I am in Tokyo!!! But not after a 7 hour terrible flight.. I didn't sleep much, and was totally stoned to the max when i arrived at the airport.. I went past immigration, collected my luggage, and headed to the counter to purchase my train ticket for the Narita Express.
And true to the stories i heard, the train was super punctual on the dot! It arrived 1 minute before the stated time, and stopped at the exact minute. Amazing!
The train ride to my hotel was about an hour, during which i dozed off a few times, but woke up again for fear of missing my station. So i was nodding off like nobody's business.
My hotel was 5 minutes walk from the station. If there is one thing i will never forget about Tokyo, it's the human traffic.. There are endless streams of people everywhere!! And they are all walking so fast, one would feel like they will get run down if they try and cut through the stream of people! At first, i thought maybe it's just my station cause it's the business district area, but after taking the train a couple of times today, it was the same everywhere.
Anyway, when i arrived at the hotel, i was not able to check in as the hotel was too full to accomodate my early check in. So i had to roam around for 1.5 hours. Walked around trying to look for breakfast, but the restaurants were all not open either.. It was the worse 1.5 hours of my life.. Imagine me walking around in about 8-10 degrees of cold weather and totally stoned from lack of sleep. Nonetheless, stubborn me refused to sit at the hotel lobby and wait. Would rather walk around. =)
By 11am, i got my room. My Italian colleague was due to arrive around that time, so i decided to take a short nap and meet him for lunch. I slept for only 30 mins in the end.
First up, we took the train to Shibuya for the famous ramen store. It was the best i have ever tasted in my life!! The soup is to die for !
After lunch, we walked around the Shibuya area. I bought the LV bag for June's colleague.. Waited so damn long just to get the stupid bag.. Cause apparently, the salesman had wrapped the bag so nicely in a nice big LV box. And i had to lug the stupid box throughout the evening.. Regret buying it already..Anyway, i intend to throw away the box and just bring back the bag. Already told June! = )
After Shibuya, we took the train to Ueno to see the cherry blossoms. En route to Ueno, we stopped at a cafe for some tea and hotel chocolate in the cold weather.. damn shiok!
Then we strolled to the park.. It was beautiful to see all the blossoms although it was not in full bloom.. And i've never seen so many people in a park. People were just sitting under the cherry blossom trees having picnic and chatting.. So nice!!
We took a lot of photos at the park, before we headed in search of dinner at Shinjuku, the district of wining and dining.. We got lost cause we took the wrong train line.. So confusing the train network here!! But being the extremely nice and helpful people they are, a Japanese man actually alighted from the train to show us the directions to the right train line! After that, he boarded the next train.. We ended up at this soba restaurant in Shinjuku where we had tempura soba and grilled squid. Not very nice leh.. had better in Singapore.. wasted one meal! My colleague bought a nice Japanes style umbrella for his wife.. Maybe i will also buy one for my sister / mom before i go back.
We headed back to the hotel after dinner.. And i slept soundly throughout the night.. what a day..
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April 9, 2009 at 5:19 PM
Haha, that happened to me too! I fell asleep while waiting for my flight which was delayed. They had to call my name twice before I made a run for my plane. Hee!
I thought Slumdog Millionaire was pretty funny, sad too about their living conditions and life there.
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