Dear Chibi,

Today Hubby and I went to see the beautiful cherry blossoms blooming at the Auburn Botanical Gardens :D The Sydney Cherry Blossom Festival is an annual event but for some reason I always miss it! This time I marked it on my calendar so we wouldn’t forget :)

Credit goes to Hubby for all these amazing photos~

You probably couldn’t tell from the photos but there were so many people it was kinda crazy! Most of those portrait shots were taken when we arrived in the morning. Half an hour made a lot of difference. If SMASH attendees came around today, there wouldn’t be any room ;p Surprisingly, not many dressed up even though they encouraged people to cosplay or to wear a yukata/kimono… which lead to an abundance of people wanting photos with me. I don’t mind taking photos with strangers (it’s flattering that they like your attire) but some don’t even ask~ I got pulled over a few times @.@ What ever happened to a bit of courtesy? Others were really polite though so I guess there’s some of everything ^^”

I was really surprised to see a Madman photo booth! :O How did they end up here without me knowing? ;D The booth was pretty cool~ it comes with a print-out and a video sent to you ^.^ I took one with Hubby and one with Kaz and mum who were also at the event.

Crazy girls ;D

There were two main stages at the festival: Harajuku stage and Kyoto stage. Like the name suggests, the Harajuku stage featured j-pop, dance and karaoke while the Kyoto stage had traditional arts and performances. Both had some entertaining acts. At the Harajuku stage, we heard plenty of Kyary Pamyu Pamyu! One of the singers covered anime songs~ she did Evangelion and Pokemon along with some 80s anime (SORRY I DON’T KNOW THEM XD). Over at the Kyoto stage we enjoyed Taiko drumming which was probably our favourite performance. These guys are so passionate and enthusiastic :D

Overall, I had a pretty good time :D We sure got to experience a nice dose of Japanese culture this weekend :) The main problem is that there’s way too many people >.< We queued up for about an hour waiting in line for food O_O I would suggest for next time to have a very big breakfast and not eat during the day XD

The festival is also on next weekend for those who want to check it out. There should be even more cherry blossoms to see then!