Tokyo, Japan - Part Two.

 

Peachyyyyyy.

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DAY FOUR

This was the day I was looking forward the most. I recovered from what I was suffering for the past few days and was going to Disneyland! I'm not a kid anymore but I love amusement parks a lot. It's been such a long time since I sat on a roller coaster.

Fetching us to Disneyland was a Taiwanese lady. It's great to speak Chinese to someone else other than my mother since the we can't speak Japanese. The Japaneses' English aren't really that good either.

Even though it's a weekday, the theme park is still flooded with people. We noticed that majority of the customers are the locals. I was even more surprised when I saw a big group of school students in their uniform at the park. They were on a field trip, and I thought I didn't have to queue up on a weekday ..

The famous icon.

In Tokyo Disneyland and DisneySea (Yes, there's DisneySea), they have a system called the FastPass. This is a system that lets you minimize the amount of time waiting in line at certain attractions by assigning you a specific time to enter the attraction. You get the pass with your ticket near the entrance of the attraction, return at a specific time, and enjoy the attraction with just minimal wait.

It is really useful, rather than waiting at the standby entrance (they even display the time for how long you have to queue up). However, they had the press around that day and all of the FastPass machines are unable to use. In the end, I only got one pass for one attraction and decided that the FastPass is completely useless.

Disneyland is just like any other theme park. Well, it is more special since you can see the mascots are Micky and Minnie running around, but it's almost impossible to take pictures with them. The queue is oh, so long.

I was looking for thrilling roller coaster rides but none of them are in sight. I rode the kiddy rides with my dad (Thanks, dad!) and well yeah, it's not bad. Inside the rides, they create 3D models of the characters and move them with machines. Their movements are almost alive and many times I thought they were real. They don't look robotic at all!

Besides rides, there are many 3D theatres. Since my mom doesn't want to sit on rides, that's the only thing we can do together as a family. I pity her since she had to wait outside in the cold for me and my dad. We were at the theme park from morning till the closing time at 9PM.

The characters are so talkative ._. 

They ask about your day and many things. I just wanted a photo.

The parade. They spent their 30th anniversary on the 15th of April.

Smoked turkey legs were a craze is Disneyland but it wasn't as delicious as it seemed.

The castle at night.

The conclusion based on my experience is, it's not really that interesting. Yes, it's pretty but there aren't many thrilling rides to satisfy me. The crowd is overwhelming and the weather wasn't to my liking. The firework display before the closing time was a disappointing and lasted for only four minutes.

We went back to our hotel disappointed and tired.

DAY FIVE

We asked the Taiwanese lady (I don't know her name, sorry. OTL) to fetch us earlier to DisneySea than the scheduled time. DisneySea (DS) doesn't have as much visitors as Disneyland (DL) and it boggles my mind why. Because I thought DS was thousand times better than Disneyland.

The building structures are different in DS were different from DL. DL is a place with different kind of themes from different kind of Disney shows, therefore when you add them together, they don't really blend together well. Whereas in DS, all the places seemed to be more similiar to each other and it looked more comfortable for me.

While DL have their place created like in a fantasy, DS built the park like you're in Italy, Rome, Arab and many other examples. It's more beautiful that way, in my opinion. And they actually have streets that are empty, perfect place to take photos without people photo bombing unconsciously.

My parents and I spent so much time wandering around, exploring places that almost none went to. In DS they create small attractions and details that most won't notice, but is still are amazing as the major ones. We really had a lot of fun, especially my father.

A planetarium! You can move the planets here.

Triton's Kingdom at Mermaid Lagoon. Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful.

The attractions are more interesting and fun in DS, they even had a ride that goes 360°! But the ride I enjoyed the most was the Journey to the Center of the Earth, and my father and I rode it twice. Not only the attractions are better, they had small side shows that can happen anywhere at the street!

We managed to see a drum performance by some chefs and Donald, and the janitor that has sound effects on every movement he made! Gah, it was so hilarious and so amazing how the sounds were made in such perfect timing. He even interacted with the crowd, so we don't know if the kids involved were actors or it just happens like .. magic.

We ended our trip to DS with a gondola ride at Venice.

DAY SIX

I woke up little earlier before 3AM (Yes, morning) and had cup noodles for breakfast. The reason why we were up at this hour because we had to catch a cab to the fish market at Tsukiji. They have a tuna auction opened to public at 5:25AM, but it was only limited to 120 people. It's held early in the morning so the fishes are fresh.

To ensure we have a spot, we followed the guide book's advice to arrive early. It was about four in the morning when we reached the fish market's information centre (in the freezing cold) and we're very lucky because the last spots were taken by all three of us! Ahh, imagined if they only had two spots left.

The rules in the fish markets are very strict and we're advised to follow the guards and not wander off. Since the auction is real business but not a show, we can't use flash photography or make sudden movements with our hands (the bidders use their hands to bid) when the auction is going on, so the bidders are not distracted.

Look how big the fishes are.

When the auction begins, the auctioneer will stand on something and start to, something like chant loudly. Not only he chants, he bounces (?) up and down and it looked like he was screaming for his life while doing exercises. It was weird, but I guess it's a good experience in the fish market.

The auction ended shortly and we exited the market to eat sushi for breakfast. Ahh, it will never happen in Malaysia where I can eat sushi topped with raw fish and drink delicious miso soup for breakfast.

Shops outside the fish market.

We then rode the subway to Asakura, where the Sensoji Temple is located. At the front of the temple, there was a huge lantern and people took pictures although it says 'No Photograpy'. Before we entered the temple, there was a row of shops selling souvenirs.

The temple looked like any other temple with people placing incenses everywhere. It's a little different from the Buddhist temples in Malaysia as there are practices there that we don't have in Malaysia. It was just like how I watched in the animes and mangas.

We walked at the area around the temple and found stalls selling food to eat. I finally spotted the takoyakis I wanted to try and my mom had grilled scallops. I also had a banana dipped in chocolate. Haha, it was a great place to eat. I'm not surprised that gain weight after I returned to Malaysia!

Honestly, I prefer the takoyakis in Malaysia LOL ...

After that we took the subway trains to Akihabara. It's a city where they sell latest technologies, video games and items related to Japanese animation. In other words, it's a great place for otakus. There was a lot of youngsters there and we did managed to see maids promoting their cafe and a cosplayer.

Akihabara.

Maids =w=

I entered a large building selling items related to anime and mangas just to browse. They had eight floors selling many accessories, cards, figurines and dolls. Evangelion is really popular in Japan. Most customers are males. I was so tired climbing up the stairs.

I couldn't spot the items my cousin asked me to buy and I was lazy to go any further, so we had hamburgers for lunch and returned to our hotel. We went out again at dinner time to search for restaurants selling kobe beef, but we got lost even though we asked for directions. Thank you, random stranger.

In the end we dined in a teppanyaki restaurant. It was like other high class restaurants serving appetizers first,  then the main course and lastly dessert. The chefs cooked in front of us and the food is beautiful and delicious. The price was also 'beautiful'.

My father missed the moment when our chef cooked it so I took this ._.

AWEZUUUMMMMM /o/

DAY SEVEN

It's our second last day in Tokyo and we headed to Harajuku again to visit the Meiji Shrine nearby. We walked quite a long way before we made to the main shrine. The place is huge and have museums and gardens around the shrine.

When we arrived at the main shrine, there was a wedding ceremony going on. My mother when excited and told me to take pictures. The bride was all dressed in white and the groom in black. The family were dressed in black too. It looked like a funeral to me, no offense.

May you live happily ever after.

The shrine was exactly like what I saw in animes and mangas. They had the ema (wooden plaques) surrounding a tree and many tourists wrote their prayers on it. I wonder if kami can read English, Chinese, or other foreign languages.

Then, we walked to Takeshita street again because we wanted to try some crepe. It looked so nice me and mom had to have it. We also had udon for lunch at the same restaurant we went to. Then I bought another sneakers!

 But things didn't go well after that because I lost my subway ticket. We returned to Tochomae after buying another ticket and rested until night.

Go jyu nana.

We walked around Shinjuku and searched for a place to eat. I was craving for rice so we ate a restaurant named Negishi where they served beef tongue. I don't have such exotic taste buds and settled for their beef that tasted so wonderful. It was a nice dinner.

Shinjuku is a lively city even at night.

Before we returned to our hotel we went to one of many convenient stores to buy cup noodles because my brother wanted to try them. It will be last time I get to see that handsome guy working night shift there. It was sad because he was wearing a flu mask so I couldn't see his face.

LAST DAY

Nothing really happened. We went to the airport in the morning and catch our flight to Hong Kong again and to Kuala Lumpur. By the time we arrived at Malaysia, it was already 8PM.

When I got off the plane and entered the unhygienic toilet, and saw how an aunty rushed into the toilet without waiting for me to get out, I thought to myself,

'Guess I'm back at Malaysia now.'

Anyways, I'm grateful I am able to spend a week in Tokyo with my parents and this is a wonderful experience that not many can get. I wouldn't mind going back there again and I loved the place, especially the subways.

Thank you, Tokyo!

EXTRA FACT ABOUT JAPAN

My father often joked how the Japanese are robots and machines because they are like, almost perfect. They are polite, you can see that especially in Disneyland and DisneySea. They always smile and never get tired of repeating things again and again.

My father nicknamed them ATM, 'Automated Talking Machine'. I don't mean to insult any Japaneses out there, but it's because you guys are so awesome.

The Japanese are also civilized and disciplined. One example is when using the escalator. In Malaysia, people will occupy all the spaces, sometimes standing in the middle and there are no chances of passing through if you're in a rush.

It's different in Japan where everyone stand on the left side of the escalator, and allowing people who are in a rush to pass through the right. This also applies in stairs. Things are so much more organized this way and Malaysian should learn this.

Like any other place around the world, Japanese glue their eyes into screens of their cell phones. But they also glue their eyes to books to. Japanese read a lot and it applies to all ages. Also, Japaneses are still a fan of flip phones.

Everything is efficient in Japan. You buy tickets from machines. You order food with machine. There are vending machines everywhere. Everything is fast. The people walk fast. They prepare food fast. Fast, fast, fast.

It's like another world.