游山玩水

Logging my Kyushu trip - second time in Japan! :) It was really 游山 cos Kyushu is less for city stuff and 玩水 cos of the hot springs!

13 Dec - 福岡

It was such an early flight on 13 Dec.. Was out the previous night at the premier of The Curse of the Golden Flower - missed seeing Chow Yun Fatt himself but caught the opulent imperial settings with blossomy women whose boobs could pop out of their corsets at the next deep breath; another imperial tragedy - and slept rather late. But I chose to take the train to Changi, thrifty all of a sudden..

Some facts before check-in: 23 in tour group; all families except the four of us; no cute guys and all the boys are too young - oh well!

Caught two Jap movies on the ANA flights, I like! Heavenly Forest or ただ、君を愛してるwas a little weird and some things were just unexplained but a nice show nonetheless. Remember vividly this line that goes 今のキスには、愛はあったかな？Ahhh… Bawled my eyes out for this one.. The other one, Udon, was quite cute and funny but I pulled tissue all the same.. I’m a weeper!

Had a late yummy buffet dinner - I had udon :p - before I slumped in bed, all energy and fluids drained through my nose during the two flights - yes, flight flu struck once more. The guys went with the tour group for a night tour of the city but apparently, I didn’t miss much.

14 Dec - 長崎

Woke at 2am or so and never slept again - CW snored!! :p But I was awake enough la, still feeling excited simply cos I was in Japan!!

Went to a mansion with all the Madam Butterfly exhibits, not too memorable. The atomic bomb museum was much better, quite scary actually.. But war has always been a scary thing.. (Hence Sito prayed for world peace on 16 Dec - see below)

Statue in 平和公園, one hand pointing to the disaster from the sky and the other seeking peace


We had kong bah pau!! :p


Think we ended the day with a shopping trip in a mall. I walked into this shop manned by a few girls who didn't realise I wasn't Japanese until I opened my mouth to ask for a tie in other colours. They were sooo cute! Had great fun talking with them. One interesting thing was that they knew Singapore only as a clean place where you would be fined for littering, sighs.. Anyway I bought a polka dot tie for myself and struck up another conversation with a kind lady at the kimono counter while waiting for the guys.

Dinner that day was dreadful (so was breakfast the next day). We consoled our stomachs by shopping for our faces near Chinatown :p But bought supper as well, yum yum!

Hey, you need to open it first! :p


Wa, they were so loving..


Beer guzzling male and female (female is behind the camera :p)


Then we had a mask party!

Scary mf!


The boys had the green stuff


We went to sleep moisturised and pretty :)

15 Dec - I don’t know where exactly :p 日田?

First we went to a nice sake factory, then we roamed quaint 豆田町, where it felt like 江戸 era..


We also had a nice lunch at this little soba place, where I took a nice picture of Hup sipping soba tea


They gave CW horse radish for wasabi!


Afternoon was really sweet cos we were at Hello Kitty Harmony Land in 湯布院/由布院!


And I made the boys take a picture with birthday Kitty too :p


Oh, someone commented on Hup and I again: siblings?

So alike right?! Not bad, this brother better looking than YQ, who is getting real fat *.*

Remember the tea cups? 懐かしい! Only clear shot of the Kitty cup

Learnt for the first time that you could spin the cup! I was trying to stop Sito from spinning and my hair fell all over my face..

We took the ferris wheel and I got to choose the car..

"Eh, what you looking at?"


But we got too high and poor Hup!


Then we went to 血の地獄 and took a foot bath


Taken at our hotel 風月 in 別府, where we had our first hot spring of the trip..

.. and also where the boys deserted me to walk around town while I was in the bath; male and female separate! =( I was freezing while trying to look for them *complain complain* Was rather pissed and ate an extra bowl of soba at dinner!

16 Dec – More hot spings!

Cooking eggs in 海の地獄


At 水前寺成趣園, we saw miniatures of stuff from other parts of Japan, including a grassy Mt Fuji.. This was where Sito prayed for world peace..

(But I think he was asking for money in this shot; world peace was after that :p)

Had a nabe lunch and we ordered horse sashimi!!

Tiny bit for 1000yen.. Apparently, only the leg of the horse is eaten raw.

Hup: Somewhere, there’s a horse with a bandage..

It was rather cold but four of us had ice cream outside the lunch place. I had chestnut (yummy!), Hup had rose (smells good!), Sito had lavender (um, like my handcream..) and CW had tofu (imagine that!)

We didn’t go into 熊本castle, just pose outside


Got warrior somemore!


Took a cable car to 阿蘇山上, a live volcano.. Could hide in these stone shelters should Mt Aso erupt..


We had a very nice stay at Aso Farmland that night!


The hot spring was incredibly huge! It was raining but we went to the outdoor one as well. There mist have been twenty odd different hot springs, for beauty, and even one wine spring! It was onsen before dinner, onsen after dinner, and onsen before breakfast! Good for slimming :)

Thinner arm? :p


Need to do more onsen cos we ate this much (only 3/4 through!)


Obviously no pictures from the hot springs.. But the scene was like 100 naked women of different shapes and sizes.. I was very motivated to keep jogging and doing crunches simply by the sight of jiggling flesh! The interesting thing was that some mothers brought their little boys along.. Well, I learnt to ignore! Later also heard from Sito that some fathers brought their little girls along; that was just plain odd! Maybe cos I didn’t grow up soaking in hot springs with naked strangers..

That was the only night we had a quart so Sito and CW moved in with Hup and mf, and left the other cottage for toilet purposes. The rooms were actually individual cottages like this one, for smoking :p


I hung up my top and, can’t remember why, but Sito tried my shirt.. I was only quick enough to snap a shot when he was trying to get out of it!


Was lazing around and saw a Kodak moment: tare panda and bookworm!


Hup leh?

Hmm.. No interesting caption leh.. Pose, pls?

Yes, this is more interesting: kitty Hup!


As the room was round, sounds reverberated round the room when we all laid back. It was fun until we slept; the snoring was like right at my ears!! I was shocked awake some time in the middle of the night, was trying to find something to throw at the snoring one but I couldn’t tell if it was Sito or CW.. Also found Hup sleeping at the foot of his bed so that it was not as loud.. Too lazy to check out the source of the snoring, I sat up for a while and resigned myself to fate.. Then the snoring softened.. Slept a bit more, phew!

17 Dec - Sand bath day

On the way to 桜島, another live volcano, we found a food vending machine at a service stop


Of course we bought some snack :)


Hup’s sole got loose that day and finally came off at the volcano!

(The other one was ripped off in a menthol’s moment)

The fiery four at the volcano


Our 黒豚 lunch!



Tamaya at Cuppage has this as well, yummy..

Then it was sand bathing time in 指宿! See the heads? The bodies were all buried in hot sand.. The sand on me felt heavy and comfortably warm, not hot.. Not until I happily sank my fingers deeper into the sand!


The boys were nowhere to be found but I didn’t go find them this time. Went to the beach instead. It was bustling on the side of the sand bath place but serene on the other. Even the rest of the town was quiet. Roaming alone, it was as if 我死了不见了都没人知道, 好冷…


Went back to 鹿児島 town for our lodging but not before we did some shopping! Hup was the winner with two pairs of shoes in 30min..

I like the traffic lights. The red man and the green man had hats! Not too clear in the photo though… Sito was harping on the hats of the service personnel in the airport etc..


Oh, wait, there’s a photo of me in a hat somewhere.. It was ZF’s summer hat when she was in Japan. Taken at our healthy lifestyle activity, doing the Biennale tour.. Is mf cute? :)


And our dinner :)


18 Dec - 東京

Flew back to Tokyo in the morning. Had lunch near 浅草寺 and left the tour group to go roaming on our own..

Was trying to find the usual curtain at entrance to hot springs, the one with ゆ written on it but I could only find a small one and it was blue.. Blue, not my colour =(

First stop was 秋葉原 where Sito helped a friend get some yaoi manga. The chap’s face was funny when Sito asked him about the books at the counter :p He sent us to a level manned by girls; yaoi is meant for girls anyway!

We left for Shinjuku to shop but didn’t get much until we went into the non-mega store area. Took an express to Narita and hopped onto a cab to get to our hotel, 800yen, not too ex.

19 Dec - End of holiday..

There was a cute girl on the flight.. Was talking a little to the auntie next to me since we were sitting apart due to late check-in. Again, I was complimented on my Japanese, that it was うまい, kind of cute to hear that :p

Returned to a rainy Singapore and heard about the floods in Thomson. Scary cos I can’t swim! :p They were doing more works at my block so I had to brave the rain and walk one block, quite pissed.. And then it kept raining! Gaaar! Good that it's more normal now..

Anyway, came up with this along the way..

九州游之三"不"领悟

1) n加一的旅行，不适合日本，或任何有温泉的地方，因为男女分开泡澡．尤其当我是那个“一”的时候…
2) 男人和女人的不一样不仅在生理上；前者的基本意识会在吃饭大便间流失…
3) 期望这东西，还是不要有的好，免得助长下一次的失望…

Time to plan for my next Japan trip: Sep 2007 with Yan and CY :)