amused sisley (2)

[[me failing at taiko no tatsujin:【悲劇】太鼓の達人でナイト．オブ．ナイツで遊んでみた… ]]

In the previous part, I talked briefly about the whole Japan experienced and shared about our sightseeing trips. This time, the focus is on my favourite part of any trip -- shopping. We were given lots of time to shop at various places, arguably even more than lessontime. Needless to say, I ended up spending too much.

In fact, the whole programme kicked off with a shopping experience. The activity was legitimately called 'shopping experience', and it was supposed to help us feel the atmosphere of shopping in Japan. We were given an hour to shop at three huge stores, which seemed quite impossible, but after endless dashing, I ended up buying a lot. I picked up some products from the drugstore, then shopped for basic foods (peaches!) at the supermarket, then completed by buying some cheap cushions from Seria, the 100yen shop.

That wasn't it. Every single day, typically starting from 3 to 6pm, we were given hours of free time, during which we paid frequent visits to the nearby Circle-K and went home (yes, I referred to it as a home for the three weeks) with heavy, enormous bags of food for the week. There was no drinking water, and we couldn't leave the dorm after 7pm, we carried home heavy 2-litre bottled water. I made sure to get enough drinks for daily consumption until the next visit. On a typical visit, I'd get some chocolate, a few onigiris (riceballs?), around five drinks and three cup noodles.

There was also this one time, when the teacher suddenly offered to drive us out to a nearby drugstore, Kyourindo. It was huge, bigger than any other drugstore I had ever seen. As you might've known already, I'm a fanatic when it comes to shopping for skincare, or even makeup (even though I don't wear them, I just swatch everything haha). Time was tight, we had less than an hour to run around the enormous shop. I hurriedly tested and picked up a few items, including a facial foam cleanser, a lipbalm and some samples. I must've broke all the records for speed shopping back then, I'm serious. They had literally every product you could think of, so it was very overwhelming and amusing.

We paid frequent visits to all sorts of shops. Omiyage shops (souvenier shops), fashion stores, supermarkets, department stores, you name it. We went on outings a lot, so we stopped by many food stalls and omiyage shops. I would spend a lot of money, bit by bit, on small food items that would then go on to accumulate to become a big pile of fat (and money). There were lots of yummy food, like Takoyaki, soft cream (soft ice cream), assorted desserts and more. I would go crazy. Also, at each of the tourist attractions, there would be some adorable themed omiyage shops. Seeing something memorable or well- representing the place, I'd buy it right away.

The first weekend came, and we were taken to the nearby Aeon department store. It was bigger than any Jusco (Aeon) I'd ever seen in Hong Kong. We were given three hours, which seemed enough, but the place was so big it really wasn't sufficient. There were tons of great food and fashionable/cute items there, all assembled in a nice building. I hastily dashed through the building searching for fashionable pieces to purchase without actually finding much, but I did succeed in buying a pair of Keds for half its original price, which made me very happy. I had never thought that I'd buy Keds, but since I was in a good mood, I actually went and bought them. I then discovered a game arcade and stayed there for nearly an hour. We were stuck in completely rural surroundings for, like, a whole week, so Aeon was the most metropolitan thing we had seen the whole week. Purikura was one of my favourite things, but I thought that I'd have no chance/time to take them since we were going to such a rural city. Much to my surprise, I found around six machines there and immediately hopped into two in the limited time. I was all hyped up after that, and queued up to play a few rounds of Taiko no Tatsujin, a drum game. I had a hard time and my hands hurt immensely, and I failed hard. I actually have a video record of my painful failure, featuring my dear friend who laughed at me for not even being able to play the easiest level. I have it linked above:D

In between were days and days of lessons, which we typically ended with regular trips to the nearby convenience stores. Once in a while, we'd go and explore the surroundings, such as the Waji post station (from which I sent a letter back home). However, nothing much happened until we were brought to the city. It was like being reborn as a countryside girl and seeinh the city for the first time. Obviously, the main advantage of signing up for the program was to detox, but after many days of green surroundings, nothing was more overwheming than the city.

We were taken to the center of Hamamatsu, near Hamamatsu Eki (station). There were tall buildings and big shops, some that I hadn't seen for a while. It was amazing. I was enchanted by the glamour of the long-missed city, and for the first time, I felt really blessed to be in a city. Being born and raised in the big city of Hong Kong, I haven't experienced a lot of the countryside, and thus I took the city for granted. This time, it seemed like the most amazing thing ever.

I went to the city three times -- once with the teachers, once with my parents and once with my friends alone. During those three times, despite being in quite a hurry, I gathered a lot of items. I bought shoes (yes idk why and how), a watch, two pieces of clothing, some skincare and lots of skincare masks. But that wasn't it. For the city, it was more about the shopping experience of vlogging and running around. I went to Bic camera, which was very big and offered a lot of electronics for us to try out. We also went to the bookstore, where some of us bought Manga, and I bought magazines.

On the 8th, near the end of the whole trip, we had almost the whole day to ourselves so we went to the city again. I lead them onto the bus and to the MayOne mall, which made me so proud. Leaving behind one roommate, we went to Wako for lunch. It was the best lunch we had there. We ate scrumptious bowls of Katsudon (fried pork cutlet rice), which Wako is famous for. It was very delicious and I managed to pull out my amateur Japanese ordering skills.

After lunch, everyone gathered again and went for purikura. I had always wanted to go together (yes, for once), and I was lucky that everyone else wanted to too. We stuffed ourselves into the USAGI machine, the only one which allowed all of us to fit in. After that, I completely satisfied my purikura urge by trying three different machines consecutively. They all had different styles, which was cool. They were all the newest ones, unlike the fairly outdated ones in Hong Kong. They were also a lot cheaper.

After about two more hours of shopping, we took the bus back to the school.

Lastly, on the second-last day, the teacher brought us to the Aeon mall again, this time giving us five hours (around). I spent the first one and a half hours in the game arcade with friends, playing Taiko no Tatsujin over and over again. After that, I took purikura with one of my new friends, which was surely a first in sisley history. After that, I realized the shortage of time and ran around for some last-minute fashion shopping and omiyage shopping. In the last forty-five minutes, I seized every second and took two more times of Purikura. 

In the middle, I stopped by Starbucks to grab a cup of Japan's exclusive drink, Peach in Peach. It was paradise to me -- a milky peach frappe with chunks of peaches in it. It really couldn't get any better. To remember this historical moment, I took purikura holding the drink. Before I left, I managed to purchase a delicious crepe to eat on the way back.

That's about it. Sorry for the lengthy text, the experience was really such an enriching and long one, not like anything I had seen before. If I have time, I might write one more post on the learning, let's see.