universal studios japan

Our first full day in Japan began with the singing of the Doxology, followed by buffet breakfast in the hotel's banquet room.  They served some Japanese dishes, along with scrambled eggs (kinda undercooked), breakfast meat, green salad, fresh fruits, croissants.  The breakfasts during the trip were the only meals we all had together (except for the final night's dinner) and were a great time to talk about the plans for that day and sometimes the next day.  Kahu Kordell Kekoa also shared devotions and thoughts for the day, going through Psalm 23 everyday.  This first day we also had a visit from  Band Director Clarke Bright's friend, who is the casting director for all the shows at Universal Studios Japan.

Took this picture of Group 11 in the main entrance to the hotel, on the grand staircase.  This day's required attire was a Kamehamaha shirt and, of course, their nametag on the trip lanyard, which had the trip's logo.

We managed to get a quick family photo before going in to the park. 

One of the highlights of the day and what I'd been looking forward to was seeing a performance of "Wicked."  We had seen it at Pantages Theater in LA when we went on the Pasadena trip and loved it.  We even listened to (and sang along to) the soundtrack in the car for months after, never tiring of it.  The Universal Studios version was an abridged version with a smaller cast, but it was great.  Some of the songs were in Japanese, some in English, and some a combination of both.  Elphaba was American and sang beautifully.  So glad we got to see it again.






Kylie and her mom Joslynn also joined us on this trip, coming along as "accompanying travelers."  Though they were on a different flight and on a different bus, we did get to spend time with them at meals and at the various destinations during the trip.





After we had lunch (Darrell and I had Snoopy burgers, cute yah?), Darrell decided to go back to the hotel to rest, so Joslynn and I hung out together, going shopping for cute Hello Kitty stuff and going to see the Shrek show and the Michael Jackson tribute show that had a Kamehameha graduate perfoming in it.

The Hello Kitty stuff was fun...they had a kiosk where you paid 500 yen to get a chance to win various Hello Kitty merchandise items.  Here is Joslynn sticking her hand into the contraption that was blowing all the prize tickets around.  We were hoping for the HK hard-sided carryon suitcase but got the smaller prizes instead.  I got a tiny alarm clock and a cutlery set for 1000 yen.  Wanted to try for more but decided to stop since I am just not lucky like that.





Kylie and Ryan got a caricature done and it came out so cute!  They went around the park with his friends since the rule was that all the students had to stay in groups of 3 or more. 

I met up with some band parents, the band director and Kahu Kordell and decided to get on the "Back to the Future" ride.  "Wicked" was great, but this was probably the highlight of the day!  We laughed so much just getting onto the ride and all the way through it, and couldn't even take a straight picture afterwards because we were still cracking up so much.  What was so funny?  We were trying to explain to the ride attendant that we wanted to be together, and for some reason her reaction was hilarious to us.  Once hysteria set in we were lost, and everything became super-hilarious, even the ride!

Got some omiyage shopping done...just got some stuff that you could only get here since I didn't want to have to pack so much so early in the trip (and since we still had two more hotels to go to).

One thing I DIDN'T buy was "Snoodles" ~ Snoopy Cup Noodles!  They were really cute though.  There were SpiderMan ones too, though I'm not sure what they were called ("Spoodles"?!).

1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8-9...that's what I was doing the entire trip, counting to make sure I had 9 boys accounted for.  AND I wanted a pic with my group at the end of the day.  But omg I just noticed that I had a substitute boy in this pic (Michael) and was missing one (Mark, where are you?)!

L-R:  Keola, Ka'ala, Michael, Joel, me, Ryan, Kalei, Treston, James and Nainoa.





Went to CityWalk after the park closed for shopping and dinner, and had some yummy gyoza ramen.  And yes, I took pictures of almost everything I ate in Japan.

So Day 1 (which was actually June 3 since we lost a day coming over) was fun-ippai (lots of fun!).