*update for the links if you would like to read on for my trip in Japan!
This is going to be a long post. You have been warned. If you want to skip the drama mama, you can skip the first two para. Otherwise, you can read to find out how we dealt with cancelled flight last minute.
The good thing doesn't last, and bad thing followed up. resting at Novotel was really one kind of luxury (To me at least because whenever I travel with my sis, we always stay pretty budget accommodation). We had a good rest with two fluffy pillows each and woke up for international breakfast buffet and off we go to the airport to JAPAN. Our flight is at 1105hr at Taoyuan and we arrived at the airport pretty early, I remembered it was 0830ish. Searched for the screen to check on our counter number and realised there is none on our flight. Nevertheless, we thought we were early and just head straight to the counter of our airline. We have bought Peach airline to fly to Japan. When we were at the counter, there was a freaking long queue and after all the commotion, we realised that the queue was so long because their flight was cancelled since yesterday and only able to fly on the day. My senses told me something was wrong. So, I went to check the screen again while my sister queued and true enough there really was none on our flight. So I wanted to check with the counter attendant and the duty manager hold something on his hand and was ready to stick it below the screen.
I don't know what has gotten us for this trip but yes, our flight was cancelled and that was the announcement. I was like WTF, not again?! Went to check with the duty manager on our situation, along with a couple of people with the same flight as us. We were told to do the flight changes online directly with Peach airline and quickly changed it to 1130hr (the long queue for that flight). But apparently, nobody could get in, with us using wifi and with the taiwanese using their own data. Seriously, this was insane. I was like, wtf wtf are we gonna stuck in the airport again, or staying in taiwan again to wait for next flight? I was anxious and I told the duty manager that we came from Singapore and we were not notify of the cancellation of flight thru emails or whatever mode. Zero. The rest of the people had some commotion, and asked if they can be fully refund. They gotten their answers of course, and THEY LEFT. WHAT THE HELL. I mean we can't really do that, where can we go?! Quickly asked my sister to liaise with our insurance agent to check on our situation and see if we do need to stay, can we claim for it. In the meantime, I persist that we need to fly to Japan today and asked if the duty manager could give us an suggestion. Apparently, they could not help us to change our flight timing to 1130hr ( I don't know why). So, he suggested to us that we could check with other airlines and gave us a list of timing and airlines that are flying to Japan today. FOL seriously, what if we need to incur cost again to change airline. No other choice, my sister went to check on the other airlines while I insist on waiting that the duty manager find a solution for us. There must be some ways to solve and help us, I believe. I think the duty manager can sense our anxiousness and lost as well, because he was trying very hard to find ways to help us get onto the 1130hr flight, as well. (The flight was not full yet) I think heaven pity us two girls and didn't really want us to be stranded in the airport and finally they managed to get the Peach airline to change the flight for us via phone call ( According to what the duty manager say, their office line doesn't operate on Sunday). and IT WAS 1045hr when we knew that we could changed our flight. Quickly got my sister back via Whatsapp because she was still looking for airlines and she had both our passport. AND YES WE HAD TO RUN ALL THE WAY IN THE AIRPORT AND OUR BOARDING GATE WAS ONE OF THE LAST. FOL SERIOUSLY.
I usually don't sleep during flight because I couldn't seems to sleep well but when we finally settled down on the plane, I fall asleep. Guess after all the drama mama, we were exhausted. Anyway, Peach airline was not bad, better than Jetstar for sure. It's more spacious and the chair was not so upright till you are sitting like a robot. I kid you not. This is what happen when I sit Jetstar. That also explains why I couldn't really sleep. Anyway, after 2 hours plus, finally we reached JAPAN. OHAIYO NIHON!! To save on our budget, we didn't take a cab, instead we took the subway train which of course took a much longer time to get to our lodging place. A good 2 hours of travelling on the train which really took all my energy. Showing you our Osaka lodging for our 5 nights in Japan!
A very simple room for 3 pax. We asked for a 2 pax private room but we were upgraded to a 3 pax room instead! This was taken in a wide angle mode for your information! Considering that we won't be staying in the hostel room for long because most of the time we would be out in the street, we decided on a hostel which would cost less to our wallet. In case you are wandering, we booked this hostel in June I think and it was almost full. Initially we wanted to try other hostel because this was the previous lodging that my sister stayed before, but no luck! Apparently it was summer holiday for them and taiwan so everywhere was quite packed. Nevertheless, I would say this is quite worth it for us. Oh one thing to mention, as you can see, it is just a room with a bunk bed and a single bed at the corner. There is a mini fridge and a small side table as well. So where is the toilet? Well, it is a shared toilet outside our room. There was only one toilet for the female at our level. If not you could use the toilet at the lobby as well. I don't mind, neither does my sister so we find this alright. But if you need a private washroom to yourself, I suggest you not to book this hostel. Otherwise everything is good. I left out the shower part. You need to go to the lobby to shower thou. There is two private shower room and one public bath for female only. Since we are at this topic I shall tell you my experience. For the first day (which is this post), we had an early light off as we were really too exhausted. So after having our dinner, we head back to the hostel to have our shower already. As we were early, the private showers were both empty for use. But for the rest of the day we were in Osaka, we had to use public bath because there were queues when we got back from touring and shopping. As tired, we just want to get ourselves clean and off to bed because every single day we were sweating like crazy. At first, I was abit awkward because we had to strip naked at the powder room before we step into the bathing room. Even thou all are girls but you know, it is not something that we will do with people around. But when you see the locals being normal and all that, I get used to it the next minute already. Then, we realised we are the only few who dare and were willing to use public bath because those who came to stay here were mostly taiwanese, Thais and other non local. So, we had the bath to ourselves practically. There is a hot sauna inside the bathing room as well. Very relaxing to soak in after showering. So, do check this hostel out if you intend to do a budget lodging planning:
Hotel Raizan North
Nishinari Shin-imamiya, 1-1-3 Taishi, Nishinari- ku, Osaka, Japan
Tel: 81-6-6647-2193
http://www.chuogroup.jp/kita/en/
Total lodging cost for 5 nights in Osaka: Approx. SGD 300 ; so one night is SGD 60 which means each of us paid SGD 30 per night! I would really say worth it. Given that it is at the CBD area which is quite accessible to many places via train. Japan train station map is very overwhelming for a first timer so take your time to study it because our hostel has actually two stations that you can alight. ( It is like MRT and LRT, so dont get confused)
Shin- imamiya Station (supposingly this should be the main line or something)
Dobutsuen-mae Station (this station is just right outside the hostel)
Look for this black building if you book Raizan hotel!
Yes and because we book our dinner reservation at a themed restaurant, so when we check in to our hostel, it already 5pm and our reservation is at 630pm. So basically, I just washed my face and off we go to for our dinner. It is a prison-themed restaurant near Tennoji station. We alight at Umeda station thou and went to ask the security guard of a mall for direction because my sister didnt know the place. According to the website, it say a 5 min walk from Tennoji station which i vividly remembered that there is the station just beside the building of the restaurant. Anyway, just ask for direction if you do not know the way but remember to show them the japanese address instead.
THE LOCKUP
(監獄レストラン ザ・ロックアップ あべのルシアス店)
Lucia's 15F of Abe, 1-5, Abenosuji, Abeno-ku, Osaka-shi, Osaka, 545-0052
http://r.gnavi.co.jp/k267901/lang/en/
I shall leave the pictures for talking since this post is too wordy. pardon me for my lengthy post because how not to when it is so drama mama for me!
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| perfectly themed from the moment you step out of the lift |
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| "The cell" that you will dine in. |
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| What it is like looking from inside to outside. |
Now to bring you food that we ordered.
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| omelette rice |
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| takoyaki. Seriously, this look so normal right. just 6 takoyaki balls. What is so big deal about this then? blame it on the fact that it is a themed restaurant. THIS CRAZY DISH IS CALLED A TIME BOMB. I forget that my sister cannot be depend on when she eats basically anything so she doesnt really bother to read the description of the dish. FML. one of the takoyaki has their ultimate spice and god knows what chilli in it. AND THE DAMN SUAY ONE IS ME. I LITERALLY CRY AFTER EATING THE LAST TIME BOMB. AND I KID YOU NOT. MY EARS AND GUMS PAIN LIKE HELL. |
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| hotpot beef which is awesome. This is really good |
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| Very colorful and interesting mocktails and cocktails they have. You just want to order all of them and try! |
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| To suit the theme and have some picture-worthy drinks to post, we order these two! |
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| Green apple soda, that is. Refreshing drink for me. I like! |
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| my sister's drink: grapefruit orange I think. no, not my liking. Grapefruit is too bitter for me. |
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| If you have a chance to visit the restaurant, order this because I think it is their signature but we were craving for beef too much to care about pork or chicken. |
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| Dessert time!! I was still burning with tears over the stupid TIME BOMB TAKOYAKI. For picture-worthy again, I order this biscuit dessert. It was not bad. |
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| my sister's. All cream. which I dont fancy. There is some cake in it if I remember correctly. |
A summary of this prison-themed restaurant:
It was pretty interesting given that they really lead you into the theme well. The hostess are warden who would handcuff (yes, real handcuff) you to your cell. Very dim and dark atmosphere throughout to make you feel a surreal mix of bizarre and horror.
The cell that you dine in is quite small thou. The other staff are dressed as prisoners.
We were lucky to experience their highlight of the restaurant; at certain point of time, they will off the light totally and bring you into the world of the monstrous prison whereby frantic announcement were made(in japanese of course), explaining that the prisoners of the cells have escaped and various sound effect were projected to scare you ( like the ghostly voice of a girl etc). Then the prisoners ran around scaring the diners (we were so suay to be seated beside a group of jap young girls we supposed, because they have been screaming non-stop). The rogue prisoners and ghosts would try to scare you by crazily hitting your cell door(its closed) and opening your door suddenly. Whatever that you can think of with the link of ghosts and rogue. Of course dont worry, they wont touch you. A very good 15-20mins of this theme line-up.
I believe they have an english menu if you asked, if not it would be like the Japanese menu we took with lots of pictures.
Make reservation if you want to dine in this restaurant because it can be full house at times.
For the above food that we ordered, we spent approx. 5,600YEN (SGD70). If you like to experience a little fun and adventurous themed restaurant, I would recommend this. Food are of average thou. Oh and just a last point, they have a limit dining time of 90mins (so that there is no hogging of the seats)
And this end my first day in Osaka, Japan. Wait for next post of my Japan trip!
