Sapporo

Haluuu

Been delaying on Sapporo write up for more than a month already

Hihi

Nevertheless, here it goes ~!

So where is Sapporo?
It's in the northern part of Japan in the Hokkaido prefecture
It's also the capital of Hokkaido
According to a Malaysian that I met in Japan, it's always cold in Hokkaido
In a year, it feels like 9 months are winter and only 3 months are summer
Average temperature of below 10'C
It's one of the cities in the world with heavy snowfalls
Making it a famous attraction for winter sports
Tadaaa~
This is how Hokkaido looks like

Mum was telling us, "eh ada snow la !"

I was like, "ehh snow? Check weather forecast macam takada je"

I thought I was still dreaming
Apparently I was not
Baru plan nak bawa mak tengok snow after this Spring trip
Rezeki mak dapat tengok snow
Just that she still hasn't seen snowfalls yet
Semoga ada rezeki yang cukup in terms of health, money, time and age. Aminnn 💪

When I told my dad's friend that I wanted to visit Sapporo

He asked why Sapporo

There's nothing in Sapporo

Well, nothing much really

We just wanted to see how does Sapporo look like

Being first time visiting Japan, choosing Sapporo as the first stop was the best option I'd say

I totally fell in love with Sapporo

With the serenity
With the people

Even though they can't speak English, they still wanted to help us around

Just few facts about Japanese that I noticed in Sapporo

I noticed Japanese adalah bangsa yang sangat sopan
Full of manner
You know how people rush around train station
There was one time I accidentally knocked into a guy
Kita yang langgar dia, tapi dia yang toleh belakang balik just to bow at me
And he said sorry in Japanese
Then he went off

I remember on our first day

We were looking for our house

Out of no where, a Japanese lady came running to us

Asking what were we looking for

She could speak English but she had no idea either where the apartment was

So she asked other Japanese around

And they escorted us until we found the place !

In the train, it's a violation to answer any phone calls
Memang ada signboard clearly showing no phone call should be made
To avoid from disturbing others
Memang sunyi la dalam train
Everyone would be looking at their phone
Or doing some reading, working with their laptop and most sight was, sleeping
Hardly I could hear people talking

Not much of activities we could do around Sapporo

But 4 days 3 nights stay was perfect !

Not too long, not too short either

A place to relax, yes ✅

But place to stay for a long period of time?
Sorry I don't really favor that kot ❌

My body can't really stand the low temperature

But I would definitely wanna go to Sapporo again some time in the future ! 😉

29/3/2017 (Wed)

Sampai2 airport, we looked for JR tourist info centre
Bought Airport Express tickets + Sapporo-Otaru Welcome Passes
The pass is cheaper if you plan to go to Otaru
Because it's a combination of 2 tickets
A returned trip to Otaru + unlimited one day ride around Sapporo
Lagi pun Otaru is just a small city
So a half day trip is more than enough
Before purchase, we need to set a date for the returned trip to Otaru
Which means, bila dah beli, kena lah pergi on the date printed
But for the day ride ticket, it's undated
Looking at the cost, balik from Otaru, we just used Kitaca to go around Sapporo
Cheaper that way
The next day baru utilise the unlimited day ride pass
Or they called it, Common-Use One-Day card

Since we reached Sapporo in the morning, and we couldn't check in yet

We took the JR Airport Express Train and stopped at Sapporo Station

Put our luggage in coin locker provided

Then walked around Sapporo Station

There was a department store underground

Bajuuu dia lawa2 😍

Prolly because it was Spring

But soooo pricey
Ended up not buying any clothes there

There was one time, I went to the ladies alone
Tgh khusyuk betulkan tudung, a Japanese lady approached me
Excitedly asking me about my tudung
She was talking to me in Japanese the whole time !
I told her I can't understand Japanese
Dia tak peduli langsung ! She kept talking to me ya Allah 😂
So I just had to listen properly and tried to understand
What was she trying to tell me
Dapat lah agak sikit2
From her gestures
And she mentioned tomodachi, Malaysia, scarf
So I assumed she was telling me she has a Malaysian friend who wears scarf
Then the friend taught how to wear tudung
The friend pin sini pin sana
Beria tangan dia tunjuk how her friend taught her where to pin
Then she asked me, how did I wear mine
There it goes, sampai Japan kena buat tudung tutorial pula 😆

Dah habis pusing2 Sapporo station, it was time to check in
So this was our place

I highly recommend this place

Owner's name : Hiro & Yasu

This house was the most spacious among 3 Airbnb that we stayed

They were so helpful from the start until the last day of our stay
Clean place, strategic location
Even provided us a pocket wifi
So handy
Nothing to complain of 👌

An 8 hour flight was pretty long
Nikmattttt dapat dinner nasi panas + sambal ikan masin + serunding + sambal ikan bilis
Our first day ended pretty early 💤


30/3/2017 (Thurs)
The next day, we woke up to this view
It was snowing the night before

Odori Park

From our place, Odori Park was just a walking distance
To go to the nearest train station, we had to walk through the park
Then we took the train to Otaru
Approximately an hour journey
Used the pass that we bought at the airport

To go around Otaru, they have bus service

I'd prefer walking because Otaru is a really small city

To make things easy for mum, we bought the unlimited day ride

 Otaru Canal

The famous Otaru Canal

Bad timing kot

At night it might look more,,,attractive 😅

We took a different route to go back to our apartment

There's an underground walkway (Chi-Ka-Ho) from Sapporo to Odori station

Exit 8 is the nearest exit

If you can't stand the weather, it's recommended to take this underground walkway

That's about it on our Day-2 trip

Nothing much to see in Otaru, really

We only found good food 😂

We bought mochi, smoked fish, smoked prawns & smoked edamame at Otaru

Ya Allah sedappppp ok mochi dia & smoked edamame tu

Gambar mochi tak sempat nak ambil

Dah masuk perut 😋

Mochi was cheaper in Otaru

Prolly because it's a small city & outskirt

Smoked fish & prawns tu hmmmm I didn't really favor

I heated up the fish for 10 secs, tapi bau satu rumah *pengsan*

Rasa macam ikan jeruk

Masam2, masin2

Sikit boleh la, can't take it too much

Muak

Lepas makan, I had rashes throughout the night

I believed it was because of the smoked prawns

Prolly it was not really fresh or not prepared hygienically

Tak pasal2 jadi Angelina Jolie kejap

At the Sapporo station, there is an underground shopping walkway

We bought strawberries at the supermarket

It was about Y500 per pack

Sweeeet, hugeeeee and so much cheaper compared to Tokyo and Osaka

Apparently strawberries were most expensive in Osaka, about Y700-Y800

Masam pula tu

So please please buy strawberries in Sapporo

31/3/2017 (Fri)

Remember the Common-Use One-Day card that I bought at airport?

Together with returned ticked to Otaru

We used it to spend our last day in Sapporo

So what did we do on our last day?

A visit to the Shiroi Koibito Park

It is a Chocolate/Cookies factory famous in Sapporo

Nearest station is Miyanosawa

Can you see the brick building?
That's the place

Front of Shiroi Park

 Compound of the park

The building resembles our Colmar Tropicale kan?

After paying for the tickets, they gave us a pack of their famous biscuit

Then we had a trip around the factory

Learned about history of chocolate, how chocolate is made, etc etc

They have a transparent viewing area
Where we can see ourselves the process of making their famous chocolate biscuits
Very clean

Biscuits dia sedappp

So thin and crispy

But the white choc was a bit sweet for me

They put a thin layer of white choc in between

At first I thought it was cheese

Dah penat bau biscuit, we stopped at their cafe

Menggoda ok bau biscuits 😝

Had a dessert each

While enjoying this view 💖

 I had this pink dessert. Sorta like a trifle. Sakura apa entah. They actually use Sakura flowers as one of the ingredients. For me, it tasted bizarre. Plus they put a cherry leaf in between the layers. Weird, but it was okay. I finished it anyway. I didn't eat the leaf fo sho.

Can't remember the name, caramel something? Not bad

This was good ! You know how Japanese always make soft spongy cakes? This was one of them.

As usual, mana2 pergi, there would be a place to buy souvenirs

They have it before you exit the place

After the factory visit, we went to the Curb Market

There are 2 nearest stations; Soen or Nijuyonken

My friend told me, "Kalau pergi Sapporo, make sure you try their crabs !"

We thought of just going to this one famous restaurant in Sapporo

Dah alang2 jumpa crabs at this market

We just bought one and heated it up in the microwave

Didn't buy the whole crab

Toooo pricey !

Approximately RM800 seekor

I'm not sure what type is this crab

They've got a lot of types

Horsehair, snow crabs, king crabs

Sepit king crab je dah sama panjang dengan lengan 😂

Sebab dah teringin sangat, we just bought this much. Cost us about RM240.

Tapi sedap dia, ya Allah

We just put in the microwave for a min or so

Tak perlu nak masak dengan sambal ke apa

I've never liked crabs in my 26 years of life

Because of allergy

But this, ya Allah

It beats the record

I makan sambil tutup mata ok

Serious

Memang sedap

Fleshy, sweet, fresh

No allergic reaction

Taste of ocean

I can still remember the taste

Mmmmm I'm salivating as I'm typing this ! Haha

Worth every penny

Highly recommended !

 Supposed to be eaten raw. Nama pun octopus sashimi. But I heated up in microwave. Keluar kedut2 😂 Tasteless. Not my taste I guess.

Salmon eggs. Salty.

That's the end of our journey in Sapporo

I guess it's quite obvious that mostly it revolved around food 🙈

Priceless eating experience in Sapporo 😍

I budgeted Y1,000 per person per day

Which means, approximately RM40

Y1,000 is an average meal you can get in Japan

Since we didn't dine out, buying that expensive crab didn't burst my budget

I sound like so budget concerned kan?

Mesti ada selit2 on costing

In reality, I'm not so budget concerned type of person *facepalm*

Because I planned the journey from the start

And we were on our own

So I was quite worried if we overspent

Thankfully, we controlled ourselves well haha

Well, that's it on Sapporo

The next day we took a flight to Tokyo ✈

______________________________________________

I'll cover Tokyo in next post

But can't promise when will I finish writing it

I'll try my best inshaAllah

Good night 💝

Q