09.04.2008, NARITA AIRPORT, TOKYO

9th April 2008. The day finally came when my dreams came true; that was stepping into the land of the rising sun, Japan. The 7h 20 min ride on JAL from Singapore to Tokyo was kinda strenuous but the feeling was gone immediately when I arrived at the Narita Airport. The whole atmosphere was totally different from Singapore and the weather was C-O-L-D! Everybody started putting on their thick jackets (yes I dun think we have the chance to do that in our hot island) and we were whisked off to a bus which did airport-hotel transfer to our hotel for the first night; Hotel Narita Marroad.

After putting down our luggage, we headed to AEON shopping center to have dinner. Yes, our first dinner in Japan and it was located in a food court at the basement of the shopping center. As we chose JAL over SIA (which was an overnight flight), we had to settle the dinner on our own. Thus, we chose to eat bento set because we wanted to ‘experience’ the Japanese culture. And we got to encounter the first communication barrier with the stall owner. Haha. It was pretty amusing as we spoke to her in English and she replied back in Japanese. (!!!) Nevertheless, after some ‘pointing’ and nodding, she finally understood us and ta-daa, here’s our bento set dinner.


Since it was too late to go any places of interest, all we could do was shop around. OMG, I gotten to see LOTSA(YES I mean LOTS) gachapon machines IN THE SHOPPING CENTRE! God I was excited. (In case you are wondering what gachapon machines are, it’s a kind of machine where you put in the coins, turn the knob and anticipate what toy you are going to get from the capsule. Also known as Tikum machines in Singapore. Heh heh..)

So I started digging coins and try my luck. See the ones I gotten! But it’s actually more expensive than Singapore, so I decided to wait and get the toys back in SG instead. Hur hur hur…

We managed to visit the DAISO in Japan, which sells much more variety of goods than what we get in Singapore. The best part is the goods are only 100¥ (=SGD$1.40) each! That’s really CHEAP; we have to pay like SGD$2 in Singapore. But the catch was not ALL items are of the same price. You have to see carefully if they have additional price tags; else the items can be quite expensive.

I gotten some Stitch keychains for only 100¥ (=SGD$1.40), aren’t they cute?
Alas, the shopping center closes at 8.00pm, so we had to leave after a short while. So back to our hotel, and guess what we interesting thing we found in the toilet?
YES an automated ‘clean your butt’ toilet bowl. I was like ‘WOAH’. Question, how do you use it?
My guess was there’s sensors installed because whenever one sits on it, it will automatically be on ‘ready’ mode (You can hear the machine sound) and you can press the buttons to wash. You can select different pressures as well as the height you want the water to reach your butt. AMAZING. Heeheeheee.

Another thing about Japan Hotel rooms was that ‘Yukata’ will be provided as your pyjamas. Hah, obviously I would not miss the chance of trying (being the curious me)! So how do my sister and I look?

Okaayyy…maybe acting cute isn’t our cup of tea, but who cares as long as we’re having fun! Haaa. And yes, it was time for us get enough rest for the highlight on the next day, Tokyo Disneyland.