DAY FIVE: ULTRAMANLAND

This post is dedicated to (chef!)Agul and his suitactor(s) AND his other colleagues, whose woobie shenanigans kept the strange longing Ultrafic flowing for three months straight. Thanks a bunch, you big blue tsundere squeeball. ;___;

State of mind: hungry
Current soundtrack: Dance Mix - Kamen Rider Den-O - Climax Jump (AAA)

When I saw N hugging chef!Agul—nay, clinging to him as if for dear life—I was reminded very suddenly why we like Ultraman. Outside your family, you attach yourself to something that gives you stability. And that, in the form of a costumed chef who will pet you on the head, was hers.

Gweeee. Sorry. Just had to get that off my chest.

Sped through brekkies today and left the tour group—ye gods, FINALLY. I will speak not about the family who have personified kiasuism and pushy parenting for me forever. Much. Headed for the train station and promptly realized that oh shite, we didn’t know where the platform for the train was.

Luckily Japan had thought of that, and all you needed to do was just follow the handily coloured trail.

Boarded the limited express/tokkyuu Ariake no. 10. Talked to an old guy in the train who later helped me with my bags, yay! Snagged a taxi and headed for the teenyweeny but cosy-cosy Hotel Blanca. Surprise surprise, it literally DUMPS you into Mitsui Greenland. (Now I know where to stay the next time if I can’t afford Verde! *w*) The reception was very kind, evidenced thusly:

R: OK, and here we have some discount vouchers for (insert little list of Greenland-connected theme parks)
M: Gee thanks, that’s all really nice of you, but I just want to go and see Ultramanland today.
R: Oh, that’s very easy. *unfurls Map of Awesome* You go aaaaaaall the way over there, and when you arrive at the East Gate, you just go out. K?
M: ‘Kay! :D Thanks!
R: Have fun! See you!
M: Oh I WILL. :D Byebye!

…I went aaaaaaaall the way over SOMEwhere. Couldn’t find the gate at all, and Greenland is all over goddamn hills. Would you believe I wound up ENTIRELY LOST and ended up exiting from a service/staff exit?

M: Wait! Stop! *hee haa* I want to get out!
Staff: Uh, miss, you know if you’ve come out here you can’t come back in?
M: _Ohshit._ Uh…I have this…coupon thing…this is OK, right?
S: Oh yes.
M: Lovely. So, which way is UMLand?
S: *points*
M: Thank you! *hee haa jog jog jog*
S: Have fun!
M: I WILL! 8D~

A few hills and one crossed road later…it APPEARED LIKE A BRILLIANT VISION @o@. Tiga, Dyna AND Gaia statues were there, guarding the road before it. And LO, M.Y.’s heart did sing and soar and do happy bouncy dances.

Tickets were being sold with original CREW GUYS badges (for a small surcharge) so I got one—AND a discount voucher. Which I could use tomorrow. ♥ I’d missed the opening ceremony by a fair bit, so went walking around a bit before catching every single show that went on after that. (and to be truthful, some of the pictures I'm still planning to put above this? Taken when I returned the following day.)

This was how it went.

Christmas Fantasy — Santa’s White Bag and Black Bag (Santa no Shiroi Bukuro Kuroi Bukuro)

Otherwise known as The One With Booska In. Oh gods. I HATE Booska. Wryyyyy?!!

Anyway. Show starts with your friendly yellow monster being lent a white scarf from the MC lady. The story moves on to Santa, who senses a dark aura and traps a rampaging Red King in the form of a toy, in his black bag. Santa goes on to natter something about all darkness being evil. ‘Ah,’ says M.Y., ‘I know where this is going. Agul’s in this, isn’t he? Light-and-shadows-and-balance, and all that.’ Wrong. Santa was dead serious. : Booska bumps into Santa, knocking him out (lay off the ramen!) and accidentally procuring the black bag and Santa’s other, white one. He accidentally chucks the RK figure out, which brings it back to life and prompts Gaia to appear—in a Santa suit!— (“Eh? Where’s the party?”) Booska makes his escape, and a short interlude follows involving Christmas music, and Nice in a Santa suit singing ‘Jungle gym’ in lieu of ‘Jingle bells’ and performing an Opappi routine.

Nice: Sonna no kankee nee, sonna no kankee nee…
Everyone else: BWAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
M.Y.: _What in the world is this unholy doinkery?_ OAo;

A voice issues from the black bag, begging Booska to release its wronged owner. As is usually the case, it is a fakeout; Booska does this anyway, and a seijin pops out mwahaha-ing away, intending to steal the presents and destroy all his competitors. Boo runs in shame (Gaia appears again around this bit) but is persuaded to atone for his doings by the mysterious MC lady. He returns, and another fight ensues where he recaptures Santa’s white bag. He vacillates for what seems to be FOREVER about what figure to chuck out from the bag (JUST THROW THE WHOLE THING, DAMMIT!)

So he throws a figure. Just one. Finally. And Agul appears, back to the audience and looking frightfully awesome, because he is the original Blue Badass Antihero Ultra. The first thing out of his mouth?

“Merry Christmas.” (+ thumbs up)

“Not what we called you here for, Agul!” ←x_x; (Gaia, half-dead)

"...Do you have ANY idea how embarassing it was to say that?!"

Ahem. Anyway. The two fight, and are duly trounced. However, Santa appears to kick some butt (wait a minute...) and the MC heals the two to full power. (WAIT A MINUTE...) The final battle ensues, and Santa/MC reveal themselves to be Ultra Father and Ultra Mother. Ohboy. Why did I not see this coming? This, btw, is also about the only time I’ve seen Ultras do a dance in real-life. A-Agullll… *sweatdrop* (trust me. You may not want to ask where the dancing came in...)

OYAH. ‘Santa’? Agul is ‘dark’. Faust and Mephisto were ‘dark’. Tiga WAS dark. Your manga oniisan was dark. You of all people should know the world is not binary.

After the show, Father went off outside to take pictures with the adoring public. While in the queue, I overheard a conversation between a mother-of-two and um, some-other-lady, and chipped in helpfully with ‘yeah, Ultra-love is eternal.’ See how much of a kaypo Malaysian I am? XD We then got to talking further.

“You’re not Japanese?”

“Oh no, Malaysian.”

“-_-…Do you go online?”

“-_-; …Yeah, I’m M2000…”

“Oh my. I’m N.”

“ZOMAIGOD N-sama!” *takes her hand and pumps it*

N is a BNF I hadn’t been in contact with for about a year. I had mentioned to her friend (and one of my worships) S that I would be coming down, but never expected to see her instead! Sorry guys, no pictures—Japanese BNFs, particularly from this fandom, are all veddy veddy veddy shy and secretive. In public, anyway. But she is kiut, and her kids are kiut too. :D

We talked a bit and spent s’more time hanging out later. But now it was time for the next show!

A Warrior’s Determination (Senshi no Kakugo)

Hikari sounded good. Mebius sounded…generic. ):/

Kyuraso Seijin works for an ebil organization, but seeing Mebius and Hikari in action, he decides he wants to be an Ultra too. Someone’s willing to help—too bad someone happens to be Mefilas, who happens to be planning world domination. Again. Smarmy man obtains Man and Seven’s cell samples in battle, and turns Kyuraso into Chaosroid U.

:O Mebius and Hikari are warned about Mefi’s plans, and Hikari (smexily) beats some info out of a Muzan Seijin but is tricked and bashed up. Flying in to help is Scott, and the two go to help Mebius, who has been tricked into some sort of pact by Mefilas. (“Defeat Chaosroid, and I will leave the Earth.” “…That’s a promise, y’hear?” “Yes, of course. IF you win.”)

Kyuraso!U is finally defeated (of his own volition), as is the Chaosroid S(even) that later appears. But the coolest part of the show is Mefilas going down in a blaze. Mebius is cheered to full strength by the audience, and fires off a beam—and straight down one side of the stage, a full line of firecrackers went off with a splendid and cool effect. How splendid and how cool? Dude, I watched this show FOUR TIMES and I forgot to take a picture of it at every single go. I just stared with my mouth in an ‘O’.

Mefi acts well, and is deliciously cruel (how DARE you kick my puppy!!!) but talks waaay too much. Pontificatus maximus…

During the show I saw three kids with hand-sewn UM appliqués on their jumpers. Law, were they squeeable.

Ultra Gakkou

…Um, 80 teaches road safety. Baltan interferes. Then he doesn’t. There’s not a lot more to say. I wish there was!

Paper Theater (Kamishibai): Ultraman MomoTaro

LORD SAVE US ALL, ULTRAMAN MOMOTARO. *dies laughing*

The story goes as the Momotaro story generally goes – old couple (Ultra Father and Ultra Mother) find a peach and cut it open to have a kiut little baby spring out. Ultraman Momotaro goes forth into the world with his banner (it says ‘Uchuu-ichi’ instead of ‘Nihon-ichi’) and ‘millet dumplings of light’ to defeat the monsters on Ogre Isle (for some reason, this includes a daikon-snarfing Gomora). On the way he meets Nice (the dog), Zearth (the monkey) and Dyna (the pheasant).

Very cute, with JUST as much crack as you’d come to expect from something containing Taro. *dies laughing again*

Ultra Petit P

The last time I went, there was a fadorable Zetton in the Petit P. Picture him, this angular, grumbly black space dinosaur, killer of Ultras and emitter of searing fireballs, *squealing* into the audience, “Minasan, konnichiwaaaa~! Boku wa, Zetton desu~~~~!” This time it was a not-as-fadorable Taraban, and a definitely-not-fadorable Hanejirou. Mm. This should tell you something, as Hanejirou IS the essence of fadorable. Both were in Santa suits. The day after, Taraban took leave and was replaced by Zarab.

Nothing much to report here. It was a song guessing game.

Seems that N comes extremely regularly to Ultramanland, so everyone knows her and her chibbits. :o~ Ii naaaaa. She was extremely reluctant to leave at 5, as was I, so we, er, dillydallied near the Ultra de Restaurant (‘Land also has an Ultraman M78 World shop and Ultra Dessertland). Apparently less and less people go to Ultraman per year (although that day, supposedly, was not too bad.) Chef!Agul showed up, and aye, I remembered N luffluffLUFFS Agul. Seeing her hug him, and him stroking her hair, made me wibble mightily. I have to admit that much. When I saw N hugging chef!Agul—nay, clinging to him as if for dear life—I was reminded very suddenly why we like Ultraman. Outside your family, you attach yourself to something that gives you stability. And that, in the form of a costumed chef who will pet you on the head, was hers. And it’s not just her. To the fans, he is ‘mercy and (a sense of) justice’. He is ‘a cherished thing’. He’s Ultraman. We may never find the likes of him again, yet one can always hope.

Got back to the hotel, futzed around figuring out how to pack stuff, and went for dinner at the hotel’s little restaurant. We were the only people there. O_o; It was fun translating the courses for Dad. It was NOT so fun realizing that Ho Lee Shuet, the little fish was NOT the main course and was followed by a little steak. So…much…meat…*falls over*

Even the weather seemed happy to cooperate. I hoped it would tomorrow. Tomorrow, I would try to complete every goal I set, including the shopping. I was still short of much music!