Golden Week Gathering 2008 (Day One)

3/5/2008

After much planing, a flurry of e-mails, phone calls and sms`s, the day most ex-ppktj-nian`s dream of dawns. OK, i do admit it sounds a bit over the drama but, i think we all secretly feel that way. These precious few days in a year where we can meet up with long lost friends and talk face to face, see how they have grown and to joke around, momentarily forgetting all our work and worries are something we value a lot.

So here`s some of the gang who arrived early at Shinjuku Station. It was a really bad case of playing the waiting game where the earliest waited for the next group of ppl and that group of ppl waited for another and it continued on and on and on.

So when we were done waiting for new arrivals, we went to search for some entertainment while waiting for the clock to turn 10-10.30am. That`s when the organisers are gonna come and tell us what to do see. So we had to fend for ourselves till then. Since there were some PPL who were so hyper and wanted to sing K, we all trouped of to sing K and since they were so SMART, we found out that the K shop`s were all CLOSED at that time after ambling through the streets like homeless ppl. Sigh....at least it was kinda weird in a twisted ironic way so i actually found it interesting , or I would have been bored out of my mind. Actually, i was. Hehe...

Then somehow or another we ended up in Tokyo Dome. Of all places to play bowling- of all things. Haha...... life`s weird.
Anyways, since the last time i played bowling was years ago in PPKTJ, i had some reservations. Nevertheless, bowling proved to be much fun. Especially the competition we had between the three teams. Hahaha.....the losing team was suppose to buy a round of drinks for the winning team and guess who was on the losing team....
Hahaha.....after 3-4 rounds it was obvious my team would be the one forking out some dough. So we had some wonderful tricks up our sleeve. Eg: buying cocoa powder to make drinks out of or to make lemonade. Just to save cost. Haha....cos we are damn stingy. Wonders of all wonders, everyone including the winning team forgot all about the whole thing in the end since we were so busy traveling here and there and getting stuff ready for the barbecue. :P
My team`s scores. Ah...they are how should i put it bad. Haha.....and i was quite bad in the second half. Keep getting guttered. But since i got 69 and the last time was 40+ I'm happy. After the scores were out ppl started to cam whore around. I'm liking this pic best. Cos there`s the 3 Jo`s inside. Three?? Yup, look closely, there`s an impish Joann in the middle.

And this is ...ahem....the picture of the team who got third place. See..see....we are showing three fingers and all....some more so happy. Third place...third place.....*nods head vigorously*

After bowling, we split up and went to do what we wanted. I is of course going shopping and since Ikebukuro seems to be good for doing just that, we girls and one sesat guy set of in search for something other than Harajuku or Shinjuku. The place proved to be not bad. There`s this huge shopping mall called Sunshine City and next to it is Tokyu Hands. Sunshine City seems to be a great place for girls to shop cos there`s lots of girly shops and there seems to be this super popular ice-cream shop as well. The line was sooooo long and they even had to cordon it off. There`s also ABC Mart and stuff but we didn`t get to see all since we were pressed for time. The down side is that its quite a distance from Ikebukuro Station (East exit - 東口) to Sunshine Walk. So be prepared to walk if u do go there someday.

Around 4.30pm, we all gathered at Shinjuku Station again to go to the Youth Center where the gathering will be held at. Needless to say, with a group that big, some ppl are bound to get separated from the group and it was somewhat tiring and nerve wrecking. After sorting out the loose ends, everyone got on the train safely. Thank goodness!

But that`s not the end of the story!!! We still had to get groceries to get the barbecue going and some food for breakfast and lunch. So of we went again to SATY. Im used to buying groceries since i cook for myself but, the amount of food bought for the barbecue seriously blew my socks off. And this is only for the barbecue!!!
Have you ever seen such a long receipt before in your entire life? I don`t even use this much in a month!!! And there are another 2 receipts.... thank goodness there was lots of man power to carry all the bags. And i still cringe when i remember the super heavy bus laddened with the bunch of us and the luggage and the groceries. Oh....the poor bus. Hope the suspension in the tyres are still ok.

Neways, we reached the ULU youth center in the dead of night and had to lug all the stuff up hill for 1km before we reached the main building. Hahaha.....i tell you. There`s nothing like brisk exercise in the dead of night to wake you up. The fresh air was seriously good. And guess what, it was around 8pm and we have not eaten dinner yet. Worse still, we were suppose to barbecue it. On top of that, we can`t bath after 9pm since the ofuro would be closed. Hahaha....so what happened after is a big mayhem. But, we girls managed to have a real decent Girly Party. Loved it!!!!

Im still reeling from all the crazy things i did. Jeez....there seems to be no end to it after i came to Japan. Hahaha....maybe that`s why we are all so crazy. Anyways, thats the end of day one.

p/s: I took some photo`s from others. So kudos to them and thanks for the photos. And i wanna give credit to Calvin who thought of the idea to split the post on GW since there`s seriously so much to say.