JORDAN.

i'm back! i tried doing some of the entries while in japan but i keep falling asleep after writing a few lines :x here it goes. i can't recall everything, but i'll try my best.


DAY 1

went to the airport at 10.30pm. flight was at 1.10am. the group were seated at the back of the plane. arrived at japan at about 7.40am and met up with our tour guide and the driver for the whole trip. the first thing that amazed me was the temperature. it was like woah! free aircon. although the sun was quite scorching in the morning, but the cold temperature and the cool air makes up for it.





our first destination was the Dazaifu Tenmangu Shrine. its said that you could pray here for your studies. i think we're also quite lucky to catch a ceremony where it's mainly for children aged 3,5,7 to ward off evil spirits from them. headed to NHK TV station where it's half governed by the government. didn't really do much there. our first lunch was at some local restaurant. it's pretty good though, there's raw fish and some tempura.



proceeded to Genkai Nuclear Power Plant later, where it is the main power source for Genkai. after going through the guided tour, we walked to the greenhouse as there was still some time left before the bus would arrive. the greenhouse was an amazing sight. the flowers and plants are beautiful and the greenhouse is big. i saw pictures of a wedding ceremony was held here in this greenhouse. probably i would hold mine here too. heh.



all this sums up for the first day of the trip after dinner at a local restaurant in a shopping mall. the hotel room was pretty small, and their toilet and bathroom is seperated as well. wow.


DAY 2

breakfast was pretty decent for me. it seems to me that the japanese would always carry a tray and take whatever they could eat once and probably won't really go for a second serving. our first destination was the Nagasaki Atomic Bomb Memorial Museum and Nagasaki Peace Park. it shows the aftereffects of what happened after the bombing during WWII. after that a we had a speech from the bomb survivor about what he was doing when the bombing happened. the after-effects of the bombing was quite serious to him as i heard that he has stomach cancer while his brother died from some other cancer. deadly.





my model for this picture.





the rose shaped ice cream is made by an old lady in the streets in the early morning, and she does it flawlessly!



for the first time in my life that i've actually in a ferry that actually transports people with their vehicles! it's pretty cool. and the wind is shioooooook too.



arrived at Kumamoto after the ferry ride and since we had lots of time before that, the guide brought us to Kumamoto Castle for some viewing. by then the bus had some problem as the brake was leaking. because of that, we were somehow stranded in at the castle for about 2hours. the bus company sent cabs to bring us to Gokase, which was the farmstay for the night. boy the taxi ride was a measly 90 minute ride. we're supposed to reach the farm stay at about 5pm and in the end we reached at 9pm.



the farmstay was pretty cool. 7 of us were staying at the farm by someone that i've somehow forgotten the name -.-. it was a 10minute drive up the mountaineous region from the town council where we gathered. the night air as the mountain is cold and shiok too. furogi-san, who was entertaining us the whole night, served us with lots of food for dinner and breakfast the next day and we couldn't finish everything. it's seems quite a bad thing for us when we couldn't finish the food. the farm had some plantation and some cows which are probably for contests and competitions. oh, and there was a huge language breakdown as we were struggling on how to speak jap and my cds jap book was deemed pretty useless too. -_-


DAY 3

our first destination was to visit Mount Aso. the volcano is said to be one of the active ones around in japan. the stench of sulphur was quite strong, but the view was nice as it's my first time seeing such things. =x



we made soba during lunch. my noodles were quite big since i had some problem cutting the mould into noodles. nevertheless they were still edible and good =x

headed to Umi Jigoku (Sea Hell) after lunch. it's some spring area where you could soak your legs. the foot spa was good, and they said the temperature was like almost 100 deg. ahah.



checked in at the hotel later in the night and i tried the onsen with reuben, royston, mervyn and john. we had to like strip all the way before we could enter the on-sen. since this could be a once in a lifetime chance and i was like forced not to say no, i gave a try. i felt very weird though, naked with friends. HAHAHAHAHA. the first time was during secondary sch day when we were camping with SJI students and they just completely stripped down all the way when they are bathing. how brave they are. the on-sen experience was pretty good, although it makes me drowsy after the end of it, and a slight difficulty in breathing. -_-

had midnight supper at coco curry house with a group of people. and this marks the end of day 3.


DAY 4

we had a visit to Honda factory. the factory that we went mainly manufactures small parts. most of the workers there are handicapped or on wheelchairs, more than 60%. the factors they used and the working environment makes it very friendly for those on wheelchairs.



headed to Kyushu University later in the afternoon and we managed to see some of their project and work the students had done. those works are amazing and it definitely explains uni standards. sadly i've somehow lost the interest for programming, if not i'd probably give a try on doing such animation which they took almost a year to complete it. OMG!



we had one hour to do some shopping at a place called Marinoa, but there wasn't really enough time to shop the whole place, although there were like a few things that i wanted to get. ohwell.



checked in at our hotel which we could stay for 2 days and not checkout the next day (like finally -.-) and somehow marks the end of day 4.

DAY 5

had a school exchange with Kurume National College of Technology where the students are like 16-20. we introduced ourselves with the japanese. my partner's called Mizuki. she's pretty friendly and quite outgoing too. the funny thing is that she showed me her pokemon toy that she was playing and she liked T.M Revolution. ahah. a fun experience.






my jap name written by Mizuki.


Citizen's Safety of Fukuoka was next. we were able to experience examples of big wind, earthquake, and fire controls. among the 3 of them i'ld say the earthquake was the most challenging one. at least we're lucky that these things won't happen in SG.

shopping! a group of 15 left the group as we wanted to have more time shopping around. walked around Canal City, Tenjin Underground Mall and some parts of Daimaru. this place seems bigger than orchard road somehow.

gathered at 9pm and we had our dinner at a roadside stall. it was quite cold and it started to drizzle as the typhoon was passing by. we actually planned to take cab back to the hotel, but the stallholders of the ramen roadside stall gave us lots of help. in the end we took a bus to Hakata station. we were also very lucky that we meet two very nice gentleman who offered their help with the rest of the journey. they gave directions on how we could go back to the hotel by subway and coincidentally, we'll be taking the same stop as one of the gentlemen and thus they were able to help us. boy we are sure lucky. after reaching Akama station by subway, we took a cab to the hotel. the cab meter jump very fast, the starting fare is already like 10sgd and each time it jumps it adds a dolloar more. omg! imagine if we took cab from the shopping centre itself, i think it'll be a bomb.




and that's the end of day 5.

packed my luggage for checking out the next day and we headed to the airport. home sweet home at about 3pm!

kinda enjoyed this trip, but just that there's probably too much time spent in the bus. plus i couldn't sleep in the bus most of the time and ms wong is so naggy -_-

at least i won't get the chance to go as a school again anytime soon.

story of your life

swear like a sailor