Tokyo : Farewell dinner

Well, the last post didn't take me long to write. 10 mins have passed. Still 50 mins before landing. So here's another post. In case you were wondering why the posts were updated so slowly given the fact they had been all written at once, its to generate more hits! Haha, what fun would it be to show you everything at one go!

Well, Wednesday was the day Alcatel Japan gave us a treat as a celebration for the success of the setups. Didn't managed to take any photos cos I thought it'd be weird and paiseh when you have big bosses and ppl there and you act like some country bumpkin so amazed about their every stuff.

Anyway, here's a short summary of what happened, coz the detailed summary would have alot of stuff which might be censored by our Garmen.

The dinner was supposed to be from 7-9pm as the room was booked during that slot. I was kinda glad becoz I can't really communicate with them as they had limited command of english. And I don't like such drinking/eating session. I am too much a pure boy at heart. Haha.

In the end, turned out that after 9pm there wasn't any other booking for the room. So we could stay as long as we wanted. Damn..there goes my plan to go back early and slack in bed. There wasn't much food, some sashimi and 2 pot of soup. I think it's more of a drinking session to them. They kept ordering beer, shoyu and what other kinda stuff they have. I had green tea and grapefruit juice. After they finished eating, they started toking about their Japanese fantasies if you know what I meant.

Can't believe that could drag on for 3 hrs. From 830pm to 1130pm. I was kinda bored becos it gets abit too repetitive. Is it so nice to discuss such things to such extent? I dunno, maybe they have not much common topics, given we are all guys. But 1 thing I find amusing was the way they luff. I dunno wat's it that tickles me, but they sure look funny to me. Thou I dunno wth they talking about at times.

So I finally got saved by the last train. Taxis here are expensive and they go 30% higher after 11pm. So they die die also must catch the last train. I wished the last train was at 9pm. Anyway, the 3 hr of senseless talk ended at 1130pm. Found some dark secrets of some other Sg employees during the talk. Haha, but it shalln't be disclosed here.

No pictures taken cos i feel abit pai seh when there's so many ppl ard and not very familiar with them.

Tokyo : Charcoal Grill

Another post written on the plane. Still 1 hour to go before reaching. Battery estimated lifespan 87 mins. Should be able to last till the plane lands.

Hmm...I think we worked late on Tuesday too. Can't rememeber but we decided not to go out. So we went to try their charcoal grill. But I think this isn't Jap food, more like Korean food. Faizal didn't join in coz he don't want his jacket to be all smoked up. So he went for Mac.

The grill was nice but costly. It's more for the experience than the food. Cos we wasn't really full after the meal, but it tasted good!!!



All the 3 plates shown below cost 1000 yen each ( $13)







The bill totaled up to 5000 yen.($65) for 3 of us. It's an expensive experience!


Gluttons click here.

Tokyo : Shinjuku Bookstore visit

Okie this is still being blogged on the plane. Thou it took me 25 mins to blog the previous post, I still had 90mins left till arrival. I guess i'd just blog all my post till my laptop battery runs out.

Monday is back to work again and I guess we left quite late. Lotsa cokups and stuff. I was doing some patch on the Personal Server (PS) and it went kuku. Sercurity issues were showing up everywhere. Damn, had to reinstall the whole thing again. Luckily I was familiar with it and it didn't take long. Had to test out serveral stuff to make sure it's working again. By the time things were settled, I think we left around 7+ pm.

Didn't have much time left to go out touring, so I decided to set out and get some notebooks my sis asked me to get. You know it's harder to find notebooks here than porn. Everyday since I arrived I have been keeping a lookout for nice notebooks, but their bookstores are really book stores. They sell published books and nothing else. I went to some stationery stores and they sell imported notebooks, brands like Campus and other stuff. You don't see a notebook with any Japanese words on it. NO WAY! 6 days of searching and I still can't find any!!

So I googled out some nicer stationery store and decided to go there just to find notebooks with Japanese words on it. So today my mission is just to find a nice notebook for my sis.

Vincent went with me while the rest stayed in the hotel. Probably tired after 2 long days of touring. Well, i'm tired too!

Anyway, reached Shinjuku at around 820pm and following the map that I got from google, we were lost. All because the map was a brief one and the only landmark on that map showed an Isetan. But....there were 3 Isetan there!! In the end we have to ask someone and he was kind enough to actually bring us there. It's already 840pm and the shop is closing.

Still, I didn't managed to find a notebook that has Japanese words on it. In the end I settled for a diary with Japanese words on it. Well, it can still be used as a notebook.

After that we were both hungry, I mean we were always hungry. But didn't eat coz wanted to find the bookstore before it closes. We went back to this alley that we'd been to a few days ago and tried their food. It's called Food Alley i think, and there were lotsa cheap food there. My ramen costed 400 yen ( $5.50) only.

The rest of the pix here.

Tokyo : Shibuya

I am blogging this on the plane home. It's a really long journey, 7 hrs 30 mins of flight back. I wonder why it only took 6hrs 40mins when we took the flight to Tokyo.

Anyway, moving on, I have finally reached the Sunday post. Had a good sleep on Sat night and decided to go out at 12 noon on Sunday. The previous day was a long one, waking up at 5am to go to the fish market.

It's gonna be a free and easy day and we decided to go to Shibuya, more like the Orchard of Sg. But then the plan stretched and we ended up going more places than planned.

A subway museum.


Shibuya got its name from this dog. Story has it that this dog waited faithfully at the station waiting for its owner to come back, never leaving that spot till it died, even thou its owner never came back ( cos he died in sch, he's a teacher)


Parco is big here, I wonder if it's the same Parco. They have Parco 1, Parco 2 and Parco 3.


GAP in Japan. Seen enough of this brand in USA already!


The only church I've seen so far. Wonder if it's like City Harvest that kind?


Faizal always had his radar on.

After so many pictures, you'd have thought that we already had our lunch. But no! So now it's time to have lunch at this classy place. One thing odd about Tokyo I found, is that sometimes food court, roadside stalls have prices similar to restaurants. Its like a normal meal would cost you around 700yen but to have food at these restaurants which have nice deco and stuff, might only cost you 900-1000 yen.

After lunch we visited the Disney Store. It's a big thing here, you see Disney stuff everywhere. Guess it's coz of the Disneyland.


Next stop, Yoyogi park. This place has a lot of performances by budding artists. It can range from bands to comedy and abstract stuff. Not to mention strange people who do the weirdest things.

Walking further into the park, we stumble upon the Sungei road of Sg!! There's tons of ppl selling stuff here, not sure if they need any license for it but the sellers here are certainly not uncles!! In fact, even the road sweeper was a 20 year old girl with make up. Wanted to take a shot but didn't managed to get a good shot of her.

This is a concert hall where many performances by bands are held.

Elvis worshippers?

Till this point, i realised this is quite a long post, and of course a long day. Went to their Meiji Shrine which was destroyed in a fire or earthquake, can't remember, and rebuilt using public donations.

They had some ice carvings exhibition going on, wonder if it's all year round.

By the time we came out, it's already dark but not late. Skies turn dark here pretty early at around 5pm. This shot was taken around 530pm. After that we had our dinner.

Well, you would have thought the post would end here! But no, actually we went to another place called Odaiba. There's ferris wheel there and you could see the Rainbow Bridge of Tokyo and a scaled down version of the SoL. It's very cold as it was near the sea and many of my shots turned out to be blurred. ( shivering hands haha)

The ferris wheel from far. Didn't managed to go there coz it was a 20 mins walk and by the time we explored the Rainbow bridge and SoL we had barely enough time to catch the 930 shuttle back to out hotel.

That's all! Finally reached the end of Sunday's blog. As usual there are more photos to check out here.

Tokyo : Suidobashi Tokyo Dome (Sat Last part)

Finally to the last part of Sat's journey. To Suidobashi! There's this amusement park there called Tokyo Dome with ferris wheel and roller coaster and some other stuff..

Had my first roller coaster ride in my life. Damn it was scary. But Sam didn't join in...he's scared. So the 3 of us went to take the ride and guess what! Me and faizal took the very 1st row. Woosh. Nice for a first timer like me !! When the ride was going down....we can't even see the tracks...that's how steep it was!! But it was fun and we got a postcard with our photos taken before and during the ride. Looks totally different! haha

After the ride we went to Mac for dinner and I found some pretty interesting sign

Had taken a video of a cultural performance but it's over 100 mb so i can't get it up on YouTube. So I'd just post a shot here.

All the photos here.

Tokyo : Akihabara Electric Town ( Sat Part III)

After Ueno, we went to the Sim Lim Square of Tokyo, called Akihabara. There's not much difference between here and SLS. Doesn't really look appealing to me coz the stuff aint that cheap and I could always get it back in Sg. The only thing here that might be cheap is PSP (19700 yen ~ 240 sgd) but I think i'm not going to spend more $ on games.



Upon exiting the station, you could see 'maids' giving out flyers. They have some cosplay cafe around here I guess, as well as 'maids' giving u foot massages and stuff like tat.

We didn't really walk much coz most of the stuff could be bought in SG with corresponding voltage and better warranty.

Saw some interesting stuff you could win at the arcade's UFO catcher

Some sexy leg lamps

Tokyo : Asakusa Shrine ( Sat Part II)

Okie! Today I didn't go out coz I think i am gona fall sick soon...got a bit of a bad throat. So here's the next part of my Sat adventure...yeah took kinda long to post this. Still have sunday...monday.

Anyway after the fish market, the next stop we went to is Asakusa. There's this old Buddist shrine there which schoolgirls go to pray for their exams I guess. We met a bucnh of them on a school excursion on our way there.

On exiting the station, I saw them selling 'gao luk'! haha didn't know they sell these here, my ah ma would love it.


Here I am under the big lantern. Not really under la..


Bought a small cup of sweet sake for 100 yen.


Look at the busy streets and things to buy on our way into the shrine.




Here's a postcard worthy shot.


People crowd around this incense burning urn to get some good luck I think.


There wasn't much stuff to look at in the shrine. Didn't wanna get anything from there too. Since its against my beliefs. Just visiting would be fine I guess. After that we went to Ueno station and walked around the Ameyoko market, settling for lunch. Wanted to eat noodles badly and finally found some Korean food. Damn hot!

Looks hot eh?


A cheap chocolate store I think. There were lotsa ppl queuing to buy.


After that we walked by a store that sells big taco pachi..haha but there's no squid inside. Just veges, but it's huge!! So I bought 1 ball and tried it ( at 200 yen). It wasn't as nice as it looked.


Rest of the photos here.

Tokyo : Tired sia...

Everyday go out morning tour...come back must upload photos and blog...buey tahan la!! Haha, I will space out my blogs over 2-3 days and will keep updating this till all my trips have been documented. That means it would still be updated after I go back to Singapore. So for now...I need to sleep!

Tokyo : Tsukiji Fish Market ( Sat Part 1)

There would be too many things to write for today, so entries shall come in parts. (And also when I have the time and is not so tired)

Sat's been a super busy day, traveling 5 places in a day is no easy feat! The first stop of the day is the Tsukiji fish market. It starts early in the morning at 530am-6am for its auctioning. We set to leave the hotel at 5am and reach around 530am in time to see some exciting bidding. On my way there, I wonder why I didnt wake up early in Singapore to go Punggol to see people selling fishes.

Had a cup of Starbucks (210 yen) from the mart to perk me up.

When we reached there, the subway station was kinda empty. It's too early in the morning. And our mind were empty too, coz we went off the wrong direction and got lost. By the time we found the market it was like around 640am.

The auctioning had ended, there's still vegetable auctioning thou, but we weren't interested. So we took a walk thru the place.

How the place reminds of me the wet market in Sg, thou the smell isn't as bad.


Cutting frozen fish with a saw....dangerous


Big squids? I dunno what is this species.

Went outta the fish market to explore the wharf. Supposed to have boats docking in and unloading fishes. But I guess it's already 7am and everyone had finished their work.

I guess they paint the big fish to help them net more fishes (their belief?) Haha, thats my guess.

We went back into the market after exploring the wharf and exited thru the market. We saw some shops that sell huge scales. Maybe like for a backup in case the merchant's scale spoils, dun think any merchants would get their scale there.

On our way back, caught a sleeping driver in the vehicle. I guess he must have waken up early to do his job.

For more pictures of fishes and buildings. Click here

The next part of the trip continues to Asakusa Shrine. Stay tuned.