day 2: asakusa

There is the One Piece Museum which is on a boat, I think..since we were at the cruise ticket counter, and there are these huge posters on it, I thought it looked interesting~ I didn't even know it existed. XP

Went for a boat ride along..sumida river, I think. Most of what the guide was narrating was about the various colourful bridges along the river and the asahi beer building. For the tourists, but I wouldn't say it's worth it.

Had lunch at yoshinoya (yep, there's one at 1u). It's practically a japanese fast food joint, for those people who need a quick lunch and go. The doors don't automatically open, since there are the occasional people who walk too close to the doors. You push the largish grey button and voila, the doors open! XD haven't actually seen any of those here yet. And the food is ok, since most of us were hungry as it was already 2pm by the time we got there.

asakusa is a tourist-orientated place, since most of the shops on nakamise-dori (which is the way to the temple itself) are little souvenir shops. They sell alot alot of things; saw alot of lanterns, tengu masks, handphone accessories, yukatas (both the cheap and the really expensive kind), mochi, sweets, biscuits, purses, boxes, katanas (the display kind), fans,keychains, slippers, back scratchers...quite alot of neat little stuff. And especially the hand-made things(like the hand-embroidered handkerchiefs, designs on yukata); whoa, they cost. Really really.

Was tempted to buy alot of things, what held me back was the price. @_@ crazy. All those neat stuff like the various ningyou, tengu masks, little shurikens, katanas (which both my brothers were most interested in, but if we were to pass through immigration with those stuff, whoa man...we'd look like potential terrorists or hijackers) we could just drool at.

Reached the asakusa temple, and boy there are alot alot of people there. Took pictures with this huuuuge pair of straw slippers. My parents actually took a picture with it almost 2 decades ago, can you believe how awed they were went they came back here a second time, with their kids and all... so of course we took pictures with it. XP

I guess onii-chan was really happy especially when we saw these girls walking around in their summer yukatas. He nudged me, and said, "hey, could you ask those two girls to take pictures with us?" Hehehehehe, how could he not? So I thought, ok, why not? First time we took, it was me+onii-chan+the two girls..after that though, he whispered,"Take another one, just me ok?" surprising coming from him. Somewhat. Ok. So I complied. He was grinning from ear to ear after we were actually done. sama-sama faham larrr~

heyhey sooguan, you're right on that part. =D

So that was the height of his entire trip I bet. But mine was when... I saw this yukata shop selling the entire set for about 5250yen~ yukata+obi+geta! Most shops just sell the yukata itself, and that already can cost up to 3000yen! so I pleaded mom+dad..XDXDXDXD

bought 2 sets of yukata; one for me, one for ai-chan. hey ai-chan, you're paying me for this! XP spent a fairly long time picking one, since I'm not gonna get this chance again, I gotta get a good one. The lady at the shop was really nice, and I guess that moment was the closest I got to actually conversing with japanese people as japanese-ly as possible. It went ok, since we understood each other most of the time.. I think. XP It's fun to be able to put it in practice.

Had an early dinner. Dad was so intent on having yakitori at least once on this trip. So we did~ the shop is pretty hidden, in one of those little streets where most people wouldn't think of going into. The yakitori there is great~ XD Interesting experience. They served us some kind of salad, which otouto wouldn't touch, so we ate it for him. That we ate for him XP your loss, man.