December 31 night: I went out with a Slovakian girl and a China guy from my dorm. We walked to Shinjuku and ate toshikoshi-soba at this shop.


I didn't bring along my backpack, hence the disposable chopsticks aiks.

When the clock hits 12 am, nothing spectacular happened around Shinjuku but quietness. On our way to Shinjuku station, the Slovakian girl picked up a cellphone on the floor (She picked up a bunch of stuff on our way to Shinjuku). Someone called when we were on our way to Koban aka police box, and he happened to be around the same area as us. So we met him near the exit and returned him friend's phone.

What a nice way to start off our new year.

It doesn't really matter whether we go for huge countdown events or whatever, what matters the most is who we spend our time with. Basically we were just wandering around Shinjuku, and we met random people who greeted us Happy New Year, random Starbucks which still opens even after 1 am, random group of tourist from Hong Kong, pushing their luggages in the middle of night.

The China guy was saying that I am just like a book with blank pages. Apparently I am so mysterious and he doesn't know what the next page is going to be.

I kinda like this metaphor. Maybe I am.

I will be going to Shikoku and Kansai area in next few hours for 5 days. This afternoon I went to Shinjuku to check out whether those internet cafes are 'sleep-able' or not, because I'm gonna spend a couple of nights there.

It looks better than those dodgy hotels or capsule hotels. Plus free drinks, shower, message chair, not to mention manga, DVD, internet. Who needs a real bed?

Anyway, Shinjuku was kinda empty today.


Underground passage to Shinjuku station (1.30 pm, 1 January 2009).

I am kinda exaggerating.

Year 2008 was great. I stopped eating meat other than seafood, stopped drinking coffee, met a bunch of cool YLs, went to Singapore three times, Bangkok once, and now I am in Japan, travelling and seeing a bunch of concerts (besides studying Japanese).


My daily diary.

Happy new year and hope you guys have a great year ahead!!

PS: Some evidence that I really went to Hokkaido.


Hitsuji-ga-oka, Sapporo. I went there because YUI went there before too.

And,




Now left Hiroshima.

Album: moumoon - moumoon

This post has something to do with YUI street live at Sendai.

It has been a while since I listen to a Jpop album repeatedly. If you think YUI sounds like Avril Lavigne, listen to this by moumoon. I actually had the chance to see moumoon for free, when they were opening for DAI free live.

Of course, I was late, so I didn't get to see them =/

Btw, I love Do you remember? by moumoon the most. Great album opener. After ELT, DAI, maybe Ikimonogakari, next will be moumoon.

I'll post about this before I talk about my Hokkaido trip.

Last week I went to STUDIO COAST in Shinkiba (Tokyo) with a Hungarian, to watch some concert for free. They have this so called 'live monitors' which they invite someone to watch some concert, and then these live monitors have to fill in a super simple questionnaire after the concert.


Outside STUDIO COAST. Very few people around.

Basically it means that they need someone to fill up the hall ;P
Finally got to see Jinn（ジン）~ Anime fans might heard of them, Raion and 解読不能.

I'm a big fan of the vocalist, Hitan's blog. She really put a lot of effort to update her blog, she divided her blog into three parts. First daily stuff, then something poetic (her writing is really good), then end with a well taken picture plus caption.

Since Jinn performs quite often, I was sure that I could see them for free someday, and I was correct =D When Jinn appeared, I was like,

OMG what happened to Hitan??????????

Someone she turned into a beautiful girl (can fight with those idol groups), while I was procrastinating and stuff. Don't get fooled by all those Jinn videos in Youtube. I'm so gonna go to their new album tour now, and do some serious exercising.

Oh I saw SCANDAL and HALCALI too, if you know who they are. Apparently Hitan was the oldest among all these female performers. Which means, me, YUI are getting old =/

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On the same week, I went to see GO!GO!7188 twice, once in Tokyo, once in Sendai, which is 5 hours away from Tokyo.


Akasaka BLITZ (Tokyo) is a nice live venue. Second time here. I still could see Yuu san clearly even though I was at the last row. As usual, orange juice. GO!GO! performed Kinkyori Renai *HAPPY*, and unlike my previous GO!GO! live, I got to see ROCK this time~ IT REALLY ROCKS!!

Of course, I was at Yuu's side and stared at her whole night. Funny that Yuu (GO!GO! guitarist) mentioned in her diary that she wishes to have Rin Toshite Shigure guitarist TK's skills.

I would like to exchange guitar skills with you too, Yuu sama.

Because eplus is selling tickets of POLYSICS 「ULTRA FIGHT OR DIE!!!!」 live with no transaction fees, I went to Sendai~


Zepp Sendai is just beside Sendai Station.

Morning 5 am, I left Tokyo by taking local train from Takadanobaba. It only costed me 2300 yen all the way to Sendai because I was using Seishun 18 Ticket.

A little bit of Geography lesson in case anyone is confused.


Red = Hokkaido (of course), Yellow = Tohoku region, Green = Kanto region

As my goal is to visit all 47 prefectures in Japan (so far 14) during my stay, and since I was using Seishun 18 Ticket, first I made a 2 hour stop at Fukushima station.



I had a nice lunch at this Italian Cafe called Lauren & Leaf, it was the best ever lunch I had so far in Japan.


My favourite Omurice, and potato salad =D They are actually Japanese cuisines haha. Restaurants outside Tokyo are so much wider, can camp inside whole day.

I didn't know how I discovered this restaurant online, for only 980 yen (Vegetable Omurice), I got to enjoy free flow of drinks and salad as well (I didn't know about it when I entered the shop).

Seriously, unlimited orange juice, potato salad and cornflakes with sesame salad dressing for 980 yen, I was the happiest girl on earth. Japanese salad is LOVE.


I printed out the voucher from their website, and got free dessert~ (cheap people)

As I had to catch another train to Sendai in 1 hour, I couldn't eat until the lunch time ends. I'm gonna come back again someday...someday.

That would be cheating if I don't visit real tourist attractions. Since I have some time before the live starts, I went to Matsushima, which is 40 mins away from Sendai station, can see so called one of Japan's Three Great Views there. To me, it is just another tourist attraction, reminds me of Kamakura.


I have to make this picture blurry haha. I was wearing GO!GO! tour T-shirt, and that pair of shoes were killing me. Moral of the story: Don't wear new shoes when you are going for a long journey. More pictures of beautiful Matsushima can be found in depyon's blog. He went there few months ago.

Marimokkori is everywhere, as long as it is a tourist spot.



My legs started to hurt and I dragged myself slowly back to the station. It was a Sunday, hence the seats in the train back to Sendai were all occupied. My hand phone battery was running low and I had to meet up with some stranger I know through mixi.

I was planning to skip the opening act by someone called LEO Imai. Since I have promised to meet up with this guy, I entered Zepp Sendai without having dinner. Luckily I bought some onigiri before that. Paid 500 yen for orange juice (as usual), and met with the guy. He is some concert veteran, likes moshing, Chatmonchy and DAI. Too bad I didn't get to talk much with him, too little time, plus my leg hurts.

Because of that, I gave up the thought off diving in mosh pits for the very first time. Plus the venue was only 70% full, I could move around freely.

Artist performed:

1. LEO Imai

I like TAXI a lot. This guy is actually studying in Oxford walao.

2. Fujifabric（フジファブリック）

They seemed to be an established band. First time listen to their songs. They have a bunch of catchy songs, guitarist is cool, this PV is very funny.

3. GO!GO!7188~

They performed C7, so me happy. I forgot about my feet, jumped and screamed like a mad person. Couldn't believe that I would see Yuu twice in a week. I actually joined their fanclub, and plan to attend as many lives as possible in their next Hentena tour (anyone wants to join?). I wonder if I will have the chance to see them performing songs such as 眠りの浅瀬 and 考え事 in the future.

4. POLYSICS

I got interested in them after seeing I My Me Mine and Baby BIAS performance in ROCK IN JAPAN. They have great live presence, and it looks fun to watch their performances. The crowd went crazy when they appeared. I didn't really enjoy as much as I expected. Maybe because of the shoes, or because POLYSICS sang in alien language (their lyrics actually don't make sense). I felt totally out of place. Hence I left during encore. However, of all the concerts I've been to, POLYSICS has the craziest fans so far.

I left Zepp Sendai, and dragged myself to this place.



Sun mall Ichibancho, 15 mins walk (ouch my feet) from Sendai station. The ones who happened to bump into dear YUI were really lucky I guess. I don't know what time YUI went there, should be after concert, which would be around 9-10 pm. I took this picture around 10 pm, and it was quite empty.

Then I wandered around Sendai Station until my night bus back to Tokyo arrived. I had to go back Tokyo because I have classes on the next day (Monday) before our holiday starts (Tuesday). See, I'm a good student.

The next night, I took 30 hours train ride to Hokkaido.

To be continued.

I'm going off to Niigata -> Yamagata -> Akita -> Aomori -> Hokkaido (Sapporo) -> Hokkaido (Hakodate) -> Aomori -> Iwate -> Miyagi -> Fukushima -> Tokyo, to celebrate my first Christmas in Japan.

Hopefully I can survive the coldness of Hokkaido, the land of Marimokkori.

Till then, Merry Christmas~

PS: To Singaporean readers, you might have to wait for your 'late' Christmas presents, and some other YUI fans.

I got jealous of these high school students after I saw this video in YouTube.

1. They got to see YUI.
2. They got to jam one song with YUI.
3. Some of them shook her hands.
4. YUI got really really popular these days......the students were basically screaming when she appeared.
5. When I was in high school, I couldn't even play flute properly =/

I wonder if they get those Sony mp3 for free.

YUI, when are you coming back??

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A little bit of update of myself, I took JLPT test last week, and few weeks ago I went to Kamakura with two Taiwanese, hoping to see some autumn leaves at some place with less crowd.


Taken on top of Hasedera temple （長谷寺）.

No, I didn't really do a proper YUI location pilgrimage like artunee does previously because I was too lazy to do the research.

I went to see the always pissed looking Great Buddha at Kotoku-in （高徳院）.


Dear YUI was once there too.

Then we walked to the Taiyou no Uta looking beach.



I'll do a proper pilgrimage next time...including Yokohama.

Then last Wednesday, I went to see ORANGE RANGE at Budoukan.



Yasukuni Shrine is just nearby, so I went there and see see.

Before that, I always thought that Budoukan is a huge hall, apparently it is not. My seat was at the second floor, facing the stage, I could see everything clearly, the screen on both side were like HDTV or something.

I had the feeling that I was ripped off by Shiina Ringo.

I was sitting next to girls, one of them was alone, the other one was with her friend. At first, they seemed to be normal Japanese girls.

When the hall turned dark, the girl on my right started to scream like hell. The one on my left got really excited. Later she screamed out names quite a couple of times, and danced and jumped along, even though she was alone. I was amazed. Since I'm not really a big fan of ORANGE RANGE (esp. after the cute drummer left), sometimes I kinda felt out of place, I had no idea when to sing along or jump and shout or whatever, but it was fun. ORANGE RANGE knows how to entertain the crowd.

All of us did "human waves", quietly. My first ever human wave with Japanese, which was kinda weird. In Malaysia, when we do human waves, we will like, "YAY" or "WOW" along or whatever when it is our turn to jump off the seat.

The human waves were organised though. My heart skipped a beat when they sang Hana >< That was the song I looked forward most to. And I almost forgot that they sing Asterisk too XD

Summer songs medley (Shanghai Honey, Locolotion, Onegai Senorita) was really fun~ Because I know all the songs, still stuck in Katchan's era.

When they sang the final song, I decided to sneak out early so that I won't stuck with the crowd later. On my way out, I saw the drummer of Flow. We were going out through the same exit, I was behind him, so he was like, looking back as if he thought only VIPs will leave early. Then he walked towards the specials staircase for VIPs.

Concerts are a good place to bump into artists. The tour goods booth was completely empty, so I didn't have to line up for hours =P I bought one T-shirt and wore it to school on the next day. No one noticed it though.

Yeah I don't like crowds and queuing/waiting.

I don't know if the sound setting was bad or the music was too loud, they didn't really sound that good in this live.

Seriously, no more arena halls, unless I have the $$$ to pay for the seats at the ground. I failed to get Mr. Children tickets in Budoukan =/

Watching concerts isn't that fun any more, time to travel instead~ I'm planning to go Hokkaido and Kansai area during winter break, using the cheapest method (JR Hokkaido & East Japan Pass and Seishun 18 Ticket).

Any suggestions on what should I do around new year's eve??