First trip to Tokyo

Hey Herstorians, thanks for dropping by!

-Random- I kinda wanna try some new greetings to start my posts.... Though this sounds very... Feminist. LOL 

I guess I am sticking to the once-a-month frequency for good. Been kind of slacking. I mean, I was planning to blog about my first trip to Japan exactly a month ago... OTL

Anyways, a month ago, I finally got the chance to travel to JAPAN! I was damn freaking excited as it was my childhood goal to go there and I FINALLY DID! I was always so envious of those people who get to travel to the Land of the Rising Sun and finally I could say, I was one of them XD 

It just so happened that Edris wanted to attend her favorite Jrock band - The Gazette 's anniversary concert and it so happens that I had no modules on the month of March. She asked me if I wanted to travel with her if not she might need to go alone. Basically, fate is telling me that I should take this as a chance to go (I am being willingly delusional), since I don't have school holidays AT ALL after that ;A; I was only able to travel as I was exempted for this single module out of my 3 year-course, my only 2 month "holiday". 

The one week in Tokyo was like a ultra-relaxing trip. With only 2 person, we pretty much planned our schedule the day before, with us buying supper from the nearby convenient store almost every night (Mostly FamilyMart...you can't imagine how much we spend there...) and waking up at 12 in the morning. Since we don't like to rush, we didn't really go much places.

Day 1 - Leaving Singapore

It was a midnight flight on Scoot which we got it at a pretty good deal (Around S$606 per person and we even added on Food and 35KG baggage on the return flight- which I only used 25KG of it ;A; but that's beside the point...). 

Got a surprised upgrade on our seats XD

(Yellow seats are with better leg space than the blue ones)

Lucky us~

 It was estimated 10hour flight with transit at Taipei, which I initially thought we could stop for something to eat so I brought along my NT notes, but they only had the vending machines available since it was still very early..

The pretty clouds, reminds me of the Sky Island.

At one point, it really looks like we were flying over Northpole/Southpole/Alaska 

(well, you get the idea) A wide bounder-less land of snow XD

We realized at some point that the Suica card can be used for NEX trains as well so there was really no need to purchase the train tickets.

Like how I realised You-You card can be used at the train stations in Taipei too.

Well, lesson learnt~

Looks pretty much like a train ride in Taiwan, with occasional Japanese-looking houses.

At that time, we still do not have the feeling that we were in Japan. 

Weird.  

My first meal! I really do call it my lunch since the Katsu Sandwich was really big.

I really do miss the wasabi-mayo inside~

It was around an hour's ride from Narita Airport to Tokyo

Funny thing was, we were suppose to transit at Shinjuku Station to Ikebukuro but we kinda got lost in the station because there were so many lines at the station itself. We ended up exiting the station, wonder about looking for the Yamamote line and back inside again when we realized we read the sign wrongly (It was really pointing out!) 

That was NOT the end of our journey. After we reached Ikebukuro, we faced another problem. Direction. Ikebukuro station has a lot of exits, and being first-timers, we really couldn't find our way. I couldn't remember exactly which side we went but it was the EXACT opposite. 

We didn't know it at that time, so we continued to follow this map from the Sakura Hostel site. They showed the landmarks, which we assume it to be right and proceed to get lost around half of Ikebukuro. 

Ironically, we were saying that we wanted to get lost in Tokyo one day and experience it. Didn't expect it to come so soon and WHILE we were carrying so much luggage. However, we did gain some interestingly memorable experience LOL. We did passed by Animate (Which Edris refused to budge cos she wanted to enter but I said 'no, not with our luggage') and found the Swallowtail Patisserie-(which led to another "getting lost" experience, but that was another day). That was when we realized we were completely at the other side of Ikebukuro the hotel was suppose to be.

So next, we got lost AGAIN at the right side, while reading the map outside the station exit. We dragged our luggage across the street to this place full of Motels. I was simply amazed at how many of those love hotels there were in that single area. It was getting quite late so I was slightly paranoid; you know, being my mum's daughter, pessimistic thinking at this kind of situation is our specialty that we might need to stay in one of the motels cos we may never find the hostel we were looking for...or something like that. Anyways, we were really tired by the time I saw the hostel's sign and literally screamed. 

According to the site, the hostel was only a few minutes walk from the station. We took close to 3 damn hours just to find the place! Initially we wanted to put our bags and walk about Ikebukuro (which we unintentionally did anyway, while getting lost) since we suppose to still have enough time , we decided against it since our arms and legs just needed rest.

Note to self: Next time, REMEMBER TO PACK LIGHT. Gosh, I don't know where the elevators or the lifts were but with our super bulky baggage, we really don't want to spend time looking for it and obstructing people. Hence, we CARRIED our luggage up the stairs. Ah...the most exercise I've done all week...

Finally, we were here!

The room was cozy, with a pretty small private bathroom too. 

But nevertheless, it was just right for 2 person :)

Our loots from Family Mart. Can you believe it? In just one night!

Most of it is Edris' though. Says she wants to bring it back to SG LOL.

Lodging Details: 

 Sakura Hotel Ikebukuro

http://www.sakura-hotel-ikebukuro.com/ 

7 nights Double private room 53,400 Yen 

(After the 'limited period' discount)