We Want To Go To Japan!

Tadaima!

2009-07-07T20:03:00.002+01:00

Good day everyone and　ようこそ　みんな! It has been a very long time since the last post due to.. oh lets call it a case of 'life' and 'reality' setting over us. Now I believe reopen this blog and continue discussing the long forgotten plan of going to Japan!

Now during the blog's downtime SOME of us did manage to go to Japan, but! The ultimate goal of this blog is to go there as a group and enjoy the sights, sounds and people together!

Now that not all of us are students and can't just have long holidays, the longest we could stay for our trip would be 1 week. That's a whopping 9 (Friday to the next Sunday) days! Therefore this would either mean doing everything we've planned so far within those 9 days or spending more quality time enjoying one city/region and plan to return another time in the future for the other regions! The former would be very unpractical and tiring as we'd have to travel all over the country and would not get enough time to slow down and relax. We shall therefore focus on one region while trying to do as many of the planned activities within our reach!

Obviously we have to go to Tokyo first because.. well most of what we (well I do anyway) want to do is primarily there and the surrounding areas! I won't list them out because that would mean going back through the archives and finding what we had planned before (yes.. I have forgotten everything). The planned time would be sometime in the summer of 2010 and therefore the first course of action is to see who is coming along with us so that we could figure out how much it would cost for a return journey and accommodation. On that note, you shall all spread the word! Count the heads and we shall continue from there! In the mean time, when I do manage to find the time.. and when I'm bothered to I shall make a rough plan of what we're going to do for the 9 days in Tokyo.

Jom ke CC!

2009-03-21T20:59:00.003Z

I present to you Case A: Link

And as the great Takasu Ryuji once said, "We'll stay in a business hotel or maybe even a manga cafe for now.."
Kids, I believe this is a cheap alternative to a hotel.. love or no love.

Love Hotels

2009-03-10T02:07:00.003Z

There's no doubt that we'll visit a love hotel, but which ones?!

Hello Kitty S&M Room (bed), Hotel Adonis, Osaka, Japan

Vending Machine with Vibrators

Kufufu.

Oi ~ Kagamin ~

2008-12-21T15:29:00.004Z

Am absolutely appalled that this hasn't been updated in months, but not to worry, we shall have a real life massu on my birthday soon nyahahah!

We should be doing some pretty otakuey activities such as prancing around in London with neko-mimis on and maybe go read mangas at forbidden planet. =.=

How I wish there's a maid cafe in London!

Themed Activities

2008-10-21T19:58:00.004+01:00

I figured that since we're going to be spending a lot of time in the land of the rising sun, might as well set some activities to keep us busy.
Therefore I propose that we go around Japan in search for places that look like the opening for Lucky Star to take pictures of us in them reenacting those scenes. More specifically, these:

A field

Torii next to some shop house

Next to a zebra crossing

In front of what looks like a school

Initial research (2 minutes on Wikipedia) shows that the anime is based in the city of Kasukabe in the Saitama Prefecture. It's north east of central Tokyo and takes about 25minutes by train to reach... so if we're bored/hardcore enough we could pay that place a visit and maybe uhh.. walk around and do stuff?? Ok it seems more and more unlikely this is possible as it's quite out of the way and we're not guaranteed to find those places. What's important here is the intriduction of themed activities! So if anyone else comes up with any activities please feel free to share them!

[edit] So even though it's not relevant anymore, I've found the places in Japan that was shown in Lucky Star. This is the shrine where Kagami is dancing in front of and this and this shows comparison shots between the anime and real life. I'm not obsessed.. I'm not I'm not I'm not. [/edit]

Kit List

2008-10-07T21:16:00.006+01:00

Since the concensus was to travel light, may I suggest the following items that should be prepared for the tentatively 2 weeks trip.

Rucksack
Any 25-35 litre rucksack from a dependable, sound outdoor make (Berghaus, Lowe Alpine, The North Face, Osprey etc) should comfortably hold clothes, pared-down toiletries, notebook and various pamphlets/brochures if need be, travel towel and chargers for extended periods of time. Look out for features such as rain covers, back ventilation, storage management and style. It wouldn't work if you think it looks shytez.
Budget <£100

Toiletries
Shampoo, face wash and shower cream in individual 100ml bottles for each person should last two weeks. Light travel towels are available from outdoor equipment shops as well, providing massive size with very little bulk. They tend to stink though as synthetic materials attract bacteria. A rinse with clean water after use and hung to air for the night should do the trick. They dry within the hour. An interesting problem to note, since we're travelling light, there's bound to be laundry. How does buying washing powder/detergent in Japan and wash clothes at night sound? Hotels and ryokans will provide yukatas to be worn during your stay with them anyway.
Budget <£50

Clothing
Throwing all sense of fashion out the window, best things to wear would be trekking trousers which are lightweight, comfy airy and quick dry and microfibre shirts covered with a softshell jacket. Since not everyone is like me, I suggest whatever stuff you like (that is suitable for wet autumnal times), enough for 3-4 changes. Inclusive of whatever undergarments and socks. Prepare something to keep off the rain. Umbrellas would be good but unpractically bulky. Waterproofs are expensive and probably to hot for the weather. I'd go for the aforementioned softshell jacket. As far as footwear goes, comfort's t3h word. That, and good grippy soles for variety of terrain. 'nuff said.
Budget £200-300

Other
A nifty little hidden travel pouch is a good idea. Passports, ID and money can go in there. As far as camera gear and bags go, I leave it up to Chee-kun. Thats about it really. A laptop, if we're really hard-pressed. Max size should not exceed 14.1" widescreen. Weight shouldn't be more than 4 kilograms all in.

Anything else?

Sabishi~

2008-10-05T02:03:00.002+01:00

It's been a while since this is updated, I wonder why.

Well I suppose everyone's been slacking pretty much and I've been busy since I have to go to classes. =.=

Chee-kun has failed to get Lonely Planets' guidebook to Japan owing to teh fact that it seems to be sold out in every single bookshop! There are still some copies left in WHSmith over here though... :3

And since it is also scheduled to be updated in 2009, Chee-kun figured we can wait till then.

On another note, Yo Sushi! is having this insane promotion which says that if you eat 10 or more plates, you shall have 5 plates free! (the plates with the lowest prices of course)

NOM!

Structure and Backbone!

2008-09-23T14:07:00.002+01:00

In our couple of weeks of mass convo’ing, there’s been tonnes and tonnes of really good ideas and t3h shizzle for our activities while in Nippon. However, the problem of having too many to do arises, for at the moment, the amount of time we’re going to spend on this uber holiday is still undecided.

I put forth a suggested length between two to three weeks, tentative! Now that we sort of know the ballpark, we can flesh out the itinerary (which Jeng-san is very good at. Down to the last freaking minute. Bloody engineer =.=)

Tokyo and Kyoto will be a must for our first edition of this bi-annual trip to Japan! Haahaha. Definitely. We can stay cheap in Tokyo but maybe at some place more mid range in Kyoto. Gion Matsuri or no Gion Matsuri?
Another must is to splurge on at least one night at a traditional ryokan! The good ones. With Kaiseki!
Then we is has to go to DisneySea. Because I never got to go when it first opened. Nyah.

Another consideration is budget. A wild guess takes us into the £2500 - £3000 region for the whole trip. This is assuming that prices do not increase more than 15% and inflation not being taken into account.

Last decision to be made is to whether we want to travel light or not. Let me know and I’ll see if I can comes up with a plan and kit list. Jeng-san can be designated cameraman. He reckons that he’d have his DSLR by 2010. Hopefully.

Osu! Discuss.

Travel Plan

2008-09-23T00:36:00.002+01:00

So after many discussions I believe we have a vague idea of what we're going to do in Japan. For now, plans are to touchdown at Kansai Airport where we would take a train to Kyoto, our base of operations for the Kansai region. Then for the next few days we would attend the Gion Matsuri festival and visit neighbouring cities Kobe, Osaka and Nara. This is estimated to take around 4-5days.

Next region would be the Gifu prefecture which includes Nagoya, Shirakawa-go and Takayama. This part of the journey has a more traditional theme and it looking more and more likely that we would skip this area completely. This is because each stop only has attraction (that we're interested in), and due to time constraints and the distance between them it does not seem practical. But who knows! Maybe after more detailed research and planning we might find a way to fit this into our plan!

The last and final part of our trip is in Tokyo and its surrounding regions. This includes Disneyland, Disneysea, Kamakura and the Mt Fuji area. A big proportion of this would be spent in Tokyo itself where we would be visiting the places in our list. Thus if all goes well during the planning stage, we would head to Narita Airport and head back home at the end of our trip.

The trip can be separated into 3 sections; Kansai, Gifu and Tokyo. I will write a more in-depth article about these sections when we have a more definate plan!

[Note] We intend to splurge on a Ryokan somewhere in our plans but are still undecided on the what, where and how. But fear not! It will be included.

Onsen

2008-09-21T16:16:00.003+01:00

After searching through a list of all the wonderful onsen's available in Japan, I believe Atami would be the best for us. It is known as one of the san dai onsen (try and guess that what means) and being on the Tokkaido line, we could stop over for a day before going to Tokyo (or to Osaka.. depending on where we start our trip). Also anyone with an interest in diving could give that a try over there.. although I doubt we'd have the time or money to do that along with everytihng else we have planned for Japan.
I haven't found much information on the Hotels or Ryokan's there but that will be up soon!

Day Trips

2008-09-21T15:06:00.004+01:00

Kamakura - From Tokyo
If you want to visit Japanese Bhuddist temples may I suggest a day trip to Kamakura. This small town is situated south of Tokyo and is abuot 30mins away by train although a slower and cheaper 90minute train is available. There's temples, a giant bhudda statue and beaches around this area which I think would make a great day trip away from the hustle and bustle of Tokyo! Local delicacies include Hatosabure which is a pigeon shaped biscuit and the purple potato soft ice cream (紫-芋ソフト) which I'd imagine looking a lot like yam ice cream, mmm...

Nara - From Osaka/Kyoto
This town is conveniently located east of Osaka and south of Kyoto. It's a historical town with many temples, statues and parks. Travel time from Osaka and Kyoto are both 35 minutes although cheaper and slower trains are available (slowest would run about 50mins).

Specialties include Narazuke (some sort of melon pickle with a strong distinct taste), handmade brushes and ink and Nara sarashi (cloth). The local delicacies include kaki-no-hazushi (which is sushi wrapped in persimmon leaves), somen (do I even need to describe what this is?) and food products made from Kudzu (some sort of vine).

There's a Kansai Thru-Pass which allows unlimited usage of trains, buses and subways in the Kansai region (excluding all JR trains). What this means for us is that for 5000yen, we can freely travel between Osaka, Nara and Kyoto within the 3 days. Other towns that we could travel to with this pass are Kobe and Wakayama, but with as the tickets are only valid for 3 days we won't be able to visit that many places. If any of you are interested in visiting these places we could put aside another 2 or 3 days (along with another Kansay Thru-Pass) to visit them.

Accommodation

2008-09-20T16:15:00.003+01:00

I've found a couple of potential places that we could stay at from journals of gaijin-sans and they've recommended these to stay at since they're supposed to be very good for the value of your money as well as being quite cheap.

Mk-san enquired if we're going to an onsen, and I think unless we're going to stay at the onsen for the night too, the experience simply would not be complete! (ie. yukata wearing, banquet after teh bath with wonderful sashimi nom nom)

However, we would need to find somewhere more economical rather than having to spend over a hundred pounds for one night. :(

A teaser! :

Map of Japan

2008-09-19T10:16:00.004+01:00

Because I'm n00b and have no geographical skills whatsoever, I shall add this map of Japan (actually it's a Shinkansen map, but it doubles up to tell us where these places are in Japan and what train lines access them). Clickity click to enlarge!

(Map based on Wikipedia artwork by Sekicho and used under the GNU Free Documentation License)

Places We Have To Visit.

2008-09-19T00:16:00.007+01:00

This is an ever growing list of places we have to visit when we get to Japan!
(Last updated 21/9/2008)

Tokyo

Akiba
Anna Millers
Cat Cafe
Comiket
Ghibli Museum
Kamakura
Love Hotel
Manga Cafe
Tsukiji Fish Market
Hanabi Taikai

Izu

Atami (onsen)

Chiba

Disneyland

Gifu

Shirakawa-gō
Takayama

Iga

Ninjas!

Kyoto

Gion Matsuri

Osaka

Kaiyukan

Nagoya

Nagoya Castle

Things We Have To Eat

2008-09-18T22:09:00.007+01:00

Because I like organised lists, this is a going to be about the food that we have to eat. Divided into main course type things, snacks and desserts/other. May include where we have to eat said things.

(Last updated 26/9/08)

Snacks and Desserts

Anmitsu
Anpan
Castella / Kasutera
Chinsuko
Dango
Dorayaki
Fried ice cream
Hakuto jelly
Imagawayaki
Kakigori
Melonpan
Onigiri
Pocky
Taiyaki
Takoyaki
Yakitori

Main Course

Bento
Croquette
Instant noodles
Kareee~
Okonomiyaki
Omuraisu
Ootoro
Sushi/sashimi at Tsukiji!
Yakisoba pan
Yoshigyu
Zaru soba (it IS summer right?)

Gion Matsuri

2008-09-18T22:09:00.005+01:00

I want to go to Gion Matsuri! Because it happens throughout the entire month of July it seems like a good plan to drop by whenever. Although I think the main event is on July 17th, a parade of some description.

Therefore I suggest we make a trip to Kyoto as well!

Will start up a section on festival we have to go to if I can collect enough information on festivals. Hehe.

Hai hai Chrissy desu~

2008-09-16T17:03:00.004+01:00

Hi, Chrissy reporting in for duty! I haven't had much discovery since my last post but I've been stalking various blogs via google in order to research for our ultimate trip to the land of the rising sun!

For instance, I've found Eddie who had gone to Tokyo and Hokkaido in his trip and actually stayed in the ryokan that I quite like - Hotel Edoya~ He's been very helpful and gave us a rough estimate of his budget:

depends on where you are visiting. I visited Tokyo and Hokkaido.
SQ Sin to Japan Return Flight + Tokyo to Hokkaido Return Flight cost me at S$1,800.
Hotel was about S$50 per room/night in Tokyo. S$120 per room/night in Hokkaido.
All of the above plus shopping, food and other transportation will add up to about S$3,500. Where do you intend to go?

It's important to keep in mind though that ideally we would like to spend around 2 weeks there and cover more locations than that despite it may be difficult to jam pack everything into our tight schedule.

It's gone down to 2 weeks since Chee Jeng made a point about that being the maximum leave for a person who has a job, so... That made me think a little of how this trip could be done in the xmas break which means we can probably enjoy onsen even more... Phoaar! This is just a thought though, I'm not too sure if I would want to miss the hanabi taikai and the various festivals that are organised throughout the summer. :/

Oh, I've also tried looking up the prices of flight tickets from London to Tokyo, and it seems that it's ranging from £700 for the summer, whereas it is muuuuch cheaper in the winter and spring from about £400-£600. Could it be that it's expensive because it's too early to look it up now or it's always been expensive in the summer? =.=

I shall spam more later!

What's to eat in Japan! - Part 1

2008-09-15T22:57:00.003+01:00

I'm going to blatantly use wikipedia's article as a gospel on how we should aim to tackle this problematic issue, as is always the case when a bunch of Malaysians get together. Typical =.=

Anyway! For Part 1 desu, we shall take a look at the myriad of snacks and sweets that we shall have to get our hands on the moment we step off the plane. It's straight to the convenience store for a box of Pocky and a bottle of Calpis (or Aquarius or Pocari Sweat, depending on one's tastes or curiousity). If the Calpis wasn't enough to wash down the the biscuity aftertaste, may I suggest a cone of soft serve green tea ice cream, hopefully available from assorted shops and such... hopefully.

Moving on, as part of our visit to the Senso-ji in Asakusa, traditional snacks like dango sticks, takoyaki, anpan, dorayaki, melon pan, mochi, aforementioned green tea soft serve (!) and much much more can be found along Nakamise-dori, on the way in. And out the back. Awesome place to buy omiyage for so-called friends who didn't come along for this trip because they weren't happening enough. Oh we can offer prayers at Senso-ji as well, which is a shrine dedicated to Kannon Bosatsu (Goddess of Mercy, Guan Yin et al).

Keep a look out on anyone or place selling nikuman (char siu pau), butaman and manju too. I want to try those. Nomz. Amanatto sounds interesting as well. I've not tried it on my last trip to Japan, but seeing that it looks really interesting on wikipedia, I'll put it in here anyway. Others include fried ice cream, Hakuto jelly, imagawayaki, kakigori (ais kacang! woot~), castella / kasutera, anmitsu and possibly chinsuko, though it doesn't look very appetising.

When we were still cute children, occasionally we'd be given biscuits made in the mould of fishes and packaged in bright red or blue or yellow plastic 'baskets' and we'd be so reluctant to eat them but once we do they're gone within minutes. Taiyaki is the Japanese equivalent. Find it. Buy it. Eat it. And relive our bygone days~

I think I stop here la. Next I shall go on about Brother Sperm's 'Day in the life of an Otaku - Mealtimes'.

Nomz to all!

Sumidagawa Fireworks Festival

2008-09-15T21:18:00.002+01:00

If we want to go to the Sumidagawa Fireworks Festival, we'll have to be in Japan in the last Saturday of July, which is 31st July 2010.

Which is probably cutting it a bit fine for me because I have to be back to start work in August >.< Nyooooooooo~

But otherwise it means that July is probably a good time to go?

The "how-to" to the "have-to"

2008-09-15T21:05:00.000+01:00

So as you all may have noticed the "have-to" lists on the right have been changed. Now when you click on them they will link you to the related post. Feel free to add any other have-to lists and link them in the same format as the rest of the list.
Now as I'm kinda finicky about these things, I will lay down several rules regarding these lists.

You are free to add anyting you like to the lists as long as they are relevant
When adding to the list please arrange them in alphabetical order
After editing the list please change the "last updated" date

That's about it for the rules. Please try and follow them.. it's just so that the blog looks more organised :p
May the NOM be with you!

Poor day

2008-09-15T20:57:00.000+01:00

Looking at the "to-do" list, I realised that we could group some of them together in a day as some sort of theme. Therefore I propose an otaku day! This means having instant noodle breakfast, bento lunch and uhh... instant noodle dinner?
This also means that we could go do otaku stuff throughout the day to match the theme such as visiting Akihabara and the arcades!

Things We Have To Do

2008-09-15T20:52:00.003+01:00

Here's a list of a bunch of things we have to do in Japan!
(Last updated 21/9/2008)

Drink tea and sake from each area we visit
Hot beverage from vending machines
Karaoke
Purikura
Ramen stall
Shinkansen
Sleep on Tatami mat
Sushi-Ya
Wear yukatas

To start things off!

2008-09-15T13:56:00.000+01:00

The main reason why this will be in summer 2010 is because... We need more time to collect the money for our budget which will no doubt be quite a large sum of money, and most of us won't be available for a trip this coming summer! The budget has not been discussed owing to the fact that we are not sure when, where and how long we'll be staying there for. In my opinion, I think the most important thing is to have all our comrades suggest places that they would like to visit, and we'll decide time slots for that later.

At the moment, we've figured that we would very much like to try or vist these places:

Love hotel
Maid Cafe
Comiket
Hanabi Taikai
Shinkansen
Tsukiji Fish Market
Osaka

Karaoke
Purikura
Manga Cafe
Akiba
Wear yukatas!
Onsen...? Maybe in the next trip :(