Tokyo with Zg, Day 7, Tsukiji, Ginza, Roppongi

We started the day early at Tsukiji which was insanely crowded. Every single sushi restaurant was packed to the brim, and there were loads of people queuing in front. If you intend to go for sushi, make it a point to go earlier. Like way early in the morning. 

To reach Tsukiji, take the Oedo Subway from Shinjuku Station to Tsukiji-Shijo Station. 

We walked to Ginza, which took us about 15 to 20 minutes. It was a very interesting walk, and we went by many interesting little shops and neighborhoods along the way. The roads in Ginza were closed during the day as it was a weekend. There was something liberating about strolling along the road without the fear of traffic. 

We had lunch at a traditional soba place (Tanaka-ya Soba) at Matsuya Departmental Store before continuing our little walk around the area. Found Manneken tucked in a corner of a busy junction and joined the queue for yummy waffles!

Went to the Mori Tower Observation Deck. Admission is 1500 yen with an additional 500 yen for the sky deck. I would strongly recommend paying the additional 500 yen for the sky deck because the view from the sky deck was really breath-taking. The sky deck is actually a helipad which provides a glorious 360 degree open air view of Tokyo. You could see Mount Fuji on one side, and the Tokyo Tower on the other. If you are lucky, you can even catch the setting sun! The Tokyo Tower was beyond beautiful when it lit up. 

We had dinner at Roppongi that night and this marked the end of our spectacular Tokyo trip together! Thank you Zg for being my awesome travel companion on this exciting little trip, for being the better navigator than I am, and for all the fun and laughter we had together in Tokyo. Exploring Tokyo was not completely magical or fuss-free, and we had our little moments where we struggled with the foreign language, the extremely confusing train system, crowds, and rain. But it was definitely a great experience! 

Read about Read about Day 1, Day 2, Day 3, Day 4, Day 5, and Day 6. 

What to do and eat in Osaka, and staying in Hotel Monterey Osaka

Osaka is a great place to stay if you intend to make day trips to other interesting cities in the area. We stayed in Osaka for 5 days and made 3 day trips to Kyoto, Nara, and Nagoya using our JR Pass. If you do not intend to visit the other cities, you would probably be done with Osaka in 2 days. There are stuff to see and do, but just not as much as Tokyo.

Hotel Monterey Osaka

Staying in Hotel Monterey Osaka was good. Location was perfect, being a short walking distance from the Sakurabashi exit of Osaka station. Osaka station is your gateway to the Umeda area, dotted with large departmental stores and interesting little streets. 

However, it takes a lot of work if you are heading to the Sakurabashi exit because there are no escalators, and you have to lug your luggage down flights of stairs to reach the exit. Upon reaching the Sakurabashi exit, cross the road and walk through Umesan Kouji (梅三小路). You will reach Hearton Hotel first, and Hotel Monterey Osaka is the next hotel on your left. 

Hotel Monterey Osaka is decorated in European fashion, complete with vintage lifts and a chapel.

The room is small and the closet is smaller, which was the reason why we draped our coats on the chair. But the bed was comfortable and clean.

What to do in Osaka

Shop at Umeda (Osaka Station): There is Yodobashi with many floors of electronic items before a few floors of small boutiques. There are the usual Hankyu, Hanshin, Daimaru and Isetan. There is so HEP Five with cute little boutiques and a large ferris wheel. Take the ferris wheel if you have the time! It offers a fantastic view of the Umeda area for 500 yen (approximately SGD 5). 

Walk around Dotonburi (Namba Station): Dotonburi is the Osaka highlight for me. Bustling streets filled with loads of street food, interesting little shops, and of course, Glico man, and the large crab sign! I was very happy to be at Dotonburi, walking along the streets with the colorful neon signs, braving the gusts of cold winter winds from the canal, with hot takoyaki and okonomiyaki in my belly.

Shop at Shinsaibashi, Namba: Shinsaibashi is right next to Dotonburi and is a long covered street with boutiques on both sides. The crowd is crazy, so be prepared to squeeze if you intend to drop by. I like shopping in Shinsaibashi because I generally prefer to shop in little streets as compared to departmental stores. The central heating in departmental stores in winter makes me very very sleepy

Visit Osaka Castle (Osakajokoen Station): You have to pay to enter the Osaka Castle, but you don't have to pay to walk around the park surrounding the castle and enjoy the beautiful architecture from outside. The Osaka Castle is beautiful in the day against a bright blue sky, but it is incredible at night when it lights up against a darkening sky. It poured shortly after I took this shot and being caught in the rain in winter is one sad and cold experience. My brother and I were busy navigating and trying to find our way to the nearest station, and thankfully my parents were so patient despite shivering in the cold. My brother was also shaking because it poured while he was devouring a soft serve (hahaha!). I was, perhaps, the only one who could still move my hands, but my phone decided to hang right at the moment. Good job, Note 4. 

Shop at Namba Parks, Namba City: Namba Parks has the usual high street fashion while Namba City has the little shops which I fancy. Not high on my list, but definitely something to do if you are in Namba and love shopping. 

What to eat in Osaka

For what it lacks in things to do, Osaka is a foodie heaven. I love the food in Osaka! 

Eat okonomiayki at Mizuno, Dotonburi: We arrived at about 4:30 pm for our dinner just so we could avoid the queue, and even then, we were the third in line. When we were done with our meal and exited the restaurant at about 6 pm, there was a long snaking queue outside. Lesson learnt: Either come at odd hours, or be prepared to queue.

But all is worth it because the okonomiyaki here is too damn awesome. They prepare the okonomiyaki at the table so you smell just like the okonomiykai you are going to feast on. We ordered 4 of the top 5 items to share and it was really so good. Crispy on the inside, but extremely soft inside. Okonomiyaki goes well with beer so we had a mug each. Ahhhh happiness.

1-4-15 Dotonbori, Chuo-ku, Osaka, Osaka Prefecture 542-0071, Japan

Eat takoyaki: We did our research and tried the popular ones, but we also tried the tourists trap ones. Frankly, I could not tell the difference. So I would say, just go for whichever takoyaki you see around Dotonburi. They are definitely better than the ones in Singapore. 

Eat Ichiran ramen at Umeda: Inside Higashi-dori Shotengai, which is a street filled with restaurants and pachinko outlets, Ichiran Umeda is like any other Ichiran you find in Japan. Thin ramen noodles in thick pork broth. I would not say it is woah fantastic, but it is definitely hearty comfort food. 

3-13 Doyamacho Kita-ku Osaka-shi Osaka-fu 530-00

Eat pancakes at Butter: This is a bit off the beaten path, and not something most tourists would eat in Osaka. My brother's friend recommended Butter in Umeda, and we went for brunch one morning. Heads up, not the easiest place to find despite using Google Maps and excessive navigation. However, the pancakes were so fluffy that I was immediately glad we came! Butter is located under the train tracks so you would feel the constant vibrations from the trains which added an interesting touch to the place. 

530-0012 大阪市北区芝田1-6-6（阪急梅田駅高架下）

I would go back to Osaka for the food!

For cherry blossom viewing in Osaka, visit here.

How to use a Japan Rail Pass (JR Pass)

During my recent 2 week trip to Japan, my family bought the Japan Rail Pass (also known as the JR Pass) for unlimited travel on the JR lines over 7 days. 

How to purchase your JR Pass

The JR Pass must be purchased before your arrival in Japan because it is not sold inside Japan itself. We bought ours from HIS Travel in Singapore which, according to my parents' research, provided the most competitive pricing.

We received the Exchange Order for a Japan Rail Pass from HIS Travel and were told to exchange for our JR Pass upon reaching Haneda Airport. The Exchange Order looks like this:

Exchange for your JR Pass

When we reached Haneda Airport, we found the JR Office and exchanged for our JR Pass. You will have to fill in a form separately before the staff can process your exchange. Everything was done quickly and efficiently, in typical courteous Japanese fashion. The actual JR Pass looks like this:

When you exchange for your JR Pass, you can stipulate the starting date for your Pass. If you purchase the 7 days JR Pass like I did, your end date will be 7 days from the starting date.

How to use your JR Pass

When using the JR Pass, you have to enter the station via the manned gates. Thankfully it is not too difficult to find the manned gates and generally each exit has a manned gate at the side. Simply show your JR Pass to the staff and walk through the gate. 

Your JR Pass is valid on the JR lines and the Shinkansen (only the Hikari and Kodama bullet trains). The JR Pass is only truly worth it if you intend to use the Shinkansen heavily to make day trips to other cities. We stayed in Osaka for 5 days and made numerous trips to the nearby cities. Check out the timetable if you would like to know the specific timings of the Shinkansen. 

Reserve seats

You will find that most websites advise that there is no need to reserve seats on the Shinkansen but being the typical Singaporean that I am, I left nothing to fate. We made it a point to reserve our seats on the Shinkansen each morning so that we were guaranteed seats in the reservation-only carriages. Then we went for breakfast and waited leisurely for our bullet train. We drank so many Starbucks on those mornings that my brother managed to collect all the Japanese Starbucks cards. 

We rode the Shinkansen at least twice a day and reserving slightly ahead of the scheduled departure time worked for us all times but once. For our bullet train ride from Osaka to Tokyo, we tried to reserve our seats about an hour ahead of the scheduled departure time and was informed that the bullet train was almost full! Eventually the staff managed to find seats for us but we were all separated and sitting in awkward middle seats. I was sitting between an elderly couple, both of whom were very sweet and nice.

How to use your JR Pass from Tokyo to Osaka

From Haneda Airport, we took the monorail to Hamamatsucho, then the JR Yamanote to Shinagawa. We boarded the Shinkansen at Shinagawa and reached Osaka almost 4 hours later. Suffice to say that we were so tired!

Where to go using your JR Pass from Osaka

From Osaka, we went to Kyoto, Nara, and Nagoya. I will share my detailed itinerary soon (when I finally get around to blogging). 

East 8 New York Fusion Tapas and Bar, Grand Park City Hall

This is truly such an awesome find near the office! I guess I should make the effort to explore the places near the office but lunch is truly too short to indulge in too much yummy food. Seriously, the attack of a food coma is the last thing I need in the office. My thanks to the friends in office who introduced this place to me!

East 8 is located in Grand Park City Hall, at the side facing the church. If you are walking over from City Hall MRT, you would have to walk around the hotel to the other side to locate East 8. East 8's lunch menu was pretty extensive and all items looked equally tempting!

After much deliberation, I chose Norwegian Salmon ($15) because I am generally a fan of salmon. The pan-fried salmon came with mashed potatoes and mixed greens. I love how the slice of salmon was perfectly pan-fried with a nice golden hue yet retaining its moisure within. 

I guess we should have stopped at our mains but we succumbed to some Portobello Fries ($16). The Portobello Mushrooms Fries were so crispy on the outside but when you bit into them, the juice from the mushrooms oozed out steadily. The truffle oil used to prepare the Portobello Fries were also very fragrant. The only downside to this yummy dish was a tummy which subsequently felt full of grease.

The Mascarpone and Matcha Mille Feuille ($15) was lovely! It came with fresh berries, mascarpone and green tea cream in a puff. The puff was light and fluffy while the cream was rich and thick. I'm seriously such a sucker for anything sweet.

I would definitely head back to East 8 again because there were many other items in the lunch menu which caught my eyes!

#01-21 Grand Park City Hall

Mon to Fri: 12:00 - 15:00

Mon to Thur: 17:00 - 23:00

Fri: 17:00 - midnight

Sat: 18:00 - midnight
Closed on Sundays

You can reserve online or call 63388289

Nana's Green Tea, Plaza Singapura

My backlog of draft posts is immense and I am still trying to find time to do my Japan posts! But first, one of my long overdue posts below.

Our third Book Club meeting and it was held at Nana's Green Tea in the new wing of Plaza Singapura. I always thought Nana's served only desserts and was pleasantly surprised to find that they serve main courses too.

I ordered the Salmon Cheese Curry Udon. If you are expecting a bowl of thick curry, you would be rather disappointed since it tasted very much like curry soup. However, the sweet salmon and melted cheese went very well with the curry soup. 

The desserts were definitely way better. This was soft serve with red bean paste, mochi balls, and kanten jelly. 

The parfaits were awesome! I would definitely return for them.  Between the matcha and hojicha parfaits, I would recommend the matcha because I love anything that is green tea with red bean!

Nana's Green Tea is a great spot for desserts after a meal. I can totally imagine myself returning to indulge in another cup of Matcha Parfait!

The Atrium @Orchard, Plaza Singapura

#03-80

11am to 10 pm

66844312

Bintan Spa Villa, 2D1N trip to Bintan

Zg and I joined our friends for a trip to Bintan in July 2014. Indeed, this post is severely overdue and I have to admit that I am majorly distracted by my food posts and have been neglecting my travel posts. Before I share more about our trip to Bintan Spa Villa, let me first thank Yida for organising this getaway and doing all the planning for us. It was a fuss-free trip for us and we did not have to worry about anything because you did all the fussing, planning, and worrying for us :)

We took the ferry from Tanah Merah Ferry Terminal and reached Bintan at about 10 am plus. A staff from Bintan Spa Villa was waiting for us at the ferry terminal and packed us into a minivan. I kind of expected a short drive to the resort since Bintan Lagoon Resort was pretty near to the ferry terminal. To our utmost surprise, we took almost an hour to reach Bintan Spa Villa. One hour on a bumpy rocky road. Thankfully, Mr Bean was screening on a small television in the van and I laughed myself to sleep, woke up, watched Mr Bean through heavy eye lids, and slept again. 

Our rooms were not ready when we reached so we had lunch at the dining area. Unlike Bintan Lagoon Resort with several restaurants in the resort, Bintan Spa Villa had only one dining area served by one kitchen. I ordered Seafood Spaghetti (SGD 8) and a bottle of beer (SGD 6.50). Was not very good. The sauce was way too sweet and tasted like watered down ketchup.The spaghetti was kind of soggy and the seafood was rather bland. But I finished it anyway because I was that hungry. 

We wanted to kayak but the wind was too strong so we ended up playing frisbee instead. It was a nice lazy afternoon, warm sunshine on our faces, and we ran around tossing the frisbee at each other happily. The short stretch of private beach was mostly deserted and I saw nobody else when we played around on the beach. The beach chairs were also unoccupied the whole afternoon. The water in this area is kind of murky though so I would not recommend swimming in the sea. 

When our rooms were ready, we retrieved our keys and headed upstairs. The room was clean, spacious, and bright. We went about unpacking, changing, and doing all our random stuff before heading off to the Trikora Spa for our massage.

The boyfriend and I went for a full body traditional massage (SGD 40 for 60 minutes) and it was really good! Our massage room offered a fantastic view of the sea and it was just so calming to enjoy this nice view after a relaxing massage. We were led to the balcony outside when our massage was over and given two cups of steaming ginger tea. Perfect. 

It was dinner time after our massage and we decided to have the Seafood BBQ dinner outdoors on the grass patch. It was lovely sitting under a dark sky filled with stars, watching bats fly in large groups, and eating delicious barbecued food and steam boat. However, there were just so many mosquitoes and insects flying around that we spent most of our time swatting them. The resort handed us some insect repellant which was unfortunately rather useless. 

That said, the food was pretty decent. The steamboat was okay with a herbal soup base and a generous serving of food items. 

The Seafood BBQ was good! I would recommend going for the Seafood BBQ if you are in Bintan Spa Villa. There was a list of seafood items on the menu and we could pick the ones we wanted. The boyfriend and I chose the set for 2 at SGD 39 and picked satay, chicken wings, otah, baked potato, crayfish, and Grouper fish. I really liked the satay and crayfish!

We went back to our rooms after dinner to wash up and started our drinking party. We had to buy ice and soft drinks from the resort to prepare our drinks and oh boy were they exorbitant. We asked the resort staff if there were any convenience shop nearby where we could buy ice and soft drinks and they said no. It was getting dark outside and we had no idea where to head to in search of ice and drinks. Eventually we decided to suck it up and shell out an incredible sum for the ice and soft drinks. We discovered the next day that there was a small local provision shop less than 400m to the left of the resort. Now you know.  

After a few rounds of drinks, we said good night and went to sleep. The sunrise was apparently splendid the next morning but I was sleeping like a pig and missed it completely. Thankfully my boyfriend woke up early and snapped a shot of the beautiful sunrise.

Breakfast was included so we headed to the dining area for our breakfast. Selection was limited and most of the food was not hot so we flocked to the waffle station instead. I had a nice fluffy waffle with maple syrup and that kept me happy. 

The boyfriend and I went back to our room and grabbed a short nap before lunch. We returned to the dining area with our friends and I had the Chicken Chop for lunch. The Chicken Chop was much better than the Spaghetti Seafood. Well-grilled, juicy, and tender. The fries were a little limp though, like they sat out in the open for an hour before coming to me.

We had Magnum Gold before it was time to pile into the minivan and take the hour long ride back to the ferry terminal. This short getaway was a much needed break and I was thankful to be in the company of my boyfriend and our cheerful friends. 

Saturday

I've spent most Saturdays for the past four years with the boyfriend and it felt strangely odd that I would find myself alone on a Saturday. I woke up early to get some work done and went about methodically trying to sort out the pile of unopened letters on my desk. My parents were out, my brother was busy, so I threw some Japanese snacks into my mouth to satisfy the random hunger pangs. By early afternoon, I decided I needed to go out to run some errands so I got dressed in an old black tank top, orange shorts and a biege cardigan, slipped on my trusty pair of Havis, and headed out the door with my ear phones plugged firmly in my ears.

A sense of deju vu hit me while I boarded the bus. It felt like not too long ago when I was dressed in a similar casual attire, listening to crappy tunes on my Ipod, and taking bus 31 to Marine Parade. I still remember those moments, my head resting against the window of the bus, watching random people drift in and out of my sight, placing my Ipod on shuffle but always, always, forwarding to the tracks I prefer. 

I don't remember what my point was when I started this post and now I have no idea how to end it. Do we always start something with an end in mind or do we start something and see where life takes us? 

Jj.com Fish Mart

The concept here is pretty much the same as Fish Mart Sakuraya, where fresh seafood and sashimi are arranged neatly in a chiller and you can pick the one you want and hand it to the cashier. Tucked away in the basement of Vivocity opposite Giant Supermarket, Jj.com Fish Mart is an unpretentious Japanese eatery without a crowd on a Friday night so we went in. We decided not to go for sashimi and chose to have the bento set instead. 

We decided to share the Salmon Shioyaki Bento ($15) and the Chicken Teriyaki Bento ($15). Both bento sets came with a small serving of salad, pickles, two tiny slices of salmon sashimi and miso soup.

The Salmon Shioyaki Bento was average. The slice of salmon was a little dry and bland.

The Chicken Teriyaki Bento was slightly better. The chunks of chicken were well-grilled and drenched in a light teriyaki sauce. Not the best, but definitely better than the Salmon Shioyaki. 

The food tasted a lot like those served in food court yet it cost more than double the price of a normal food court. I doubt I would be back.

UPDATE: So Jj.com Fish Mart moved to Central. I received an update previously from the owners but sadly my poor memory meant that I did not remember it until some friends suggested we have chirashi at Central. I thought they meant Mistuba but they brought me to the ground floor instead. So there we were at Jj.com Fish Mart when it hit me that it was the same shop as that in Vivo! It helped that the deco looked really almost the same. I had salmon aburi that day and, as per my previous visit, it was just average. My friend was in love with their white tuna and chirashi don though!

06 Eu Tong Sen Street, The Central @ Clarke Quay, 
#01-68/69, Singapore 059817, 
TEL: (65) 6221 0339