Must do in Japan 2: PURIKURA!

Previous post was long enough so I broke it up into 2 posts

MUST DO IN JAPAN 2: TAKE SOME PURIKURA (photostickers in a shiny photobooth)
I remember when I was in secondary school and we would fork out like $12 to take some neoprints in bugis! haha. Purikuras are kind of like a regular thing that girls in Japan go to (though the frequency really varies) It's probably a pretty big part of a Japanese highschool girl's life and I'd say it's definitely something anyone should try while visiting Japan!

But be careful because the purikura corner is only for girls or guys who are accompanying girls. strictly no guys-only groups! Guys not allowed to be girly and take neoprints!? hahaha.

That aside, omg I have to say that purikura has really EVOLVED. I remember those tacky little photo booths where I went to back in JC and when I first came to Japan. Go in, take a few shots that get spammed with sparklies, then try to cut and divide them up equally with my friends. And later realise that my hair was sticking out weirdly in some photos. BUT SAYONARA TO THOSE DAYS.

As we walked into the purikura section we noticed that there were a lot of chairs and mirrors...

There was a WHOLE AREA FOR YOU TO DOLL UP! omg wth hahaha complete with hair dryers, curling tongs, cotton buds and cotton pads for you to touch up your make up!! No wonder Japanese girls always look so perfect in their purikuras. wth seriously Japanese people really think of everything! Though I think this is not very common, I haven't seen make up areas before actually.

Anw when Esther and I saw that we were like *omfg tension agaru!* and then started redoing our hair LOLOL. It was late and there was no one there so we had the whole place to ourselves!

Looks totally pro right, but the truth is the two of us probably took like half an hour trying to curl my short hair in. Until I gave up and asked esther to do the back of my head for me :x

My hair all curled in :D so inspired to take out my hair iron and curl my hair everyday now :x and that heart shape thing that esther is holding is the cotton pad for touching up make up!

Couldn't resist :x

So okay when we were finally done messing around with the hair iron and nice lighting, we went into one of the booths.

LOOK AT THIS PURIKURA BOOTH. So smart! No more having to worry that your friend looks a lot taller than you -coughesthercough- because now you can both sit down and be the same height!! HAHAHA. SO AWESOME.

After that we went to edit the photos! You can choose how much you want your eyes enlarged and stuff, like those apps on the iphone, but I dunno, something is just different about doing it at a purikura booth with your friend next to you!

And here are the results:

OMG OUR SKIN SO SMOOTH AND MY EYES ARE SO BIG HEHEHE :D

You can also get soft copies of your photos sent to your phone so you can continue editing them until you look perfect  have a digital keepsake forever. we totally copied poses suggested by the purikura machine, but we just looked stupid in some hahahaha XD

And look at that! No more having to fuss over who gets which photos. They came pre-cut into two pieces and I could even choose the design of the template! I chose one that had pretty leopard print deorations since I never cut up my purikuras anyway.

And the best thing? This only cost 400jpy! Which is like, what, 5.20SGD. siao! so cheap! that's only 2.60 per person! we almost went to take another one on the way out LOL but it was cold and late and we wanted to play taiko no tatsujin lol. But it was too noisy and we couldn't hear the music so we just went home instead D:

So anw my conclusion is that purikura is awesome and everyone should try because it probably isn't as awesome and available overseas. Just make sure there are some girls present or you may get kicked out :P