HAPPY NEW YEAR!! I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday break. I’ll admit I ate way too much over Christmas. I’ve turned into such a glutton! I guess it’s time to start that new fitness regimen.

+++

I’m a little behind in vacation posts, so I’ll get right into the next one. The day after the Arashi concert we had another early start in Harajuku at the Toni & Guy salon. I had asked Yuka to book our appointments before we left for Japan, so I was really looking forward to a morning of being pampered. A couple hours later we emerged from the salon with brand new haircuts – and a much lighter wallet. My sis and I grabbed a quick bite to eat at the takoyaki stand down the block, then made our way to the station to take the train to Yokohama.

Yokohama is by far one of my favourite places to visit every time I’m in Tokyo. We had a lot to do, so our first stop was at the Shin Yokohama Ramen Museum. We paid our discounted admission at the front, then made our way inside. The first floor is devoted to selling all sorts of ramen-related products. Taking a flight of stairs down to the bottom level, the museum suddenly goes back in time to the Showa period. Everything looked so nostalgic.

We had just made it in past 2pm, so the lunchtime rush was over. We picked up a map of the museum which gave a description of all the restaurants inside. Each restaurant served a specialty from a different region of Japan. We decided to order smaller bowls of ramen so we could try different ones. At the end, we each had two bowls of ramen. One was tonkotsu and the other was shoyu.

After eating to our heart’s content, we made our way back upstairs. I spotted an illustrator near the entrance drawing caricatures, so I couldn’t help but sit down for my own portrait. For ¥500 the drawing was a steal! I think it really looks like me. ^_^

+++

For the remainder of our time in Yokohama, we took the train towards Sakuragicho and shopped at World Porters and the Red Brick Warehouse. We did sooooo much walking the past two days my feet were going to give out. It was a miracle I managed to drag myself back on the train towards Shinjuku.

After collapsing at the hotel, I was too exhausted to move. Initially we were thinking of going for kaiten sushi, but I couldn’t pull myself out of bed even to satisfy my hunger. Later we were contemplating if we still wanted to watch the 9:40 screening of Ohoku at Shinjuku Piccadilly. The combination of being hungry + sleepy = extremely grumpy. I knew we had packed too much into our day already, but it was the only night we could watch the movie and I had really wanted to see it. So I dragged myself out of bed and made a pit stop at the Family Mart across the street to buy some onigiris before the movie. I ended up eating one even before we made it to the subway entrance!

We had a bit of trouble locating the theater after we came out of the subway, but we made it inside with time to spare before the show. This was the first time I’ve been to a theater with so many floors. Our movie was playing at Screen 7, which meant we had to take the escalator up to the 11th FLOOR. I think I got dizzy by the time we were halfway up. LOL.

One thing I do like about Japanese cinemas is that all the seats are pre-assigned. I also get a good laugh at the ‘No More 映画泥棒’ announcement before the movie. It never fails to crack me up. Hehe.

I had a great time watching Ohoku even though I didn’t understand a single line in the movie. However, the movie was easy to follow and had a stellar cast. I was so shocked I didn’t fall asleep in the middle, although I did catch my sister with her eyes closed on more than one occasion.

Afterwards, I was famished once again. We decided to walk back to our hotel from the theater. Along the way we stopped by First Kitchen to buy some soup and pasta, then I stopped by McD’s to buy apple pie for dessert. After eating our midnight snack, it was really time to call it a night!