TheRapidsNerd Posted February 2, 2008 Posted February 2, 2008 DH "What happened to then?" DC "We passed it." DH "When?!" CS "Just now." DH "When will then be now?" CS "Soon." DH "How soon?" Hang in there Lou.
Carnage Posted February 2, 2008 Posted February 2, 2008 I just finally caught up on the last 6 or 7 pages. I thought it'd take me longer. Then I realized about 5-6 pages didn't even have pictures on them. I'm enjoying the TR so far Lou. Post updates when it suits you.
larrygator Posted February 2, 2008 Posted February 2, 2008 Lou - with a linguistics I'm sure you know that Shakespeare invented thousands of words when the need arose. So you go girl.
coastercrazed49 Posted February 3, 2008 Posted February 3, 2008 DH "What happened to then?"DC "We passed it." DH "When?!" CS "Just now." DH "When will then be now?" CS "Soon." DH "How soon?" Hang in there Lou. Haha I was just watching that. Good movie. Can't wait for the update Lou.
Louise Posted February 4, 2008 Author Posted February 4, 2008 A few notes... 1. Larry saying "You go girl" makes me ginormously happy () and I don't really know why. 2. Rich, I would never be so mean as to insult Jeff that way.... Honest. 3. Lisa, I don't have the funds to do a trip like this either! I was lucky enough (well, unlucky enough really when you think about it... ) to have rather a lot of inheritance from a few different people in my family, but even putting a chunk of that towards the trip I still ended up in debt. But it was totally worth it, I had an incredible summer that was worth every penny and all the flying (I hate to fly) and exhaustion. 4. Cool points go to anybody who yelled at Brian in my defense, to Bob for using the word "proper" (I have taught you well, young grasshopper), and to Kyle and Jon for being hot. No, wait, for quoting an awesome movie, that was what I meant! 5. Jeff, I was using the Sony Cybershot with fat-adding age-reducing modifications. It's awesome. Moving on, I'm actually gonna do another update! More Random Pictures from Japan The morning after eating authentic Japanese food in a real traditional Japanese restaurant where nothing was Westernised or touristy.... We had breakfast at Mr Donut. Normality is resumed. To be fair, many of us tried to have breakfast elsewhere a couple of days in Fukuoka but this was the only place that opened really early, so here we were. Today was a three-park day, so Richard took the opportunity to catch up on sleep on the first train of the morning. I include this picture for two reasons... Ichi, I have very few pictures of Falafel and this one shows the ever-evolving colours of her hair rather well, and Ni, it wasn't long after this that the train conductor dragged Richard and I into the bathroom (we were frightened) to explain through the universal languages of gesturing and dance that somebody in our group had pushed the E-stop button instead of the flush. Somebody worked out later that by doing this, E-Stop Chuck (as he shall now forever be known) had likely inconvenienced around 2 million commuters. Chuck, I salute you sir. More mountains and traditional buildings. Eventually, we arrived at Harmonyland.... Hello Kitty is a whore, by the way, I hate the bitch. Bob doesn't seem to mind her so much though. She may be a whore, but she is kinda cute... And yes, I'm talking about the damn cat. Miles looks happy to see her too, but then panthers and cats ARE of the same family! I include this picture for two reasons: 1. To somebody with the right kind of mind, it's amusing. 2. We had an AWESOME water fight with this drinking fountain! You could turn it up so it blasted like 10 feet in the air, and with the heat and humidity up there and half an hour to kill before the coaster opened, it was a great way to cool down. The Rhythmical Coaster surrounded this Plaza, so we all congregated as we got off it, good place to take pictures and video! We couldn't WAIT to ride the Hello Kit's A Small World, so we hopped onto the speedy train to the other side of the park. The train moved so quickly that the boys could barely contain their excitement. Brian, you have a GINORMOUS finger!! It's a pretty poor shot, but you can tell we're pretty far off the ground, and how themed the train is. Everyone looks pretty happy on Hello Kit's A Small World.... Richard probably looks happy too, but I cut him out of the picture deliberately in order to fit everybody else in. Oh God, we're going into the tunnel of cuteness..... My eyes, my eyes!!! It's too cute, I can't take it!! I actually liked the cool coloured things hanging from the ceiling... Didn't come out on film too well. This ride was actually okay... Just a tad too cute. I took a picture of the final Can-Can but not of the penguin getting spanked?! What is wrong with me?! Mike looks disgusted, but he was actually enjoying his squid balls! I was kinda disappointed to find out that they were balls made of squid as opposed to... Well, you get the point. I tried a bunch of new food on this trip, but didn't quite fancy these . If it looks like a urinal.... in the middle of the restaurant... Farewell, Hello Kitty park! Next up, we were off to Wonder Rakutenchi, aka Wonder Raku-Animal-Abuse, where Hot Fuzz found himself some Pepsi... Ginormous Pepsi, no less! Heading up the scary mountain we had a cool view of our steep ascent! Despite me not being keen on this park, it had a REALLY cool setting. And the old coaster actually wasn't bad at all, I enjoyed the historical value. The now-infamous duck-racing. I was moderately amused by it until I realised the guy carried a giant stick, and although we never saw him touch the ducks, they shied away from it, which I guess means its likely they were trained to race by being beaten. I understand the cultural differences, and I also understand that such things go on in this country, the US, and everywhere... Still find it tough to see though. At least the ducks looked well-fed and cared for... I've certainly seen worse in this country. LOL!! PLUTO!!!! Having seen the penguin in a cardboard box in the sun, and then played four different versions of Whack-A-Mole (even the arcade games were themed! ), Ryan, the Hoffman Guy and myself took a stroll to the aviary, which was quite small but I was pleased the birds had some freedom and they seemed happy enough. I love birds! They're so brightly coloured they almost look painted! The things I remembered from Robb and Elissa's video of this place were the duck racing, and Elissa not liking the bridge or wanting to look down. I can understand why. I love heights, as long as I have something to hold onto, but this bridge even made me a little nervous! And we had to pay to cross it. Would you trust this rusty metal with your life? In Japan, even the crappy parks are so beautiful! Cool city view. Walking up a path, we discovered (along with the torso that Robb liked so much a couple of years back) this monument, complete with fox guards. I wish I wasn't so uncultured and understood more of the significance. On the left you can just see the Shinto Torii gates (I at least knew that much) we walked through to get here. Chris and I left some money. We had no idea what for, but it seemed respectful. Mmmmmm, Dew. (What were you saying about my camera, Jeffers? ) At this point, the heat had gotten too much for many of us and we had congregated in a shaded bit of shelter with tables and vending machines. We all ended up leaving early, upon which we found that most of the group had been gathered in various places, whether it be the arcade or basically anywhere with shade or AC. Moving on, we reached Kijima, where Jupiter is so good, it'll make you piss yourself! More like it'll shake the contents of your bladder loose. It even looks ominous. Ouch. I did not enjoy this and have no idea how I got talked into riding twice. Even worse were the park employees looking so hopeful and giving me questioning thumbs-up. I did the fake smile and "yay" thing, which I feel bad about, but I didn't know how to gesture "I AM BLEEDING INTERNALLY". Mmmmm, lunch. Yay, go-karts!! Nowhere near as good as Uminonakamichi's Unpavement Cars, but still fun. I'm enjoying myself! Bob notices how closely I'm following and thinks it's funny to slam on the breaks... The bastard! WHIPLASH! After Zorbing (which was all kinds of fun and made me giggle ridiculously, though I wish the course had been longer and more exciting), Chris, Bob and I braved the pirate ship together.... Richard preferred to be antisocial. Waiting for the rest of the group, I managed to snap a picture of this butterfly... It was so beautiful, and the size of a bird! Returning "home", there were yet more dramatic views. Wow, you guys look SO enthusiastic!!! Oh yeah, that's muuuuuch better... Jeff and I were happy to be practising the ancient Japanese art of chair reversal! I don't remember what we did this evening, I had actually thought that we had returned to the Yakatori place, but that must have been the night after this... Mental block here. Either way, this was an okay day! Hello Kitty park was okay if a little soulless (and weird because it was SO empty), yeah, I didn't like Rakutenchi at all, but Kijima was fun, several fairly decent coasters and an okay tower. I won't promise when I'll get around to doing the next update, but hopefully not too long! I appreciate everybody's patience, more soon!
ParkTrips Posted February 4, 2008 Posted February 4, 2008 If it looks like a urinal.... in the middle of the restaurant... and appropriate enough that you photo'd Joey since its just his size!!!
larrygator Posted February 4, 2008 Posted February 4, 2008 You go girl! You think that's funny? You should hear the accent when I say it aloud and waggle my finger at the computer screen . So, now I finally get the full red button/e-Stop story.
Louise Posted February 4, 2008 Author Posted February 4, 2008 ^ I'm not sure if it was funny or just fascinating because I can't picture you saying it! Poor Chuck. I still want to know why the conductor picked Richard and I as the people he should try and explain the situation to! Do we look like the kind that are likely to cause trouble?!?! Does Chuck look innocent or something?!?! I guess we'll never know.
mcjaco Posted February 4, 2008 Posted February 4, 2008 You go girl! You think that's funny? You should hear the accent when I say it aloud and waggle my finger at the computer screen . So, now I finally get the full red button/e-Stop story. That story was never explained to it's fullest in Florida. Had it been, poor Chuck would of never heard the end of it.
Louise Posted February 4, 2008 Author Posted February 4, 2008 Okay, now I'm feeling bad for telling the story!! Don't hate me Chuck, I love you!!
Moose Posted February 4, 2008 Posted February 4, 2008 Thank you for your very kind thanking of Kyle and I. I appreciate your hugegantic number of ginourmouses in this segment.
ebl Posted February 4, 2008 Posted February 4, 2008 I need to save my money and join all of you on a trip sometime. Preferably to Japan if for nothing else its WTF?!?-ness. Eric
Carnage Posted February 5, 2008 Posted February 5, 2008 To be fair, many of us tried to have breakfast elsewhere a couple of days in Fukuoka Is that pronounced the way I think it is?
coastercrazed49 Posted February 5, 2008 Posted February 5, 2008 Nice update Lou. I wish parks in the states had those cool little cars that you could drive around. Can't wait to see more.
TheRapidsNerd Posted February 5, 2008 Posted February 5, 2008 Alright! Happy for the update AND bonus cfc story. While the red button story is funny, we should remember that Chuck as also brought other mirthful moments into our lives (and stomachs). Who could forget his Hall Decking advice, his Apricot Cheescake, Igor the Mixer, or the resulting cheesecake spin off TR this past holiday season? Truly, a purposeful and master comedian.
OldJJman Posted February 5, 2008 Posted February 5, 2008 To be fair, many of us tried to have breakfast elsewhere a couple of days in Fukuoka Is that pronounced the way I think it is? We did the first couple of days! (fuk-oo-ah-ka) I think it's "supposed" to be pronounced either "foo-koo-wah-ka" or "foo-koo-oh-ka". Not exactly sure. Fun, nonetheless.
zeke11793 Posted February 5, 2008 Posted February 5, 2008 I just read all of these pages today and this is an awesome TR! Can't wait to see more!
miniviews Posted February 5, 2008 Posted February 5, 2008 Great TR Lou! Funny how you have great candid shots of me happy, but when you took a photo of my first "squid" (I believe it's Octopus) ball experience, I look rather disgusted. In truth, I was receiving a 1st degree burn. HOT!
cfc Posted February 5, 2008 Posted February 5, 2008 Okay, now I'm feeling bad for telling the story!! Don't hate me Chuck, I love you!! Aw, don't cry, Louise. Your TR did mange to "e-stop" my computer when it ran out of "virtual memory." Do you still want some of my Japan photos? I haven't heard back from since our initial message exchange a while back.
Louise Posted February 5, 2008 Author Posted February 5, 2008 ^ Yes, I do, please!!! I have like 15 PMs saved to my hard drive that I'll get around to responding to eventually. I'll have a scan through your TR and send you the links. Thank you, I really appreciate that! You had some great ones of our Disney group and from Fuji-Q that I loved. LOL Mike!!! Was it octopus?? I don't know my fish... And I'm also pretty damn sure that octopus and squid are not fish, but I don't know what they *are*, so whatever. Paul, I was led to believe that it's pronounced "foo-quo-ka", but I heard it pronounced a couple of different ways (by the Japanese) so I'm not too sure, but I do think that's a close approximation. I wish it was pronounced the other, more entertaining way.
TheRapidsNerd Posted February 6, 2008 Posted February 6, 2008 I'm also pretty damn sure that octopus and squid are not fish, but I don't know what they *are*, so whatever. Squid - cephalopod http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Squid Octopus - cephalopod http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Octopus Now, what's in the balls Mike's eating sounds fishy no matter how you look at it.
Louise Posted February 7, 2008 Author Posted February 7, 2008 More random pictures from the TPR Japan Trip! YES, it's Adventure Taxi day. We were the last group to get into our cab (apart from Elissa's, obviously), and Chris was our designated front-seat-passenger-leader... Big mistake. We did have some entertaining conversations in the cab though. (Oh, and are you happy now Barry? ) The Mitsui Greenland (awesome park, btw) map. They don't have a mother and baby room, but there *is* a specific Lactation Room! I found this amusing. Awww, this ashtray LOVES cigarettes! I am a T-Rex!! I have tiny useless arms!! Chair ride with NO restraints... It's weird to me that they put mesh wire underneath in case you fall... Surely that's gonna hurt more than landing on the softer ground six feet below it! Ryan and I both made it safely. Okay, so maybe it's a little more than six feet.... Check out the cables going up the side of the hill, and the creepy building up top... We'll be heading up there later. In order to get into some AC for a while (this was a particularly brutal day, several of us developed rather nasty heat rashes and I'm surprised nobody got heat stroke), we headed into the Dinosaurs In Space museum. This is Alan. He has tiny useless arms. "ROBOPUPPY MISTREATMENT ALERT. ROBOPUPPY MISTREATMENT ALERT." So cute! Awesome baby seal that looked around and made little noises... I wanted to steal it. Other people just made clubbing jokes. That made me sad. A quick detour for a second... I think we had ridden maybe four or five coaster by this point but I remember nothing except that I almost blacked out in a vertical loop on Gao (I *think* it was Gao), Ultra Twister was so much fun but my patience levels are lower when I'm hot and I couldn't be bothered doing 10 rides on it (which I regretted later because I wanted my name on a stick really), and I seem to remember some kind of suspended coaster kicking the shit out of me. The indoor powered coaster was okay... I'm kinda fond of space-themed coasters. Was this the place where everybody saw Buddha and I saw Jesus? Japan has too many of these things. I also think this is the coaster that Chris and I spent two whole rides discussing, where he thought he'd heard about it but that it wasn't powered... Anyway. The first ride of the day, however... I remember rather vividly. We were all already pouring with sweat and kinda uncomfortable from having a while to wait before the park opened, so spotting a 4D movie theatre not far past the entrance, we decided to head in. Oh, my, GOD. This thing was creepy to the extreme. Did anybody else do this?!?! Admittedly I'm easily startled, but I jumped so many times, and overall it was just the creepiness of the movie... I held Chris and Richard's hands through most of it!! There were parts of the plot that were somewhat difficult to understand (not speaking Japanese), and I won't go into much detail anyway, except to say that this is the darkest amusement park movie ever, it's like a real Japanese thriller, and the screen effects are frighteningly realistic in parts. We weren't sure to begin with whether the screen wasn't working properly or if it was meant to be that dark... I'm going with the latter. Great movie. Moving on... For want of someplace better, our group lunch for this day was scheduled for McDonald's! Which had the best air-conditioning ever. Robb and Elissa went to the counter to deal with orders, so Ryan and I got to have some quality time with Miss Kristen, who is all "Get it away, I want McNuggets damn it!". I really need to give up my quest to find another pair of shades that actually look okay on me. It's futile. Heading up the mountain... This park was BIG! Oh, and also: "A haunted *cow* you say??" After being FORCED to ride the pumpkin ride (seriously, the guy wouldn't let us get on the alpine slide until we rode), we headed back down the hill again, me first, Richard second... ...followed by the Hoffman Guy... ...then Chris and his prosthetic attachment. Hellooo, we have balls on our faces. Alright, the story behind this picture: The park had a splashdown boat, and Chris was all "Ooh, yay, let's go ride that!!", so we start heading over. I had initially said I wasn't in a water ride mood this day, but then realised how much it would cool me down and decided to join them. As we get to the bridge to the station, Chris takes one look at the water, and goes "umm, yeah, I'm not gonna ride, I don't feel like it". "But it was your idea!" "Umm, no, I'll film you guys instead!" "Alright then... *cough* p*ssy *cough*" So we ride, and it's fun and all, and then after we get off the boat, I look down and there's this big purple stain on my top where the water (which was green by the way) had reacted with the metal in my belly piercing. Worrying. So yeah, that was that. Apologies Chris for another anti-you story. We are not impressed with the filthy water. To relieve the aggression, we headed over to Fujin Rai... I mean, Milky Way. Sitdown side was fun, stand-up side.... Wow!! INCREDIBLE airtime that's rare on any coaster but was a whole new thing for me on a stand-up. And to relieve yet more aggression.... Archery! Jeff remembers the days when mankind HAD to use bow and arrow to hunt, before guns and microwaves and stuff were invented. I believe this was the Hoffman Guy's target. I love how confused all three of them look here. At this point, we were dying. I think Bob went to ride the ferris wheel, we all needed more drinks, and I needed the ice house. Hi Jahan. The penguins in Japan wanted you to go visit them! I don't know what Richard is doing here. Check out the big line of taxis waiting for us! Oh, and Jeff scratching his arse. Joey seems to be enjoying his cab ride.... Has he actually moved into the middle seat to get closer to Barry?!?! Back at the train station on our way home, we encountered this amazing mechanical dragon, and argued over whether it was motion sensitive or not. We all had such funny skintones on this trip. Something tells me that although the sun got to Chris's face, it didn't reach the insides of his arms. Jeff and his Sexy Little Pink Flame! Giant screen on the side of our hotel... I was trying to capture fellow Brit Robbie Williams on screen, but didn't quite get my camera out in time! It was nice to be back at the hotel before dark, so a few of us made dinner plans, and after wandering around the area trying to decide where to go for a quarter of an hour... We ended up back at the Yakatori place, ostensibly to show the place to Bob and Chuck, but really just because we wanted to go back. Bacon-wrapped cheese? Oh yes! None of us knew/could remember the Japanese word for "noodles", and the menus here had no English and no pictures, so trying to get this ramen was entertaining, but totally worth it. Chris and the whole fish on a stick. This is what you get when you tell Robb and Richard "order me one of anything you like and I'll eat it". *sigh* I ended up nicknaming this fish Kenny, as apparently it needed to die multiple times. Over the course of half an hour it was stabbed, impaled, stabbed some more, crushed, drowned, bitten into, then finally impaled and crushed again. As a side note, writing this just made me remember Joey almost throwing up on our first visit!! What was it that did that to him?? Some kind of egg?? That was hysterically funny and yet seriously terrifying all at the same time! And to think, him puking has cost Elissa and Robb $2800 SINCE then... He could have got us into trouble too. Poor Joey. Chuck seems impressed with his skin! As if poor Kennyfish hasn't been through enough, Richard now pretends to inhale him... Awwww! "Chris, you're a pussy. A funny pussy, but a pussy nonetheless!" "I am not eating that fish... I'm going to kill it." After dinner, most of the group went back to the hotel, but Richard and Chris and I stupidly decided to try and find a bar. After ending up in some slightly dodgy area (the only time in Japan I didn't feel completely 100% safe, even it was only for a few minutes) while trying to find some Irish place Steve and Miles had talked about, we gave up and just headed to the first place we saw, mostly because Richard was dying for the loo. The penguin punched Richard in the... Hi Ryan, how's it going. Richard instructed the waitress to "give me something Japanese"... Resisting the urge to comment on this. I stuck with Coke. Chris had a Cassis Orange, which was yummy!! After a couple of drinks, we walked back to the hotel for some sleep... VERY early start the next morning! I could not get these lift buttons the right way round. To me, the diagram on the button on the right indicates "open"... Except of course it isn't a diagram, it's a Japanese character. So basically I'm stupid. Next update: Three parks in one day, and Mission Get-To-Nagoya.
Loefet Posted February 7, 2008 Posted February 7, 2008 After being FORCED to ride the pumpkin ride (seriously, the guy wouldn't let us get on the alpine slide until we rode), we headed back down the hill again, me first, Richard second... Wonder if they got paid by the amount of riders they manged to get, since this was exactly the same that happened to us. Not to mention the haunted tower at after the chair ride up to the top, he almost forced up into it until he would let us pass. Mitsui was really great I really want to return there, keep the updates coming.
SharkTums Posted February 7, 2008 Posted February 7, 2008 I'm pretty sure Mitsui is my favorite 'non-theme' park in all of Japan. There is just soooo much there and it's wacky stuff! Oh, and the majority of the credits aren't too bad either. As for the rides, yes. The park is made up of several companies, each own different rides. That is why some rides even have their own website (like the Ultra Twister). When they scan your POP Wristband for each ride they're getting a cut of what you paid! We talked to one of the managers and it was very interesting sounding.
Louise Posted February 7, 2008 Author Posted February 7, 2008 Yeah, overall I really liked the park, it definitely stands out in my mind as one of my favourites (though Disney beats all, obviously). I also quite enjoyed the mouse, which I didn't remember until a few minutes ago, although it had scary gas smells surrounding it. And that crazy simulator-on-a-track thing!! With the ants, and the 80s graphics and sounds! Amazing. The park really does have a bunch of random stuff. Just wish it hadn't been so hot that day, I know I bitched a lot about the heat, but I think *everybody* was bitching about it that day, it was SO brutal. Now that you two have mentioned it I remember somebody telling me about them getting paid per rider, now. It was almost funny how insistent some of them were! We had plenty of time so we didn't mind, it just seemed a bit weird!
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