So here we are on Day 4. God this write up is taking forever!! I'll try to make this quick, with lots of pictures.
So Day 4 is the day we went to see the Sumo match. The match was in Tokyo, which gave us an excellant excuse to ride the Shinkansen, which means bullet train in Japanese.
The fastest Shinkensan is the Nozomi, which links Osaka and Tokyo while going through other cities as well. From Osaka, we needed to go to Shin-Osaka station and buy the tickets from there. It was a bit confusing at first coz I had thought that the ride would be a direct trip with no transits. In the end, it didn't matter because the train only stopped at the various stations on the way to Tokyo for like 2 minutes each.
How much did the Nozomi tickets cost? Hahahahhahaa....seriously, you wanna know. All in all, 2 way tickets from Osaka - Tokyo for 2 adults came up to about 52,000 yen. Which is about RM2,000!! Hahahhaha, En Rashid almost got a heart attack when he saw the amount but he can't say I didn't warn him. I had told him earlier (like when we were still back in Malaysia( that the tickets would cost about RM500 per person one way. I guess he didn't hear the "one person one way" part. Hehehehe.
Anyhow, we bought the tickets and then headed up to the platform where the next train was due to depart. We bought the unreserved seats so for half of the way to Tokyo, we didn't get to sit next to each other. Only when people had gotten down to at Nagoya did we get to sit with each other.
This is how the inside of the Nozomi train looks like. The seats were very comfortable (well, if i"m paying RM2000, they'll better be!!) and they could recline much better than the normal plane seats. There were a lot of businessmen on board, I guess most of them transit between their home and work place using the bullet train everyday.
Piece of advice: If you wanna experience the Shinkansen but don't want to pay a bomb, just buy tickets from Osaka to Kyoto. It's much cheaper (dunno how much but should not be more than a few hundred ringgit) and the trip is only 15 minutes.
The trip to Tokyo took us a little bit over 2 hours which was pretty fast seeing how the distance is about 246 miles or 395km. Apparently the train can go up to 270km/hr so it was awesomely fast!!
Nagoya was one of the stations that we stopped at on the way. I kept thinking of my MIL and her obsession with Nagoya silk and cloth. Hehehehe..
En Rashid enjoying the view. Or maybe still thinking about the ticket price. Huhuhuu...
I think this was at Shin-Yokohama station. I dunno what's here but quite a few suits got off so I presume a lot of offices.
Here's the view of the Ryogoku Stadium from across the street. The colorful buntings are actually the names of all the Sumo wrestlers.
At last!! My most wanted photo with the Sumo wrestlers!! These were actually from the Junior league..not the professional league. Those dudes only came out when it was time for them to wrestle.
We were actaully trying to find our seats when we came across these dudes. Sian, depa tengah nak makan lunch, alih2 ada minah tersengih2 nak ajak ambik gambar. Sib baik tak kena duduk!! Hahahha...
This is the view we had from our seats. Pretty good actually. We could see eveything. The best part about the match is that you could rent mini radios from the lobby for 100 yen to listen to the English commentators. Made the tournament so much more interesting because the commentator would talk about the wrestlers and their track records and their favorite techniques, so you would get a better appreciation for the sport.
These were the professional wrestlers from the East Coast. Or maybe they were from the West Coast. salah satu la...
Wrestlers from the other coast.
Sometimes, the referee's decision (the dude in golden robes) is not final and may be disputed by the five shimpan (judges) seated around the ring (the dudes in black robes). If this happens they will meet in the center of the ring to hold a mono-ii (lit: a talk about things). After reaching a consensus they can uphold or reverse the referee's decision or order a rematch, known as a torinaoshi.
OK, itu copy paste je dari Wiki..but just to let you know it happened once during the tournament. Both wrestlers fell at the same time and the referee could not decide who won (dia main tunjuk je la side mana2 dulu). Dah habis diskus kat tengah, in the end, the judges decided to have a rematch. Best giller!
Butt action!!!
These were actually advertisement from the various sponsors. Before the last match, I think there were like twenty of them brought into the ring.
The Emperor's Cup. Dapat ambik gambar je pun jadi la.
I can't recall the names of these sumo wrestlers. I think those cut outs are actually size. You can see how comel En Rashid is compared to them. Hahahha...oya, the dude on the right has a hairy butt! Just saying.
The mural outside the stadium. Some dudes from Australia helped take this picture for us. Thanks mates!!
Bye bye Tokyo. We'll come and visit you again next time. For now, it's back on the train to Osaka.
Muka puas hati sebab 1. dapat bergambar ngan ahli sumo 2. dapat naik bullet train
Proof that we paid a bomb for the train ticket. Hehehehe...13,240 yen was one way one person. Kali la sendiri berapa semua kitaorang spend.
The nozomi train.
