8 times this price over in japan!
before leaving universal studios, i remember wanting to get a little momento before leaving, thus i had to queue about 15 minutes to get a little elmo soft toy keychain. the elmo was really little..say not more than 5cm in height. But it cost like around S$10. and jap people all around me were lugging like huge soft toys and memorabillia to the cashiers. i rem feeling a little bashful paying for the small puny thing i had. and in japan you had to put your cash on this small little metal tray instead of handing it directly to the cashier. whatever change that belongs to you would be returned on the very same tray.
because we had to queue so long, we were late to return to the bus where the tour group was waiting for us. both bernice and i had to practically RUN all the way to our bus. and never had i run this fast for such a long time. and then we almost couldn't find our bus. i mean the tour guide gave us the parking lot number for the lot the bus was parked. but we were late. and i couldn't rem whether it was something like lot 56 or 65..in addition to that the carpark was HUGE! somehow we managed to find the bus. and running in cold weather felt extremely good for some reason.
dinner was at this place near shinsaibashi, a well-known shopping street in osaka.
we had to remove our shoes and place them into small locker like compartments and retain this wooden key to retrieve our shoes after our meal.
dinner was buffet steamboat and the food was surprisingly good. given that there was little meat and lots of vegetables and mushrooms!
after dinner we explored the shopping alley of shinsaibashi a little.
the famous moving mechanical crab of osaka
and not forgetting that japan is hello kitty crazy land
my only buy that night was a shiseido blotting paper just because the packaging looked rather nice.
we stayed at ramada hotel that night and the place was clean, comfy and good.
i spent a little time with the toilet bowl, trying to figure out the different functions. ahaha..they had sprays or bidet. have no idea what's the difference, i guess it's up to your preference. it even had this knob for adjusting the intensity of the water pressure! and the toilet seat heats up everytime it detects pressure. it was weird getting used to in the beginning. cause everytime you sat down on the toilet bowl, it would start making same sort of whirling sound. rather scary at first!
our toilet seemed as if it was in this tiny box.
and the toiletries provided was from shiseido. normally i don't like using hotel shampoos. but that night, i tossed aside my pantene shampoo and used the provided shampoo happily!
and right before bernice and i hit the beds, i discovered that out of the 2 pillows that were provided, one of them had grainey stuff in them! sort of like barley grains stuffed pillow! bernice and i laughed over it for awhile with bernice swearing off using the weird pillow. i tried sleeping on it and surprisingly, i had a rather good sleep, given how hard the pillow was!
