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Thursday, August 11, 2005
hokkaido part 1 - hakodate... 7/26
we got the shaoshan virus... all of us...
what's the shaoshan virus??
Shaoshan virus (n).
-describes the disease upon which if contracted, the person will, automatically and naturally (almost innate), perform the action of chapping in when other people are posing for photos.
i, too, contracted it during the trip... hehe... super irritating, but everyone's doing it... so しょうがない... ;p
anyway the photos above are taken at the haneda (羽田) airport... which is less than half an hour from kawasaki... 便利だね... and it is prettier than narita airport... much much better...
after the automated check in was done, here's my boarding pass...
first flight of 2005...
we had to take a bus to board the plane, and during the bus trip, we went pass the pokemon plane...
cute right??
the flight lasted around 2 hours... and i totally slept through it... missing the beautiful flight attendants free beverages offered... hehe...
first thing we did when we landed at hakodate (函館), besides renting the cars, was to head for the famed morning market...
it was still morning when we reached there...
hakodate, i heard, is famous for its 烏賊, i.e. squid... and we can see loads here...
ikas swimming around in a tub...
the ppl sitting at the tables in the background are ikannibals... those who pay, fish for ika, see them cut the ika straightaway, so that they can dine on them fresh on the spot...
ewww... (cos i dun like squids haha)
anyway, let's see one ikannibal in action...
errr... game-keeper showing young ikannibal how to fish for one...
young padawan at it now...
wheres that darn ika??
got it!
**scenes where ika was mercilessly cut up are not shown here, as they are not suitable for the PG audience of this blog**
of course, besides ika, the market offers many other seafood as well...
like wet markets in Singapore, only here they only sell seafood...
of course, some shops cook them on the spot to sell to visitors like us...
look at these yummy bbq delights! (ok lah, only the scallop looks yummy to me, cos i dun eat the rest ;p)
fiona now will give a demonstation alpha on how-to-eat-200yen-snails... (ok i'm sure they are not snails, cant remember the name, but they look like anyway)
ewww... looks gross right??? (i'm not talking about fiona...)
now for the more delectable one...
le pétoncle, aka. ほたて, aka. scallop.... slurrpp...
this one costed ivan 400 yen.. he was nice to let me have a nibble, and it was real great! thanks ivan... ;)
there are other ready-to-eat ones like...
うに (sea urchins) - ewwww....
and...
蟹 (crab) - slurrrpppp!!
resisted the temptation of getting crabs cos would be going for a crab buffet sometime during the trip...
the ice-cream lady looked mightily tempting and delicious... and they were!!
made from milk from hokkaido cows... heehe.. guaranteed freshness...
with all the tempting seafood around, we had to settle for this for lunch...
chicken spaghetti...
at this chain of restaurant named "Lucky Pierrot"... apparantly quite famous in that part of japan...
it was quite delicious (esp the chicken bits)... hence you can see me here enjoying my food ;)
we went to fort go-something... cant remember the name lah... but the interesting thing about the fort was that the perimeters are shaped like a star, so it made it harder for others to breach the fort...
miniature model of the fort.
the real thing from the top of a tower...
a customary photo of me with the scenery...
this nice structure is in the fort actually...
after this, we went to the motomachi area for some shopping...
look at the "clouds"... can't do anything else much becos of the rain...
the "clouds" also meant that we had to, regrettably, abandon our plans to go up the mountain for hakodate's famed "million-dollar view"... 残念だった...
inside of the red warehouses are really quite nice... lined up with nice stalls selling cute little things...
nice...
it was also a harbour... much akin to SF's Pier 39...
kinda melancholy day... suits me fine... the last photo here is my current desktop wallpaper.... hehe...
we did some driving around, stopping by some sights just for quick photos...
town on a hilly terrain...
actually cos of the hilly thingy, this place reminded me of parts of Montreal, the part near the what's-the-name-park?? where it is hilly as well?? those who've been there should know what i'm referring to... i must add... this part only!! cos actually the whole town reminded me of malacca - not too new, not too old...
we went to vivien's (a fren of yuhui) ex-host family's place for dinner... the host mum and dad were super nice and frenly and hospitable... brought us to ofuro after dinner too!
we passed by the motomachi area again late at nite...
nice feel to it, with the lights...
after ofuro, we headed back to our 1000-yen bikers' inn, recommended by michiyo, a fren of mine...
not entirely pretty, but serves me fine for a nite of good sleep...
after a good sleep, we headed to sapporo the next morning... which will be covered in the next post ;)
posted by winz at 3:05 PM
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4 Comments:
montreal: it's called parc du mont-royal.
By
Anonymous, at
10:25 PM
ahh... thanks!! yeah... you were there just recently right?? nice hor?? i miss canada...
By
winz, at
3:13 AM
Nice entry! Short and sweet. Haha ...
By
Anonymous, at
1:39 PM
short meh???
By
winz, at
2:13 PM
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