SECOND TO LAST

have only today, tomorrow, and part of wednesday left. can't believe this trip is coming to a close lol. me and lucio are with nori at his university's computer lab ... went to the tsukiji fish market this morning. we were supposed to go early - like at around 4 or 5am to see them auction off the fish ... but we couldn't wake up lol. went to sleep too late i think :p so we left later at around 7 or 8ish just to walk around and see whatever there was left to see ... and find something to eat. started raining pretty much as soon as we left the house. fish market was aiite. saw a lot of fish ... got to eat some fish haha. i got a tuna, egg, and okra rice bowl that i thought was pretty yummy. kind of hungry now though again. idk what else we got planned. we're just kind of chillin' and doing whatever till we meet up back at nori's place at 5pm ...

DAY 7: ARRIVAL IN JAPAN!

yay. so this is the day we arrive in japan! woohoo :D i'm with nori right now at his university using his physics lab's wifi to write this. so much to write, so little time. anyhow, here goesss ...

yo. so basically we left korea in the early morning ... got up at like 6am or something to catch our flight over and arrived in japan at narita airport sometime in the early afternoon. me, ron, and david shared a flight and billy and amy shared a different one. we met up at the airport mcdonald's and then took a bus from the airport to tokyo, and then the rail/subway to ichigaya station ... near nori's place. was raining ... like always ... haha. not everything went as smoothly as we had hoped or planned, but we made it. by the time we met up with nori, at the station, it was like 6pm ... 12 hours since departure.

but who cares? WE MADE IT! we were in motherfucking japan!!! haha. we took the long uphill walk (in the rain) to nori's place to drop off our stuff and then went out in search of japanese food with NORI! motherfucking NORI! dannng, too hype lol. he took us to this crazy ass place where we could actually fish for our own food. like they literally gave us all fishing rods and bait INSIDE the restaurant, and we went out to try and hook our own sushi. depending on what you caught, it was a different price.

david and billy ended up being the bread ... i mean, fish-winners of the night. once you caught the fish, they took it to the back and prepared it into sushi for us to eat ...

forsure one of the more fun dining experiences i've had. japan is looking up. 

OUT OF ORDER

sorry if some posts are out of order. trying desperately right now to catch up with my blog postings. fell way behind during the week we literally had no internet access ... hopefully i can get back on track and up to date sooner rather than later lol. there is just SOO much ... in the meantime, bear with me pleaseeeee :P

KYOTO "THE DARK ESCAPE" 2013

footage from lucio's go-pro. day 12 in kyoto. him and ron are playing a scary 3d first person shooting game. shit was scary. yeaaaaaah ... hahaha

DAY 6: INSADONG

our last day in korea was spent at the historic city of insadong. first thing on the menu for breakfast: KOREAN BBQ! ... oh the realness lol. meat in korea is hella expensive. no wonder kbbq in california is so popular. for one small tiny ribeye, it was like 40 bucks! ... the price of two all-you-can-eat full course menus at manna. daymmmm.

samgyup sal was a little cheaper ... but still pretty pricy. we each had like a couple bites of meat and the bill still came out to over 25 bucks per person. aside from the ribeye and pork, we got some raw marinated meat and a some denjangchigae. wow, culture shock for sure.

then it was exploration time. we went in search of some palaces and temples to wander ... unfortunately a lot of them were closed. we did a bit of sight seeing and shopping though in the area, so our time wasn't a complete waste. we also got to try some traditionally made makkoli, yakju, and soju. we spent just a lot of time walking around and looking at stuff ...

was pretty fun. got to see a lot of interesting structures and scenery. here's a cool panorama of one of the sites we visited. my first iphone panorama! haha

here's a funny photo i caught of my ron, amy, and david ... drama much? 

just kidding. was a moderately successful escapade. although we didn't quite get to see everything we wanted or expected to, we had a good time looking around the city and checking out small shops, bakeries, and such ... some of the more historic viewpoints were really nice.

before we knew it, we had to start heading home to pack up and get ready for our flight to tokyo the next morning ... 

stopped off at the local lotte mart next to seoul station to pick up some food and drink. got some watermelon, chips, and mochi. japan here we come!