Yay, my first day in KongHong
My neighbors are Puddles the frog, Iggy the goat, Opal the elephant, Dora the mouse, Otis the robin, and Chow the panda-bear.
I was kind of shocked when the very first time I talked to Opal, she called me pathetic and said my clothes were ugly. I guess that’s one way to welcome a newcomer! Then, later, when talking to Chow I accidentally pressed “B” and declined his request to find his lost handkerchief. But Chow didn’t care if it was an accident. He immediately set off into a rampage. I kept trying to talk to him to calm him down, but he just got more angry. I forgot how easily villagers get upset in this game. In New Leaf I think they only get angry if you hit them with a bug net.
Anyway, after finishing my part-time job with Nook I wrote an apology letter to Chow and planted some cherry trees.

A sweet bear, Maple, moved in today. Chow replied to my letter. He said he hates writing letters, but I got the feeling he secretly was happy somebody wrote to him. I built a Snowman today. I set him up overlooking a cliff so he has a nice view.
Oh, and I paid off my mortgage today. Yay! Time for a bigger house!

When I started up the game today, I wondered why my house was still so small. Then I realized I forgot to talk to Nook after paying off my mortgage last night. Arghh! So I’m stuck with my tiny house for another day. And good riddance, because I keep hoarding furniture and I need some place to put it. I bought a potbelly stove from Maple today, because why not, and it seemed like a cozy thing to have in my house during the winter.
I went to check on my Snowman and discovered that somebody built an igloo right next to him, which is pretty neat:

Unfortunately, shortly after taking the picture I accidentally murdered the Snowman. I noticed that walking into him made his head wobble around, so I kept trying it and he exploded in a cloud of snow. I don’t think I ever discovered that as a kid. Or, maybe I did but blocked it out of my memory because I felt so guilty!
I found a nice mossy rock today, so I sent it to Chow. I think he’s already warming up to me.

My house has been upgraded! Yay! I spent a lot of the day rearranging furniture. Also, I FINALLY got a fishing rod. It should be a lot easier to make money now.
I was on my way to donate some fossils to the Museum when I made the mistake of talking to Opal. Immediately, she set her sights on my T-Rex Skull and pressured me into trading it for some ugly wallpaper that I didn’t want. I refused, and she gave this nasty retort:

Okay then, Opal.
I found some panda-themed stationery today, so I wrote a letter to Chow. Okay, fine, I’ll admit that I seem to have some kind of bias towards Chow. Something about that big cuddly guy makes me want to befriend him. I mean, just look at him:

Chow wrote me the sweetest letter today!!!

Judging by that signature, I suppose we’re officially friends now.
Katrina the fortune teller was in town today. She told my fortune for only 50 bells! Although, I’m not really sure what to do with a fortune as cryptic as this:

Today I caught two rare things: a bagworm (cocoon thing that comes out sometimes when you shake trees) and a stringfish (huge river fish). And I caught a BEE for the first time.
Also, Tabby the cat moved in a couple acres away from my house, next to the waterfall.

Tom Nook’s was closed today for remodeling, so there wasn’t much to do. However, one kind of eventful thing happened:

I was playing a game with Dora, who wanted to buy a playroom rug from me. I had to pick a card, and whatever card I picked determined how much she would pay for the rug. I was so surprised that I was able to sell that dirty old rug for over 35,000 bells!

It was snowing in KongHong today! So pretty Also, Velma the goat moved in today.

Yup….that’s the VERY first thing she said to me. And I thought Opal was rude. To be honest, it’s somewhat refreshing how downright mean villagers can be in this game compared to New Leaf. You’re not the mayor, so they’re not afraid to be rude to your face. Still, it took everything in me not to shove her in a pitfall at that moment.
On a more positive note, I saw a floating present attached to a balloon today. I followed it and it eventually landed in the tree next to my house. What are the odds? I opened the present and all that was inside was a peach. (I don’t know who is putting peaches in boxes and attaching balloons to them. Probably the same person who puts pieces of furniture/bags of money in random trees everyday.) I planted a peach sapling in the acre next to my house. I hope it grows!

Some good things from today:
– The peach tree I planted yesterday has started growing!
– I caught ANOTHER stringfish today. As a kid I remember only catching ONE in my several hundreds of hours playing and it was a huge celebratory moment. According to the wiki they really are “extremely rare”, so I guess that makes me extremely lucky for finding 2 in 2 days. 
Between that and the 35,000 bells kiddie rug it’s been a very good first week in KongHong. 

Almost forgot: Bill the duck moved in. He is friendly but seems like an airhead.

Something amazing happened today.
Groucho moved in next to Chow!
And I don’t mean in the acre next to Chow. I mean, their houses are literally right next to each other.
Two cranky bears in the same acre. I love them both. My unpopular Animal Crossing opinion is that the “big” bear villagers are cuter than the “cub” villagers. They just look so…huggable.
Today Chow asked me to change his catchphrase “aiya”. But I LOVE his catchphrase. So I “changed” it to “aiYA” instead and he didn’t seem to notice. 
I also paid off my debt a second time today. Nook asked if I wanted to expand my first floor or add a basement. I opted for the basement. I like to have an extra room where I can store random junk that I haven’t found a use for yet. (In real life, I prefer to stick to the KonMari method, but in Animal Crossing my inner hoarder flourishes without shame).
I’m also getting QUITE annoyed with Iggy. For two days in a row now he’s holed himself up in an igloo, and I need to retrieve Chow’s picture book from him! Arggghhh!

I saw a rare sight today: Tortimer the mayor. (Now that I think about it, where IS he all the time? Where does he even live? Is he the one who puts peaches in present boxes and ties them to balloons?) Anyway, he told me he’s going on vacation for the next week and needs me to come in every evening to turn on the lighthouse. If I remember to turn it on every day until he comes back, he’ll give me a special gift!
Today Chow was in the igloo so I STILL couldn’t give back his picture book. But he gave me an interesting item: “crab stew”. It’s actually a furniture item so you can’t eat it, but it looks pretty tasty. Apparently it’s one of several igloo-exclusive items—another one of which is a fireplace, which I’d love to get my hands on since I’m aiming for a “comfy” vibe in my house.

My peach tree finally bore fruit today. I planted 2 peaches and gave one to Dora. I also got another igloo-exclusive item, an igloo model, from Velma of all people.
Paolo the elephant moved in. He is…nice, but something is definitely “off” about him. He also has a slot machine in his house, for some reason. I played it and got three 7’s but nothing happened.

KongHong has grown quite a bit. Since my last entry, 2 new villagers have moved in: Ava the chicken and Truffles the pig.
The most adorable thing happened today. The other day I wrote Chow a letter telling him to please come visit me sometime. I attached a dapper shirt as a gift to win him over. I was surprised to see him outside my door when I logged in today, wearing the very shirt that I gave him! He said it was a bit “loud” for his tastes, but he wanted to honor my gift.

A list of updates since my last entry:
1. Petunia the cow moved in, so now KongHong has 15 villagers (the maximum amount of villagers in this game).
2. KongHong now has 3 bridges, the newest one being right next to the lake. It’s so much easier to get around now! Here’s the current town map:

3. I completed the lighthouse quest! I got a miniature lighthouse model as a thank-you gift. It even lights up when you interact with it.
4. After much trial and error, I finally got this message from the wishing well:

For those who haven’t played this game before: you can only get this message if your town is “perfect”. The conditions for whether or not your town is perfect are based on how many trees are in each acre. It sounds simple…until you realize there are 30 acres, and trees can be shared between acres—oh, and trees die very easily in this game. It’s like some kind of weird Animal Crossing sudoku puzzle, and it’s probably the only part of this entire game that I find stressful, so I never could be bothered with it as a kid. But now I’m a completionist adult. And I have to admit, I’m pretty happy that after some 15 years of owning this game I finally have a perfect town.
5. I got this very bizarre item from a treasure hunt.

In case you were wondering, the item is called “Nook’s portrait” and I’m fairly certain it is only available in the Gamecube version of Animal Crossing. Personally, I feel some sort of sinister energy emanating from it….

Today’s entry is brought to you by this lovely comment from Chow:

I actually DO have a job, Chow. Today is a Saturday, so I don’t have to go to work. Also, last time I checked, YOU don’t have a job, either. Geez.
Anywho, the focus of today’s entry is a glitch that allows you to walk on water. You can even use it to go to the island without a GBA link cable. I actually do have a GBA cable (if I remember correctly, it’s because of this very game that I forced my parents to buy one for me), but it’s at my parents’ house and I probably won’t be going back there for a few more months. And I’m impatient and really wanted to see who my islander is
You can see how to do the glitch here. You don’t need any fancy hacking devices to do this glitch, but it does need to be winter in your town since you need to use a snowball. You also need to be somewhat precise because if you run too hard into the snowball, it will move upwards, which is the opposite of what you want. But if you just barely nudge it, it will move slightly downwards. It took me a while to get the hang of it, but I finally got it:

I walked south a bit and reached the island, which was disappointingly all covered in snow. I did meet the island’s lone resident, Boomer, an eccentric penguin. He didn’t make any comments about seeing a Jesus-like figure walking on water, but he’s still pretty cool. He also appears to be an extreme minimalist, based on his house, which contains nothing but a fire-hydrant:

Whoops, it’s certainly some time since my last entry. I’ve been playing almost every day, I just haven’t been writing too much, besides taking notes whenever anything significant happens. Here’s what has happened since my last entry :
On Jan 31, I received a letter from Groucho informing me he decided to leave town:

What’s wrong with me?! What’s wrong with YOU? I thought we had something special, Groucho, and you just up and left town without asking my opinion first.
After Groucho left, Tom the cat moved in. I’m not going to lie, Tom is awesome. He’s a blue cat with big yellow eyes and a mean attitude. He always says “ME-YOWZA” at the end of his sentences, as if you just yanked on his tail or something, and I think it’s hilarious.

February 2nd was Groundhog Day. Early in the morning the townsfolk gathered at the wishing well to see the mole—er, “groundhog” Resetti give his verdict on springtime. Much to Tortimer’s chagrin, he proclaimed we will have a few more months left of winter til we can enjoy springtime weather.
On February 10th, Otis moved out and Hugh the pig moved in his place. I’m not really heartbroken over it the way I was with Groucho. Otis was that one villager I always forgot lived in my town.
Yesterday was Valentine’s Day, and I received a letter from every male villager in town—though most of them seemed to be sent out of obligation rather than emotional attachment. The only exception to this is Chow. I have to be honest, his letter may have made my heart skip a little.

With his letter he included a “wobbelina”. It’s a strange, but cute pink doll that wobbles when you touch it. Actually, it’s literally me if I were a piece of furniture in Animal Crossing. I love you so much Chow.
I also FINALLY got the Golden axe from the wishing well. If you maintain “perfect town” status for 14 days then a strange little bearded man named Farley comes out of the well and gifts you the golden axe. It’s actually really weird because there’s no context for who he is or why he lives in a wishing well. But it’s okay because he is ADORABLE.

It’s been an awfully long time, hasn’t it? I did check in to KongHong one day in October 2019, but haven’t gone back since.
I received a letter from Maple informing me that she has moved out, which I am very sorry about. Another letter of the same nature from Petunia, but that gave me completely the opposite emotion. Bitty the pink hippo moved in on Acre C-4, where Hugh used to live. Lovely girl, but terrible interior decorating skills. Caught a cockroach and donated it to the museum, much to Blathers’ distress. Bought a new bonsai at Nookway to add my collection upstairs. Went ghost-hunting at midnight with no success.

Finally found Wisp the ghost last night! I found all 5 of his spirit thingies within 15 minutes and asked him to de-weed Kong Hong.
Betty the hen moved in the acre below Chow, next to the waterfall. She is one of the “lost” villagers, who never returned to the series after the Gamecube game. A shame, really. She is very cute and sweet~