Day 62 - 31st of October

11:39pm　セミナーハウス

天気：晴れ

Today was... very long. I woke up at about 8 this morning and started making pancakes at 9. Diego guided me through the process, and I too was producing perfectly round pancakes; I was thrilled. I decided last night that, instead of going to Hello Kitty world (which I didn't really have that much interest in), we'd go to Kuzuha Mall. At 10, we left with Carly in tow, to meet Jessica in Makino station (the guys working on the site of the recently destroyed house stopped to pose for us when we got out our cameras - Japanese people are so cool). Just one stop down and 150円 later, we were in Kuzuha. There were a lot of clothes shops; reminiscent of the Sunshine Plaza. We walked around for a while and came across a few interesting shops; one that sold no brand goods, and another that had everything for letters (stamps, paper, brushes).

After exploring the rooftop (car parks) and checking out the view, we went down for lunch on the first floor. I went for Okonomiyaki (with pork), and we all had icecream afterwards. Mine was very much Halloween themed; magical mint-night, and pumpkin! Seriously though the pumpkin was amazing. We walked around the main building a little more, then went out to another adjoining building. On the first floor there was a really cool shop called "Lush", that sold handmade soaps and cosmetics. On the third floor there was another cool shop that sold heaps of retro stuff; a lot of stuff from the West. Carly and I bought some Studio Ghibli manga. Our original plan was to go back to the dorm and then get changed for tonight, but, since it was already pretty late, we decided to go straight to Hirakata by train, but not before waffles; sweet potato! I'm finding that I'm actually starting to like a lot of foods that I never used to like before.

After arriving in Hirakata, on an extremely packed train, we went to the department store across from McDonalds, and I got a nice shirt on sale for 990円; Diego got a 500円 shirt with the Road Runner on it! Then we went to "Book Off", which sells second hand books, games, CDs and DVDs, which are (for the most part) extremely cheap and good condition. I bought a My Neighbour Totoro story book, and Kingdom Hearts novels; really cheap. I'm going to see how well I can read them. Finally, we got to The Hobbit, and Katie and Eaaf met with us soon after. We felt a little awkward not having dressed up; the owner himself was dressed in a Power Rangers suit and witches hat. Diego struck up a conversation with him since he could speak Spanish; the owner's actually been all around the world, with photos on the wall to prove it. He just opened up the restaurant in September. Okay, so here comes the weird part. We had to exchange our yen for "Hobbits" (glass tokens basically): 250円 = 1 Hobbit. The were small (snack size) plates of food put out which were one Hobbit each! Oh, and the drinks were 2. So I ended up spending 1000円 on appetisers and and a drink!!! We realised that, since it was Halloween, they wouldn't be serving the food on the menu.

So we left, and went to Saizeriya; YAY!!! I got a vegetable and mushroom pizza, a drink (with refill), and garlic bread for just 500円; so much better value. After eating Katie and Eaaf left, and Diego, Jess, Carly and I went to Karaoke. It was fun, but pretty expensive for 2 hours; we decided that the one in Makino was much better, and had a better variety of songs. So with croaky throat, and sore feet, we said goodbye to Jess at the station; it was about 10:30). We met up with Peter (whom we incidentally saw at the Hobbit - he was covered in blood and tattered clothing - a zombie apparently). and came back to the dorm on the bus. Unpacking my stuff, I knew for sure I'd lost my keys; I realised when I was at the station before we got on the bus. In the morning I'll have to tell Otousan. The lock will have to be changed and the money will come out of my insurance deposit. So today, Halloween day, certainly had it's ups and downs. Now, I just want to go to sleep...