Was the route in one day.

We woke up 5am (me la. Xiaxue snoozed until dunno how many times) and the awesome limo by Park Hotel Hongkong was waiting for us downstairs. Then we caught a 8:30AM flight to Haneda, Tokyo because there was no direct flight to Hokkaido that day 🙁

#1

Freaking empty flight!! We got 4 seats in a row each! 😀

#2

Normally i don’t take photos of airports but i took this cuz Xiaxue took forever using the toilet. Which i totally don’t blame her because JAPANESE TOILETS ARE FREAKING AWESOME.

I blogged a long ass entry dedicated entirely to Japanese toilet 2 years ago.

#3

This is a handicap toilet in Haneda airport. Would you look at that?! It looks like a freaking laboratory where cure for earless bunnies are formulated wtf.

We had an almost 4 hours transit in Haneda before we flew to Chitose, Hokkaido. Luckily the airport was full of cute shit like this so we were damn busying Waaa’ing and Awww’ing.

#4

This is Shiro Tan!  Next time you dunno what to name your kids maybe you can consider this.

#5

Whole shop full of Shiro Tans.

If you think it only has cute shit for girls and all you people with a Y chromosome will get bored to death, check this out.

#6

A freaking massive mini racing track. Ok i just oxymoroned it but whatevs!!

#7

Hungry so we had ramen for lunch!! Xiaxue said she didn’t like it but i think it was quite nice! Mainly because Malaysian’s ramen sucks shit i guess.

#8

A huge Hello Kitty shop!!! U JELLY?! #trollface.jpg

#9

Kitty-yaki

#10

Some Haneda only limited edition thingie

#11

I heard this Kitty feature is for good luck!

#12

Haih when will i ever get tired of cute shit like this.

#13

More cute shit.

#14

Was thinking really hard if i should get this. Xiaxue is really a bad influence she keeps getting me go back to all the cute shit just when i decided to ditch it.

#15

We spent like forever deciding which cute shit to buy and were chatting with a Singaporean lady who works there.

Until she asked me what time was my flight. I looked at my watch, it was 2:15. Our flight is at 4:15PM. We had plenty of time to have a headache over which cute shit to spent our yen on!

AND THEN I REALIZED THAT JAPAN IS ONE HOUR AHEAD.

Means it was 3:15 at that time. And then i kancheong abit and told Xiaxue we should go. So end up i didn’t buy any cute shit and we rushed to take the shutter bus cuz our flight was in another terminal

We missed the bus so we had to wait 5 minutes for the next one. I pretended to chill because didn’t want to freak Xiaxue out but in my heart i was like ZOMG PLS PLS PLS LET US MAKE IT.

So the bus came and it was a 10 minutes drive to the other terminal and we had like 25 minutes left so we rushed and sorta half-run to the gate but we didn’t know where it was so we had to stop and asked someone and finally someone pointed where the gate was so we dashed over to the check point but our ticket wouldn’t go through the scanner.

Then the airport staff looked at me, nonplussed, and said, YOUR GATE IS IN THE NEXT BUILDING.

She didn’t say it in caps la but that’s what it sounded like to me wtf.

I totally freaked. Then i translated to Xiaxue and she totally freaked. Both of us just totally freaked. So we asked where’s the next building and apparently it is like SUPER FAR AWAY and we had to run for real this time and mind you both of us were wearing HIGH WEDGES.

So we run like forever up the stairs down the stairs etc etc etc etc and made it in the end. Luckily it was a domestic flight so last call was like 10 minutes before flight time if not we would have missed our flight and get stranded in Tokyo wtf.

#16

This is our after run look wtf. Was so hot i took of my meshy top and were all sweating and flushed.

MORAL OF THE STORY: ALWAYS ADJUST YOUR WATCH TO LOCAL TIME.

And find out exactly where you should be going. It was a flightening experience for us.

#17

It was one-hour to Chitose.

#18

#19

View of Hokkaido from above!

And landed in Chitose!! First thing we saw?!

HOKKAIDO LOVES ME!

#20

I love you too!

After that it was pretty easy. We bought tickets for the next train to Otaru.

#21

People there are just soooooooooooooo helpful it makes me tear.

He even came over to check and make sure we get down the right station. I guess maybe there isn’t a lot of foreigner tourists at the moment in Hokkaido 🙁

Everybody faster go there help boost Japan tourism please!!!

#22

Love this pic!

#23

Camho with the freakishly realistic looking soft toy that she bought

#24

#25

Half way the train ride became super surreal the train is like floating on the ocean! So beautiful!!! <3

#26

it’s like out of a Ghibli animation <3

And then we reached!!

#27

This is the landmark of Otaru Chikko, and our hotel is just right next to the station!

#28

Blur but pretty shot.

#29

Grand Park Otaru hotel!!

#30

It is super duper grand indeed!

We arrived about 8:30PM So we met the manager of Grand Park Otaru and went straight for dinner.

We were supposed to have buffet dinner at Terrace, the hotel restaurant, but because we arrived so late, the buffet was over. So the chef specially prepared a 5 course meal for us ZOMG.

I don’t normally blog about food, even if it is really good, but this is what i cannot NOT blog. In fact this is like the highlight of our trip (although there are many others).

(I mean, come on  it’s Japan.)

#31

So for the first course we had a cold seafood salad dish. And a corn pancake because corn is a Hokkaido specialty! I really love how in Japan they are always so proud of their own local produce.

#32

Then of course we had the famous corn soup!! This wasn’t my favorite but according to Xiaxue it was superb. I couldn’t finish mine so she was like, Gimme cuz it’s too good to waste!!

#33

And the best Ringo Juice ever. I cannot stress how much i love Ringo Juice in Japan.

#34

And the ZOMG BUTTER.

I should have taken a picture to show you how fluffy the texture of the butter is. It’s almost like whipped cream. So soft and it just melts like a fluff of cloud IT IS SO GOOD YOU JUST WANT TO PUT IT IN EVERYTHING.

Xiaxue and i actually considered stealing a whole chunk of them from the breakfast table during the next few days.

#35

Next we had some seafood thingie on seared vegetables with fried potato crisps.

#36

I think it’s pan fried prawn, fish and scallop. I am not a fancy writer about food but i just can say it’s really good.

AND THEN.

We thought that was it, cuz we were really full already. Mana tau the waiter brought out another two plates and we were like waving our hands and told him we were really full but the chef was like soooo nice he specially worked OT just for us so die die we also had to try la.

#37

It was some beef with sweet pea and super nice carrot and SUPER SUPER NICE mushroom.

And the beef.

Was.

MIND = BLOWN.

#38

Seriously. Screw whatever best steak house in KL. No, seriously.

Never in my life had i tried beef that is so….. ZOMG. Xiaxue and i were just staring at each other in disbelief and our stomach was exploding but it was just SO. GOOD. that we kept eating it.

We kept guessing if it is some kind of super expensive beef like wagyu or kobe or matsuzaka even something more atas that we have never heard of. HOW COME IT CAN BE SO GOOD?!??!

So Xiaxue made me ask the waiter. So i did. And then the waiter ran into the kitchen to ask the chef and came back out.

“so what beef is it?” We were waiting expectantly for a mind blowing answer.

And guess what he said?

.

.

.

.

“Errr…. it’s roast beef.”

#39

I’m sorry for boring you with so many picture of the same food.

Roast fucking beef.

A COW.

A random cow from a meadow nearby happily lived off green Hokkaido grasses. Why did i pay RM200 for Angus beef in a KL steak house again?

MIND= BLOWN.

So after the cow, there’s dessert. I mean, a meal wouldn’t be complete without it. But Xiaxue was like, I REALLY CANNOT I HAVE TO UNBUTTON MY PANTS. And she said she hopes it’s some chocolate thing that she doesn’t fancy so she doesn’t have to eat it.

I was feeling meh about it too because i memang am not a dessert person.

And this was our dessert.

#40

Apparently some pudding made of milk from a random cow that happily lived off Hokkaido grasses from a nearby meadow. With some milky sorbet and strawberry puree.

Xiaxue wanted me to try first because if it was meh, she will just skip it.

So i took one bite.

And my face was like

So she was like DAMMIT so she took one bite and her face was like

#41

I cannot describe it. The softness of the pudding and the special flavor of the sugar and everything else combined.

Maybe you will have to read Xiaxue’s blog to find out. But basically she told me the feeling can be described as “savoring angel’s brains”.

That’s some sick metaphor but i guess as far as “HEAVENLY” goes for food, she probably has a point.

That is not all. Guess what happened next.

.

.

.

.

SHE TEARED.

Like, literally. I saw her wipe off a tear from the corner of her eyes. And she was like, i just feel so lucky that this is happening.

#42

And that made me tear too.

Maybe it sounds exaggerated or condescending or whatever, but i could really feel the sincerity in the food. I could taste the chef’s heart.

感動するほどおいしかった。

#43

i looked like shit but i insisted this picture. This is the chef (i forgot his name because i lost his name card T_______T) who made us tear with his food. ありがとうございました！

There’s a part two story but i’m really tired so i will stop for now.