Suzuka Hot Air Balloon Competition 2008

One of my very last minute trips. had a 3 day weekend this week and decided to go somewhere. at first i wanted to see gifu's ukai(comomarant ? fishing) but then i found this! lots n lots of hot air balloons!(HAB) it was in suzuka though and the event started pretty early ( 620am) i decided to take the last train there and find an internet/manga cafe to bump around for the night. i checked google maps for one and they said there was one pretty near...how wrong they were... i couldnt even find it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! walked like aimlessly for an hour and a half. then i decided to give up. at first i thought of sleeping at one of the many benches at bus stops but they were patrol cars coming now n then(unlike malaysia) and i wouldn't want to talk to them, they're slightly discriminatory against foreigners i reckon..once i was stopped to verify whether the bicycle i was riding on was mine and i took them ages ago ( my japanese friend said they don't do that to japanese....) deciding i would rather spare myself to long conversation i would have with them if i slept there i decided to head for the venue itself, which was by the river. it was abt 1.30/2am when i got there and pretty quiet. there were quiet abit of stars too, and since i had time i decided to experiment a lil on long exposure photography(will post it up if i have time) i dozed off for abt 30 mins before it got reallyreally ff*ing cold! luckily i brought a thin jacket but it wasn't enough and i din have gloves!i just couldnt sleep anymore, so i packed up and headed for a convenient store 5 mins away(they're really godsent, 24 hours with incredible service) bought a cup noodle and some kara age (fried chicken). it was almost as nice as the hot coffee i had on top of mount fuji :P then read some mangas they had there and by then it was almost 5. went back to the venue, played a lil DS, then by 530, ppl starting coming!people prepping up their balloons!
the queue was for free breakfast, it was only bt 6 but already they were a couple hundred of people! this event has been one of the better ones..not many events have free stuff :P

being inflated

Asimo,Honda's flagship robot says Hi!
2 balloons are up!
Asimo takes flight
other balloons on the horizon. they were alot of balloons and they all couldnt launch from the same place..in fact only 2 were launched from my place.. in fact my place was used as some sort of checkpoint.
asimo does the superman pose
one of my fav pics, burning fuel!
a diagonal line?
a crude traingle?

an empty carriage?
big circle,small circle, kind looks like gears!
more balloons launching from afar
balloons up in the air!there were quite a few more behind me
2 balloons
honda's other balloon ( honda has a very big presence here just as how toyota is based in toyota)
blue balloon drops of checkpoint marker
flying really low!
looks like sth from a wallpaper eh
spectators enjoying the view
photographers capturing the moment
wannabe red hot chilli peppers band...
tv crew on board.. these were test flights for the public.. the queue started at 6am and the announcer said by 8, the queue was a couple hundred long

flying tako(octopus)!!!it really looks cool when it's being inflated, the tentacles seems to move, just like an octopus!
4 balloons for public use
kelly,kamarull,3rd yr junior and kelly's friend, Rie from suzuka kousen joined me at about 9 am. they're posing with the SDF ground forces, who are looking for recruits!
Armored up!they even did this for free, how cool is that!
group pic!

i then headed with them to Rie's town(nearby) as there was some celebration going on. will post pics if i feel like it.

hopefully,there will be more photos like this from now on. current schedule is

a. college fest
b.gujo hachimon(one of gifu's top tourist spots) with the photography club
c.kobe luminarie
d.winter hols (ski and most likely osaka/amanohasidate)

would love to squeeze abit in for autumn photos.

till then!

this has been one damn long post eh :P