The Smiling Machine

After the 4th day, we moved a little further from Tokyo…

Day 5 - Tokyo DisneySea

Despite how they named it, DisneySea is actually located outside Tokyo. Chiba prefecture, to be exact. As everyone knows this place is just fun. We spent an hour just to queue for one game, but all I can say is everything was worth the wait. We came in on the opening time and went home just right before the gate closed.

The last arena we rode was Journey to the Center of the Earth, which made me dizzy all the way back to Ebisu because I lost too much energy to scream.

Day 6 - Utsunomiya

Utsunomiya is located in Tochigi prefecture. It took us about 2.5 hours with the train to reach this north neighbor of Tokyo. We actually didn’t plan to go there, but since our Japanese friend kindly invited house to stay in her house, we thought it’s better than going nowhere in Tokyo.

Utsunomiya was slightly hotter than Tokyo, so we didn’t really go sightseeing except to a castle and a shrine (oops, I forgot the names). One interesting spot for me was a fairy museum which is located inside a shopping mall. The small museum displays books, figures, and pictures related to fairies.

Day 7 - Nikko

From Utsunomiya, our friend’s family took us to Nikko, a heritage city nearby. Unfortunately, this place was also a “victim” of summer holiday. The way to Nikko was very crowded, and we had to line for quite a long time before entering the cultural heritage site.

The site was not that special, to be honest, but yeah, I liked the cool weather there. One thing that attracted me more was a senbei (Japanese snack) factory which allowed us to bake our own senbei, and we could even draw anything on it.

We went back to Utsunomiya station on the afternoon and proceeded to Yokohama. Yes, we went across Tokyo from the north part to the south part and so that we sat for a super long time inside the train.

Living in a small, peaceful city called Beppu for almost a year, my friend Dea and I decided to have an escape to somewhere crowded and challenging: Tokyo!

We’ve discussed about this trip even since the beginning of last semester. At first we tried to search for cheap airline tickets, but since August is the month of summer vacation, which also has a spiritual festival called Obon, we could hardly find them.

God answered our prayers through the newly established AirAsia Japan. We only spent 14,000 yen for the round-trip ticket. We went there on Thursday, 8/9 and be back on Tuesday, 8/21.

So this is how we spent our days there…

Day 1: Narita Airport —> Shinjuku

After arriving at the airport, at about 11 am, we took Narita Express to Shinjuku station. We also bought Suica card, the rechargeable card for any kinds of transportation within Tokyo area.

Shinjuku station is said to be the busiest station in Tokyo. No wonder it was very crowded when we arrived. We strolled around Shinjuku for around 6 hours without any specific place to visit. It took another hour for us only to find the way back to the station. Despite being very big, it was really hard to find because of the crowded surroundings.

We proceeded to my high school friend’s house near Okubo station, put our bags there, eat dinner in a pasta resaurant, and went back to Shinjuku.

We spent the night at an internet cafe, which is way better than I thought it would be. It has a shower room, all-you-can-drink vending machines, and small “rooms” occupied with flat seat which is similar to a bed.

Day 2: Odaiba

On the second day, we went to Odaiba, the big artificial island. Starting with some photos in front of the liberty statue miniature, we walked around some interesting places.

The first one was Fuji TV studio. It was very crowded of people that we could not enjoy all the small games related to Fuji TV programs which were provided as part of their summer event. We also went to the 25th floor, the highest floor of the building. The view was good but it was nothing special.

Our next stop is Miraikan or the science museum. Everything there was, of course, sophisticated. There was an exhibition where we can try hi-tech items with Doraemon and some other manga characters.

After passing by Venus Fort and took photo inside its well-known European-style atrium, we went to Diver City for dinner. Before leaving the island we took some photos in front of a huge Gundam statue which projects colorful lights at night.

Our second night was spent in a ryokan (Japanese traditional guesthouse) in Ikebukuro. In spite of its hard-to-find location, the place is quite comfortable.

Day 3 - Ikebukuro, Harajuku

There was nothing spectacular in Ikebukuro. Since we didn’t want to spend money for the famous aquarium, we only went to Toyota Amlux. It looks like an ordinary showroom, but it has some simulation games and a mini-theater.

It might not be a good choice to visit Harajuku on a Saturday afternoon, yet we were quite satisfied. We walked through Takeshita-dori, which has an AKB48 shop and so many fashion stores. I was lucky to be able to (secretly) take photo in front of Johnny’s store, which ticket was already sold out at that time.

We walked a little further to Meiji Jingu shrine, where we saw a Japanese traditional wedding ceremony. It is interesting for me how there were more strangers than the bride’s family members who visited the wedding ceremony.

After dinner, me moved to a budget hotel near Ebisu station.

Day 4 - Shibuya

Our day in Shibuya started with a photo in front of the famous Hachiko statue. We did sightseeing while walking to NHK Studio. It has a small museum where we can play games and take photos with NHK TV programs’ characters. We met many school kids who went there for their summer holiday.

Going back to Shibuya station, we stopped by at Seibu department store which established a mini A-nation museum. A-nation as a big music event there, and the museum collects the costumes of the performing artists. Too bad we were not allowed to take photos of the costumes.

From Shibuya station we took the subway to a rather misterious place which was later known as Kawasaki city. Dea, who is a huge fan of Nodame Cantabile, aimed to visit the school where Nodame, the main character, used to study at.

Our last stop before coming back to Ebisu was Meguro, where the Indonesian Embassy is located. We didn’t go to the embassy, though. We went to the Indonesian School of Tokyo, and help my friend’s friends preparing for a quiz for the students. We also had ifthar together with Indonesian moslem community.

Tomorrow i’m gonna i must post the stories of my 2nd semester and the Tokyo trip!

wow. feels like i haven’t posted anything for years centuries. i feel sorry for this tumblr account coz when i made it i promised to fill it with my stories in Japan. in fact, i’ve been ignoring it for no reasons but laziness :p

soooo, in order to apologize, here i put some pics taken during my first 6 months (yes, time does fly!) in the tiny-but-lovely city called Beppu and some other places in Japan, completed with short stories about them. enjoy!

September - new place, new life

so this is the desk in my room, just right after i moved in. the sliding door next to it is the door to my roommate’s room . my room and my roommate’s are actually two different rooms, but they put a sliding door there in order for us to catch up with each other. anyway i really miss that black laptop, the one that i brought form indonesia. it’s broken now. :(

October - time to enjoy Beppu

the campus holds a festival called Tenkusai every October. this is where we can eat delicious food while enjoying performances from students’ clubs (we call it circles). talking about circles, on October i decided to join a Japanese traditional dance circle called Mai Raku.

November - the first Idul Adha abroad

at the beginning of November, we celebrated Idul Adha—the “celebration of sacrifices” for Moslems. for me it was the first time celebrating it abroad. for the past three years, i celebrated it in my high school’s dorm, so instead of missing home i really missed my high school that day. despite that i felt so blessed to be with my Moslem family. some Indonesian and Sri Lankan (or Bangladesh?) women even cooked super delicious dishes for us!

December - winter, love it or hate it?

so i finally experienced my first snow. i really thank Allah SWT for it, although it’s not as romantic as i thought. haha. maybe because i was (and still am) single? :p but it’s ok, coz i have a very nice roommate who asked me to go on a date. we went karaoke-ing. the room was way to big for only the two of us, so we did some choreography while singing akb48’s or snsd’s songs.

January - the super month

so many things happened on January. to start the month (and of course the year), i watched my circle’s performance in front of a shopping mall. actually i auditioned for the performance but i didn’t make it. my roommate was also there, playing the taiko (Japanese drums). after the performance i went to Joyfull, a 24-hour restaurants, with my Indonesian friends from the same batch. we really enjoyed playing cards and laughed until the morning.

February - holiday = holy days

i went to Hokkaido for this year’s spring vacation. my roommate is from Sapporo, Hokkaido, and she invited me to stay in her house for a week. for me, being there was such a precious opportunity. it was snowing heavily everywhere in the city, something not usually seen in Beppu. my roommate’s family was also super kind and funny. even her high school teacher was. when we was walking around my roommate’s high school, this teacher told us to introduce ourselves in front of her students. an embarrassing yet interesting experience.

mm, i guess this is it. really hope that i can defeat my laziness and continue writing more stories after this. well, let’s see!

the day when so many things happen :)

Wah, udah lama banget rasanya sejak terakhir kali nge-tumblr.