Hokkaido Trip: Sapporo Factory

Day 2, Part 2.

(Austin)

    After buying stuff, taking pictures and freezing my hands off at the Yuki Matsuri Odor Site, we headed towards a mall called Sapporo Factory. I wanted to go to Sapporo Factory because I read on the internet that there was a special event being held there related to Snow Miku stuff. Snow Miku is my favorite Hatsune Miku variant, so I was excited to go.

    After taking a train and walking through the snow covered sidewalk we finally arrived at the mall. Good thing too because I was FREEZING. We went inside and started looking

for the event. The mall was huge and had many different shops. We briefly stopped in a puzzle shop to look around. I really want to get an anime puzzle however I Dont think it will look good hanging up. The ridges between thepieces make it look...kinda bad.

    After exploring the puzzle shop we continued our search. We looked through a lot of the mall before I decided that maybe it was in the building beside the mall. We walked over there and DID find something similar but it wasnt what we were looking for. The event we found was an anniversary party for a company called Shaft; They make high quality anime.

    Not to be detered we wandered back to the mall. In the middle of the mall was a wide open space with a few restaurants and shrubbery. Sadly I didn't really get any pictures but I've not really seen anything like it in the US. Ryosuke called the Mall help line to see where the event was and that is when we were told... the event was over. It had ended the previous day before we had even arrived in Hokkaido. "Well.. that sucks" is basically all I could say. 

    Luckily some of the restaurants were still doing their Snow Miku themed promotions so we went and had a small snack at one. I got a delicious drink that came with a free drink coaster. Something is better than nothing, right?

    It was starting to get late so we decided to head back, but before we left a small singing talent show started on a little stage. We were on the top floor above it, so we could only barely see it but we listened the whole time. Two girls sang Romeo and Cinderella, one of my favorite Miku songs. The people in Japan are really good at singing.

    We headed back towards our hotel. On the way there we stopped at a tiny ramen shop. It could only hold about 7 people in the whole shop. I had miso ramen again. It was extremely good. We parted ways with Ryosuke after dinner but agreed to meet at the McDonalds in the morning.

    Finally back at the hotel we relaxed and settled in. I finally took some pictures of my capsule. These capsules were much nicer than the ones in Tokyo. They had a TV, headphones, a radio and Elijah's favorite part: cushion. While I didn't have any problems with the beds in the pods in Tokyo, Elijah said they were really uncomfortable to sleep on. Suffice to say these were much better.

Tokyo Trip: To the Hotel!

Day 1, Part 2.
(Austin)

    After finishing our crepes we decided that we should find our hotel and check in before it got too late. With Elijah as our navigator, we started walking to the station that was on the proper train line connected to the one near our hotel. Tokyo has a TON of train lines.

    On our way to the station we went down some back roads and I took the picture of Tokyo Tower lit up against the night sky. Its quite pretty in my opinion.

    We made it to the station and headed towards the hotel. At the destination station we found a bakery and bought some real food for dinner. It should be noted that a bakery here isn't just cakes. Actually, there aren't any cakes in bakeries here. Those are called cake shops here. Bakeries here have different kinds if bread, many of them with meats baked / cooked in. They are very delicious and cheap; great when you're on the go.

    We left the station and started towards the hotel. The hotel was a little bit confusing to find. The address, when used with Google, puts you in front of a building that clearly isn't the hotel, however there is a sign that says, in Japanese, "if you're looking for 1980 hotel, it is at the back of this building". While we were trying to read the sign 2 kids, maybe 12 years old, saw us and told us in very broken English that the hotel was around back. I guess they knew because we were foreigners. They ran inside the front of the building. I guess they live there.

    After walking around back we found the hotel, paid, checked in, and went to our pods. I say pods because it wasn't a hotel like many of you are thinking of. It is something called a Capsule Hotel. You basically have a bed and a small closet or locker to put stuff in and that is all. It is INCREDIBLY cheap and gave us everything we needed. Elijah complained that the beds were slightly uncomfortable though. If you are wondering, I could've put 2-3 of me shoulder to shoulder and fit. Length was also fine.

    The pictures show the ladder to my pod. The lower pod under mine was Elijah's. His opening is to the right, not shown in the picture. The other 2 pictures show the inside of the pod and the lockable closet beside the pod.

We were tired, so we collapsed and went to sleep.

Thus ended our first day in Tokyo.