Tour Guide.

For the past couple of days I have been deliberating whether I want to sign up for the tour guide license course conducted by the Tourism Council.

As most of you know, I enjoy travelling and I enjoy making other people happy, and since it’s not that possible for me to become an artist appaering on the TV screen, the next best thing could actually be a tour guide. I mean, that allows me to fulfill many of the things that I enjoy doing – I get to travel around and see different places, I get to entertain people who are on tour with me, I get to do arrangements to make sure that the people get to enjoy themselves. Doesn’t sound too bad isn’t it?

Of course, I don’t think my dad will be too impressed with me if I suddenly decide to switch career, and to be honest I don’t see myself being a full time tour guide yet – maybe I’ll start with taking the course and perhaps getting the license first. Maybe by that time I’ve been given the boot by VTC and might need to start looking for a new job!

Have not been feeling well today, and I believe the flu is acting up on me – the weather has been brilliant for the past week. Last week this time I have to turn on the heater to keep myself warm, and today I have to switch on the fan to keep myself cool. I think I must have caught the cold that way.

Humid.

The one thing I never like about spring is the humidity. For the past couple of days, the moment I step out of my home I see almost pools of water on the corridor. Not because it rained the previous night, but it was water vapour that condenses on the cold floor because of the humidity. It’s also a nightmare washing clothes as they never get dry because it’s so humid. The clothes I washed on Tuesday have yet to be dry because of this kind of weather, and I’m definitely not impressed with it.

I think I need to get a dehumidifier soon.

Anyway I think I’m getting a bit of the flu – feeling a bit sick, but not sick enough to skip work yet. Hopefully the flu can recover itself and I don’t have to take sick leave – I haven’t taken a day of sick leave yet since returning to VTC and I intend to keep it that way for some time!

Cold.

Have been back for almost a week already and it’s the lazy bones at work again, since I didn’t update my little journal for about that long.

My second last day in Tokyo was spent aimlessly walking around Shibuya. I bought a puzzle for my brother at church, and some clothes for myself – you read me right, I found clothes that fit me in Tokyo of all places. I spent about 10000 yen on a jacket, a long-sleeved t-shirt and a jacket, which I thought was fair enough. But what I feel quite amazing is that I could never find anything that fits me in Hong Kong, and yet on my second visit to Tokyo I spotted a shop that sold clothes that fit me and look nice! Now there’s another place for me to get my clothing!

The match between Japan and Hong Kong wasn’t exactly memorable for the match itself, but for the rain and wind that accompanied throughout the game. Luckily I had my thick down jacket on, otherwise I would have pretty much frozen by the time Tulio Marcus Tanaka scored the second goal against Hong Kong. The HK Reds lost 3-0, but against a top team like Japan, I think that’s a respectable score. As for me, the night would always be remembered for the rain and the freezing temperature. I believe it must have been like sub-zero degrees there.

For Friday, I had a walkabout in Shinjuku before meeting the rest of the guys to take the train to the Narita Airport. The flight wasn’t exactly exciting, but I was grateful to Lord that it was very smooth without any turbulence. Touched down pretty much on time, though our banners, which we had to check in, came out late and we were made to leave the airport late as well.

Then the four days of Lunar New Year holidays were pretty much spent aimlessly too.

Went to watch the Lunar New Year Cup at the Hong Kong Stadium yesterday, and to be honest, none of the teams (TSW Pegasus, Kitchee and Pohang Steelers) really interested me, but I was there just to try to do my little bit as a football fan. I thought the games were decent, and it was my first time watching such triangular invitationals. I actually quite liked the concept of playing 3 periods of 45 minutes each, but I guess I could do with slightly higher temperatures – a Hong Kong Stadium that is only 10% full can be a very cold place!

Lately I’ve been getting a lot of wedding invitations – is it a trend to get married? Kinda makes me tempted too (though I probably need to find someone who’s willing to marry me first)!

Yokohama.

The last time I came to Tokyo, I didn’t really bother with visiting places outside of Tokyo (with the exception of Gotemba). But this time round I made it a point to include Yokohama in my itinerary because I really want to see more of Japan than just Tokyo. It turned out to be a brilliant choice.

I started the day with a visit to Marinos Town, the training centre of the J-League team Yokohama F Marinos. For a training facility it was really big and I think nowhere in Hong Kong is even comparable to standards like these. There were 4 pitches, 2 with natural grass and the other 2 with artificial grass, and they all look beautiful.

After that, I headed out to Chukagai, or Chinatown, for a walkabout. For me, it really doesn’t feel very Chinese. In fact, it felt more like a Japanese town selling localized Chinese food. But then again, the market that the Chinatown was catered to was Japanese anyway. Apparently this Chinatown is one of the biggest in Japan, though I have a gut feeling that I might find more Chinese people in Ikebukuro here in Tokyo than Yokohama itself.

Took a train over to Shin-Yokohama after Chinatown for a visit to the Nissan Stadium, homeground of Yokohama F Marinos. I was lucky enough to have caught the stadium tour, and the best part of it was that I was the only one on the tour, so I basically had the whole tour guide to myself. Mr. Shirai, the tour guide, was a very friendly man, and he also helped me take a lot of interesting pictures. The tour itself was really great too, as I got to see a lot of wonderful things, such as the actualy dressing room for the World Cup winning Brazilian team, the seats for the bench, etc. It was 500 yen well spent.

Met up with my friends for dinner, and had a good chat as well as some nice photo taking session at Minatomirai, before adjourning back to Shinjuku.

I’m catching the Hong Kong-Japan game tomorrow, and while I know it would be quite impossible for Hong Kong to come away with a win, I sure hope that they do themselves justice. And who knows, since stranger things have happened, you’ll never know how the match is going to be!

Palace.

I went out to the Imperial Palace in the morning – of course I never got the chance to step into the area where the Japanese Emperor lives, but the garden which is opened to public is good enough for me. The garden was really beautiful, and it was great to have such a big piece of greenery in such a big city like Tokyo.

After the Imperial Palace, I headed over to Harajuku for the Meiji Shrine. I was actually supposed to have gone to the Shrine the last time I was in Tokyo, but somehow contrived to have forgotten all about it. Anyway the Shrine was pretty much like all the others that I’ve seen in my two trips to Japan so far, so it wasn’t really like completely astonishing to me. But it’s still good to visit somewhere that’s authentically Japanese.

In the evening I went to Odaiba for the night view of the Rainbow Bridge. I saw it in the day before, and the night view was really quite stunning. I hope the next time I come to Tokyo again, I could be with someone I love, sitting at Odaiba and watch the Rainbow Bridge with the Tokyo Tower behind it in its grandeur at night!

Heading to Yokohama tomorrow, hope it will be fun.

Mount Fuji.

The last time I came to Tokyo, I didn’t even catch the slightest glimpse of Mount Fuji because of the poor weather, but I managed to do so today!

I took a train ride from Shinjuku to Gotemba via Matsuda, and after 2 hours, the grandeur of Mount Fuji was right in front of my eyes. I think the beauty of this mountain can’t really be described in words, and it must be seen to be believed. If you need to see how grand it is, the pictures are on my FB page.

This trip to Japan has really been a leisure trip as I am really just going to places on a pretty ad-hoc basis, heading out to places as and when I feel like. I guess that’s really a very nice relaxing trip for me, though I can probably do with less heartache being dished out by the Hong Kong team. Haha.

Still got a couple of souvenirs to buy, but as far as the shopping is concerned, I think I’m doing just fine.

5-0.

Day 2 in Tokyo was a Sunday, so I went to the Tokyo Baptist Church for the Sunday service. The Tokyo Baptist Church is in reality an international church with the congregation being made up of people from various nationalities. I even managed to meet a fellow Hongkonger who’s married to a Japanese husband! It was really great to see someone from Hong Kong here, and I think I must have heard a couple of Singaporeans chatting with one another because of the accent, but I didn’t really say hi to them.

Spent the afternoon walking around, the first part was from Daikanyama to Shibuya which took me about half an hour at a very leisure pace. It wasn’t really cold today, so it made for a very good walk. After that I headed over to Akihabara to get an adapter for my electrical appliances as I forgot to bring mine over. Had lunch in Akiba, which was a set of rice and soba.

The evening was spent at the National Stadium as the group of us Hong Kong fans gathered to watch Hong Kong take on South Korea in the East Asian Championship. The wasn’t any surprised as Hong Kong succumbed to a 5-0 defeat at the hands of what I feel is the best team in Asia. Let’s just hope the lads pick themselves up and do themselves justice in the next match against Japan. I don’t expect the team to win, to be honest, but they should at least give a good account of themselves instead of getting rolled all over by the opponents that easily.

Tokyo (Day 1).

I arrived in Tokyo at about 2 in the afternoonb local time, but didn’t reach my hotel until about 5. The trip from Narita Airport to Shinjuku took a little more than an hour, but the main deal is that I was made to undergo a full search at the Customs in the airport. Not too sure why the officer picked me, but I had a good time chatting with him using my limited Japanese.

After reaching the hotel, the few of us decided that we want to watch the game between Japan and China going on at the Ajinomoto Stadium, so we set our foot off to the stadium. When we got there, we went to the stand with the Chinese fans – there were quite a few of them with the majority being students who are studying in Japan. Managed to see a few people who spoke Cantonese, and hopefully they would be in the stadium to support the Hong Kong team tomorrow when they take on the Koreans.

The game between Japan and China wasn’t exactly a classic, and in fact to a certain extent it was a bit dull. Both sides didn’t really have clear cut chances, and when one did finally come, the Chinese striker managed to miss the penalty which was awaded to them after Yuji Nakazawa (or was it Marcus Tulio Tanaka) handled in the box. So the game finished 0-0, and it looks like it will make for an interesting tournament.

Besides the game, I think the highlight of today is that it was really cold here in Tokyo! When we touched down, it was about 6 degrees. And then while we were inside the stadium, I was so cold that I was literally wrapping myself with whatever I could find! I was secretly cursing myself for not wearing my down jacket to the stadium, as I thought my 4 layers of clothes would be enough – big mistake! After the game, when I was on my way back to the hotel, it was apparently 2 degrees outside!

Anyway I’ve got the pictures of my adventure in Tokyo so far posted in FB, so if you are interested please go there to take a look. And tomorrow I’ll be making my way to the National Stadium for the game between Hong Kong and Korea – but not before I attend a church service at the Tokyo Baptist Church. I hope the experience in a Japanese church would be interesting.

See everyone tomorrow.

Japan.

Would be heading over there in 2 days’ time. Can’t say I’m too excited by it – I mean, I originally was, but seems like that hasn’t been the case for the past two days. My main objective for the trip to Japan is of course to watch the Hong Kong team in action in the East Asian Championship, but I guess after these couple of days, I’m adjusting my mentality. As to the reason why, I guess some of you would have already known, so I’m not repeating. I was just a bit baffled, if I have to put it mildly.

Perhaps I do need a break from work after these while that I’ve been on hyper mode. Of course I made a trip to Kaohsiung in December, but tha was a rather short break, and wasn’t really free and easy considering I was walking about all the time. This time round I haven’t really got my itinerary planned, so I would be taking it fairly easily. I know I would head to Yokohama and do another visit to Gotemba, but I haven’t got the rest of the days sorted out yet. And I’m not even bothered by it at this point of time.

Either way it’ll be good to go out of Hong Kong for a few days. Perhaps I may get to know a female Korean or Japanese supporter.

Off to sleep and perhaps I at least dream about getting to know a female Korean or Jaanese supporter. After all these while, however, I think I prefer a Korean. Haha.

Sleepy.

The past few days have been strange. I’m averaging about 7 hours of sleep per day and yet I’m always feeling very sleepy. I’m not down with the flu or anything like that, so I wonder where my source of exhaustion comes from.

Anyway I’ll be heading to Japan on Saturday and would be there for 6 days, returning on the 12th. This is the first time that I’m travelling for leisure with friends, and even though I’m not staying at the same hotel as does everyone else, I think the trip is still going to be a good one.

Some things are bugging me and I’m not feeling too happy today, and plus the fact that I’m so sleepy makes it even more tiring for me. But I guess with me being what I am I should be able to recover very soon.