Boutux adventure in the land of the rising sun...

Wow...I just browsed through this thread, read about your adventures, looked at the pictures and watched the video. What a great experience! What cute pictures! What a dinky/tiny apartment! OMO! You are so cute boutux. I love the pics of you. :) Thanks so much for sharing your adventures with us. I hope there is more to come. ♥

ladyfaile wrote: wow rice cookers are cheap here, the one i have usually goes on sale for about $20 (it's not an especially good one but still) you'd think since they're such an essential item in Japan that they would be cheaper

rice cookers are expensive in japan new models come out every season the price ranges from 60 to over 1000usd. i'm not kidding. i saw one in a store for about 500usd. for 500usd this rice cooker better double as a teleportation device or smtng. i've been buying pre cooked microwave rice cuz packs of rice go for about 10usd for these massive bags and i won't cook rice often enough to use all that. so i'm waiting till i find the miracle cheap rice cooker to buy a pack of rice. lol.

ah, btw..it's summer soon, right?? means hanabi is getting closer! you'll go for hanabi, won't you??please take a video and upload it here~ always love seeing hanabi.. :)

Ah, lucky you ! I went to Japan last year , Tokyo to be more specific but it was only a brief trip and we didn't get to walk around much :(, i wish i would have the chance to go there again.

Unfortunately it is very much illegal to ride with an umbrella (I've totally done that too though... technically speaking riding on the back "seat" of someone's bicycle is also illegal, but you see it all the time in dramas/movies...), but the police can't do very much if they catch you... unless they catch you a lot... that's where you have to be careful as a foreigner... The only way around it is full out rain gear (long waterproof jacket and pants... lots of people ride bicycles or motorbikes in the rain so you can find these lots of places... not so attractive, but it mostly keeps you dry...)

Hanabi is usually mid-late July and early August... The biggest ones in Fukuoka seem to be:
1. 西日本大濠花火大会 (Nishi Nihon Ohori Hanabi Taikai) In Fukuoka City on August 1... not so big, but in the city, so lots of people show up...
2. 筑後川花火大会 (Chikugogawa Hanabi Taikai) Probably the biggest in terms of number of fireworks, in Kurume, maybe on August 5 (haven't announced the official date yet)... also apparently they've been doing it for 352 years... Japan has a long proud history of hanabi!
3. 関門海峡花火大会 (Kanmon Kaikyo Hanabi Taikai) This one is actually in the strait between Kitakyushu and Shimonoseki in Yamaguchi, it attracts more than a million people, but if you divide that between two shores its not so bad... 2nd biggest in terms of # of fireworks... It's on August 13...

Then there are tons of smaller events all over the prefecture... all (or most) of them are listed here http://hanabi.walkerplus.com/list/fukuoka.html

if you take a train make sure you either have an IC card (prepaid card) or you buy a roundtrip when you board, or a return ticket as soon as you get there cause the train station will be mega crowded when you go back!

I'm always outside Japan during hanabi season (its for work so it can't be helped), so see lots of hanabi for me!!

And rice cookers you should be able to find in a recycle shop, but if you can't there is always Rakuten (gotta love the internet...) http://search.rakuten.co.jp/search/mall/%E7%82%8A%E9%A3%AF%E5%99%A8+%E4%B8%80%E4%BA%BA%E6%9A%AE%E3%82%89%E3%81%97/-/

(this is the search for 炊飯器　一人暮らし... rice cooker living alone)

kurinezumi wrote: Unfortunately it is very much illegal to ride with an umbrella (I've totally done that too though... technically speaking riding on the back "seat" of someone's bicycle is also illegal, but you see it all the time in dramas/movies...), but the police can't do very much if they catch you... unless they catch you a lot...

haha..reminds me of my friend' story..he was caught by police because of bicycle thing, but he didn't want to have long conversation with the police, so he acted like he can't speak japanese (he was awesome in japanese, actually..) and said to the police:
"sumimasen, nihongo wo tabemasen" ROFL! the police then said he can just go..haha

oh~dancing! you really should try that...it's fun!
dancing on the street..with a lot of people..
you don't know them, but dancing makes you feel like all of you're friends! great feeling~^^

Yokohama now, great place to visit if you have the time. Kyushu is the one major island that I haven't been to... and Okinawa too :( Someday... Looking forward to hearing all the fun stuff to do there :) Credit card stuff and cell phone/ipad stuff... all so complicated! I was rejected once, still don't know why, but it was right after my wallet was stolen (me too in Japan... it happens if you're not careful... it was a Japanese person) and I cancelled (or stopped) all my other cards.... Or might just be because I'm foreign, who knows... But better that you got it cheaper and without the hassle! It was totally fate :)