the wacky wombat weblog

Many months ago, Au Yong told me that Krispy Kreme had opened up an outlet in Tokyo. And so, I was determined to have some yummylicious doughnuts before this trip is over. Especially since it’s been over 2 years since I last had their doughnuts (which had caused massive crazy food craving in me then: refer old raving mad blog entries here.)

So I was bumming around yesterday without much to do (gotta give that Wii a rest and stop playing for a day haha). Thus I decided to take the train down to Shinjuku and perhaps buy a dozen doughnuts. Of course, Au Yong talked sense into me and so yes, 6 doughnuts instead of 12. haha.

Being a weekday and all, I thought the queue wouldn’t be so bad. I mean, the shop’s been here for months, surely the fad’s gone down. But when I got there, omg…

There was a long queue snaking right outside the shop, with 4 blue-uniformed-men guarding/facilitating the queues (explanation of the low unemployment rate here: jobs created for every single imaginable task). And worst, the queue doesn’t end there.

It continues behind the store, right up onto the bridge that connects to Takashimaya!! >.< ack. And a very helpful little board at the front of the shop clearly indicates that: you are just TWO hours away from being served. X_x

Fantastic. buek. As crazy as I am about their doughnuts, I don’t think I’m mentally ready to go queue up for 2 hours (and buy only 6). Might end up losing my brains halfway thru the queue.

And I thought the queue at the (not-krispy-kreme)-doughnut kiosk in Raffles City Shopping Centre basement was bad. :s

Move over wombat. The position of ‘my favourite animal’ has just been usurped.  By…

The Anteater.

Yup. Saw a documentary a while back on Animal Planet when they were doing a feature on animals in the South America continent. The Anteater was huge, furry, and snoring under a tree. hahaha. It tried to run away from the camera but I think he was more like lumbering away than really running away. Anyway, that piqued my interest in the animal and started reading about it on wikipedia. Like, it eats 30,000 ants a day. BIG healthy protein diet.

Then, I was shopping around Ikebukuro the other day, and amidst the pile of tiny elephants and lions soft toys, there was one solitary anteater! Seriously, who sells anteater soft toys anyway? Except the zoo of course. Usually it’s just bears, dogs, cat, and bunnies. So I bought it.

Here it is in its new habitat. Foraging for ants (and found none in Japan!)

Once again today, awoken myself this morning to blinding sunshine that got me panicked. OMFG! Am I late for work? Did I miss my alarm? Only to realise that it’s only just 6.10am. Gargh, this must stop - I should start wearing sleeping mask to bed…

So yeah, these days the sun rises at 5.10am and by 6am, it’s as bright as 9am back in KL, which is near the equator line. I’m still not used to it, many a times I panicked for nothing. And sometimes worse, I go back to bed, only to panic again for nothing - thought I really missed the alarm…

These days coming to early Autumn season, the sun sets much earlier, nowadays around 5.10pm - which is kinda sad, coz by the time I get off work (should I ever manage to get off work on-time, that is) it’ll be dark, gloomy, depressing.

Somewhat, growing up near the equator makes one ignorant about the dynamics of sunrise and sunset. Always assumed that around 6.45am = sunrise, 7.45pm = sunset.

So I drove the company car (whee!) out to customer’s site today. Driving in Japan can be quite a challenge. Though there are quite a lot of K-cars here in Tokyo, but it doesn’t feel like it’s as much as the Kancil and Kelisa we see driven by young tudung-clad girls with their driver’s seat adjusted maximum to the front. So far in front that it’s further than the steering wheel and dashboard, pretty much sitting between the windscreen wipers and the front bumper - and that they can never see the rear/side/make-up mirrors.

Okay, shall not digress. So driving in Tokyo, we’ve gotta be on alert all the time. There’s the incoming lane rights that we’ve never experienced, much like in Singapore and US. Then we’ve gotta always be on the lookout for bicycles - they’re much more notorious than our mat motors back home. Parking in tight spaces is a daily test of skill (and if you can’t even side park, forget about parking in Tokyo, either pay thru the roof to parking attendants, or drive non-stop). And of course, the ever-distracting phone calls, SMSes, on-board TV, make-up sessions, boogers-mining sessions, and that annoying female voice of a navi system that keeps insisting you take the highway eventhough it’s jammed right to her nostrils.

And today it was about crazy taxi drivers. Comparable to those in New York. I almost got killed twice thanks to 2 idiotic taxi drivers. They seem to be so much more interested in every opportunity of a customer flag-down, than to care for his rear bumper. Twice today I had 2 taxi drivers in less than 50 metres in front of me, swerving from the 4th lane to the 1st lane (and stopped his car 45 degrees off the lane at that) just to ferry new customers. WTF? Do they really think that whenever they press the Hazard light button (it seems like Hazard light is used for all reasons except during a hazard/emergency situation) after noticing a customer flag-down, that the world would come to a slow motion and he can safely swerve past 3 lanes? Of course, the taxi driver’s actions will generally cause cars directly behind them to brake so hard that they could flatspot all 4 tyres (and maybe even the spare in the trunk, should it get bumped from the car behind who can’t stop in time) locking up under braking.

I’m sure this is much worse than Fernando Alonso being held up on track. And I’m even more sure that if was Alonso facing such taxi drivers, he would not just show the finger and curse from his car, but get down and headbutt the taxi driver with his helmet. He’d gladly give up his World Championship title defence just to get even at these taxi driver.

You would wonder why on earth these taxi drivers would risk their taxi and their lives with such moves? Well, the motivation of ferrying a customer with the meter starting at 660 yen (approx USD 5.70) for the first 2 kilometres would be enough. I’m sure the profit from that alone can afford them 10 rear bumper replacement a month, and downpayment for new taxi in a year. Hmmm, I bet if I search for “taxi bumper” in Yahoo! Japan auction site, I can find bulk packs of 1 dozen taxi rear bumpers for a steal!