For 21 years I’ve collected Tomicas, I’ve never seen one regular Tomica with this kind of quality. This is the best by far, and the details are PERFECT down to the “Jeep Wrangler” emblem and the front fascia! I think it’s about time that Takara Tomy upgrade its regular Tomica lineup to this quality.

When I went for a stroll at KidzStation yesterday, I stumbled myself upon racks of Speed Racer die-casts from Hot Wheels. And in the spirit of the movie’s hype, I snatched the Mach 5, Mach 6, and Racer X’s Race Car. Finding die-casts like these are not exactly easy in Indonesia, so I can consider myself lucky to be able to get the first batch of the line-up. If I don’t get them now, there may be no second chances.

From the build quality, I can say that specialty Hot Wheels die-casts’ quality is improving over the years, except for Racer X’s Race Car, where the paint and plastic still look rather hollow.

The thing that I hate the most about Indonesia is actually how they mark-up the price of die-casts like these. The Speed Racer line-up sells in the USA for about $3 a piece. Here, it’s Rp. 50,000 each, or the equivalent of $5.41. Pretty steep markup huh? That’s almost twice the original price. Corruption, baby!!

Last week Kara gave me a very decorative Dendendaiko for my birthday present. This is actually pretty cool, it’s not everyday I got a traditional Japanese toy for a present, hehe. Of course overtime, Ninay always gets annoyed for the loud noise it makes when I tried it. Other than the Dendendaiko, she also gave me a ship-in-a-bottle keychain. I’m not going to use it, though, I’m worried if the glass would break on impact.

The end of the Zoids sale season doesn’t stop my addiction from striking back. This time, I picked up the Iron Kong, which I should have many years ago. The Iron Kong is such a cool toy that only costs me 200.000, which is quite cheap for a thing this big. And the coolest feature of all, it lights up!

Now I’m beginning to worry about displaying my Zoids. They keep adding up, but my space is not.

A trip to the 2nd Toys, Comics & Collectibles Fair 2006 last Saturday did paid off, I got this Sharivan for 250.000, and Yero got Gavan, which he’s been wanting since months ago. A certain store at PIM2 sells these at 400.000, which is certainly a MAJOR RIPOFF!

Ahhh… Doesn’t it bring back those childhood nostalgic moments?

Sometimes I hate myself when trapped by addiction. This time, I’m starting to become a Zoids junkie. After Shin’s farewell dinner, I decided to pick up another Zoids for my collection. It’s the Gairyuki, which apparently a three-in-one Zoids with the same frame construction as the Berserk Fuhrer. I completed the model in less than 3 hours with all the decals in place, a much faster time than the previous one.

The Gairyuki is on the Republic side, that is the opposite of the Empire side, which is the Berserk Fuhrer’s allegiance. Okay, now it starts to sound like Star Wars involving high-tech dinosaur robots. Okay, it’s getting weird…

Zoids was one of the coolest toys I ever bought during my childhood. I remember the day when the family visited SOGO at the Plaza Indonesia, and we brought back 4 different Zoids. They were all spectacular. Nowadays, I always thought that Zoids are quite expensive, and they are actually less popular than other toys here.

After the family lunch yesterday noon, we stopped by Plaza Senayan. I took the chance to visit KidzStation and found that the Zoids are on sale. When I look at the prices, they are actually moderate, even when they’re not on sale. So… I decided to revive my Zoids collection by buying one of them immediately. And that is when I bought the Berserk Fuhrer.

From the packaging, I thought it was white-colored. But it turned out to be a pale-purple-colored T-Rex. Nevertheless, Zoids are still cool as ever and really fun to build.

A while ago, Hendra hinted me that Multi Toys has opened another shop in Bintaro Plaza. While I’m not particularly fond of the place, I decided to stop by today, after a meeting at Bank Niaga. And well, what do you know, his tip really paid off. And since I never got the chance to collect Chara Wheels, I immediately took a load of them and brought them home with me along with some regular Hot Wheels and a Captain Scarlet die-cast car. I couldn’t resist because they sell those for 28.000 each, and that is way cheap. I bought a Gavan No Saibarian for 40.000 the last time, so I consider this to be a huge deal for me. Here’s a list of what I got today:

• Gavan No Saibarian (Collector’s Edition)
• Robotkeiji’s Joker
• Masked Rider 1’s Cyclone
• Masked Rider Amazon’s Jungler
• Masked Rider X’s Cruiser
• Masked Rider’s Gelshocker Autobike
• Barom-1’s Machrod
• Ultraman Dyna’s Machinezellet
• Hakaider Charawheels Ultra Edition Box Set
• Porsche 911 Targa (Regular HotWheels ‘95)
• Chevrolet Corvette C6 (Regular HotWheels ‘04)
• Captain Scarlet’s Spectrum Car (Vivid Imaginations)

These are the toys I shopped for yesterday. From left to right, in a sort of order:

• A white Tomica Limited Rosso Lamborghini Murcielago
• A Tomica Limited GP gift set
• Tomicas of Hino Profia, Lamborghini Murcielago, G’Zox SSR Nissan Z, and Toyota Celsior Privately Owned Taxi
• Episode 1 Mace Windu CommTalk action figure (from TCC Fair ‘05)
• Tomitech Toyota Celsior Aero R/C Kit
• Tomicas of Thomas, Toby, James, and Henry from Thomas the Tank Engine
• A Lincoln Navigator Matchbox

Actually, there are several other Tomicas that I’ve bought last week, but I seem to forgot to post them in this blog.

For more information about these toys, use the following links:

Tomy Japan
Hasbro Star Wars
Matchbox

This is the Pooh doll in an elephant costume, or “Heffalump” according to him that I bought for Kara yesterday. I hope she’s happy with it =).