If I Leave Here Tomorrow..

Amended my flight plan and collected my tickets today! I'm flying off to Fukuoka Airport at 8pm, August 16th and arriving in Japan on the 17th (Erika Toda's birthday..). My return flight is on November 14th from Tokyo, arriving back on 14th evening at 8pm.

I also visited the Japan National Tourist Organisation (Office at #15-09, Hong Leong Building, Raffles Quay) this afternoon. The staff was very friendly and helped me print out alot of things, including weather charts, rainfall charts, (cheap) hotel contacts and camping sites around Japan. Really grateful to her for the help!

Brochure stockpiling...

The JNTO office had a lot of brochures on each major city or prefecture in Japan. Some people were there and they took 1 or 2 brochures only. In comparison, i took 40 + of them (or almost 1 of everything they had). I was afraid that the staff was going to think that i was exhibiting typical Singapore Kiasu-ism (well maybe a little) but to be fair, i AM going to visit all the places anyway so i had to take one of each.

As for the weather during this period, i don't know whether i can consider myself lucky or not, but August-November is the period with one of the lowest rainfall on the calendar. The tradeoff is, the weather in Fukuoka for August-September averages between 23-27 degress C, which is not exactly my idea of a cool temperature to ride in.

So anybody want to come see me off on the 16th? Anybody..?
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As usual i'm obliged to bring you the latest* J-entertainment news: (*questionable)

- Suzumiya Haruhi's 2nd season has been confirmed! One of my top 3 favourite animes last year and probably one of the most popular anime/book series in Japan (if you've never heard of it, get out from under that rock you've been hiding under and just take my word for it) - Source: Tokyograph

- After her last release 'Taiyou no Uta' and 'Stay With Me' under the name of Kaoru Amane, Erika Sawajiri has released another Single with 3 new songs (under the name "ERIKA", official site here). She is also in the CM for Subaru (CM here). Looks like she gained a few pounds though (chubbier cheeks...). Her songs are still catchy but her vocals hasn't improved much.

Dog in sheep's clothings..

- Erika Toda kisses another dog! Or is it vice-versa? Actually i can't really confirm it's a dog. Might be a doggish-looking sheep since it's from the set of Love & Farm.

Mahou Sensei Negima (or MSN)

- Mahou Sensei Negima (by Ken Akamatsu, author of Love Hina, the first manga and anime i've ever read/watched) is becoming a live-action drama this fall! You can take a look at the full cast of the 31 class girls here (most of them are young gravure idols/models i believe). My first impression is that most of the actress are quite unremarkable. It's a pity they didn't cosplay them (hair color, accessories) to look like the manga characters. Anyway the manga's story (what story actually?) is just an excuse to draw panty shots and the likes, so if the drama is anything like that i'm guessing i might (ashamedly) enjoy it.

Well the only character i like is Asuna Kagurazaka (main heroine) and Nodoka Miyazaki anyway (#8 and #27 if you're looking at the class list) and Sara Wakatsuki looks good for the role of Asuna. Can't say the same for the actress playing Nodoka though. - More coverage and pics here