06:00 - Wake up
We jumped up only 1 second after the alarm clock rang...
J: It's going to be a loong day la...hope everything will be fine..Can I stay awake?
C: Ah, it's time! wake up quick! it's TODAY!
06:15 - Breakfast
We needed to make sure we store enough energy for the day, as we only prepared some bread for the day due to super tight schedule. It was a proper Japanese style breakfast with rice, miso soup +...oops, my belly! ><
07:00 - Make up start
We wished to had a pre-photoshooting briefing but were told by my "account mgr" in HK only to meet with the photo-shooting team at 7am, for styling.
Well, the first 15 mins was no pleasure at all. Firstly, Jin was kicked out of the room for "girls only, pls come back again in 1 hour" (poor Jin, he could have slept for another precious hour and J: samishi nya><) Secondly, I was kind of blamed by the stylist for not showing up the previous night (come on, I was told NOT to make any contact until 7am...) ......ai, needed to suppress my fire and stayed clam, in order to build a positive relationship with them. But...my stylist was having a bad cold, kept coughing and complaining to herself...what an angry but straight-forward person...@_@
Anyway, we had ourselves dressed up in 2 hours... I was in wedding dress and Jin in Tuxedo.
09:15 - Depart from hotel
All of a sudden, two guys grabbed our belongings at the entrance of hotel...they claimed themselves our photographers.
J: who are these guys? I have never seen them..where is the director? (note: we met a guy during the HK meeting who was "supposed" to be the director - who eventually did not come to Nara).
C: they look like gangsters and still not awaken!! I am soo worried!!
The first photo shooting spot - the closest temple to the hotel
Apparently, the photographers did not do their homework. None of our request was taken into consideration.
J: Why are we going here? I don't recall discussing such a thing. Didn't they receive the information that we have briefed so much?!
C: Oh no, this is not going to work. I need to stop and brief them RIGHT NOW!
While we were doing the short briefing, staff of the temple rushed out. It seems it was the Buddha's birthday and ceremony/festival will happen shortly. They did not permit us to take photos there. The photographer did not seem want to stop and the staff keep persuading/pushing us to leave...J: I don't understand Japanese...I don't understand Japaneses...
C: @_@
I couldn't stand it and asked the photographer why we were there and what for. No photo was taken in that temple AT ALL. It's simply waste of time. Also, will all activities be stopped because of Buddha's birthday?The second photo shooting spot - a nearby Sakura tree
Probably trying to make up for something, they brought us to a big Sakura tree and started our first round of photo taking.
J: Finally, the photo shooting started. But why this place? wanna go to places that we planned ...
C: Whatever you want to take...make sure we have good photos and I will tolerate only for 15 mins...!!
Wao! It was sooooo difficult to make good posture. "Head lower", "chin lower", "RELAX!", "RELAX!""look at wife" "look at head/hand" (???)...the photographer kept yelling at us...we had no clue...we thought we were already relaxed....aiyaya...I was a bit irritated for not being able to fulfill their request (but it's my responsibility to improve). Jin felt the same, too...(I hope my interpretation didn't make things worse).At that time, a group of kindergarten kids went by....little kids kept saying.."kawaii~" at me...hohohoho...
Anyway, time's up, rehearsal done. We needed a "real place" to take good photos, we requested to move to a lake in the Nara garden.The third photo shooting spot - 浮見堂
We got on the rental car and moved to the lake - 浮見堂.
I was totally drawn into that perfect environment, got into the mood immediately (poor Jin was still in the midst of communication barriers and could not relax fully). The photographers, too, was getting exited for the possibilities that he could create in that perfect environment ...we made a lot of postures, one shoot after the other, on a rock backed by the lake, along the bridge, on a small road inside the wood, etc. We started to enjoy it =)
(Jin took this from his mobile while he was told to "rest")
J: Finally, somewhere we have asked to take pictures. Goodo sakura trees!!! Lots of poses which we asked to do!!! yey yey!!!
C: This is so ideal...we are surrounded by sakura, sakura trees, sakura carpet, wind blows us sakura flakes...thanks god we are alive!
It was a hot season for 花見, many tourists were around for sakura appreciation. All of them were surprised at us - it is very uncommon to do outdoor and pre-marriage photo-shooting in Japan. Some took pictures of us (they thought it was an ? event and we were artists/ models! hahaha) and many of them sent their blessings to us...arigato gozaimasu! \(^^)(^^)/
Photographers got really excited, he kept pressing the shutter and went beyond schedule - we had an appointment at Kimono place at 12:00! We quickly called to delay but at that time the photographer tempted me to change to another dress for "just a few more photos". I did the change in the tiny rental car...and continue the photo-shooting....
13:50 - change to kimono at ふた藤:
Our apologies for being late m(_ _)m! That was so Japan - staff standby for us and kept their smiling faces. All our expectation was met (in term of time requirement, quality of service...everything!) We had 3 staff to help us. 1 of them was the student of the kimono master, it was rare occasion that people do such a formal kimono dressing like us!
While I took my washroom break, Jin had already gotten out of his tuxedo. After Jin was changed to 紋付袴, my hair was already half set. (it was only around 15 min!). Everybody then, focused on my kimono...in a total of 50 min, everything was perfectly done! I also received my Japanese style bouquet - how lovely! This is less than half of the typical amount of time taken!!! Thank you sooo much for the ふた藤 staff!!!
(taken the day after - my kawaii Japanese bouquet)
15:10 - full team again:What a shame...the HK/TW team came late for the pick up (the photo shooting team went for lunch while we were changing). We went back to silence again...they were astonished at our looks and how serious we were for the photo-shooting. I felt the pressure of the photographer. His didn't react as sharp as he used to be and let us do all the instruction...
15:30 - The fourth photo shooting spot - 春日大社-夫婦大國社
This is a temple for blessing of all aspects to a married couple. We chose this place not only for this very meaningful aspect, but also for the fantasy of the heart shaped wish board called"絵馬".
(hehe..this is the wish that we made (^3(^^)
We made a request to this particular place, which was something unknown to the team. It supposed to be a 10 min walk from the car park to the temple, but we ended up taking almost doubled time... I could only take small steps in kimono and wherever we went, we caught people's attention... people amazed, congratulated us, kept taking photos of us, not only as a scene but also with us... we were like tourism ambassadors, waving our hands, smiling to the crowd. ahhhh, we needed to say no, walked quickly and avoided eye contacts to the people...sorry!
We were worried if we were allowed to take photos in the temple....especially it was the Buddha's birthday...Jin made a courtesy conversation with the staff at the temple and yeah! everything was alright.
We felt that the photographer was a bit nervous, did not know how to handle photos for kimono. No more sitting on the ground and everything had to be super cautious/ elegant. But gradually, he found his way, he focused more on the overall atmosphere of the pictures, instead of doing this and that actions, he wanted us to give more emotion and facial expression. Jin was 100% tuned into this photo style, we all were excited for involvement of EVERYONE! Jin even made surprises to us...he initiated a number of facial expression/pose for photos, HAPPY!!
J: Although I had to tell the staff some exaggeration, we were able to get an exceptional approval from the temple to take some pictures. This was a great thing!!! We even got a small gift (not on sale)!!! Thank you obasan!!!
C: My dream came true! I am in Kimono with Jin in an authentic Japanese environment. I used to be the tourists who takes pictures of kimono girls but I am taking opposite role...haha. We were also told that this is the one and only one temple for a couple's wellness in all aspects! We will definitely become "shiawase" yo!
The fifth photo shooting spot - Japanese tea house 水谷茶屋
A Japanese tea house is a must! (I always like Japanese tea house and it has been a must-go place for my every visit) Thanks to Jin's extensive research, this tea house was the most gorgeous one in the area. It was in fact also an unknown place for us, we needed to keep walking to find this place and we were there!
I couldn't stand the temptation of Japanese green tea and started ordering... We thought it might be good for the team to take a break, we treated them green tea and snack as well. They were melted by our "hospitality" and became so nice to us, we started some heart-to-heart conversation, how Jin and I met, how was the typical life of photographers, etc. They even took out their personal camera and took photos with us. It was no longer "work" but a "tourist fun" for them. This was really GREAT!
The photographer was really like a kid, explored something new (kimono and Japanese places) and was totally into taking photos of his real interest (which of course aligns with our requests). He jumped here and there and suggested many ways of taking good pictures. We finally reached this ideal situation of "ENJOYMENT FOR EVERYBODY!!"
(Jin's mom said we look like 七五三 kid's birthday dolls)
They also helped us to take private photos via Jin's mobile phone...hehehe (which was supposed to be restricted)
J: This tea house was very nice. It matched very well with the Kimono. It was worth coming here.
C: Yeah! This is so nice. At this point, I am already 80% satisfied.
The sixth location: Dawn at 奈良公園
We enjoyed the time so much that we forgot when it was...probably after 5pm. Time became so critical as sun was setting. We named a few and the photographers suggested a place on the other side of the 奈良公園 , for sunset photos. It was a huge pitch of green. So spacious and peaceful.
We prepared a number of props but it had been too busy and messy that we were unable to plan/structure any...here we go - prior to the trip, we decided to write each other a message card, expressing our feelings. We kept it a secret and read only on the photo-shooting day. We wanted the photographers to take our real, touching emotions.
J: The 奈良公園 is very huge but there are items in the 公園 which each is very attractive. The section we took the sunset pictures was an open area of lawn. Very large yet silent place which went well with the sunset.
C: hehehe...how lovable Jin is! we had a lot of sweet sweet moments together and the photo team said they really envy us...!
The seventh photo-shooting spot - 人力車
We planned a lot of scenarios for our precious kimono look, including 人力車. The team was very committed and quickly located 人力車 for us...Jin again spoke with the 人力車 "driver" about our request. It costed some extra money and we went for it. We had the "driver" pulled the 人力車, Jin pulled the 人力車...funny photos!
J: This was an interesting experience for me. I hope the pictures turn out well!!!
C: haha, do we look like 華麗一族? The photo shows not only the authentic Japanese but also thickness of history.
19:00 The eighth photo-shooting spot - Nara old streets
It was getting dark when we return to the Nara old streets, which is somewhere near to our hotel.
However, our eager wasn't fulfilled yet. Night pictures were extremely difficult...the level of light needed to be so well measured and tuned. A few trial and errors and photos became PERFECT! I mean Jin looked sooooooooo handsome in those dim photos (haha!!!) The photographer was really in his mood and fulled engaged to take good photos for us. Trying this, trying that, and showed us the gorgeous photos!! We mean it!! sooooooooooooo gorgeous!!! Yey Yey!!
J: The pictures he started to take were very artistic. I can't wait for the outcome!!!!!
C: Wow...it was so artistic and classy...like movies of the 50s...I mean ...again, 華麗! hahaha
20:00 Return to hotel
We were so content! (despite that fact that we missed Chinese costumes) We continued doing some private photos with Kimono...but all of a sudden! I felt soooooooo painful in my chest, the kimono was really tight tight...I was able to switch off the pain mode when I was 100% focus on photo-shooting but...when everything was done...it blasted out. Jin quickly undressed me. We folded a thick level of clothes (for return on the next day)...n layers of clothes that we wrapped ourselves in the kimono. Whoa?! it was sooo heavy!!! I couldn't believe we were wearing such heavy weight and walked (moved) all over!!!
With such a "weight training" and after the undressing of kimono...I found myself lost the belly created from the breakfast (for time concern, I only had 1 bite of the bread for lunch)....we became soooooo hungry and rushed out for food. Due to door restriction, we needed to come back in 30 min, we bought some food convenient store and kept eating eating eating like refugees. ><
P.S: We had our own way of showing appreciation...it was a loong day with so much achievement, we really deserve something! It is our habit to "chop" a "well done" stamp on the other's forehand if something was done brilliantly. We both awarded this stamp!
It was sooo content..and we were full full....drawn into bed and a deep deep sleep.....
A few words from us:
J: This was an interesting experience for me. I had known that taking pictures is very much an important aspect of life for the HK people, but everything was new to me. I think the camera man was very tolerable to me since I could not understand his instructions. However, I think the outcome should be awesome!!! Because, Carol was soooooooo lovely and cute and kawaii and kirei and and and .......!!!
C: Jin, I know it was not easy for you. Thank you for tolerating everything...HK/TW service level, communication barriers, my temper....hahaha. For me it was a mixture of everything, but the happy memories with you and the excitement of anticipation (for the final products) worth everything! Let's keep our fingers crossed, hope everything will turn our perfect in our album!!!
J: hehehe. Thank you ne, Carol, for all your tolerance in smoothening out the communication. The outcome of the picture and my expressions are solely because your care was there. Although there were lots of efforts, money, and time spent, I think we did put EVERYTHING into this big event. I just cannot wait for the outcome already!!
P.S.#2: this is a bonus photo...thanks for reading this lengthy article...>w<
(This was the 'dorayaki" or "叮噹豆沙餅" as we call it in HK, it was of the size of my face! hehehe, so yummy and I finished it up at that night...)
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