Prelude: epic failing

So I started my journey by going to my friend's birthday party&midsummer celebration to Kokkola which is around 250 kilometers from my home. I had a great time with bunch of friends there and was about to go to Helsinki with one of my friends' car ride. On the way to Kokkola from Helsinki one of the tires in their car had broken down and they had to struggle the rest of the trip with a spare wheel. But they got a proper replacement tire in Kokkola thanks to our host friend's father.

So we headed towards Helsinki yesterday when after 100 kilometers of driving we noticed ANOTHER tire had broken down. So we had to change the car's spare wheel with the broken one and try to manage with that setup. But as somehow expected, all the tires of that car were on the verge of breaking down so of course the third wheel started to act up too and our trip came to a halt. We had to leave our car somewhere between Seinäjoki and Jalasjärvi. Then our friend picked us and we tried to board the last train bound from Seinäjoki to Helsinki BUT of course it was already fully booked by that time. So what we decided to do was to head over to our friend's place (who lives near Seinäjoki) and sleep the night over there, he got us a deal for a set of wheels with a fairly cheap price.
So today we woke up, got the spare set of tires and headed over to the place we had left the car to change the tires. The tires were luckily a match (they were previously from a different car than the one we had) and we finally could continue towards Helsinki. I finally arrived to my ex apartment in Helsinki and tomorrow I'm gonna go buy some souvenirs. Then the day after tomorrow it's finally time to fly to Japan!

This was also blogged by our driver Drasa, from the staff of Desucon (in Finnish)

A new beginning 新しい旅

So a lot of things have happened since my last trip to Japan, mainly the surgery operation because of my spinal disc herniation and all the rehabilitation that's been related to it. But on a positive note I just ordered a flight ticket to Japan and this marks the start of a new journey!
This time there is gonna be 3 fellow Finns from my hometown Oulu travelling along with me: Joni, his girlfriend Jenni and Kake. They are spending whole June in China from where they will travel by a ferry from Shangai to Osaka. My flight arrives to Osaka's Kansai International airport on the 1st of July at 08:55 and my flight back to Finland departs from Tokyo Narita airport on the 27th of July at 12:00. We've ordered a 7 day Japan Rail Pass between 8th-14th of July and our travel plan is as follows:
- Osaka 1st-7th July
- Kyoto 8th-9th July
- Hiroshima 10th July
- Kyuushu (Beppu and/or Fukuoka) 11th-13th July
- Tokyo 14th-27th July

This time my aim is to see other parts of Japan too besides Tokyo which include Kyoto's most famous sightseeing spots, Hiroshima's peace memorial park and the famous atom bomb museum. Also I'm really looking forward to experincing the beaches of Japan, lots of different onsens and at least one 'traditional summer festival' (夏祭り).
Originally I was planning for stay all the way till around 17th-19th August because of the coming Comic Market 78 (in August 13-15th). But since I didn't have enough funds for it, I settled for the same time as my friends are staying in Japan. Even then I have 3½ weeks to make the summer of 2010 one of the most memorable ever!

Day 15: Back to Finland.

I woke up at 7:00 and we checked out from the hotel at 8:00. The weather was very cloudy and it somehow fit the depressing leaving day. The walk from hotel to train station and from station to another was hell and I almost lost a feeling of my right arm while carrying all the heavy luggage. The airport hassle went pretty smoothly as expected from Narita and we were on the airport right on time. The plane ride was boring, I watched some Family Guy and listened to the music I bought from Tokyo. We arrived to Helsinki around 15:15, got our luggage and then we finally were back to Helsinki. It's tuesday the 12nd, 7:35 as I'm writing this and I still have to go back to Oulu by train. My train leaves at 9:30 and I'm supposed to be back in Oulu at 15:15. Then my journey will finally be over...

Day 14: The last day

At the beginning of our last trip I went to Harajuku to buy the last souvenirs I still had to buy for my friends. Takeshita street was as annoying as ever but I managed to buy the things I needed. After that I wanted to check if there were anything interesting at Yoyogi park so I headed over there and bought some takoyaki on the way. I the famous rockabilly group there and sat down at the bench near them to have some takoyaki for lunch. Takoyaki was okay, nothing too special and after I eating I walked around the yoyogi park. There were some actors rehearsing around the park and it was kinda interesting to see em do that. Then it was time to leave Harajuku and go to Akihabara one last time. I went to the arcade at first and met Laggy there by chance. Then I decided it was finally time to enter one of those famous maid cafes with Laggy. We tried to go to Nagomi and @home cafes first but those were full so we went to a cafe called Popopure. I ordered a "traditional maid cafe dish" called omurice and it was surprisingly good, reminded me of risotto. And of course I took a pic with one of the maids there, it's so hilarious I have to scan it asap. :D Then it was time for some last minute shopping around Akiba and before going back I went to play some arcade games one last time. I finally managed to clear the Area 88 game too, cost me 4 credits and totally worth it. On my way back to hotel I bought some melonsoda and candy as a souvenir for myself and then it was time to get some sleep at hotel because the following day was gonna be rough: going back to the airport with all the stuff I had with me...

Day 13: Goi, Chiba.

The 2nd last day of our trip we went to pay a visit to our friend Qward's hometown area which was a place called Goi in Chiba. We took a bit under 2 hour train ride there and arrived to Goi station around 13:00. From there Qward drove us to his home with his car and we greeted his mother and little sister there. Of course the first thing we did was to go to the local arcade so we drove there from Qward's house. The arcade was decent at best and after a little while we decided to head back to Qward's house to grab something to eat. We went to a local chinese restaurant and the food there was really good! After eating it was time to check the local DVD/anime/manga store and after that it was time to get some alcohol for the night. So we drove to the local liqueur store where Qward bought some good brand sake and then we bought some beverages from a local supermarket and convini. The night was pretty awesome, we drank a lot and talked at Qward's room and at the end of the night we all were really drunk. So we left back to station all pretty wasted and we were shouting some stupid things on the way, and of course we acted like we were "FROM AMERICA" ^^; . Laggy felt at the half way of the train ride but at the end we arrived back to our hotel safely. Tomorrow was the last day of our trip and I wanted to make most of it...

Day 12: Government Building, Asakusa, onsen etc

At the beginning of day 12 we finally decided it was time to go to that Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building we were trying to enter for some while. So we finally got inside and rose up all the way to the 45th floor of the building, at 205 meters. The views from the top were astonishing and at that time I just kept thinking my existence feels very small. So we took many many photos from there and went to both two observation towers it had. After taking photos etc it was time to go sightseeing and souvenir shopping to Asakusa's famous temple area. Asakusa area made me feel a bit nostalgic because I stayed 1½ weeks there last year and we entered the Sensō-ji temple area. From there we all bought some nice souvenirs for our parents and took some good photos of the temple area. After shopping and sightseeing we went to relax at some local onsen near there, the 41C water of the rotenburo felt really good. After onsen it was time to end the day traditionally by going to Akihabara and from there back to hotel.

Day 11: Ueno and Kouenji

I went to stroll around Ueno park area which was really nice. There was also some yoyo performer named Naoto doing a show and apparently he had won last year's yoyo world championship in California. I ate some kitsune udon at some old famous soba restaurant in Ueno's ameyoko and later on I went to hunt some used records from Kouenji. Kouenji's record stores didn't have so good selection this time but I found the best arcade so far from Kouenji, the beatmaniaIIDX machine was top-notch and only 100y/play. After arcade I went to Shinjuku's disk union chuuko center where I found several cheap records and wasted the rest of my day budget there. After that it was time to go back to hotel.

ps. I finally fixed my WLAN problem, turns out it was the stupid Sygate firewall blocking the WLAN connection. Uninstalled it and everything works normally now, even with my integrated WLAN adapter