The Japan Trip: Hakone And Our Last Day

Our trip to Hakone started early and began with, again, the hard truth that speed came with a price. Our JR East Pass was much cheaper than the regular JR Pass, therefore we could only take the normal train from Ueno to Odawara Station. By the time we reached there, Eday and friends had finished their breakfast.

All of us then travelled together from Odawara to Hakone-Yumoto Station. From there onwards, the whole thing felt almost like déjà vu, because I had done it almost a decade ago, when I had a family trip in 2014! That bridge above the stream, the bus stop and the jetty! I was there, did them all in the same sequence!

Gunawan on the bridge above the stream.

The slight difference here was the visit to Hakone Shrine's lakefront torii. It's the one that people see from the boat and we walked to the shrine to see the other side of the torii gate. There was a queue when we got there, a popular tourist spot, apparently. We waited a bit for our turn to take pictures. 

As we headed back, we saw ducks swimming playfully on the lake. But the leisure walk immediately turned into running when we realized the ship was about to depart. We managed to get into the ship and sailed across Lake Ashi. It was nice, but fairly breezy. We eventually decided to get warm inside the cozy passenger deck as the pirate ship approached Togendai Station. 

Inside the pirate ship.

The station has a restaurant, so we grabbed our lunch before continuing our journey. In normal circumstances, we would have taken the Hakone Ropeway from Togendai to Owakudani on the mountaintop, but it was under maintenance, so we took a bus instead. 

It was here in Owakudani that Robinson Travel failed to deliver. We had seen sakura and snow so far, but Mount Fuji was nowhere to be seen that day, thanks to the fog. Even Parno must be so agitated that he spontaneously blurted out, "but where's Fuji Film?" 

And everybody laughed at his malapropism.

Aming Coffee supporters in Owakudani.

But it was also here that a historical moment happened. You see, I have always been a fan of Aming Coffee since 2017, when I interviewed the man himself. I always thought of Aming Coffee as our kind of Hard Rock Cafe, the one thing that is good from our hometown Pontianak. So on the last day we were together in Japan, we wore the Aming Coffee t-shirt. We embraced the freezing cold weather (you could tell from Parno's expression) and took the picture in Owakudani. It is now hanging proudly in my living room.

From Owakudani, we continued the journey with ropeway, tram and train. We were eventually back to where we began, then we hopped on the next train back to Tokyo. We stopped at Shinjuku Station and Parno, who was so determined not to get lost again, followed Eday closely. He even followed Eday going round the station pillar, not realizing that he was actually tricked into doing so. Now this is following someone blindly! Literally!

BL and Japanese girl he got to know in the train to Shinjuku.

We went our separate ways from Shinjuku. Seven of us went back to Akihabara to check out the seven-story Pop Life Department M's, the pachinko parlor and the porno DVD shop in the nearby basement. After that, we visited the maid cafe called @Home Cafe. 

This was one unique experience. The waitress dressed like a maid and the nickname of ours was Kitsune. She wore a surgical mask, so half of her face was covered, but she looked more like Caucasian than Japanese. When the maids served us, the whole interaction was very animated. The story was bombastic, the expression was over the top. 

At maid cafe.

Surianto informed us he couldn't make it, so we told the maid that Parno's desk had only three people. When the maid saw the bill charging for four guests, she acted surprised and threw her hands in the air, so anime-like that she got us laughing. Then, when the drinks were served, there were some gestures we gotta do and mantras we gotta say, something sounded like, "moe moe kyuutttt." 

Later on, before we went back to the hotel, we had our supper at McDonald's. Parno grumbled that we still ate even though it had been quite late at night, but he turned out to be the one eating the most, haha. As he was coughing a bit, Ardian eventually took away the fries for his own good. 

At Mcdonald's.

The night ended with us packing our luggage and gambling. We had so many coins by the end of the trip that losing the bets was not necessary a bad thing because we could finally get rid of the coins! Susan and Cicilia won that night.

The next morning, things were coming to an end. We had our last outing together in Asakusa. I had my last breakfast with Eday and Muliady, then Eday and I went to Tully's for coffee. For one last time, we saw how Surianto always appeared unexpectedly as he took the escalator down right in front of us. Then Eday, Taty, Surianto and I checked out. Eday headed to Narita while the three of us went to Haneda, going back to Singapore via Manila...

Parno and Eday: two old friends in Japan.

Liburan Ke Jepang: Hakone Dan Hari Terakhir

Kunjungan ke Hakone dimulai sejak pagi buta dan sekali lagi kita diingatkan kembali dengan kenyataan bahwa ada harga, ada kecepatan. JR East Pass yang lebih murah harganya dari JR Pass hanya memungkinkan kita untuk naik kereta biasa dari Ueno ke Stasiun Odawara. Ketika kita tiba di stasiun tersebut, Eday dan kawan-kawan sudah selesai sarapan.

Kita semua lantas melanjutkan perjalanan lagi, kali ini dari Odawara ke Stasiun Hakone-Yumoto. Apa yang terjadi setelah itu terasa seperti déjà vu karena sudah pernah saya lakoni hampir 10 tahun silam, sewaktu saya berlibur bersama anak-istri di tahun 2014. Jembatan merah di atas sungai, halte bis yang sama dan juga pelabuhan di danau! Semuanya sudah saya lakukan dengan urutan yang sama! 

Gunawan di Hakone.

Yang sedikit berbeda di sini adalah persinggahan kita ke gerbang torii Kuil Hakone yang menghadap danau. Ini adalah gerbang yang sering terlihat di brosur dan kita berjalan ke kuil untuk melihat gerbang ini dari sudut pandang yang berbeda. Ada antrian ketika kita sampai di sana. Cukup populer rupanya. Kita pun menanti sebentar untuk mengambil foto. 

Kita melihat bebek yang berenang di danau saat berjalan kembali ke pelabuhan. Akan tetapi kapal akan segera berangkat, jadi kita pun bergegas. Setelah menunjukkan karcis, kita naik ke kapal yang menyeberangi Danau Ashi dan membawa kita ke Stasiun Togendai. Kita sempat mondar-mondar di atas kapal, namun angin dingin akhirnya memaksa kita untuk turun ke dek yang hangat. 

Di dalam kapal bajak laut.

Setelah kapal berlabuh, kita bersantap siang di Togendai View Restaurant. Lantai berikutnya adalah tempat untuk menaiki kereta gantung, tapi karena sistemnya kebetulan sedang dicek, kita akhirnya menaiki bis menuju ke Owakudani. 

Dan Robinson Travel gagal menunaikan janjinya di Owakudani. Sejauh ini kita sudah melihat bunga sakura dan salju, tapi Gunung Fuji tidak terlihat karena terhalang kabut. Bahkan Parno pun protes dan spontan berkata, "jadi mana Fuji Film?" 

Dan semua tertawa karenanya. 

Pendukung Aming Coffee di Owakudani.

Tapi di tempat yang sama ini pula sebuah sejarah diukir. Bagi yang belum tahu, saya menggemari Aming Coffee sejak 2017, sejak saya mewawancarai pemiliknya. Saya selalu merasa bahwa Aming Coffee ini bagaikan Hard Rock Cafe, satu hal yang membanggakan dari kota kelahiran saya, Pontianak. Jadi di hari terakhir bersama di Jepang, kita memakai kaos Aming Coffee. Kita abaikan dinginnya cuaca (anda bisa lihat dari ekspresi Parno) dan berfoto di Owakudani. Foto ini kini digantung di ruang tamu saya.  

Dari Owakudani, kita lanjut dengan kereta gantung, trem dan kereta, kembali ke posisi semula di Stasiun Hakone-Yumoto dan pulang ke Tokyo. Kita turun di Stasiun Shinjuku yang ramai dan Parno yang trauma karena telah beberapa kali ketinggalan kini mengikuti setiap langkah Eday. Dia bahkan ikut mengitari tiang di stasiun, tak sadar bahwa ia sedang dikerjai, haha.

BL dan gadis Jepang di kereta menuju Shinjuku.

Kita berpencar di Shinjuku. Tujuh orang termasuk saya pergi ke Akihabara lagi, kali ini kita mengunjungi toko pernak-pernik seks setinggi tujuh lantai yang bernama Pop Life Department M's, tempat bermain pachinko dan juga lantai bawah tanah yang menjual aneka DVD porno. Sesudah itu kita mampir ke kafe pelayan @Home Cafe. 

Ini adalah sebuah pengalaman yang unik. Para pelayan wanita ini memakai seragam seperti di komik dan nama samaran pelayan kita adalah Kitsune. Dia mengenakan masker, jadi mukanya tertutup separuh, tapi raut wajahnya terlihat lebih mirip bule daripada orang Jepang. Ketika mereka melayani kita, interaksinya mirip kartun Jepang. Ada cerita di balik menu minuman dan pelayannya pun sangat menjiwai perannya. 

Moe moe kyuuttt!

Landak mengabarkan kita bahwa dia tidak bisa datang, jadi kita memberitahukan pelayan bahwa meja Parno hanya ada tiga tamu. Ketika ia melihat bahwa bon di meja dihitung berdasarkan empat tamu, pelayan tersebut kaget sampai terangkat tangannya, benar-benar seperti kartun sehingga kita pun tertawa. Kemudian, ketika minuman disajikan, kita harus mengikuti gerakannya dan mengucapkan mantra yang terdengar seperti, "moe moe kyuutttt." 

Sebelum kembali ke hotel, kita mampir ke McDonald's untuk makan lagi. Parno mengomel karena kita masih makan meski malam sudah kian larut, tapi dia sendiri malah yang makan paling banyak, haha. Karena dia agak batuk, kentang gorengnya lantas diamankan oleh Ardian demi kebaikannya. 

Di Mcdonald's.

Dan malam pun diakhiri dengan kemas-kemas koper dan judi. Kita memiliki begitu banyak koin sehingga kalah pun rasanya lega karena kita tidak perlu lagi menyimpan segenggam koin di saku celana. Susan dan Cicilia menang di malam itu. 

Keesokan paginya, ada kesan bahwa kebersamaan kita akan segera berakhir. Kita berjalan-jalan di sekitar Asakusa untuk terakhir kalinya. Saya, Eday dan Muliady sarapan bersama untuk terakhir kalinya. Selanjutnya saya dan Eday pun ngopi bersama di Tokyo untuk terakhir kalinya. Di situ kita juga melihat Landak yang sering tiba-tiba muncul untuk terakhir kalinya. Dia mendadak turun dari eskalator tepat di depan kafe Tully's. Setelah itu, saya, Landak, Taty dan Eday pun meninggalkan hotel dan menuju stasiun. Eday berangkat ke Narita sementara kita ke Haneda, kembali ke Singapura lewat Manila... 

Parno dan Eday: dua teman lama di Jepang.