idontlikesummer

[idontlikesummer]

Woah thank you for talking about and showing so many pictures of your trip!!

Ahh thank you for the nice ask!! I wasn’t sure if my travels would interest people, so it makes me really glad to receive positive feedback about it! I hope you enjoyed it (๑>ᴗ

[idontlikesummer]

Japan Trip 2018 (Kansai)

Back from Japan again!

This time I went with my family went to Kansai!!

There were so many things we did in the span of 10 days that everything had passed by in almost a blur. The entire vacation was quite thrilling because we landed in Japan right when the flooding was taking place in Osaka. We stayed at my hometown in Nagano for about three days, and by the time we reached Kansai, most of the flooding had disappeared!

As with the previous travel post, I took pictures of almost EVERYTHING I saw. Some of my brother’s and dad’s photos will be in this log, and I will highlight them accordingly!

Please enjoy!! :’D

(Warnings: Lots of photos of pretty things, my sparse commentary and my occasional photobombing totoro)

Day 1: Travel to Nagano

ACK. I ate salted salmon with rice on the plane but everything was shaking and I forgot to take a picture. 

We arrived in Japan but I could only take a photo from the middle seat! The ride was crazy – the pilot said there would be clear skies but the rain was near torrential so the landing had a lot of drops. The woman behind me screamed, so naturally I, being terrible with turbulence, screamed as well. 

The floor was wet so the plane skidded a little when we landed!

NARITA EXPRESS to Tokyo station. Unlike the previous two trips, we managed to be on time for the train, so we didn’t have time to stop by the Starbucks ;w;

I napped throughout the flight since I didn’t manage to sleep a wink during the plane ride, therefore missing most of the awesome view. Totoro’s enjoying it in my stead but he’s separated from his natural habitat by a glass panel.

We reached Tokyo Station and went past GranSta!

There was an AI robot called Pepper greeting us there! This is my first time seeing an AI, but I didn’t have much time to find out what he was used for

Eventually, we stopped by Beer Hall to eat (this restaurant was located right next to Character Street!) I tried their mentaiko spaghetti and I was blown away by how light and delicious it was! This is something I can eat two helpings of before I become full!

Time to go to Daimaru, the place I can’t afford unless I’m with my parents. We bought Tops cake from there before heading off to my grandparents’ house!

I’M LEAVING TOKYO STATION AND I DIDN’T EVEN EXPLORE HALF OF IT. (Spoiler alert: I’ll be back here a few days later)

My brother ate some Shumais we bought from Tokyo station along the ride! I dozed off because the seats in the bullet train are better than my bed

Dropped off at Sakudaira! Since we were surrounded by mountains the weather was freezing despite it being mid-summer. Even though it’s only been a year I missed this place so much

COUNTRY ROAAAD TAKE ME HOOOME to the PLAACE I BELOOONG 

(the car ride back to my grandparents’ home  was super enjoyable since my brother kept blasting 70s music that my parents love)

On the way we stopped by a Seven Eleven! I got carried away with buying the cup noodles (Santouka and Ippudou) since they only cost 4USD while they would have caused 18 USD if you ate them in a restaurant in Singapore!

[First photo by my brother] Home away from home I missed you so. Most of what we had to do for the next few days were family stuff that I won’t go into detail about. But basically we had a whole lot of relatives to greet and a ceremony to prepare for! So there was a lot to do

View from my grandmother’s garden!! I love the mountains and I wish I could plant one where I live. I hope the tectonic plates in Singapore converge in five years

[Last photo by my brother] Like a good girl, I slacked off from cleaning duty to walk around the neighbourhood. This place always calms me somehow. If I lived here permanently I would probably want to walk at least twice a week! Here are some of the stuff that I photographed. I’ve always associated this place with good things and I feel like I go through some sort of emotional and spiritual cleansing each time I come here.

Here’s what we ate for dinner [photo by my brother]! Loads of protein and no carbohydrates. The chicken in particular was really nice and it was from this restaurant called Big Ben!

[First photo by my brother] Since my grandparents’ house was pretty much completely occupied, we stayed at our uncles’ place instead! It was so huge, almost like a Ryokan, and could afford at least 3 guest rooms. I can’t believe they live in something so grand it’s like a hotel

Day 2: Nagano

Honestly I live in an apartment so for this entire section to be the guest room just blows me away. IT’S HUGE.

We went back to my grandparents’ house for breakfast and ate matsutake  gohan with fish! I’ve always loved eating cheap and healthy food. The fried eggplant was probably the best eggplant dish I ever ate! Countryside food is so different from Tokyo food

Ate this for lunch during the ceremony! It was really filling!!

We had more time in the afternoon so I went to scale one of the mountains to a satisfying height!

Our grandmother came to join us in the afternoon, and before we knew it, it was dinner time and many of our relatives joined us with their food! [photo by my brother] It felt a lot like the Summer Wars sort of dinner gatherings, where everyone just sat along a long table and drank alcohol while chatting

We went back to my uncle’s place and our aunt made us mango pudding! She’s a really good cook.

Day 3: Nagano

The next morning she gave us cherries and grapefruit! Today we would have to leave her house for good, and it makes me a little sad. But I hope to return one day!

The next day was a day of loafing around at my grandparents’ place, but we did find some goodies! Namely my dad’s baby photos and we teased him relentlessly about it. We also tried the Ippudou and Santouka noodles and it was really good! The soup tasted just like the way it did in the restaurant!

Later in the afternoon, we went to a friend’s house! I haven’t been here for five years so it was really nostalgic to come back here! It always had a really western-decorated interior which I was fond of.

We had really delicious cake! The cream was super fresh and sweet *p*

It was blueberry season so we went to pick some blueberries from the garden! The one I picked was pretty but sour lmao. I have no green thumb

Mini eggplant! Too young to eat!

These were leeks!

Some of the flowers I really liked in the garden!

Good old chimney I always know where I stand with you

After that, we came by this area to buy our train tickets for Ise! [First photo by my brother]. I used to eat at a ramen shop here nearly ten years ago. I’m amazed how it’s been so long and everything still looks the same!

EON MALL I MISSED YOU SO [Photo by my brother]

Even the stores are the same as five years ago!! I’m on a nostalgia trip

They ACTUALLY sell uniform sweaters here! I really wanted to buy the red one but they were so expensive!! I will reserve my gakuen dreams for another day

Each time I step foot into a supermarket I realize how fortunate I am that I don’t live here, because I’d probably be bankrupt within the first week or so from attempting to buy half the stuff in the market. I mean, LOOK AT THAT BEEF.

Obon festival lanterns!

I’ve been eating at this Yakiniku house all the time since I was a kid. Until recently, I haven’t been able to return to the village, so I did miss this place a lot. Up until today it has the best yakiniku I’ve ever eaten ;w; For the curious it’s called Chikumaya (千曲屋)!

I’d probably make it a point to come by here every now and then! My favourite beef was the Karubi beef!

Cozy Corner cake for supper!! I was so full that when I lay down on my back, I felt like a turtle

That night I saw a starry sky for the first time in my life!!

[photo taken by my brother]. The phone camera quality does the scene no justice. But it was REALLY amazing, since all around, the silhouettes of the houses and mountains were actually blacker than the night sky. There were so many stars that the sky seemed more GREY than anything. The clouds also parted in a way that almost made it seem like there was a galaxy in the sky.

We counted loads of constellations, including Virgo, the Summer triangle, and we also probably saw Mars, Jupiter and Mercury or Venus. My brother studied astrology as a module in university, so he was telling me which constellations were which. And we sat there for hours by the roadside, just talking about how to read stars, which constellations were which etc. It was a really refreshing experience!

[Photo by my brother] This gave me a lot of Totoro vibes (the part where the Catbus appeared for the first time while Satsuki and Mei were waiting for their dad)

Day 4: Travel to Ise

The next day, we had to leave early, but my dad brought us to a place we frequented in our childhood since we had a bit of time. There was this mega-large slide which took approximately one minute for us to slide all the way down. We had to climb a large hill just to hitch one ride on it!

We left for Sakudaira station after this to go to Tokyo for a transit to Kansai soon after, but I’m sure I’ll be back here before long!

There was a really long queue for this ramen shop in Tokyo station, so we decided to try it! Apparently, it’s quite famous! It’s called 六厘舎 (Rokurinsha), to those interested! The broth was really good! The egg tasted like it had alcohol in it, but my absolute favourite was the CHASHU.

HARRY POTTER POP-UP STORE (anime style). I COULDN’T BELIEVE MY EYES. I wanted to take the entire stand home!!!! They had many of the popular characters, like Draco, the Marauders, and I think even Regulus Black! I was hoping to get Luna, but they didn’t sell her, so I settled for Hermione and Ron! I think the store owner was amused because I kept running back to the shop to buy new things

CHARACTER STREET! I have come back for you. Since we only had about two hours before the next train ride, we couldn’t really explore anything in detail. So I decided to loiter in the Ghibli shop!

This medal reacts to “Barus!” (words of destruction). The product makers have an interesting sense of humor

The match boxes were AESTHETIC

I WANT EVERYTHING

There were some OSomatsu-san stuff in one of the shops, but I didn’t have time to stay and look! ;w;

Self control….. self control…..

[First photo by my brother]. I ate at Italian Tomato Cafe Jr.  a really long time ago at EON Mall (but that outlet has since disappeared), so I was happy to see it in Tokyo Station! Their shortcake was just as good as I remembered!

Hoho. Komeda Coffee. I’ll be back for you one day…

Some of the things that fascinated me in Tokyo Station. Yes. That is a chandelier made up of kitkats, and that is PORK JERKY

TIME TO GO TO  KANSAI! We hitched a ride on the Hikari bullet train! This one was slightly bumpier than the one we took to Sakudaira because of  the terrain. It was interesting because our ride took place along the Toukaidou, which connected Kyoto to old-time Edo (Tokyo). Apparently, Tokugawa created this system that made the feudal lords move from Kyoto (the emperor’s place) to Edo (Tokugawa’s residence), so the economy of Japan boomed along this area. Stuff like Woodblock art and Kabuki became famous along the road.

We passed by Shizuoka, and we suspect the mountain blocked by clouds is Mt Fuji!

Well, if I can’t see Mt Fuji today I’ll just have to settle for the picture on this bottle

We’ve hit Nagoya!

We took another train to Ise! It seems like we’ll be travelling the entire day today! So I got a Café Latte to stay awake!

On the way we passed by Tsu: a station with only one syllable

The sky has become a lot prettier!

By the time we’ve reached Ise it was evening! This place feels really mystical—all the street lamps had windchimes in them, so each time there was a breeze you get this really lovely chime in the air.  To the curious, Ise is where the shrine of Amaterasu (The God of the Sun) is located.

My brother took a really nice photo of the lamps and the sunset, so I’m showing it off

[last photo by my brother]. This is the first time I’ve ever eaten in an Izayakaya and I ordered…. ORANGE JUICE. But the food was super good! My personal favourite was the omelette! Everything tasted home-cooked and the bill was really cheap! For those interested, the restaurant is called とばっこ (Tobakko).

We stayed at a really neat AirBnB! The furniture was sparse (if you ignore our laundry), and it was at a very good location. Our hostess was really helpful in helping us to find places to visit as well! 

Found this in the nearby Family Mart! I would buy you if I lived here, Hijikata… At this moment I’m eating five meals almost every day..

Day 5: Ise Jingu

We set off at 5am the next day I was near Death. From hereon we would repeat the cycle of waking up at 5-6am and arriving home at 11pm for the rest of the vacation. The good thing about it is that the streets are completely empty

It was a nice walk to the shrine! One nice elderly man on a bicycle said “Good morning!” to us and that brightened my mood for the rest of the day!

[last photo by my brother] Here we are at 外宮Geku shrine! This one is dedicated to Toyoukeno Oomikami, who takes charge of Amaterasu Ookami’s food, clothing and shelter! The place was really quiet and serene. It felt a lot different from Meiji Jingu, which was always filled with people. There were multiple offering spots in the shrine, and the main gate bans us from taking photos. The vibe here is really mystical and it feels powerful

We waited for a taxi to get to naiku! That’s Amaterasu Ookami’s shrine. The taxi on the sign looked like it was smiling. Our driver spoke in Kansai dialect – I was a little surprised to know that it’s not just the words, but the intonation had also changed!

This was a lot bigger than Geku! Like Geku, we were forbidden from taking photos of the interior shrine. One of the offering places was to the Wind God, Fujin, who apparently helped to expel the Mongols from the Japan seas in the 13th century! There were more people here than at Geku, but it still had that really mystical aura. I might come here again when the weather is cooler!

Well, since we left the house at 5.30am we were finished with Naiku by 11am HAH. We had lots of time to explore Oharai Machi, which is located right outside Naiku. But because of the hot weather, the fact that we didn’t eat breakfast,  and the little rest we had, I was about to drop dead at this point

So Oharai Machi used to be a purification and dance/singing centre dedicated to the Gods of Ise Shrine, but today you can find loads of food shops and goodies. The vibe of the place feels super retro and I love it! I caught one or two Halal shops that sell Japanese oden and kushi sticks!

[last photo by my brother] We ate some sweetened ice to cool down after the Naiku trip! They were really generous with the portions and their red bean snacks were DELICIOUS. I don’t usually like this sort of traditional sweets but I couldn’t stop myself from wolfing this down. The restaurant is called Akafuku (赤福) - at least, that’s what the signboard seems to say!

Yeah, I really like the aesthetic of this place. I live for street Udon tbh

We chose to eat at Ise Udon Soba Okadaya (岡田屋)! A sparrow flew into the shop the moment it opened so I guess we were the second customers for the day lmao. THE UDON WAS REALLY REALLY GOOD. It had a really chewy and soft texture and it became more and more delicious the more you ate it; it was surreal. It didn’t taste like all the types of Udon I’ve eaten before. I’m so sad that I can only eat it in Ise and not where I live. I will definitely be back for more argh. 110% WILL RECOMMEND. It’s pretty cheap too and in my opinion, it’s best to eat it without too many toppings. Maybe just an egg with garnishes will do

(The store had a retro telephone booth)

[Photo by my brother] We ate Matsusaka beef and ONE STICK COST 9USD. INSANE. But it was really good and chewy and I’ve never had better beef in my LIFE

Okage Yokocho is an area in Oharai Machi! It looked a little bit like a festival! They had a rifling booth which I wanted to try, but I was trying to save money so I decided against it. Lots of fancy buildings here!

We went to Kaminogo Station because our host recommended another shrine! The weather made me feel like I was swimming in a volcano, but the clear skies make it worth it! I could take photos with my eyes closed and it’d still turn out pretty

Here’s a bit of what was inside of the shrine! It was significantly cooler in temperature than Naiku and Geku. There were bees buzzing around here and there. The walk was less intense than Naiku and Geku but I was starting to get tired around this time

So we returned back to the apartment to pig out.

Only for us to leave about two hours later so we can eat… AGAIN. The sky was really pretty. I guess one good thing about summer is that you get really pretty skies

Guess what we’re having: Matsusaka BEEF! Apparently it’s one of the THREE BIG BEEF along with Oumi Beef and Kobe beef. Which means it’s expensive as hell but you only live once I guess. The restaurant was called Ishikawa 石かわ and it’s famous for Matsusaka Beef!

The restaurant had a really quaint feeling you would get from a sleepy little town. The chef pan fried the beef on a sizzling stove. I WISH I HAD A BIGGER PIECE. The beef was so chewy and the sauce was so good I made it a point to keep the meat in my mouth longer than necessary. The vegetables were also really fresh so it added to the taste! EVERYTHING WAS PERFECT. This was probably one of my favourite things I ate along the entire trip. Top 3 for sure

Ise is just as mystical at night time!

Aaaaaand we went to eat ramen for supper. This is the same restaurant as Tobakko, except it was a Ramen booth instead of an Izakaya. It had the roadside street stall feeling to it, and the ramen tasted really nostalgic! There was only one man running the shop so he must have been very busy

Day 6: Nara and travel to Osaka

The next day we woke up early to go to our host’s café! It was located deeper in the alley where the apartment was situated. I REALLY liked her decorations!

She cooked for us Ise Udon and many other side dishes like salad, omelette, and tofu pudding! It was REALLY cool because we were the only people in the café at that hour, so we could spend a lot of time chatting with her. I’ll miss this place and our hostess when we’re gone! ;w;

We traveled to Nara on a one carriage train called Yamashiro Reccha! [photo by my brother] All the blinds were drawn so the carriage was dark and my dad kept making murder mystery jokes

WELCOME TO NARA. You can almost tell from the staircase what this place is famous for; I’ve never seen wild deers before in my life so I’m really excited!! Unlike Ise, Nara seems to be a town instead of a countryside, so the vibes are pretty different

Here sells nothing but melon bread. I want to live in this stall

[Last photo by my brother] The tourist center recommended that we try 天丼まきの (Tendon Makino) for Tendon since it was a popular tourist destination. I swear to God, this is the BEST TENDON I’ve EVER eaten in MY LIFE. I’m not fond of octopus but I ate everything up in one go. There was a fried egg in the bowl you could crack open and spill all the yolk everywhere. Literally this is something I’d never get sick of. I could probably eat it everyday for the rest of my life.

MISTER DONUT. I will have you one day….

One of the stalls had a sparrow’s nest near its opening gate! While the sparrow chicks were cute as sin, I sort of pity the poor sparrow for making its nest in the middle of a tourist district

We stopped by Kofuku-Ji Nan-en-dou 興福寺 on the way to Nara deer park! The architecture of the tower seemed really old! It seems there are lots of old buildings (dating to before 16th century) in Kansai

A really nice looking hotel called 菊水楼Kiku-sui-rou. It seems they have a very high rating for their hospitality and their food!

We arrived at the gates of 春日大社(Kasuga Taishi)! And I SAW MY FIRST DEERS. I didn’t dare to approach them since I thought they would run off, but silly me, they were probably already accustomed to having people around.

More deer and shrine stuff! The deers are literally everywhere. And there are lots of tourists too! The awkward part was that there were tonnes of deer droppings everywhere, so you could step on them if you’re not careful.

There was a rest stop at the shrine, so we sat here to cool off a bit. Then this deer appeared out of nowhere and started sniffing my dad’s bag. He was sniffing every single human he came into contact with. Then he came up to me and began to sniff my plastic bag.

THEN HE RIPPED IT APART AND ATE OUR MAP.

I hope it was at least a little bit nutritious but now we hae no directions

We had ice-coffee and ice-cream at the rest stop after that!

So we walked down from the hill after that and played with some deers! This one kept following me. I’m sorry, I don’t have a biscuit for you but I can give you attention if you’d like!

Deers crossing the road! And the bus gave way to them

On the way to 東大寺Toudaiji!

Toudaiji houses the world's largest bronze statue of the Buddha Vairocana. The statue was at least ten times taller than me without exaggeration!! I also really liked how old the building seemed to look! It seemed really ancient 

We headed out of the temple and this deer stuck his tongue out. What message are you trying to relay, friend?

We returned to Nara station soon after that and took the train to Osaka! We’ve been taking so many trains that the JR Pass is adequately used!

HELLOOOOO OSAKA

We arrived at our new AirBnB destination and I slept so soundly here!! Maybe it’s because I had my own room, but I love that we had the entire floor to ourselves! I also really liked the decorations she put all over the place! It’s really close to the station and Namba City so it was pretty convenient! Here’s the link if anyone is interested!

By the time we reached Namba it was already rather late! So we scoured the place in a rush. There was a Takashimaya somewhere in there which sold nice cakes!

The store Rope Picnic sold lots of cute clothes at 70% off because of summer sale! I felt like I held myself back from spending money just for this moment!! I would be coming here repeatedly over the course of the next few days!

Meanwhile my brother ate some Milk Ice-cream that’s so smooth it looks almost like a toy [photo by my brother]

We decided to eat at 百十Momojuu since it’s a crime to go to Osaka and not eat Okonomiyaki! That is, we ordered Monjayaki instead because we didn’t know there was a difference. THE BEST DISH WAS THE TONPEI (Omelette with meat inside)! The Okonomiyaki (second last picture) was not ours, but the cook accidentally placed it on our grill. Overall the meal was pretty affordable! If I were to go back to Osaka, I’d definitely come by here again.

(The air ventilators seemed to suck smoke up in the air, so people could smoke in the restaurant without bothering the other customers!)

Day 7: Kyoto

Some things I noticed and liked on my way to the station. Today we would be going to Kyoto. I haven’t been there since I was five but I remember bits and pieces of it!

THE ESCALATOR AT OSAKA STATION IS SO TRIPPY. Apparently people in Osaka seem to stand on the right hand side of the escalators rather than the left? That’s really interesting!

The escalators in Kyoto station have handles which are actually decorated!

We’ve reached the gates of the famous Fushimi Inari Shrine(伏見稲荷大社)! This one’s well known because of all the red gates and the impressive climb you need to take to the summit of the shrine. Inari is the God of rice, and you see lots of fox statues throughout the climb. Each of the gates have been donated by a Japanese businessman apparently.

It seems that at each of the gates, the fox on the left has a scroll in its mouth, while the fox on the right has a ball.

[Photos taken by my brother]. At the base, there were tons of people, but the numbers dwindled as we hit the summit. I had to stop at every rest stop because I was just that unfit! But the climb was good and hitting the summit made me feel healthy! One thing I was surprised about was how un-summit- like the summit seemed. We didn’t realize it was the summit until we had to climb down the  stairs on the opposite end of the hill!

Down we go!! My legs hurt. I probably won’t be able to stand tomorrow agh

We reached the base and ate some oden and shaved ice to cool down! The lady in charge of the shop told us that tourists only came by Fushimi Inari about four to five years ago. It appears that the shrine was a pretty recent tourist destination!

Eventually we headed back to Kyoto station and checked out the restaurants in Isetan! There was a restaurant which specialized ENTIRELY in omurice! Naturally, I was very excited!!

...Though we ended up eating at永寿案 “Washoku” Restaurant Eijuan since we were at Kyoto!

 They serve really fresh and delicious grilled fish dishes with tons of mini side dishes on the tray. The restaurant is also located on the top floor of the shopping center so you’re treated to a killer view of Kyoto! For Washoku, this restaurant is pretty affordable and the quality of the food is really good! It’s something to look for if you like light meals :’) The service staff were also really helpful in helping us to find places we can visit in Kyoto.

We took a bus from the station and headed to Kiyomizudera Temple! We have to walk up a hill again but thankfully it wasn’t as insane as Fushimi Inari. We did a lot of walking today and my legs are tired

SCENIC

We paid about 400 yen to see the rest of the temples, but I thought it was really worth it! Most of the trees in the mountain change colours really quickly when it hits autumn, but for now all the trees are green since it’s summer. The view is really breathtaking and worth the climb!

It was a long way down from the temple, but there was a shopping district with aesthetic houses nearby!!

I’m marrying this Ice cream melon soda shake you’re invited to our wedding

TOTORO SHOP KYOTO STYLE. I LIVE

This No-Face Piggy Bank will EAT YOUR MONEY so WATCH OUT

Some other things that caught my eye!

We took the bus to Gion-Shinbashi next! Gion’s the Geiko district with lots of Geiko and Maiko (geiko apprentice) running about!

The street is really pretty! I think you can’t enter any of these shophouses since they usually cost a bomb to go into. Lots of the second-storeys of the houses are covered with some sort of curtain. I wonder why

I MANAGED TO CATCH SOME MAIKOS

Before they boarded a taxi

I wonder if they’re used to tourists gawking at them each time we pass them by..

There’s a Lipton café at Kyoto station I don’t believe my eyes

I wanted to eat here but our train is departing soon!

We’ve arrived back at Namba!

Don Quijote is going to be my best friend for the rest of my days

There’s literally an alcohol called “Do your best, Daddy!” I can’t stop laughing

In the end, we decided to eat at a Yakiniku store since Osaka seems to specialized in grilled and pan-fried foods! We ate at牛角 Gyuu-Kaku, which is apparently expensive where I live, but pretty cheap here.

[second last photo by my brother]. The meat was really good! I swear everything we’ve eaten on this trip is good. The dish in the last picture was especially good—they put some sort of cotton candy and boiled the meat in sauce, and the cotton candy just melted into the sauce after that. I have no idea how it works. All I know is that it was GREAT

THEY HAVE GRILLED MELON BREAD WITH ICE CREAM. I went to town on this one. You grill the melon bread, cut it open and shove ice-cream into it. It’s SO GOOD I can die. This is the highlight of my trip

Then we ate takoyaki after that! We eventually headed back to Don Quijote for grocery shopping

ATTACK ON NOSE HAIR

We had dessert when we went home again! This one came from CRAMERCY New York!

Day 8: Osaka

My dad went to 高野山Koya-san while we rested at home for the day. Apparently, it was first built by monk 空海Kukai, who founded the Japanese calligraphic system! Here are some of the pictures he took!

Apparently, you would sit on a monorail that wasn’t shaped horizontally to get to the top of the mountain like you see in the last picture! It seemed really cool!

Guess what we had for breakfast the next day!!

1.       Cake

2.       Cake

3.       Cake

I can’t believe they made Takoyaki cream puffs and sold it in Takashimaya

We headed to Namba City and ate a buffet meal at GOOD SPOON! I really enjoyed the décor of this place. Apparently it specialized in Italian food, especially their cheeses! The huge bag on the bolognaise in the fourth picture is in fact a huge chunk of cheese! Honestly, everything we’ve eaten on the trip has been really worth it and delicious!

On our way to Osaka Tower!

There seems to be tons of Billiken motifs in the tower. He was dreamt up by an American artist, and is said to bring good luck!

A scene from Osaka tower! Apparently you can see Universal Studios here somewhere!

The history of this place seems a little interesting. Apparently it was built and opened in 1912 along with the amusement park, Luna Park, which included arcades and rides. Unfortunately the original Tsutenkaku and Luna Park burned down in the 1940s, but they rebuilt it under Hitachi in 1956, so the tower is still around today!

The Tower also hosts the Glico museum! Glico was the company which made Pocky!

I’m honestly scared of how much weight I’m going to put on

Eventually we headed back to Namba Area as a cut through to Dotonbori!

 [last photo by my brother] Doutonbori has so many lighted billboards I LOVE IT. The giant crab in the first picture actually MOVES. It reminds me of Tokyo a little, but has more of a night life feeling to it! Lots of shops that I love here, but I only had four hours to run through the place before everything closed!

There was a festival taking place along the river while we were there

We eventually went to eat Kushiyaki at だるまDaruma because that’s another thing Osaka is famous for! It was really good! My favourite dish was the Dotemiso and the quail eggs! So far, it seems like Tokyo has a larger variety of food, but Kansai’s food is more flavorful!

Gintama sale at Marui. I’ll patronize your store another time, Elizabeth….

Day 9: Kobe

We’ve arrived at Kobe! The weather was CRAZY HOT today! I really like the port towns in Japan since they seem to have a lot of delicious Western food, history and architecture! It reminds me a lot of Yokohama in a way! Plus it’s located on a hillside facing the ocean, just the sort of thing I like!

We went ahead and took the Kobe City Bus! It looked really fancy and there was an announcer giving us a rundown of the historical importance of the routes we were taking.

Our first stop was Ijinkan! AKA the street with all the old Western houses that rich foreigners used to live in or use for their recreational activities! The street here was REALLY pretty! Since Kobe was a hill, we would have to climb around to get to just anywhere. The England House apparently had a Sherlock Holmes exhibition on the second floor, and I could see Watson’s silhouette through the curtains!

We bought the tickets to go to the Trick House! Albert Einstein greeted us from the window it was surreal

Many art pieces would look REALLY TRIPPY if you took a photo with a person in it, but I’m camera shy. Here are just some of the exhibits which don’t require you a person to be in the picture. The third one was probably my favourite since it looks like a mirror but actually isn’t! They arranged two rooms to look perfectly symmetrical and you could only tell if a person is walking on the other side. It’s a lot like that one room in the Witch’s House…

You have paintings like these too. 

It was fun to walk on air :^)

Next we had to climb a steep hill to Uroko House!! It was a struggle in the hot weather but at this point I’m so used to sweating. I wonder how the staff come here to work everyday…

Kobe tiles!!

Uroko House! …..’s café

There’s a wild boar in front of it called Porcellino which brings good luck if you touch its nose! I kept getting distracted by its name because of Porco Rosso’s nickname…

The REAL Uroko house! Apparently they named the house as such because the tiles used to decorate the mansion look like scales (uroko). This house used to be luxury rental houses for wealthy foreigners. The exhibits include not only the rooms, but also antique utensils, tableware, and a small art museum!

If I were a doll and these houses are completely furnished I’d live in them.

Some of the stuff we ate in the café! I really liked the ice-cream. We accidentally spilled our drink and the waitress was nice to refill it for us for free

Here are some of my favourite rooms!! I’m glad I came here. It looks a lot like the dollhouse in The Secret World of Arrietty

The view and some of the nice artworks in the museum!

Now we’re off to Yamate 8Ban Kan

Yamate 8Ban Kan! It’s oriented to the sea with trapezoidal bay windows in a row. Inside the building, the “Saturn’s chair” which is believed to grant your wishes if women sit on the right and men on the left. I was having a stomachache so I might have wasted my wish by wishing it to be gone

FUJIKO MINE CLORETS! I love her she’s such a role model

Now we’re going to try Kobe Beef at Steak Land! While we were taking a lift to the restaurant, a man stumbled into the elevator with us. We suspected that it might have been someone important since the restaurant continued to serve him after its closing hours

I’M SO EXCITED!

THE BEEF WAS REALLY GOOD! They cooked the vegetables first and saved the beef and beansprouts for last!! I can’t help but think that everything that we’ve eaten on this trip was really delicious! As far as Kobe beef goes, this was one of the more affordable options!

SCORCHING SUMMER SUN. You can see how hot it is. I could write a song about how much the weather makes one suffer

We continued to take a bus trip around and passed by the maritime museum! I didn’t manage to go in this time, but there will always be future trips that I can plan for :P

Kobe is so scenic!!

Nishimura’s Coffee looks really fancy and I really like the exterior décor despite not eating inside.

We headed to Mosaic Mall! Which seemed to be an outdoor shopping centre!

We meet again, Donguri Garden.

SMILING TOTORO BAG. How can something so perfect exist

My brother tried some chocolate ice-cream from Frantz! Though I didn’t manage to try it to tell if it was good or not

We took the bus back to Kobe station and headed to Namba again!

MY FIRST CREPE ON THE TRIP. I have found you at last

I seem to come across a lot more kittens than full grown cats while I’m in Namba, but this brave warrior didn’t seem afraid in the midst of all the people walking around.

Lmao R18 gacha-gachas

We headed back to Namba City for dinner! There’s this shop called C3 Baked Tiramisu which is ABSOLUTELY DELICIOUS. I’m not sure if you can find it in Tokyo but this is hands down the best Tiramisu I have ever eaten in my entire life. We bought a dozen back home to finish

MIX FRUIT JUICE SHAKE IS GREAT! I should make this on my own next time! It probably had mango and orange inside, maybe even pineapple, but I’m not too sure

Eventually we headed to Shabu Nabe Udon Noraya のらや, which specialized in Udon and Shabu-Shabu. I had the Udon and tempura set while my brother and mother shared the Pork Shabu Shabu. HOW CAN SUCH A PINK PORK EXIST. I guess the reason why the food here’s so great is because of the quality of the ingredients as well. I really like non-greasy food so this has to be one of my top 3 meals in the entire trip! Definitely would recommend this! And it’s pretty affordable as well. They are really generous with the portions!

  We had more cakes for supper

 Day 10: Leaving Japan

Tiramisu for breakfast! It’s over so soon and I don’t want to leave Osaka so soon ;w;

We stopped by Tully’s Coffee at Osaka station and my mother tried a pancake! It would take a few hours before we reach Tokyo…

We had lunch at 矢場とんYabaton  at Tokyo Station!! The Pork cutlet was really good since they cooked it with their own miso! The staff were really nice too! They helped to warm up my food since I took such a long time to eat because of my stomachache ;w;

We took a Monorail to Haneda Airport! I didn’t know that monorails would tilt to the side when they turned!

Might that be rainbow bridge?

Amuro Tooru seems to be really popular in Japan now! It’s probably because of the new Detective Conan movie in Japan but he’s always been intriguing! I hope they release more on his backstory soon.

Agghh I don’t want to leave but I will definitely be back

The sky was really pretty! Overall the ride was way better than the initial one, since much of the rainy season has cleared up. I actually managed to sleep so that was impressive!

It’s good to be back!!

I guess on the whole Kansai has a pretty different vibe from central Tokyo. Both had their fair share of cultural landmarks and city areas, but Kansai used to house the really old capital of Japan, so they had much older monuments compared to Tokyo. Osaka’s city also seems to be a lot more night life-ish compared to my experience with Tokyo! In terms of food, I’d say that Tokyo has more variety, but I really think Osaka’s food has more flavour. Literally everything I’ve eaten on this trip is delicious and worthy of a recommendation!

On the other hand, I’m really proud of myself since I managed to control myself from overspending this trip :^)

If you make it a point to visit the cultural landmarks instead of going to shop, you really can save a lot of money when travelling in Japan! There are also many more Halal food options compared to what I’ve seen last year, so it should be possible to find good Japanese food for those who have to adhere to a religious diet!

#japan #kyoto #osaka #food #ghibli #photography #travel #scenery #other stuffs #ise #kobe

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Malice in Underland Chapter 14

Took me forever to get here but I finally wrote/uploaded the scene I wanted to write for months! This drawing is pretty old (more than a year old), eh, but now that it’s no longer a spoiler I can finally upload it.

#Osomatsu-san #osomatsu san #choromatsu #osomatsu #おそ松さん #ososan #art #comics #Sokudomatsu

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Some old commissions! Oh man I really ought to stop procrastinating with posting my stuff

#original art #commission #illustration #イラスト #original #art #doodles

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Japan 2017 Trip 1.2 (?)

Yeah, it’s fast, haha. But I had to rush back to Japan because of a family event at the tail-end of July. Buying a plane ticket for a trip the next day is literally the most spontaneous thing I’ve done in my life. This 6-day trip is a lot less exciting than the previous one because we’re not technically there on holiday, but it was still somewhat of an experience. I traveled with my family this time—mainly my brother and mom, since my dad couldn’t make it to Tokyo with us. I won’t be including as much details here as my previous trip, since it really was a rushed trip! But if you’re still interested in some undiscovered parts of Tokyo and my ramblings on childhood, feel free to read on!

This is my first time taking a transit flight! We went on Thai airways for the first time! Stopped at the Bangkok for an hour, hehe.

We sat near the window seat! I was really nervous at first since I’m really bad at enduring turbulence, but this was hands down the BEST ride I ever had. Forget about the turbulence, the plane didn’t even SHAKE. Regardless, my anxiety just wouldn’t allow me a night’s rest, so I didn’t sleep for one night! 

I also ate garlic pork rice in the morning! It was really good! The first time I ate in a plane for ten years, I think. After touching down, we rushed to Ueno to take the shinkansen to Sakudaira station, where my paternal family lives.

We always take Asama line to my family’s hometown. It used to be a white bullet train with blue and red lines, but now they changed it to gold and blue ;w;. My brother and I were lamenting since the colours we associated with our childhood is gone.

To those interested, this is how the old train looks!

Chicken bentou at the Ueno station! It seems to be a very child friendly bentou.

View of the countryside where my paternal family stays! It rained a lot the few days we were there, so in spite of it being summer, the weather was very cool and pleasant. There was also a lot of fog! We used to play by a river near this area as kids, but it seems that there are a lot of plants creeping around the area this time and it’s hard to reach the river, so I couldn’t really get a picture of it. I feel a bit wistful and poignant staring at this scenery, since I haven’t been here for years. I hope I can come back more often from now on. It really is a very lovely village.

More pictures! I was fascinated by this signpost because it seems that a lot of people living in this village have the same surname as the words on the post.

Apparently, my aunt told me I was named after this flower! It was in full bloom when we arrived

Some really NICE dinner at the event. Most of the food here was sashimi! We ate sashimi for three straight days

There was a slug in the bathroom HAHA. It didn’t really move so I didn’t mind it much.

We went back to Sakudaira station soon after three days. These boxes of tomatoes were relevant to my interests! One whole box only costs 80 yen which is REALLY cheap!! They are really big too, just in case you’re wondering!

So we took the train all the way back to Tokyo again! And we docked at Shimo-Ochiai station, where we rented AirBnB! THIS PLACE IS SO GOOD. Would highly recommend if you’re staying in Tokyo! It’s a two-storey house with really homey décor! And the host (who is really friendly and professional!) lets you pick one of three rooms. We decided to pick the Japanese style room on the third floor! You can find the link to the AirBnB here!

This is how it looks! You can exit the doors on the right to go to the balcony!

The kitchen and dining area! We sat here to have supper every day while we were in Tokyo!

I caught a sticker of Yayoi Kusama’s pumpkin on the door!!

Naturally, since Shimo-ochiai was a stop away from Takadanobaba, I decided to drag my family to the polar bear’s café!! They are having a different sale right now. It seems that they are having a panda fair atm!

Now they have calendar coasters!

When I found out that they were selling a limited edition cappuccino with coffee art of panda disguising himself as polar bear, of course, I had to go get it

LOOK AT HIM.

I had the salmon stew that Polar Bear made Grizzly in episode 25!! It was REALLY good!! My mom got the same thing, and my brother took the katsu dish!

Now they placed hats on the life sized penguin and panda HAHA

We went to eat at a sukiyaki restaurant with Belle!! (and no we didn’t order what was in the picture because we couldn’t finish that). It's called 木曽路 (Kisoji) and to anyone interested I HIGHLY RECOMMEND IT because of the quality of its meat and its generous portions!

THE MEAT IS TO DIE FOR.

In sukiyaki, after cooking the meat, you’re supposed to dip it in raw egg. It sounds intimidating but it’s really delicious!!

VEGETABLES (that my brother refused to eat because he doesn’t eat his veges)

TOMATOES

Lok at all the vegetables sizzling in the pan. The onions were my favourite!

And they served the udon last before the dessert! It’s really quite a lot of food! But it’s all delicious so thank God that we could finish everything

I didn’t manage to get a picture of the sizzling meat in the pan so have a look at it on the restaurant menu.

THE FOOD IS REALLY GOOD. Literally everything here, especially the beef, was melt in your mouth heaven.

NEXT DAY (Harajuku and Shibuya)

We headed straight to Harajuku to eat since we left the house later than planned today. The first vegetable juice I drank in my life is Pokemon vegetable juice!

YUZU RAMEN. This is the craziest ramen I’ve ever eaten! It was not bad!! Apparently, it’s one of the more popular ramen joints in Harajuku. It was already jam packed by the time we arrived!

If you ever get the chance to eat Kakuni (braised pork) in Japan, DO IT. I promise you a slice of heaven

We went to Meiji Jingu just like last time, and we shopped a bit in GAP! Before long, we were hungry, and since my brother and mother couldn’t walk so much, we decided to go to Doutour coffee soon after shopping at GAP.

Don’t let the cheap prices of this joint fool you. Doutor coffee is everywhere in Japan and for GOOD REASON. Honestly this was the best BLACK COFFEE I’ve ever had. I think they roast their beans really well!

We went to Marion crepes after that! It's in the middle of takeshita street, so we had to walk a bit to get there. I also managed to shop at this place called good day! It sells the best clothes in the entire street in my opinion!

Life is good. A toast to marion crepes

We walked quite a bit after that! My brother went to do some shopping in Adidas, and we walked to Shibuya from there. Once again, on the way, I stopped by Alice on Wednesday, a quaint little shop which sells Alice in Wonderland merchandise! My family was really tired from the walk, so I decided to bring them to eat cow tongue rice.

It is as GOOD as ever. By the time we finished, everything in Shibuya was closing, so we had to go home after that. But the adventures of the day don’t end there!

It turns out there was a mini supermarket at the place we were staying. I got really carried away looking at their meat! I MEAN LOOK. All these are perfectly red and they only range from 200 to 800 yen!!

Their bacon and ham are to DIE for. But that’s enough excitement for the day. I bought some roasted pork to eat for breakfast the next day (but sadly I didn’t take a picture of it)!

NEXT DAY (Shibuya)

There was a melon bread shop near the shimochiai station! Apparently they specialize in melon bread with CREAM

This is a mini model of the melon bread. I’m excited already

The REAL THING. This is the best melon bread I have ever eaten HANDS DOWN. I love how you could just randomly walk around in Japan and go to a random shop, and everything you try is delicious.

I want this vending machine in my house

We decided to look around in the Tokyu Shibuya supermarket since my mom always talks about what nice food these supermarkets have. True enough, look at these omg

I REALLY WANTED TO TRY THIS

They didn’t have a price tag on these watermelons so I assume they’re not for sale. Pity!!

I am literally screeching at how fresh these prawns look

From the roof top of Tokyu!

We went to a Tempura restaurant at the top floor! I was really carried away looking at this thing while we were waiting for the food

IT WAS SO GOOD. I ate the set at the bottom! It was really refreshing and thirst quenching, since it’s cold noodles! They also used wild vegetables for the tempura (they didn’t have the typical stuff like sweet potato and pumpkins), so it was a really pleasant surprise! I didn’t know what I ate I just ate them all

I decided to eat kakuni again! I really want to try making this back at home. It’s such a good dish I’m obsessed

Immediately after we went back to the basement to have dumplings. Travelling with family is always about eating

Kimi no na wa posters outside the Tokyu building! It seems that the bluray just got released! We walked around a bit after that and visited the shops my family wanted to go. Including Loft

In the meantime I got carried away taking pictures of graffiti outside the shops lmao. Halfway through, my family decided to take a rest at Starbucks, while I went to Shibuya 109 in the meantime. They had clearance sales all throughout the building so I managed to snag some really good deals from this shop called Ingni!

Before long it was time to eat (AGAIN). If you’re ever in Shibuya Tokyu please eat at this restaurant! It’s called Maisen, and it serves tonkatsu (Fried pork cutlet). I think this is the best tonkatsu I’ve eaten all my life. Usually I only get the air-flown version of the food here, so eating it at the restaurant itself was a GREAT experience!

SO TASTY.

TOPS cake! It’s a chocolate brand in Japan that my entire family adores! I’m not one for chcocolate but even I loved this! It’s really worth a try if you’re in Tokyo! We ate this with our host, and we had a great chat!

Of course I’m a glutton so I ate extra things for dessert.

NEXT DAY (Shinjuku and Shibuya (Don’t we always go back to Shibuya?))

Arrived in Shinjuku! Apparently this shop is a Singaporean brand! Fancy seeing you here!

SHINJUKUUUUUUUU. I came through this exit about five years ago with my father! It really brings me back to the good old days tbh

Remember this guy from my previous trip? I saw this whole stash of Totoros at tokyu hands in takashimaya, so naturally I put my own totoro in the middle of them to snap a shot HAHA.

After this we went to meet up with my cousin who was in Tokyo! We travelled the day with her after that! First, we needed to eat, so we had to take the big lift up to the highest levels in Takashimaya. I had a bad experience with lifts before, so I excused myself and decided to take the escalator.

We ate tempura again! The last tempura was ice cream, if you’re interested! It wasn’t bad! But I did prefer the tempura from yesterday.

After this, we decided to look around in Shinjuku! We went to Tower Records, Don Quijote and Gap! And after a while we decided to go back to Shibuya again (lol)

Now I actually managed to get a proper shot of the Shibuya cityscape! I love this place so much.

We went to the basement of seibu to try out some food! Most of the shops close at 8pm, but the restaurants close later. We went to this Western buffet restaurant, and I took pictures of some of my more presentable salad plates. Lmao. Everything else after these three plates was just chaos.

Some of our mini-main courses!

After this we had to go back home ;w;. We said goodbye to our cousin and went back to Shimo-Ochiai! She was very nice to send us off at the platform despite holding so many things in her hands. I haven’t seen her for 8 years prior to this, so I hope we can see her soon again!

But the day hasn’t ended yet! Our host was very kind to buy us tarts on our last day! These cheese tarts are from a company called BAKE—which is apparently one of the most famous producers of cheese tarts in Japan. The quality of the tarts are REALLY good!!

FINAL DAY Departure

Nothing much to say other than us going back to Singapore! We left the house before peak hours so we didn’t manage to say goodbye to our host for that one last time ;w; The trip to Narita was mostly uneventful and I slept a little on the train..

Last meal in Japan at Narita airport! Porridge is great because I get quite airsick easily, so I can’t swallow too much oily food before a flight!

LOOK AT THE DECORATION. I love all the attention to detail tbh

Half an hour before the flight, I decided to swallow this down. It’s not bad! I wanted to save it for when I touched down in Singapore, but it seems that they don’t allow water on planes

BONUS:

This is just a little tidbit! But my grandma used to make us this thing called Matsutake gohan (it’s basically mushroom rice, but the mushroom they use is a special kind that only grows on mountains in autumn)! My aunt made this for us to bring back to Singapore so I was really happy and touched. She gave us enough to feed my family for three meals!

Also, I managed to eat the cup noodles I got from the cup noodle museum in my previous trip! Look at all the Hiyoko-chan narutos!!! I really hope they sell the original cup noodles in Singapore soon. It is my favourite flavour of Nissin cup noodles!

But yeah, that’s about it for now! This trip was really rushed so there were lots of things I didn’t take pictures of. But thanks for reading all the same!

#other stuffs #japan #food #photography #tokyo #nagano

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Once Upon A Pine: An Osomatsu-san Fairytale Zine

The wait is finally over!!

We are very proud to present Once Upon A Pine, an Osomatsu-san fanzine inspired by various fairytales and folktales from all over the world! Have you always wanted to see or read a Matsu AU of your favorite fairytale? You just might find it here!

This zine features 48 artists and 4 fic writers putting their own Matsu-style spin on a story assigned to them. Everyone’s worked very hard on their entries, and we hope that you enjoy every page of this storybook-inspired zine!

Download the PDF for free here!

Buy a physical copy on Blurb (for US $20.79)!

Thank you to all the featured artists and writers for contributing to the zine! And thank you for reading and supporting us! ♥♥♥

(cover art by @punpun-san!)

Keep reading

#Check it out! #It's a really well done zine and lots of artists are featured in! #Osomatsu San #Great job on the zine guys

[idontlikesummer]

Hi everyone! Thank you for your patience. We are pleased to announce that the Church of the Damned fanzine is out at last!

Church of the Damned is an Osomatsu-san Religion AU fanzine, which was made possible by the efforts and contributions of 50 fan artists. 

It contains:

- 80 pages

- Full colour

- is 21 x 26 cm in size

- No BLMatsu

- No gore and NSFW but partial nudity

You may order the book from Blurb here.

If you would like to view the digital copy of the book, you may do so here. 

A big thank you to all the artists who have made this zine possible, and to those who have spread word about the zine! We couldn’t have done it without you guys.

Please reblog this so to spread the word! 

(Cover art by the wonderful @blakkiek)

#osomatsu-san #whew #sorry there was an issue with the last post #religion matsu zine #reblogging again

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Japan Trip 2017 log

I’m back from my Tokyo (and Yokohama) trip AAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!

This is the first time I managed to go with friends and plan my own trip! Since all the times I’ve been to Japan I’ve only visited the countryside and not Tokyo, I was really excited. It’s like a dream come true!! I wanted to log in my incredible experience somewhere, and leave this as a gesture of gratitude to everyone who helped make this trip possible. To those curious, beware my spastic commentary and plush toys photobombing every now and then

I travelled with @selinawen and @b-sim was very very kind to let us bunk in with her during her stay. We’re very thankful uwu

 Spoilers More under cut (Warning: It’s long)

“PLEASE MAKE ME A TOKYO IKEMEN IN MY NEXT LIFE”

^All I could think of during the trip. I understand your pain Mitsuha

I got so excited I took pictures of almost everything I saw

Day 1: Arrival and Shinjuku

Arrived in Japan! This was one of the smoothest rides I’ve ever had! I got excited looking at the rice paddies from the window

Despite our best efforts we still missed the train to Tokyo from Narita and had to wait an hour. (We managed to get the Suica card though!) In the meantime, we went to….

STARBUCKS!! With the promised photobombing of my stuffed toys.  The Starbucks here sells Vanilla cream Frappuccino 

YAY the train arrived! And we managed to live my childhood dream of sitting on the double decker train carriage for about like ten minutes, before realizing we needed to pay a premium fee to stay on those seats. It was a short but sweet experience. I felt powerful for ten minutes

This is the first sight that greeted us after we left the train(s)! This is Takadanobaba, the town that we stayed in. During this stay I’ve come to love this place very much. It’s got lots of good food and is a good spot for relaxation from the hustle and bustle of other places like Shibuya and Ikebukuro.

After napping for nearly three hours (we didn’t manage to get much sleep on the plane), we went to Shinjuku for! This is the Isetan building. It’s really grand, sort of reminds me of the MACUSA building from the Fantastic Beasts movie. Speaking of Fantastic Beasts, the first place we went to was Kinokuniya departmental bookstore, and there was a Harry Potter corner

It was so cutely decorated! It’s hard to see here but they put a translucent witch hat on Newt’s cut out!

There was also an Osomatsu-san section! They were announcing the release of season 2, and there seemed to be a lot of F6 comics as well *w*

The last book’s cover is drawn by Takos-osomatsusan, whose art I really admire! I was really excited when I saw it

There’s a BL section in the bookstore as well lmao. All the big bookstores seem to have this section. Japan is amazing

When we came across Animate of course we couldn’t ignore it.

Literally an Osomatsu-san shrine with all sorts of goods imaginable. I have never been so overwhelmed emotionally. They even sold food!! Like these:  

I was REALLY tempted to buy the popcorn but I didn’t know if I had time to eat it

And yes, shippy doujinshi section, I always know where I stand with you. (These are the karaichi and ichikara sections). I find it really interesting how they sort the doujins according to the ships! It’s really a neat way of organizing the books. They have non-shipping doujins as well! But those are rarer. In hindsight, it’s good that I didn’t buy any doujinshis today, considering what tomorrow would bring.

They sell a Justaway orange juice drink in the Gintama section. I was so amused because this thing only appeared for like 1 to 3 episodes. I bought this guy for ironic purposes.

They gave me an animate card too! But I’m not sure what to do with it other than souvenir purposes

And here’s our dinner! We were really hungry so we just picked a random fast food chain to eat at. But I’m really happy they sold Cream Soda (a melon soda-tasting drink with soft serve). It’s one of my favourite drinks in Japan!)favourite drinks in Japan!)

Tokyo’s night sceneries are amazing. It was perfect aircon weather and windy too, I loved walking around Shinjuku in these conditions!

Shop full of beautiful hats at Takashimaya. I cry at their beauty and I cry even more at their price. Hat shopping will have to come another day…

On our way back to Belle’s home from Takadanobaba station, we came across this Cozy Corner shop. My word, they have the BEST cakes! (best for starving college students, at any rate, but really it’s very good and affordable). We bought some for tomorrow’s breakfast! I ate the mont blanc, but I forgot to take a picture ;w;

Found some Libera Chocolate at Family Mart. Just like any decent religion AU fan, I had to take a picture of it

I think I must have squealed out loud when I found out Polar Bear’s Café was RIGHT BESIDE Belle’s home! It was probably one of the places that made me the happiest, but today it’s closed ;w;

Day 2: Ueno and Akihabara

The blanket my friend lent us was quite furry. I never had a furry blanket before so I played around with it somewhat

We decided to go to Ueno Zoo today, as Selina’s friend had recommended. It’s apparently the oldest zoo in Japan since the Meiji period. Looking forward to what it might bring! I’ve never been to any zoo other than the one in Singapore  (((o(*ﾟ▽ﾟ*)o))) . And it’s pretty cheap, too!(((o(*ﾟ▽ﾟ*)o))) .

Got a crocodile ticket! Which is great because crocs are so gangster, yo

First picture!! Turns out to be a pavilion and not an animal. This was a pavilion that Thailand donated to the Japanese to commemorate the close relations between both countries for many years

Here’s a tea ceremony house! Apparently, it had existed since Tokugawa’s period (maybe even before that). We learned that Tokugawa’s shrine was pretty nearby this place too!

Kusunoki!! AKA the tree that kept appearing in Totoro. I needed to capture this for nostalgic purposes.

There were really many animals in the place, and many sections! They had a birdhouse, a nocturnal area, as well as an area for kids. I even suspect there were some places we did not visit. Sadly we had to skip the panda as the queue was very long.. Here’s some of the animals I really like!

I REALLY love polar bears so it made me happy to see that they have one here! It was hard to take a picture because there were lots of people snapping away! I’m glad I managed to sneak a shot even though my camera was facing its rear. I also really wanted a picture of the grizzly bear, but it was stuck in a corner and all I could see in the picture was a black lump

In the nocturnal section there was the Japanese flying squirrel which was just ADORABLE. Look at its eyes! So huge. This was the first time I’ve ever seen one. It moved around a lot and it was really hard to get a good shot.

There were also others worthy of mention but I can’t seem to find the photos I took of them ;w;. Among these was the “Go-Away Bird”. I love its name so much I’ve committed it to memory

Ice cream!! I wanted a brand that we couldn’t find in Singapore. It was straight out of a vending machine and I believe the hardest/coldest ice cream I’ve ever eaten. It was pretty good!

I bought a relatively cheap burger in one of the rest stops and it was the SMALLEST burger I have ever seen. I took so many pictures to demonstrate its smallness- it’s the size of my palm!! Unreal. But it was REALLY good too! It’s yakiniku rice burger, which means they shape the rice into the ‘bread’ of the bun, and the inside is filled with beef! The beef was also a little spicy too, which was a surprising but nice touch!

Interestingly, there was a cemetery dedicated to the animals that perished during the last war. The big animals had to be put to sleep, because there was a worry that war would set them loose and they would harm the civilians. There was a display of flowers and messages for these deceased animals somewhere nearby.

Amazing view from the bridge!! The wind was great as well!

Luckily, our next impromptu destination, the Toshogu shrine, was right next to the exit of the zoo. This shrine is dedicated to Japan’s third unifier, Tokugawa Ieyasu, whose family line ruled the Edo period. He was probably one of the most famous shogun, and is known for having immense patience and waiting to get what he wants. I studied him for history class so I was really excited to visit this place! Ueno’s filled with so many cultural landmarks!

Some more pictures!! Feels like I’m walking through the pages of history

We each got an omikuji! I’m glad that we both have decent luck this year （*´▽｀*）

First time eating food from a festival stall! This is one of the best karaage I’ve eaten and the good news is that there were about 8 pieces inside.

We’re at Akihabara!! Anime heaven!! (or hell, considering the questionable things it does to your wallet) (ﾉ´ヮ´)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧

Bigger animate!! I love how tall you are!

LiSA seems to be really popular here!

Little Witch Academia’s CD covers are so pretty!

Mitsuha and Taki at the counter!!

Oh no.

Toranoana (Doujinshi departmental store) and it’s the main branch. I bought so many things here online. This can’t be good at all.

Up the staircase and Selina directed my attention to this. His cuteness is illegal. Wtf, arrest him

OH JOY A WHOLE FLOOR OF OSOMATSU DOUJINSHIS

(most of the floor is osomatsu, but certain shelves of Yuri on Ice and Hetalia!)

I’m dying there are so many things here and each ship has a WHOLE SHELF dedicated to it I’m screaming. I’ll be a hermit at home after this to save up more moneys

EVERYWHERE I TURN I JUST CAN’T WIN

A birthday collage for the sextuplets! There’s a notebook full of contribution drawings at the stand, but they don’t allow photos for that. I drew an Ichimatsu in the book but I won’t be seeing that doodle again ;w;

I spent 150k yen on you shitty neets. Your fans are paying for your unemployed livelihood. I’m going to bill you it’s payday bitches

This rest space was quite photogenic! I hope I did it justice

The sun sets on my abused wallet. Fare thee well Akihabara.

Life is more peaceful at Takadanobaba! We made it back in time to have a cup of coffee at Shirokuma café! I’m so excited!!

The menus are so cute!! I took so many pictures of the insides but you can probably find better ones on the website shirokumacafe (dot) net .

The café is really big too! And they had Shirokuma’s ending playing when we arrived. I melted at Takahiro Sakurai’s voice. They even had a room for children (which was right next to the smoking room haha). At the bottom left of the picture you see Penguin on a date with all the Penkos! That poor guy

Penguin and Panda!!! How’s your day? I hope you enjoy Shirokuma’s coffee as always!

They have seasonal specials too! We went at the time when Penguin was having a special, so we bought his special tiramisu latte! It was a little pricey but it’s so damn good. They also gave us coasters based on lottery! We got polar bear, llama and Panda! Selina doesn’t watch Polar Bear’s Café so I get to hoard all these for myself

BEST COFFEE. I’ll get the penguin coaster next time, promise </3

Did some doodles before I went to sleep!

Day 3: Ikebukuro

HOWDY IKEBUKURO I’VE LONGED TO SEE YOU. I know Izaya and Shizuo only exist in the confines of the DRRR universe but I like to pretend I’d see flying vending machines in the vicinity

We started the day by heading to Komeda café! The creator of Hatoful Boyfriend (a game Selina REALLY likes) tweeted about it before. I’m here because I like cafes and because Komeda sounds like Komaeda

BOOTYLICIOUS CREAM SODA I wanted to take this cup home

For every drink they serve us a slice of bread with a choice of topping. We both ordered eggs!

We also ordered katsu sandwiches but we didn’t expect it to be SO BIG. I feel like this is payback for that burger from Ueno zoo. Look at the size of this thing and multiply it by three, that’s how much we had to finish. But the meat was so JUICY

Went back to the station and saw this. I have a direction in life now

Before we went to Parco we decided to drop by at Stellaworth, an otome game shop! We walked around a bit there before going back to Parco

I’M SHOOKED. So many parts of this exhibition didn’t allow photos though ;w;

LIFE SIZED MATSUS. I love them all so much. Look at how happy they are!

We were supposed to go to the Hetalia café after this, but they were full for the day, so we decided to come by tomorrow at an earlier time!

Aaaaand Karaoke at Utahiroba! This place is amazing because it’s so cheap and they have so many vocaloid songs updated to as recent as Mabel! As a Vocaloid fan I went a bit wild here

They had Yoake to Hotaru by N-Buna ((┌|o^▽^o|┘))♪

This song makes me so emotional. But a good part is that they use credited vocaloid pictures as videos to avoid plagiarism! Some of the artists were really good so I memo-ed them down

Walking around Ikebukuro Sunshine 60 Street and I saw THIS. LET ME LIVE

Of course we can’t miss Pokemon MEGACENTRE!! It’s located in Sunshine City Shopping Mall, and it was filled with people (unsurprisingly)! I still feel guilty for buying so many doujins so I mostly shopped for friends here. They had lots of cute files, stationery, and they even had a Gengar bag! There was an Eeveelution event going on here so there were a lot of Eeveelution plushies.

So many large Pokemon displays!! And you can take pictures of them too!

PLASMA PIKACHU. I really wanted to get this one!!!

I WANT EVERYTHING

Pokemon biscuits!! The art is so cute!!!

And the sun sets on sunshine city. The day is ending soon so we didn’t manage to explore much of this mall, but we’ll be back for more!

MANDARAKE. This is another doujinshi store and they sell not only the latest doujins, but also those that have been around for YEARS. Hoo boy I’m not sure what this would do to my wallet

The Hetalia and Osomatsu-san sections are back to back! I spent hours around here and nowhere else.

Ikebukuro at night! It’s so beautiful! Will definitely be back here again!

We were starving and by the time we could eat it was 10pm! So we went to an underground ramen restaurant called 支那そば 北熊  (Shina Soba Hokuyuu). It was really close to the place we lived and ended up here as we curiously walked down a flight of stairs. Personally I wasn’t expecting much but the ramen turned out to be TOO GOOD. We ordered it by vending machine, and they gave us an extra small bowl of rice with spring onions, and told us to pour the ramen soup onto it before trying it. SO. GOOD. And don’t even get me started on the ramen! 120% will recommend!! It was a great way to end the day

Day 4: Ikebukuro and Ghibli Museum

We found Hydrangeas on the way to Takadanobaba Station! They were really pretty!

We decided to wake up earlier to go to Hetalia café! An hour before it opens there’s already a sizeable queue! We got a number and had 30 minutes to wait and walk around a bit. Luckily, there was a park nearby we could waste some time in

There was a small shrine in the park and there were these statues!

Trying Dr. Pepper for the first time! It had a bit of strange, nutty taste. I quite like it, but I still prefer the gassy drinks I’m used to

THE SKY IS PRETTY.

We also dropped by P’Parco’s WEGO for a bit and they had a collaboration with Osomatsu-san. Every brand is collaborating with Osomatsu-san OMG

HETALIA CAFÉ AT LONG LAST. To those who’ve known me for some time, you’d know that Hetalia was my first major fandom and has a special place in my heart. Selina’s also into Hetalia, so we really wanted to come here when we found out this event coincided with our trip. It was well worth the wait! They played The World Twinkle episodes as well as the character songs!

There were also drawings on the walls!

This America in a bread was my favourite of them all <3

The food and drinks menu!! There was so much I wanted to eat but I had to limit myself!!

In the end Selina settled for Germany’s Wurst and Wedges set and I tried Prussia’s Königsberger Klopse, which is kind of like potato and meatball stew! (German brothers ❤ ❤ ❤) After googling I realized that this dish DID come from Prussia. They did good research. The food wasn’t bad! Just that it was no match for our appetites

WE GOT ENGLAND AND AMERICA’S DRINK. I was so happy because these two are my favourites (along with Japan). Here’s a commemoration photo! They placed a cherry and M&Ms in America’s drink, which actually went pretty well with coke!

MY BABIES (they give us a random poster for every dish we order, so Selina got England (my absolute favourite) and we exchanged (I gave her Russia)). The America was glued to the table ;w;

There were so many neat things in the Tokyu Hands at Ikebukuro! If I owned my own home I’d definitely buy some things there for decorating!

Jyushimatsu Ita-bag!! Now that’s good advertising

We arrived at Mitaka station to go to the Ghibli museum! We found a breadshop called Kinokuniya (top) which made us so confused because the Kinokuniya we know is usually a bookshop (bottom). I wonder if there were any plagiarism charges..

ON THE WAY TO THE MUSEUM ON THE GHIBLI BUS. It’s about a ten to fifteen minute drive from Mitaka station!

GOODBYE GHIBLI BUS. We’ll miss you!

The famous Totoro counter!! I wanted to hug him but the wall separates us both. He’s been working hard here for so many years

Ghibli museum taken during the queue! Looking forward to this ( ƅ°ਉ°)ƅ

They don’t us take pictures of the interior exhibits, but they have lots of neat stuff inside, of course! My favourite all-time exhibit was the large zoetrope which was made of clay figures in the first floor. They were also exhibiting Ghibli food on the third floor as a temporary exhibition! They made realistic figures of the food, including the strange food that Chihiro’s parents ate in Spirited Away! There was also an exhibit of Ashitaka’s porridge which explained the difficulty of animating chopsticks!

In the second section of the exhibition there was Satsuki’s kitchen from Totoro and Sheeta’s kitchen from Laputa in the airship. It made me so happy to see all the food I wanted to try out since I was a kid. Since we couldn’t take pictures I tried to draw some of the food I liked!

The museum package also includes a screening of a 15-minute animation! The one I watched was on a few rats sumo-wrestling. It was really cute!

A view of the museum from the roof!

Laputa Robot watching over the gardens!

We ate at the straw hat café for dinner (and the best part was that there was no queue because it was pretty late)! They give the menu in both English and Japanese. Totoro looks happy in his natural habitat

Selina ordered Howl’s breakfast! (the one made by Calcifer in the movies)

I ordered a Katsu curry rice! I really think this is one of the, if not the best, katsu rice I’ve ever eaten. The pork is really fragrant and succulent. I might be exaggerating because I was hungry, but this is really very good

Since we were in the café rather late, the famous strawberry shortcake I wanted to eat was sold out. I was kind of down, but the lemon cake seemed good as well, so I decided to try that instead! But then there was this really nice waitress who came down to tell me that one of the shortcake orders were cancelled by a previous customer. So they let me have the strawberry shortcake, and I was really thankful!

IT REALLY IS A VERY NICE CAKE. And HUGE too! The cream was really milky as well and I think they used a special kind of flour for the sponge. It’s really good. I’m coming by to eat here again next time!!

I chatted a bit with the same waitress after that! Apparently she was working in Ghibli museum for 7 years! She’s really friendly (and so are the rest of the staff), and I’m looking forward to coming here again!

On the bus back to the station! We moved to the seat with the dust bunny on the window hehe

We ended the day with a tour of the Waseda (the university Belle studies in) campus! Apparently some of the trees were sakura trees but we didn’t get to see them because it was nearing summer ;w; It’s still pretty cool though! I’ve never been inside a Japanese school before

Waseda had so many statues too but this was the only one that I managed to get a proper picture of because of the lighting!

There were lots of advertisements too but this particular one jumped out at me

We were talking about Oyakodon while touring Waseda. Oyakodon literally means parent and child (since you’re eating the chicken and the egg) rice bowl, and it might be a sort of sadistic name to give this dish. But all that talk made me hungry so I bought Oyakodon from the convenience store for supper lmao

Tried to draw Ghibli café from memory!

Day 5: Shibuya

Cozy Corner Mille Crepe for breakfast! I will never get enough of these cakes

It’s rubbish collection day! (I’m not kidding when I said I took pictures of everything)

SHIBUYAAAAAA. I’ve wanted to come here for so long (but even more so after I went into TWEWY for a bit)

There was a Moyai statue near the station and the Hachiko statue! Many people were smoking around it so maybe it’s a smoking area? This was donated to Japan by Niijima Island

The famous Hachiko statue!! This dog waited everyday at the train station waiting for his master, who had passed away, to return for years. After the dog passed on, he became a symbol of loyalty in Japan. The statue was a lot smaller than I imagined him to be, but still as popular as ever. So many people were crowded around him taking pictures on a weekday!

TOWER RECORDS. This is gonna be great, a whole departmental store of CDs. We went to the JPop and Anime-songs storeys! They had really good BGM in the stores too. I wanted to find the bands for all the songs they played!

Look at all the Vocaloid CDs I’ll be broke before the day is over

I bought these CDs! I was really glad that Keeno’s In The Rain (top) was available because I was looking for it for days!

BEST SLOGAN. Also there’s a strange Hachiko statue here too! He looks like it’s about to be blown away by the wind but they didn’t offer any explanation as to why he appeared this way

I marvel at the effort they put into decorating this Disney store *q*

The inside is really pretty too, the walls look like they’re made of candy and there were many statues here and there!

Spiral staircase!!

I didn’t see much merchandise of Big Hero 6 so it made me happy to see this! Baymax and his dog look so cute!

Now we begin our journey to eat ホープ軒 (Hope-ken), a ramen shop that I’ve been dying to try for years! It’s all the way to Sendagaya so it’s a bit of a walk.

We came across the Chousenzenji shrine/temple on the way there! It was rather quiet compared to the other shrines/temples we’ve visited, but I guess it’s because this isn’t much of a tourist attraction

We walked all the way to Harajuku! This place is filled with boutiques so my broke college ass can’t afford anything (which is for the best)

SANTA MONICA CREPES (we passed by the end of Takeshita street. I was tempted to go in but Hope-ken beckons me to keep myself in control and leave it for tomorrow). The store lady was really pretty!

I got a mont blanc crepe!! It was so delicious!! I feel energized again

WE WALKED FOR 40 MINUTES AT LEAST. If I was tired, I think Selina was dying. Google maps sends us around all the confusing alleys and lags a lot, so it looked like we were teleporting across the map! (╬ಠ益ಠ)

SANCTUARY AT LAST. SANCTUARY.

Selina ordered the chaashuu ramen and I ordered the wanton ramen based on the recommendation of the waiter! My family loves eating the packet Hope-ken ramen so when I came here I kept sending them photos to annoy them lol

IT IS SO GOOD. WELL WORTH THE WALK. The portion’s like mega huge too so it really filled us up after all that walking! The wanton in particular was really good because of the meat they used and they mixed it with chilli oil so it was a little spicy!

They were also playing all my favourite songs when I was in secondary school such as Ash like Snow and Gekkou by Chihiro Onitsuka! I was on a huge nostalgia trip with the ramen and the songs. There was also a window seat on the second floor but the view was filled with construction works HAHA

Shibuya crossing! I took so many videos of this place. Shibuya 109 is in the distance

SHIBUYA 109 THEY A WHOLE DEPARTMENTAL STORE OF CLOTHES. They have so much stuff here and I love it because it’s filled with Onee-gyaru clothes! It’s kind of pricey though, so I limited myself to one black shirt and a pair of sunglasses!

I LOVE THIS SHOP. I really wanted to buy something from here since I’ve been eyeing it for like years but everything was so expensive

THERE WAS THIS DRESS I WANTED TO BUY FROM CECIL MCBEE AND I TRIED IT ON IT LOOKED SO GOOD. So I drew a quick picture of it while I still remember how it looks like HAHA. I WAS REALLY GOING TO BUY IT

BUT IT WAS A PAIN IN THE ASS TO TAKE OFF. I nearly asked someone to help me take it off I was that desperate. And it only came in one size. WHAT A SHAME

We headed to Spain Hill to see what it’s like!! We didn’t know we arrived there until we walked through the place a few times

Selina spotted an Alice in Wonderland café and of course we had to go even though we were still full from Hope-ken lmao. It’s called Alice in Dancing land if you’re curious! It was so good the interior was amazing! The food was pricey but I think you pay more for the service that they provide since it’s a themed café!

Down the rabbit hole we go

The special menu! They sold this thing called pudding cake which was really good!

I took so many pictures of this place!! There was a merry go round in the center of the café and coloured glass as the window. When we arrived they made us wear rabbit headbands and madhatter was running the counter! The Alice who took our orders had a large pocket watch as her menu! Everything was so cute!!

WE BOTH ORDERED PUDDING CAKE. Selina ordered tomato juice and I ordered ginger ale. They gave us a free Potato potage as well! Everything was so classy! Before we ate the waitress told us that eating the food would shrink us, and at the end of the meal they gave us a packet of tea which they said would revert us to our normal size just like how the food in Alice in Wonderland worked!

I think this is the most beautiful clock I’ve seen ever.

Cheshire cat on our bill!

We didn’t eat anything after this but I was feeling hungry at night so I had gyudon from the convenience store as supper

FAMICHIKI IS SO GOOD. You can get them at the Family Mart convenience stores! Once is not enough!

Day 6: Harajuku

Belle made us toast for breakfast! ₍՞◌′ᵕ‵ू◌₎♡

She’s been really kind to us during our stay

Today’s Harajuku day, so of course like good tourists we went to the Meiji shrine (which was dedicated to the Meiji emperor, who opened up Japan to foreigners after centuries of isolation during the Edo period)! It was really crowded even on a weekday! But the weather was really cool and the forest-like ambience was something we don’t experience in our home country, so I really liked this place!

This was the view of the garden pond in the shrine (you need to pay 500 yen to enter). Apparently the Meiji emperor’s wife Empress Shouken often came here to fish!

The garden was so pretty!!

I liked this flower best! There were lots of bees but they didn’t bother us

Kiyomasa well which apparently brings us good luck! We had to bow and clap our hands before we could snap a picture. But we’re not allowed to touch the well for understandable reasons. The water is so clear!!

Yay we arrived at the main gate!

They were featuring a bonsai exhibition in the main area! This particular pink one was my favourite!

The shrine temple was under renovation so they boarded up the place with cardboard with a picture of the shrine. You can see the shrine is actually a cardboard picture if you squint. I love their sense of humor lol

BIGGEST TREE. The people are so tiny compared to it!

We took the main route back to Harajuku! There were lots of wine barrels and rice wine, which I think are donations!

WHOO BOY TAKESHITA STREET. I saved my money for you. This street is filled with girls’ clothes at affordable prices, definitely a must go if you like J fashion! Many shops here are trend setters!! I blew my money over here HAHA

We went to do some purikura first! There are too many faces and I’m too lazy to censor everything but thankfully purikura distorts your features a little. This is my first time doing Purikura and it’s really fun! The purikura designs are great (but the words they let us use are so thirsty)! I sort of understand why so many people used to do it back in the day

THIS WAS MY FAVOURITE SHOP. They sold everything I love over here

LISTEN FLAVOR. I knew this shop because of their Dangan Ronpa collaboration and it made me really happy to see the shop in person. The store lady was really nice and helped me to pick out something nice for me and a gift for my friend!

Takeshita street is always crowded so we decided to take a break somewhere. In one of the routes off the main pathway we came across this Japanese western restaurant with really nice and quaint interior decoration!

We both ordered bolognaise! It was really good! The portion was not much but there was a lot of flavour in the beef and the spaghetti!

This lady (and a few others) were holding a giant cotton candy! It’s bigger than the size of her head omg

We stopped by a Dangan Ronpa crepe event by Marion crepe!! I heard Marion crepe is really good so I was so excited they were doing a Dangan Ronpa V3 event!

 Selina ordered Shuichi’s chocolate crepe!!

Even though I wasn’t a big fan of strawberry I ordered Akamatsu’s strawberry crepe because I’ve a feeling I’d like her if I started the series. BUT IT WAS SO GOOD I wanted to eat another one

We each got randomized cards along with the crepes. I got Ouma and Selina got Shuichi! I guess I’m in some ways always doomed to have an affinity with the rival characters (I do think I’ll like Ouma though)

Now we head to Alice on Wednesday, an Alice in Wonderland gift shop our friend recommended. Please be kind to us google maps.

Google maps did lead us through all sorts of funky places again but it wasn’t as bad as yesterday. It was hard to notice this shop but we found it at last!! They have lots of doors and the one that leads to the shop is actually the smallest one

The first floor was mostly food and I really wanted to buy these bottles. “Drink Me”, believe me I wanted to

Second floor was accessories. I went a bit wild over here. Everything was surprisingly pretty cheap considering how detailed their designs were!

The Queen’s and Mat hatter’s rooms! The queen’s room had so many earrings I bought a few of them! The mad hatter’s rooms had bags, shirts and book jackets. They were all really pretty! This is a really gorgeous place to be in

MAT HATTER COLOURED GLASS

This place was a treat! Will definitely be back one day!

We headed down to Shibuya after that! This time we managed to catch a spot at the famous Starbucks which has a view of the scramble!! Totoro and Ichimatsu had fun watching people cross the road over and over again.

We went back to Shirokuma café after this, since we haven’t had their main course dishes yet! This time, Belle came with us! I took some more pictures of the decorations in the café. The T-shirt had autographs of Shirokuma, panda and penguin! It was really cute!

We all ordered our food, and it took me a while to realize, but Sasako was the waitress! I got pretty excited after that, and she was really nice! Apparently she watched Dangan Ronpa, and we talked a bit about our favourite Polar Bear’s Café characters!

Penguin tiramisu latte again. I can’t get sick of this. And I really want that mug omg

Belle ordered the fried salmon sandwich! It had Shirokuma’s face on it ❤

I didn’t try it but she said it was good!

Selina had the Panda curry, which looked really cute! I tried a bit of it and it tasted great!

I took Grizzly’s pork katsu sandwich OMG. It was so good. I was really impressed because themed cafes don’t usually have exceptional food, but this café cooked their food really well! I’m really really happy being here (๑ˊ͈ ॢꇴ ˋ͈)〜♡॰ॱ

Belle ordered the Shirokuma Cappuccino after that! It looked just like her salmon sandwich ww

We all took the shirokuma café character quiz after that. I got Shirokuma! (he’s my favourite btw). I half-didn’t believe the results LOL. But I did have some similar characteristics with him and penguin

I got a bit obsessed with the café so when we went back I doodled the Shirokuma Panda and penguin

Bought premium family chicken from the Family Mart! SO GOOD. I can eat this every day

Day 7: Shimokitazawa

The day today was set aside for Shimokitazawa! I wanted to come here for a while because I’ve seen pretty pictures of it, but not many people seem to know about it. Even so, some have been saying that this place may be paved away soon, so I really wanted to come down here before it happened. BEST DECISION EVER I LOVE THIS PLACE. I think this town (and Yokohama) was/were probably the prettiest place(s) we’ve visited! It is really photogenic!

I mean, THIS is a spectacles shop!!!

I came across this shoe shop called Futabaya near the spectacles shop. The shop owner was very nice and friendly! He helped measure my shoe size and placed my belongings somewhere while I was trying out the shoes.

There were also some nice travel books which he gave to us for free! They’re really useful, and they were so cutely decorated I kept them for design inspiration (((o(*ﾟ▽ﾟ*)o)))

EVERYTHING HERE IS SO PRETTY TBH. It’s a very photogenic place! And if you’re looking for a place away from the hustle and bustle of the bigger town areas, this is one place you want to go! They have book cafés, pet shops, secondhand clothes stores and a lot of cafes.

There was also this store called Village Vanguard which Belle recommended! They sold EVERYTHING and I bought an artbook with so many of my favourite artists featured inside!

The spiderman shop

FOR THE FIRST TIME EVER I REALLY WANTED TO ADOPT A CAT. This guy was really mischievous he kept moving around and tapping our hands. He was so cute!! Cats don’t usually like me but this guy was really amicable! If I lived in Tokyo I would come to visit him every now and then

We stopped by to eat at Rainbow Café. I ordered Porcini mushroom spaghetti with cream sauce. IT WAS AMAZING. The fact that I finished this quick even though it didn’t have meat says something! Definitely recommended!!

We walked a bit to the Kitazawa Hachiman shrine, which was about 20 minutes away from the main area! It was a little tiring because of the ups and downs, but we came across lots of magnificent view along the way! (we also found out there were toilets in convenient stores lmao)

Kitazawa Hachiman shrine!! It was pretty quiet compared to the other ones we’ve visited. We thought it was closed at first, but you could call the people out and buy an omikuji!

We went back to the shops area and I saw this little Godzilla with an open sign. So cute!!

This is probably the BEST SHOP I STEPPED FOOT IN TODAY. Everything was 300 yen. I bought so many things and my bill only went up to 1500 yen. They have lots of second hand apparel. Branded bags from brands like Liz Lisa and Cecil McBee only cost the same 300 yen as well! I originally wanted to go back to Harajuku after this but God was probably trying to stop me by bringing me to this shop

This BAG was 300 yen too! It was big enough to serve as a third luggage for my trip and it’s design was very useful to use!

We ate Sukiyaki with Belle at a restaurant called Manpuku at Takadanobaba! It was pretty cheap, and the food was good! The only thing was that it wasn’t filling

So we went to eat Katsudon after that lol. I forgot to take a picture before I dug into my food so have this very messy pork cutlet bowl. THIS WAS REALLY GOOD. It’s from 酒井精肉店 (Sakaiseinikuten) which is also one of the eateries near takadanobaba. This one was recommended by Belle!

Day 8: Yokohama

The next day we went to Yokohama! It was exciting getting out of the Yamanote line for once! The journey was about 30 minutes!

We didn’t eat breakfast today, so we quickly decided to eat something as soon as we got off from Yokohama station. In the basement of one of the malls in the area, we found THIS GEM. I think out of all the food we ate on our trip, this place had to have the best food! We were both craving for hamburg steak so we walked into this restaurant not knowing what it would bring. To the curious, it’s called Ishigamaya Hamburg (いしがまやハンバーグ), and it’s not hard to miss because of all the hamburg steak on display outside!

The interior deco was really homey and the service was good! They served us really soft hamburg beef, which took about one minute to cook after it was brought to us! They measured the time with an hour glass! The beef was SO SOFT, and they made good use of bell peppers too! The egg required 150 yen but it was pretty worth it since it went well with the beef!

BEST FONDANT CHOCOLATE. They even did chocolate art on the plate! This is really a warm welcome to Yokohama ❤

And the chocolate fudge actually flows out really smooth when you cut the thing open! I’ve never had such a good fondant chocolate before! The insides were always usually really hard based on the ones I’ve tried so far. The ice cream didn’t melt that fast too! Everything is perfect in this restaurant. I’d definitely be going back next time!

They have different traffic lights from Tokyo! This reminds me of the ones I see when I visited Nagano as a child so I was on a huge nostalgia trip

After our delicious steak we took the train down to Minato Mirai station. YOKOHAMA IS SO GORGEOUS. I think I’ll have a strong liking for port cities after this! And it’s really windy too because it was so near the sea! My hat was nearly blown off a couple of times!

CUP NOODLES MUSEUM. It didn’t look very eye-catching from the outside, but when we saw the logo we knew we were at the right place! (sadly we didn’t have time to go to the Ramen museum today but they had lots to offer at the cup Noodles museum!)

They allow photography in the place! This cup noodle and chicken was nearly as tall as me! A ticket is 500 yen and you get to watch a history of Momofuku Ando, the creator of instant ramen! It was a very good short film and I enjoyed it very much!

This was a reconstruction of Momofuku-san’s workshop where he experimented to make instant cup noodles for the first time! It came with a chicken coop!

The detail in the workshop was amazing!

I really liked the eggs in particular ww

A ROOM WITH ALL THE INSTANT RAMEN SINCE CREATION. I love this place so much I took several videos of it. Up until now I didn’t know that Chicken ramen was the first instant ramen, I thought it was Nissin cup noodles!

So its history began from here…

These are two of my favourite brands (along with Nissin cup noodles)! I really feel like eating cup noodles now

CUP NOODLES FACTORY. Here you get to make your very own cup noodles! You also get to see how they put in the ingredients. It’s such a child friendly place but even the adults enjoy it as well

And you get this cup that you can decorate! I didn’t want to mess up the logo, so I did the behind instead.

Tada~

You can select four of these ingredients to put in your cup noodles! I picked the Naruto, eggs, negi, and prawns!

The Hiyoko-chan Naruto was the best selling ingredient!

These are our cups! We both love eggs and Hiyoko-chan Naruto ❤ The one on the right is mine ww

After you seal the cup, you have to put it in a bag and inflate the bag to close the cup noodles! It’s really interesting. There was this little girl who didn’t know how to inflate the bag, she turned to me for help, but in the end her friend managed to help her faster than I did! Those two girls are gonna go far in life

There was another section on the third floor which only allowed kids to go in. Boo.

They also had a foodcourt that sold noodle variations from the countries in Asia. I took picture of the chicken ramen stall!

Momofuku Ando-san! Thank you for your creation because thanks to that I can survive my rigorous college days

They had a chronological account of the development of cup noodles!

Instant ramen was Japan’s top internationally recognized creation!! Pokemon is number 8 lol. Pokemon beat sushi

The museum’s main takeaway was not to give up after countless of setbacks! I liked that they incorporated Momofuku’s morals into the creation of the museum as well!

After that we went to Aeon mall for a bit of a walk before going to Chinatown! We both had strawberry shortcake! It was good =w=

This little minx repeated everything I said and it hollered some nasty words I should not mention in public. Do not be fooled by appearances it hosts the devil’s soul

Ferris wheel at Cosmo World!! What I like about this amusement park is that you pay for the individual rides instead of paying to enter. We picked the Ferris wheel also because we are terrible with roller coasters lol. But I over-estimated my ability to keep calm on the ferris wheel so I didn’t dare to move the entire ride

But the view was stunning!!

Ocean cityscape! I should come here next time during the night too!

Walking towards the Nippon Maru ship!

Nippon Maru ship! It was preserved as a ship that existed since the taisho period. It was quite huge! I love the docks and my head kept playing the SS. Anne theme piano version. We didn’t know that it was a museum, what a waste! We could have gone in!!

We took the train to the Yokohama Chinatown after that! This is Japan’s largest Chinatown

The streets and the architecture were all so different from the neighbouring areas! Quite a lot of first/second-generation Chinese were selling Chinese food products along the streets. They’re quite persuasive, so if you don’t like that it’s best to quickly walk away when they start calling you.

Stopped by a gift shop! Mao Ze Dong poker cards and Mao Ze Dong purse the store owners have a sense of humor

Ramen sweets! I was really tempted to try them but if it turned out I didn’t like them I’d have to finish the whole box on my own

There was a temple there too! And it belonged to the God that Selina prayed to!

We stopped by a diner after that. I originally just planned to eat Tenshinhan but it was really expensive (or so I thought), so I didn’t order any more. The waitress was nice to let us know that we accidentally walked into a buffet restaurant and for 2000 yen we could eat as much as we want. We changed our minds and ate a bunch because it’s really cheap!

I wish I had taken pictures of all the food we ate, but I still remember them! Tenshinhan, sharks fin porridge, sharks fin soup (I don’t think it’s the real sharks fin), peking duck, pork bun, xiao long bao, braised pork and ice cream! The food was pretty good, all things considered! Definitely worth it for the price

I wanted to try visiting the yokohama port but it was getting late so we decided to head back home

Day 9: Ikebukuro

COZY CORNER CAKES FOR BREAKFAST

We decided to head down to Ikebukuro for our last day full day because we still haven’t gone to sunshine city properly yet!

In sunshine city we stopped by the starbucks.

Earth Music and Ecology was having a Gintama event! I love the clothes they sell here!

There was a Ghibli shop in the corner as well! They sold really pretty merchandise!

 I really wanted to buy the Calcifer saucepan and have my pancakes come out Calcifer shaped!!

Sleepy totoro in the corner

We went back to Mandarake one last time! Selina found this and I was so tempted to buy it but it was 4000 yen omg

I kind of realized that Mandarake’s prices of their doujinshi depend a lot on their demand. These gintama doujins are beyond 10,000 yen because they’re so highly sought after

Crepe in a van! This was right outside Sunshine City. The man doing the crepes looked pretty intimidating but the idea that he was making crepes in a van called Papa Crepes also made the contrast pretty funny! Nevertheless, he made a good crepe right in front of us!

I ordered caramel cream! Selina ordered chocolate, as with most of her desserts ww

We’re going to eat beef tongue I’m so HYPED. This restaurant is called Negishi, and it’s located at Ikebukuro Sunshine 60 Street. I’m not too sure if this branch is different from the other branches because it always seems to have the longest queues!

THIS IS SO GOOD. They served us beef tongue (which sounds intimidating, but it tastes just like beef, just that it’s a lot softer). I sort of regret not paying a little more for the bigger set, but even though this looks little, it’s actually nine pieces of beef strips that they gave us! There was also a potato mix that you could pour onto the rice with soy sauce. It has a texture very similar to Tamago kake gohan (raw egg on rice).

BELLE BOUGHT BACK SUKIYAKI TO COOK AT HOME FOR DINNER

It was 4 boxes of raw beef with soy sauce, mirin and if I remember correctly sugar? BUT IT WAS SO GOOD. Belle cooked and we all watched Kokuhaku on TV as we ate together! It was really nice! I felt so shameless we were staying at her place and eating her food. Seriously smh at self, but THE FOOD WAS SO GOOD. I’m really thankful for all she’s done the whole trip tbh!

Watch as the beef sizzles mwahaha

After that there was some time so I doodled some stuff while watching Gintama on Netflix!

Even though Osomatsu has the ‘basic’ face of all the brothers I really think at times he’s the most fun to draw.

Obligatory convenience store supper!!! Famichicken is as good as ever I’m addicted

Remember Justaway from day 1? I decided to drink him today while watching Gintama HAHA. It tasted like orange soda

Day 10: Laze around

LAST MILLE CREPE FOR BREAKFAST. We spent most of today lazing around in Takadanobaba to soak up our memories

Goodbye Takadanobaba I’ll miss you ꒰๑•̥﹏•̥๑꒱ (Will definitely be back though!)

Last meal in Japan at Narita Airport! I had to eat light udon because I’m not so good with planes..

BELIEVE ME I WILL SEE YOU AGAIN

Kind of a little nervous here. We were waiting to go up the plane. I just hope the turbulence isn’t too severe

3 HOURS OF TURBULENCE I THINK I DIED FOR A FEW SECONDS. When we took off, there were so many clouds I had a sinking feeling, but because it’s Japan’s rainy season for the first two hours of the flight I felt like I was in a shaker fries bag. In the middle part it was pretty smooth! But when we hit Indonesia we flew through a typhoon, so fun times for adrenaline junkies and bad times for poor ol’ Selina and Yuri. This was the clearest picture I managed to take on the plane lmao

It’s good to be back!!

Oh boy I’m really gonna miss Japan. I really think it’s an ideal place for travelling if you like food, souvenirs, nice sceneries, and of course, if you like anime! This is my first time overseas and navigating and finding my way on my own around a country that doesn’t speak my first language. I also got to practise Japanese a lot! Sounds corny but it feels like I grew as a person in a way. There were also people who made this trip possible for us –Wan Yu (for letting us know what we should prepare!), Shio (for recommending places and letting me scream at you for every hour of the trip!), Belle (for literally EVERYTHING), and of course, my family, so if you’re reading this, I send you my love and gratitude!

Bonus: Here’s some of the stuff I got if you’re interested!

I snagged this from Polar Bear’s Cafe right before taking the train back to Narita airport. I actually wanted to have one last meal here, but it was full house, so I bought the notebook, the mug, and Shirokuma plushie!

Most of these were from Toranoana but a handful were from Mandarake as well. I managed to find some doujinshi which were sold out which I really wanted!

Bag by @korozikoro on twitter! It’s so cute!! Look at the colours!

Ghibli stuff from the Ghibli museum! One of them is from the Mei and Neko bus short, and the other features photos about Ghibli food!

A lot of other stuff I got were mostly clothes and accessories HAHA

I can’t wait to open them all!!

#osomatsu san #ghibli #hetalia #polar bear's cafe #japan #wanted to do this sort of log since forever #might be easier for you to read this on non-mobile tumblr #other stuffs #tokyo #yokohama #doodles #DANGAN RONPA

[idontlikesummer]

Osomatsu-san Follow Spree!!

Hello everybody!

Since it’s finally our favorite sextuplets’ birthday and I have a mighty need of shitty NEETs on my dash, I’ve decided to celebrate with you all through a Osomatsu-san related follow spree!!

Basically I’m looking for any kind of active O-san blogs:

- Serial Osomatsu-san shitposters - Fanartists, fanfic writers, both - Tabimatsu or Hesokuri Wars related blogs - Fic rec blogs - Headcanon blogs -Ask blogs - Whatever as long as it is O-san related

I’m pretty chill with blmatsu, nsfwish stuff (emphasis on the ISH, but I’m pretty flexible about this) and even those weirdass things this fandom is so fond of (let’s be honest now, it is plenty of crazy stuff). Of course the blog doesn’t have to be about the Matsunos only, every character from the O-san universe is more than accepted!!

If you’re interested, leave a like so that I can check your blog and eventually follow you (there is no need to follow me back), and maybe reblog the post and let your mutuals know?? Thank you!!

P. S.: If you have a multifandom blog, don’t worry ‘cause your time will come too, since I’m planning to make another follow spree to celebrate my 200+ followers~

#reblog #osomatsu san #other stuffs

[idontlikesummer]

your art is so gorgeous???? I love it so much!

Thank you very much, dear anon!( ´;w;｀ )♡

I will keep doing my best!

Gif: @flababe

#q&a #osomatsu san

[idontlikesummer]

Preview 3 for @religion-matsu-zine

#choromatsu #osomatsu-san #religion au #おそ松さん #osmt #art #zine #mr osomatsu

[idontlikesummer]

Preview 2 for the @religion-matsu-zine! 

#osomatsu san #mr osomatsu #ichimatsu #おそ松さん #osomatsu-san #religion au #osmt #zine #art

[idontlikesummer]

Made it just in time! :’D

Happy birthday you stupid neets. When will you free me.

#osomatsu san #おそ松さん #osomatsu #karamatsu #osmt #hpbd #doodles #art #choromatsu #jyushimatsu #ichimatsu #todomatsu #i'm kidding i love you all #coloring style taken from ひな田 on twitter!

[idontlikesummer]

First preview for @religion-matsu-zine!

#osomatsu san #osomatsu #おそ松さん #osmt #religion au #zine preview #i should just post this i've procrastinated enough haha #time to keep this blog uPdATed #art #serious art #preview #church of the damned

[idontlikesummer]

Hi everyone! This is just a reminder that the deadline for the zine is on the 30th May, 23.59pm EST. That’s about 8-9 days from now, depending on which time zone you live in. Please remember to make sure that the resolution and the height and width of your picture is correct. Also remember to take note that if you have not submitted your 600 X 600 pixel profile picture, please do so! 

Do reblog this and spread word to your friends who have yet to submit their art. Best of luck, everyone! :’D

#osomatsu-san #reblog #zine stuff #other stuffs

[idontlikesummer]

Some old doodles! 

#ichimatsu #karamatsu #おそ松さん #osomatsu san #osmt

[idontlikesummer]

SEASON 2 IS FINALLY GONNA HAPPEN??!!

#is this REAL #other stuffs