Osaka was fun because it was so over the top. Osaka is known for its good food and its tourist trap areas. Look at all this neon.
Photo by Jessica
We spent both nights perusing Don Ton Bori, the "shopping arcade," which is kind of hard to explain, but basically it is an outdoor mall. There is a roof over the street and no vehicles (except bikes, and that is a huge beef with me, fucking bicyclists riding through where there are literally thousands of people in close quarters and these douches are riding through, not even ringing a bell, I hate them, I hate them all. Worst part of Japan) but it is still outside and so feels slightly different from going to a mall. Either way, it is pretty fun, and Osaka has a HUGE arcade, about 8 blocks long and many tiny restaurants tucked away on the side streets. Unfortunately, it was pouring down rain the first night so we didn't really venture out from under the protective roof of the arcade.
Here is the entrance of the arcade area
Photo by Jessica
Here is the other entrance
(Whoops, guess it is DoTonBori, but everyone says DoN)
Photo by Jessica
The lovely buildings along the river with all the brightly lit signs.
Look how many people were here! And look at the giant animatronic crab! It is very famous and is on a lot of Osaka postcards. Yeah, big dorks we are we had to take pics of it.
Photo by Jessica (or maybe me, I am not sure)
But we are not so Japanese we had to be in the picture with it.
Oh wait, yes I am. Also, Gingerbread Latte in hand. Yum.
Speaking of which, my favorite coffee place in Osaka. Notice any resemblance to another well known US coffee chain?
Photo by Jessica
Too funny.
One of the best parts of shopping in Japan is the messed up English words and images on the clothes.
Photo by Jessica
Would you like a lovely "Slut" jacket? And some great marijuana leaf icons too!
Another great part of Osaka and DonTonBori is the "love hotels." Have I explained "love hotels?" Well, they are pretty self explanatory, but because there is no space in Japan and many many people live with their families until they are married (and sometimes afterwards) they have hourly hotels specifically for "lovin."
Usually these hotels are audacious; this one is particularly strange.
Photo by Jessica
Yup, just a bunch of heads with legs and poles through their heads.
Photo by Jessica
And salad! Ba-dahmp-bah!
God, I am such a hack.
But, we didn't just go shopping (mostly window shopping by the way, stuff is just too small in this country, maybe that is my least favorite part, that I am a fat ass and can't fit in regular size clothes), we also ate a bunch of food!
We went to my favorite restaurant, Akiyoshi. It is a yakitori place which means grilled food, aka meat on a stick!
Look at that grill and fire! Awesome. We spent 10,000 yen on two people and gorged ourselves on meat! It was fantastic. And I made Jessica eat heart. She was pissed. But at least she has a story to tell about strange food that she ate while here. And quite frankly, heart, not bad, just a little chewier than regular beef. My favorite is a chicken and green onion stick. Oh, and yaki-onigiri or grilled rice balls. I should have eaten about three of those before ordering meat so I didn't order so damn much.
Look at all these sticks!
Post gorge fest of course. And, also of course, soy sauce to dip your meat in. Jessica finished off two plates of that sauce. That girl likes her soy!
We also had a HUGE pizza!
Photo obviously by Jessica since those are my fat fingers in the picture.
Just look at the size of that monster! Wow! And only $10. Such a deal! My first stop when I come back to America, A-1 pizza. Large cheese and seasoned fries. Orange soda on the side. And a Dr. Pepper.
We weren't completely debaucherous though. During the day we went to Osaka castle.
The moat and giant wall. It is very difficult to judge just how huge this castle was by these pictures.
Photo by Jessica
Big ass gate leading into the castle.
Look at how big the doors are.
Photo by Jessica
Of course, it is a freakin' castle. Guess the doors are supposed to be used to stop invaders and whatnot. Yeah, I guess.
Also, archer slots
Photo by Jessica
The front gate to the castle led to a "massacre room" which was basically a small square where another set of doors was and more archer slots, so even if the enemy breached the other gate the castle defenders had the opportunity to kill them before they could breach to the inner castle area.
Look at the size of this giant rock.
Photo by Jessica
I believe it is something like 20 tons. Huge.
Once inside the walls there is a winding path that leads up to another inner moat (which was dry and ugly so no pictures) and to the inner tower where the king lived.
Here is the inner tower. It was hit by lightning and burned to the ground in the late 1800s and then restored in the 1970s.
There is a museum inside the tower which is kind of cool, lots of historical armor and paintings and scrolls the ruler wrote back in the 1600s. So that is pretty cool if you think about it, 400 year old paper. But, it was written in Japanese and even the English translations were boring. Plus, no photography allowed. Boo!
Some of the samurai armor is hilarious.
Note, these aren't the exact suits of armor that were in the museum, but they are pretty similar.
Several of the sets had face-plates with mustaches
The Wilford Brimley samurai.
And, my personal favorite, the one with deer antlers on the helmet.
Apparently, some samurai were rednecks too.
Here is Jessica humoring me by posing in those silly face things
Grrr! I am an angry samurai!
And now I am a more refined samurai gentleman, with silly hands.
Another thing we did was go to the aquarium, but it is now 1:30 am and I have been writing this for the past two hours, so that is going to have to wait til another day.
Oh! But before I go, another thing we did was drink a ton of Pepsi Nex. The zero calorie Pepsi soda.
Why? Not because of the taste, that is for sure. Stuff is barely drinkable. BUT, a bunch of the bottles did have these awesome little bearbrick figures on them of movie characters.
A Batman bear toy.
A super cute "Happy Feet" penguin bear. Look at his little bow-tie. So cute.
There was also a Joker one that I believe Jessica got. See if she will send me a picture.
I love that about Japan, they are always giving you free stuff when you buy soda.
Okay, that is enough for now. I have to go to bed, work tomorrow. At least I have a freezing cold apartment to sleep in. I love to sleep in a sweatshirt and knit hat. It is fantastic! Grrr.
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