Lawson e-Tickets ~ An Odyssey of Pain
Phew, I will use the opportunity to write this during my longer train trips while I am travelling through Japan. I really need to get some stuff off my chest and I wanna write about some of the things I’ve had to go through trying to obtain those freaking e-tickets for Keiko’s Birthday Event as well as the Kalafina Lives in January. The title of this post already kinda gives away that this journey was filled with lots of horrible experiences and mental breakdowns but I am happy to report that I did end up getting access to my tickets despite it looking very bleak for a while there. Gonna break this down in a few sections to make it easier to digest. ⚠️Warning⚠️This might all come across as overly dramatic to people who can actually deal with crazy curveballs that are thrown their way but I personally don’t do well with any sort of unexpected turn of events. There’s also just a lot of random blabbering and crying so I apologise for that in advance. Without further ado, let’s get going ( σ'ω')σ
Getting a Mobal SIM
This was the first big hurdle. You DO NEED a Japanese SIM card with mobile data and the ability to send SMS in order to use the Lawson e-ticket app. I was in Austria at the time so it was not an easy feat, especially considering that most foreigner friendly Japanese SIM cards only come with a data plan. I found out rather quickly that I didn’t actually have to do the app verification until much later so for the lottery application, it was enough to have a dedicated phone number from the SIM you were about to use later. Still, there was the question of where to get that number at such short notice…? The Lawson app doesn’t work with a lot of the popular SIM cards so it was important to make the right choice. After looking into all of the options and getting some advice from fellow fans, a Mobal SIM seemed like the best idea. Unfortunately, it would have never gotten to me in time for the ticket application and they also didn’t ship to Austria (because no one does☠️) so I had to find another way. A friend recommended one of her acquaintances who was willing to help me out. He ordered the SIM for me, handled the initial registration (they require an ID to complete the process) and first payment and then sent me the phone number as well as the account info so I could proceed with my lottery application. All of that took longer than I would have liked so I was constantly scared I’d miss the application deadline. Needless to say, I was stressed as hell. I am also stuck with a monthly fee for the unforeseeable future because I don‘t wanna go through all of this again. I did choose one of their cheaper plans with voice and data but it’s still almost ¥2,000 a month😶🌫️
Application for Tickets
You had to use a mobile phone and VPN to make the application which kinda irritated me. I am a millennial so I definitely prefer doing this sort of stuff on a computer. It just doesn’t feel right going through all the steps on a tiny screen. The amount of screenshots I took for this is wild but I wanted to make sure I got all the important information. At the end I had a total of eight applications (two for Keiko’s B-Day event and six for the Kalafina concerts - from both fan clubs).
Payment for Tickets
As always, I couldn’t pay for the tickets myself so I asked the guy who got me my SIM card to do it for me. Unfortunately he took his sweet time and there was also a stupid mix-up regarding the different deadlines so he ended up not being able to pay for the Kalafina tickets in time, it was a huge mess😰This was actually the thing I was so upset about a while ago😣I was obviously quite angry at the guy for not paying sooner but at the end of the day, I was the one to blame. I hated myself for mistakenly assuming that the Kalafina deadline was the same as the Keiko B-Day event one, I still can’t believe I would have made such a stupid mistake. I was dealing with so many applications and screenshots at that point that I just lost track of everything😢And till this day I don’t understand why the Kalafina payment period ended one day earlier than the Keiko one because the lotteries ended on the same day and the results were also announced on the same day🙃Thankfully, Hikaru’s lottery was right after the FC ones and I managed to score all three concert tickets through that one. Those were two shitty weeks though because things were so uncertain and I couldn’t start planning my trip and booking my flight. I was so relieved when the payment process was finally completed despite it taking very long again and someone else actually having to do it because the original guy didn’t have enough cash that week😮💨A rollercoaster of emotions😰
Receiving the Physical SIM
Fair warning‼️ This section is LONG. I did not want to risk my SIM being shipped across the world so I thought it was the best idea to just pick it up in person once I got to Japan. I had to meet the guy anyway to hand over all the money I owed him so we arranged a meeting for December 4th, a day after my arrival. Now here’s when things took a very bad turn for me. Not that anything before that had been pleasant but this was so much worse. I was supposed to meet the guy at a train station close to where he stayed. We agreed to meet at 7:30 in the morning just before his commute to work. Got there a bit early despite initially taking the wrong train and then I just waited at the station exit/entrance. Suddenly this young man came straight at me and greeted me which led me to assume that it was the guy I was supposed to be meeting. I only kinda knew what he looked like from his small Facebook profile pic but the age and mannerism seemed to match so I had no reason to believe it wasn‘t him, especially after he greeted me so enthusiastically. Then I explicitly asked him if he was the guy I was waiting for and he confirmed it🙃 Can you already tell where this is going?😨
He seemed to be in quite a rush so I brought out the envelope with his cash and asked him about the SIM card🫣He came across as quite confused at my mention of the SIM card and that should have been my first clue that something was very fishy but I guess I was too naive and just a little too nervous or maybe even stressed/jetlagged in that moment to think about it any further. He then seemingly started looking for the SIM and apologetically explained that he had forgotten it at home. At that point I was really suspicious and frustrated but at the same time, I knew that my acquaintance was really clumsy and tended to forget stuff like that so I was still willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. However, it was then that he basically ripped the envelope with the cash out of my hand, hurriedly said that he’d be back in 5 minutes and ran off…☠️So…Imagine my shock 😳
For a while there I was in a catatonic-like state, I was unable to even process what had just happened to a point where I was just in plain denial and still thinking that it was my acquaintance who would be back any minute with the SIM😔. Obviously that didn’t happen 😥I guess what I should have done is run after him immediately or maybe start screaming, I don’t know. Who knows if that would have helped…Then, just a couple of minutes later I got a DM from my actual acquaintance asking me if I was already at our meeting location. That’s when the brain fog slowly started to disappear and I realised what had happened, it was literally like I had been punched in the face. Being the weirdo that I am, I immediately felt a panic attack creeping up on me, I basically started crying and didn’t know what to do. Took me a few moments to be able to even write a reply to my acquaintance. He arrived shortly after and probably thought I was crazy for just standing there and quietly sobbing. He did greet me by name and immediately wanted to hand me the SIM card. Of course he also asked me what had happened because he noticed my weird behaviour. Didn’t wanna bother him too much about it since we didn’t really know each other outside of our little transactions but he was also shocked to find out that happened to me. He even wanted to go to the police with me but I declined because I doubted that would help me at all. Just a bunch of bureaucratic shit with no hope of ever finding the guy or getting my money back so I didn’t even wanna deal with the hassle. Plus, they would probably just put the blame on the naive gaijin girl for letting herself be tricked this easily and for being just plain stupid 😩Also wouldn’t have been in any shape to talk about the whole thing in detail at that moment, was still processing it and just wanted to get back to my hotel ASAP. Anyway, I went to the closest 7/11 with him and withdrew all the money I owed him (that was in the envelope - thankfully it wasn’t as much as it could have been but still, it was quite a bit of cash😭). We parted ways after that since he did have to get to work and I headed back to the hotel to wallow in self pity and figure out all the SIM stuff. Initially I had planned to just go to a cute café or something and chill there and install the SIM but I just wanted to dig a hole and hide away. I’d quickly find out that it was for the best but more on that in the next section. Looking back at this after a few days have passed, I can at least appreciate the fact that it could have been a lot worse. There could have been a lot more money in the envelope. He could have taken my passport or phone (with all my cards)…He could have been violent…so yeah, I am slowly coming to terms with the whole thing although I will still beat myself up over it for a long time. And I will keep wondering what made that guy approach me in the first place. Must have looked like an easy victim or he just wanted to come on to me and then changed his tactic when he realised I had misunderstood the situation.🙃
Installing the SIM
I had brought my old iPhone to install the Mobal SIM and was hoping everything would work smoothly once I popped in the card. Naturally, things didn’t go according to plan because why would they?!😩Btw, for anyone who is also planning to go through with this process in order to get e-tickets, it’s important to keep in mind that you should definitely get a separate device for this purpose or at the very least use a device that can handle multiple SIMs. It’s to make sure the Lawson app doesn’t de-verify itself once you switch SIM cards. You can of course repeat the verification process as long as you are in Japan but the dangerous thing is that all tickets you might currently have issued will disappear when the app is de-verified so you definitely want to avoid that. I hope I am making sense. Anyway, the mobile data refused to work when I put in the SIM card so that was already a big hurdle. I am not exactly an expert when it comes to stuff like that so I didn’t really know what to do.
Did a bit of Google research but all the results told me to just change the APN settings. However, turns out that on my old device you cannot manually change those settings and there’s not even an option to do it in your device settings ☠️I tried all the suggestions like resetting the network settings and even resetting the device‘s system settings. This put me back a few steps because now I had to set up the phone from scratch. By that time I was already beyond irritated so I obviously didn’t have much patience left. Once that was done, the mobile data still refused to work. At that point I was close to despair, I was literally ready to abandon everything and book the next best flight home😭I then saw no other option than to contact Mobal‘s customer support although I knew they would probably not get back to me in time. In their automated reply mail, they had a few links with helpful tips (info that for some reason isn’t very easy to find if you just go through their website). Anyway, with the help of one of these links, I was able to download the required APN settings and then the mobile data FINALLY worked 😮💨I really have no idea why they don’t have that APN info more visibly available on the site😢Or maybe I was just stupid again🙃☠️In my defense, I really wasn’t functioning at full capacity and that incident earlier had completely thrown me for a loop.
Verifying the Lawson App
Finally at the most important step!! I had printed out a tutorial in advance but that wasn’t even necessary. The whole thing was surprisingly straightforward and within a couple of minutes, I had the app verified by sending an SMS. When I was done, the Keiko tickets immediately appeared without me having to do anything else. That was a huge relief!!! BANZAI!! I had made it🎉🥳🎊And my God, actually getting to attend Keiko’s Birthday Event felt like such a huge reward after having gone through all of this🥹This sounds so cheesy but Keiko really did turn my sad scenery into light and brought me along to a brighter world✨Of course I got emotional when Keiko started to sing my all-time favourite Kalafina song but by the time she reached the final chorus, I was a sobbing mess😭And of course I am also beyond grateful that I was one of the lucky few who had their message read by Keiko and who got to briefly interact with her😍Having her remember me is such a blessing 💕
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All right, I think that’s it. Kudos to everyone who made it this far. I am a lot better now and I am trying to make the best out of my trip. Keiko’s event already was a huge highlight and now I am looking forward to Wakana’s concert 🎶
