Journey Back To The Land Of Rising Sun

Short note: I wanted to make an update immediately after I reached my place in Nagaoka, Japan but the traveling was too exhausting and I had to attend two classes early in the morning the very next day. This is gonna be quite a lengthy pictorial-post, to make up for the lost time.

P/S to Fritz: I got your Merlion postcard already. Thank you-hor, I didn't expect you would time the postcard to arrive on the day I reached Japan. Or perhaps it memang reached much earlier already, but the office kept it in the letterbox haha.

This is not the longest journey I have ever made, nevertheless it was still a tiring one.

When people at other colleges had returned to Japan, attend classes for weeks, and had their finals, I was still enjoying my time in Malaysia. However, every beginning has to come to an end and when I mentioned that I finally gonna return to Japan, the most happy people were those people who were back already haha. Unlike other times, I wasn't traveling alone this time. My flight was on Sunday, hence my Mom tagged along me down to KL a day earlier before sending me off at KLIA the next morning.

I think I inherited the tall genes from my Dad side.

Three younger sisters who are all rather tall.

Wanted to stand like Do Re Mi, but later Mom sure emo one because she is the shortest in the family haha.

The journey to KL took four hours like always and my youngest aunt picked us up at Puduraya terminal. Traffic was quite bad, as it was a Saturday and the Chinese were celebrating Lantern Festival, Indians busy doing their shopping for Deepavali. It took us almost one hour from Pudu to Bangsar. Believe it or not, this is my first time going to Bangsar haha. Sad case, isn't it?

Aunt wanted to take us try the banana leaf rice at Bangsar; apparently it is well-known among the locals in that area.

Bangsar in KL.

It is located along Jalan Telawi 3.

Restoran Nirvana Maju is the place.

Food is one of the thing that reunites us Malaysia as you can see here.

The restaurant use only banana leaves, instead of plates.

Basically, orders come in sets; there would be rice, cucumber acar, cabbage and fried bitter gourd as three side dishes and you can order for extra dishes. As for us, we ordered fried chicken and chicken masala as extra dishes. Papadam is served free as service.

Price wise, I would say it is rather fair considering Bangsar is one of the happening area in KL. There were three of us there and the bill didn't even reach RM 30.

Rice, three side dishes and curry (chicken or fish or daal) of your choice.

Fried chicken, papadam and chicken masala which was really nice.

The full set with teh tarik.

The next morning, we had to wake up early to avoid missing my flight later that morning. But first, we went to have breakfast first; my last chance to taste local food before we leave. I had a piece of roti canai and tosai each.

In between, I stole a few spoons of Mom's nasi lemak haha.

Kayu Nasi Kandar in Taipan.

I know I will miss this once I am back in Japan.

Same goes to tosai.

A very simple plate of nasi lemak, but now I miss it so badly already sigh.

Mom with the pencuri baju (inside joke lol).

The drive from Subang Jaya to KLIA was just a short thirty-minute drive.

Tiba untuk bercuti, pulang untuk belajar.

We were almost there =\

The first thing once we arrived was of course to check-in my luggage so that we could spend emo times together haha. You know, every time I am back, I will not feel emo or what because I am alone and I won't have such feeling. Emo moments will only happen when someone sent me off, just like when Michelle followed me to the airport last time.

This time however, it was far better than when Mich was with me. Haha, I won't even wanna recall those moments lol.

MH 0070 to Narita, departing at 11:00.

I guess MAS loves the environment very much; the boarding pass is so green haha.

Picture time with Mom.

Youngest aunt whom people sometimes mistaken us as sibling haha.

Hong Yao, my third year junior was in the same flight as me. We actually almost missed our flight because we took too much time emo-ing before taking the escalator down lol. We had to rush really kao kao and luckily the boarding gate was not too far away. By the time we were at the boarding gate, they were getting ready to close it. For so many times taking flights, this is the first time they call my name for confirmation.

That shows how late we were haha.

Bye bye Malaysia.

Salted peanuts and guava juice as starters.

Lunch consisting of chicken and pasta. This is the last set of chicken in the flight, the air-hostess managed to get the last remaining reserved set for me because I am hot since I do not take beef.

Mineral water made in Taiping. I am so proud to say that I am from Taiping haha.

The air-hostess who served my row throughout the seven-hour flight. Her name is Megumi-something and her English is damn nice. Face also not bad lol.

Cards and custom declaration forms to be submitted at the Immigration upon landing.

I broke quite a few records during the flight this time. This is the first time that I managed to finish a whole movie (Kung Fu Chef starring Sammo Hung) although I did dozed off a while in the middle haha. Usually, I will turn on a random movie and by ten minutes, I will surely doze off. That is the method I often use to make myself go to sleep in the plane lol.

I think the food I had for dinner and breakfast that morning was too oily that I had to go to the toilet to do something-you-know for the first time too. Imagine doing it thousand of miles above the ground. Isn't that something so cool? Haha wtf.

I get a window seat and nobody was sitting next to me, so practically I was able to move around freely. Took some time to look out the window and enjoy the different scenery as the plane ascended.

Mountains of Peninsular Malaysia, somewhere near Pahang I think.

Cotton-like clouds at somewhere I dunno haha.

This is some islands near the Philippines. Look at the beautiful island on bottom left.

Somewhere in Pacific Ocean which I also dunno where specifically haha.

Light meal for tea time was later served - salmon and cheese sandwiches and tea.

My first time tobe servedHaagen-Dazs ice cream from MAS.

The seat I was sitting was facing the East, hence I didn't get to see the sunset. So, I went to the opposite side and it so happened that there was an empty seat there. I spend some time looking out and enjoy the breathtaking sunset view.

We live in such a beautiful place.

The landing was one of the weirdest I have ever experience. When it was just going to land, I thought it was gonna be a smooth one but once it touched the ground. I guess the pilot lost his control and the plane took some swerve left and right. It was quite a nervy experience actually. Besides that, it took us more than twenty minutes before the plane reached the terminal.

I am not sure what the pilot was doing, perhaps he was lost haha.

The flight I took; picture taken upon arriving at Narita International Airport.

We didn't waste any time because it was getting late. Fortunately, we managed to catch the last shinkansen (bullet train) back to Nagaoka from Ueno in Tokyo.

We were traveling with huge luggages and we just decided to sit on the space in between the coach throughout the one-hour-and-forty minute journey.

This is my room after some unpacking the next day.

We reached our hostel just before midnight and I was already super exhausted by then. To make matter worse, I didn't have my room key with me and I had to go to the security guard's office to get it from him. Too bad he wasn't there and I went to look for the lecturer-on-duty in the hostel for that night. I got the spare key to my room from him. I didn't bother to unpack my stuff as I still gotta attend classes the next morning.

As expected, I was sleeping half of the time during lectures and planned to sleep later that evening since I got no classes. Too bad I had to go out to settle some stuff.

Went to more than five shops to get something and they told me the thing is out of stock.

But one thing, I didn't go to look for soft toys hor.