The belated DBSK concert trip post =)
Back from Tokyo. Immensely happy. Also immensely broke. But well, you only live once... =)
It all started with this band...and this beautiful song...
So here goes, sorted, kinda, by day.
After MANY sleepless nights in front of the computer frantically trying to navigate yahoo japan auctions, and flitting btw google translate and google notebook and gazillion auction pages... and lots of agonizing over the million dollar question: 'To Go Or Not To Go' and dragging at least 4 other friends down with me to come to a decision (thanks dears)... i got a ticket. Worth. more than ten times it's weight in gold. My wallet bled that night. T_T
My consolation was that the ticket was GOOD (first floor, YUNHO side, row 15, off center, gate 22). Or rather, at that time, i thought it would be decent. I figured I would be able to kinda see them decently. With binoculars of course. And yes, i'll admit that by the time I'd paid for this ticket, i'd just about thrown what sanity and logic out of the window. This ticket. Plus the plane ticket. Was more than a little nuts. ^^;;;;
So it started with me flying over Thursday night. Endured a horrid plane ride, with my dbsk-vid-loaded PSP + ipod my only consolation. Stumbled out into Tokyo Friday night, somehow shakily navigated my way through a rather wet evening to meet NIngz at Shibuya. At that time, to be honest, the only thing in my head was 'omg. I need to. Sleep. WHY the HECK are we meeting at shibuya...'
Then ningz, being the awesome FANTABULOUS friend that she was, reveals why she dragged me to Shibuya. By way of dragging me to the infamous Omotesando pillars - 13 GORGEOUS pillars wrapped round with glossy larger-than-life mugs of the DBSK boys. And of course, such hotness does not go unnoticed in one of the busiest stations in Tokyo. Naturally, the pillars get mugged. And violated. And photographed to oblivion, by thousands of nutcase FEMALE fans - all of them had their cellphones out taking pictures. I even got scolded by one because i was hogging yunho for too long O_O
Note the girls surrounding the pillars and causing a jam. And this was 10pm at night. Apparently during rush hour a guard is needed to protect the pillars and take care of crowd control. O_O Naturally, i join in with my beloved Yunho and Changmin *sigh* (and yoochun because i like that picture)
And of course being the friend that I am, here's pics of PL's faves, yoochun and jaejoong. (sorry shuui, no junsu. Because. Er. I dunno why... ^^;;; *runs away before she gets bricked*)
No one sums the madness up better than this youtube vid though *dies laughing*
--
Day 2:
After much planning with Shuui last night, and getting paranoid about not getting any goods, we decided to meet EARLy at tokyo dome on saturday to get goods first. So Saturday saw us arriving at the Dome at 8am in the morning, and joining the long queue of fans..We were kinda lucky it wasn't longer. O_o So we were about......200 pple away from the stores? Ningz the semi fan was very kind enough to join me <3
The queue didn't move for like...an hour. Then they said they will let some people in earlier, and the sales will start at 10am. So the line moved. And we...moved...2 rows up. =_= It stayed that way for the next 2 hours. Until suddenly it started moving again. Finally, at 11am, we managed to move across this overhead pass thing, and was a little nearer to our goal. I was so happy i started taking pictures.
This was where we were at 8am. It was a platform thing, connected to the bridge thing i'm standing on as I take this picture. The line kinda winded round and round that little complex thing.
Then the line extended down to the basement area, and it looked like this. We were very glad we came at 8am when we saw this O_O Note that there were THREE locations around the dome that day selling the same goods. This was just one. And the queue was the same for ALL THREE> O_o
We then reached the goods shop. And gosh. That was another bit of madness. Avex/SM is smart because they plant the goods in front of you. And you stare and stare and then you break down and buy everything. Ningz got affected. She ended up getting a phone strap and the single. Prior to that she was wrangling between getting the shirt or the towel. LOLOL. Me, i was gone from the start. Basically went broke there. O_o The ordering process was kinda painful, and went something like this:
Me: *points to item #1 on photo menu* Two please.
Girl: Okay *gets two of item #1* *in extremely bright japanese* Here is Item # 1!!! You ordered TWO! *smiles brightly and looks at me expectantly*
Me: *loses all remaining vestiges of my resolve as i stare at the shiny posters* *points to item #2* Two please. *crying inside*
etc. Repeat that 10 times. I think the people behind me were going to kill me. *shrugs* I can't help it! They take orders one item at a time!
Also, they didn't give bags, so you had to buy the DBSK bag to put your DBSK moolah in. =_= Smart business acumen, stupid fan. Dammit. I stumbled out half stunned at the price and trying not to hit anybody with the three huge poster rolls and all that knick-knack. The japanese behind me were staring at me with big big eyes. =_= And ningz couldn't stop laughing *sigh*
After getting my act together, we walked out, and saw the end of another queue. Had to post this because the japanese men were on the left queueing for baseball tickets, and the women were on the right queueing for DBSK goods. LOL
Stopped quickly by the photogoods booth to grab some shiny photographs of the boys before hitting lunch. Ramen no less, cos very poor. =_=
The rest of the day after that was spent going subsequently more broke as we splurged at uniqlo. And then ningz dragged me to salsa to test my two left feet. But it was very fun. =)
--
Day 3:
Woke up later because we were exhausted. After carefully packing my ticket, trusty fan towel, and binoculars, ningz and I trooped over to tsukiji for the usual Toro deal (we always do this when I come to japan). What made this one awesome was:
1) Same chef who served me the first time I went to sushizanmai in japan 2 years ago, served us again.
2) Everything tuna 50% off.
So we stuffed our faces with Otoro. It was heaven. All this sushi here, and multiply it by two. That's how much we ate =) Okay for me i didn't touch the unagi, but added another three slices of Otoro *yum*
And ningz and I went promptly to Toro heaven:
After that, we went to cut hair. Interesting observations:
1) they are very polite - the guy keeps apologizing if he so much as tugs your hair lightly. I ended up not realizing he'd cut so much until i felt my hair later.
2) The way they cut hair is very...precise. And skilled.
3) He thought my singapore cut was done by myself - i.e. it was so bad and off balance that he thought a novice did it =_+ I'm never going back to REDS again. sheeesh.
4) very punctual. They said we'd be done by 11.44am and we were. O_o
5) i surprisingly look decent in curled jap hair. See pic:
After we were nicely primped up, met some of Ningz' friends to go to a Matsuri near Asakusa. It was really colorful and lively. I FINALLY get to go to a Matsuri. Next time I swear i'm bringing my Yukata. dammit. =)
The middle pic is of Tanabata (sp?) where people hang wishes on bamboo shoots i think. It was really pretty... And the last pic on the right is of kids catching goldfish with paper nets. The net basically was rice paper strung within a plastic ring. It was FLAT and not net like. Rather hard. But fun to see.
From left to right, food, an old school rice krispie machine, and an old man making sugar puppets..
After that, I ran off. To start going to the concert venue for my concert. OMGOMGOMGOMG. For your sanity, putting this concert bit in a diff post. =) Click here...
--
Day 4:
Last today. was bummed. Took neoprint with ningz, and said bye bye. Thanks so much, darling, for letting me stay and helping me get tickets <3
Also, the quintissential bittersweet leaving pic...taken from the train to narita...
Sigh, till next time....
...
It all started with this band...and this beautiful song...
So here goes, sorted, kinda, by day.
After MANY sleepless nights in front of the computer frantically trying to navigate yahoo japan auctions, and flitting btw google translate and google notebook and gazillion auction pages... and lots of agonizing over the million dollar question: 'To Go Or Not To Go' and dragging at least 4 other friends down with me to come to a decision (thanks dears)... i got a ticket. Worth. more than ten times it's weight in gold. My wallet bled that night. T_T
My consolation was that the ticket was GOOD (first floor, YUNHO side, row 15, off center, gate 22). Or rather, at that time, i thought it would be decent. I figured I would be able to kinda see them decently. With binoculars of course. And yes, i'll admit that by the time I'd paid for this ticket, i'd just about thrown what sanity and logic out of the window. This ticket. Plus the plane ticket. Was more than a little nuts. ^^;;;;
So it started with me flying over Thursday night. Endured a horrid plane ride, with my dbsk-vid-loaded PSP + ipod my only consolation. Stumbled out into Tokyo Friday night, somehow shakily navigated my way through a rather wet evening to meet NIngz at Shibuya. At that time, to be honest, the only thing in my head was 'omg. I need to. Sleep. WHY the HECK are we meeting at shibuya...'
Then ningz, being the awesome FANTABULOUS friend that she was, reveals why she dragged me to Shibuya. By way of dragging me to the infamous Omotesando pillars - 13 GORGEOUS pillars wrapped round with glossy larger-than-life mugs of the DBSK boys. And of course, such hotness does not go unnoticed in one of the busiest stations in Tokyo. Naturally, the pillars get mugged. And violated. And photographed to oblivion, by thousands of nutcase FEMALE fans - all of them had their cellphones out taking pictures. I even got scolded by one because i was hogging yunho for too long O_O
Note the girls surrounding the pillars and causing a jam. And this was 10pm at night. Apparently during rush hour a guard is needed to protect the pillars and take care of crowd control. O_O Naturally, i join in with my beloved Yunho and Changmin *sigh* (and yoochun because i like that picture)
And of course being the friend that I am, here's pics of PL's faves, yoochun and jaejoong. (sorry shuui, no junsu. Because. Er. I dunno why... ^^;;; *runs away before she gets bricked*)
No one sums the madness up better than this youtube vid though *dies laughing*
Click to view--
Day 2:
After much planning with Shuui last night, and getting paranoid about not getting any goods, we decided to meet EARLy at tokyo dome on saturday to get goods first. So Saturday saw us arriving at the Dome at 8am in the morning, and joining the long queue of fans..We were kinda lucky it wasn't longer. O_o So we were about......200 pple away from the stores? Ningz the semi fan was very kind enough to join me <3
The queue didn't move for like...an hour. Then they said they will let some people in earlier, and the sales will start at 10am. So the line moved. And we...moved...2 rows up. =_= It stayed that way for the next 2 hours. Until suddenly it started moving again. Finally, at 11am, we managed to move across this overhead pass thing, and was a little nearer to our goal. I was so happy i started taking pictures.
This was where we were at 8am. It was a platform thing, connected to the bridge thing i'm standing on as I take this picture. The line kinda winded round and round that little complex thing.
Then the line extended down to the basement area, and it looked like this. We were very glad we came at 8am when we saw this O_O Note that there were THREE locations around the dome that day selling the same goods. This was just one. And the queue was the same for ALL THREE> O_o
We then reached the goods shop. And gosh. That was another bit of madness. Avex/SM is smart because they plant the goods in front of you. And you stare and stare and then you break down and buy everything. Ningz got affected. She ended up getting a phone strap and the single. Prior to that she was wrangling between getting the shirt or the towel. LOLOL. Me, i was gone from the start. Basically went broke there. O_o The ordering process was kinda painful, and went something like this:
Me: *points to item #1 on photo menu* Two please.
Girl: Okay *gets two of item #1* *in extremely bright japanese* Here is Item # 1!!! You ordered TWO! *smiles brightly and looks at me expectantly*
Me: *loses all remaining vestiges of my resolve as i stare at the shiny posters* *points to item #2* Two please. *crying inside*
etc. Repeat that 10 times. I think the people behind me were going to kill me. *shrugs* I can't help it! They take orders one item at a time!
Also, they didn't give bags, so you had to buy the DBSK bag to put your DBSK moolah in. =_= Smart business acumen, stupid fan. Dammit. I stumbled out half stunned at the price and trying not to hit anybody with the three huge poster rolls and all that knick-knack. The japanese behind me were staring at me with big big eyes. =_= And ningz couldn't stop laughing *sigh*
After getting my act together, we walked out, and saw the end of another queue. Had to post this because the japanese men were on the left queueing for baseball tickets, and the women were on the right queueing for DBSK goods. LOL
Stopped quickly by the photogoods booth to grab some shiny photographs of the boys before hitting lunch. Ramen no less, cos very poor. =_=
The rest of the day after that was spent going subsequently more broke as we splurged at uniqlo. And then ningz dragged me to salsa to test my two left feet. But it was very fun. =)
--
Day 3:
Woke up later because we were exhausted. After carefully packing my ticket, trusty fan towel, and binoculars, ningz and I trooped over to tsukiji for the usual Toro deal (we always do this when I come to japan). What made this one awesome was:
1) Same chef who served me the first time I went to sushizanmai in japan 2 years ago, served us again.
2) Everything tuna 50% off.
So we stuffed our faces with Otoro. It was heaven. All this sushi here, and multiply it by two. That's how much we ate =) Okay for me i didn't touch the unagi, but added another three slices of Otoro *yum*
And ningz and I went promptly to Toro heaven:
After that, we went to cut hair. Interesting observations:
1) they are very polite - the guy keeps apologizing if he so much as tugs your hair lightly. I ended up not realizing he'd cut so much until i felt my hair later.
2) The way they cut hair is very...precise. And skilled.
3) He thought my singapore cut was done by myself - i.e. it was so bad and off balance that he thought a novice did it =_+ I'm never going back to REDS again. sheeesh.
4) very punctual. They said we'd be done by 11.44am and we were. O_o
5) i surprisingly look decent in curled jap hair. See pic:
After we were nicely primped up, met some of Ningz' friends to go to a Matsuri near Asakusa. It was really colorful and lively. I FINALLY get to go to a Matsuri. Next time I swear i'm bringing my Yukata. dammit. =)
The middle pic is of Tanabata (sp?) where people hang wishes on bamboo shoots i think. It was really pretty... And the last pic on the right is of kids catching goldfish with paper nets. The net basically was rice paper strung within a plastic ring. It was FLAT and not net like. Rather hard. But fun to see.
From left to right, food, an old school rice krispie machine, and an old man making sugar puppets..
After that, I ran off. To start going to the concert venue for my concert. OMGOMGOMGOMG. For your sanity, putting this concert bit in a diff post. =) Click here...
--
Day 4:
Last today. was bummed. Took neoprint with ningz, and said bye bye. Thanks so much, darling, for letting me stay and helping me get tickets <3
Also, the quintissential bittersweet leaving pic...taken from the train to narita...
Sigh, till next time....
...