Osaka

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As I waited for the train at Kyoto Station I was almost positive that I was waiting for the right train, except for one detail about the sign. Before taking any public transit in a foreign country it is not enough for me to find the train that says my destination, but I must also rule out every other possibility as well before I commit. In this case, everything on the sign for the train made sense and was in accordance with where I wanted to go except for a symbol next to the car spaces. The platform numbers basically told you how far out from the center of the platform you could stand and expect to be in front of a car when it arrived. For example, trains that are 12 cars long extend through all twelve car spaces, but trains that are 8 cars long only take up car spaces 3-10. Each train listed on the sign had one of about 5 different symbols next to the car spaces, and I wasn’t going to board before I figured that out. All it took was looking at the ground to figure it out. The car spaces were labeled on the ground with pairs of symbols about door-width apart surrounding each instance of the car space number. When the train pulled up, it stopped with the doors of each car precisely in line with the symbols on the sign. I don’t even know what the reason was for such precision, but I found it very impressive. I could have taken the express train, which would have been faster than the local train, but it was crowded, and I was in no rush. So I skipped the express train and waited for the next local train, which still took only about 30 minutes. I knew Kyoto was close to Osaka, but I was expecting at least an hour. I had barely begun to relax before I saw the sign for Osaka Station.

The train pulled into Osaka station alongside about 10 other railways. The surrounding skyscrapers offered confirmation that I was back in the big city. Up in the sky alongside the skyscrapers was a big red Ferris wheel, which I took note of for later. After following the signs through 3 or 4 different levels, and about a mile of distance, I was finally outside of Osaka Station. I hiked down a large main road full of shops and people toward the Ten Hostel, where I would stay. The rooms at this hostel seemed very authentic to traditional Japanese style. A sliding door of wooden frame and paper paneling slid open to reveal a room with no furniture and tatami flooring. Tatami is a type of mat flooring that I had seen in the temples and palaces of Kyoto, and was a sure sign to remove your shoes before entering. Four “futon” beds were separated by straw curtains to partition the sleeping quarters. My bed was a twin-size futon folded in thirds and with a stack of sheets sitting on top. I unfolded my bed onto the floor and set it up before going down to the common area to meet some fellow backpackers.

After a while I found myself talking with Thomas, a German who had been living in Australia (try picking out that accent, I failed miserably), who had also just arrived in Osaka. He invited me to join him in Namba, the place he had been told to go out at night. Namba was packed with people that night, and it was only a Wednesday. Bar and restaurant employees were out on the street with menus in hand trying to corral anyone in shouting distance inside. Where I’m used to bars and restaurants all being on the lower floors of areas like this, here it was very common to have bars and restaurants on many floors. Signs on the buildings listed each bar and restaurant by floor. Though Thomas was looking for a bar, I needed something to eat first. We ignored most of the sales pitches until we were handed a 10% off coupon, which seemed to do the trick for us. There I sampled some octopus and beef skewers in addition to the complimentary bowl of edamame.

Next it was time to find a bar, but that proved to be rather difficult as there didn’t seem to be too many bars, and the bars we did find had table charges of 500+ yen. During our search, we came across a tall building with an outdoor rocking climbing wall. This rock wall was probably about 10 stories high, and as if that wasn’t intimidating enough this rock wall sat in an open space starting on the 10th floor of this building! Just past this building we saw a bar at the top of another building with large bay windows and a glass elevator leading to it. We rode the elevator up to the Okinawa bar, a tropical themed place with videos of the scenery of Okinawa playing on a big screen to the side. We drank a beer here and a couple other places before walking back home. Upon ordering a beer at almost every place, they offered us unlimited beers for one hour for the price of about 3 beers. If I were still in college, then I would have been in heaven.

I slept in the next morning, setting out at about 1 for the Osaka Castle. This place, which dated back a few hundred years, though it had been rebuilt since, was the site of the entire town of Osaka back its day. Surrounded by both a moat and about a 50 ft wall, the castle grounds was mostly a park with an 8-story tower and Osaka history museum in the center. I went to the top of the tower for a view of the whole castle area and much of Osaka surrounding it, then browsed through the museum on the way back down. The museum had a history of the ruling families that constructed and rebuilt Osaka Castle throughout its history. Three folding screens, each about 4 feet high and 20 feet wide, depicted huge battles which were fought over ownership of the castle grounds. Miniature models of Osaka Castle revealed how the grounds would have looked under different rulers back then. As the sun set I made my way back to Osaka Station for a view of Osaka at night from the top of the Ferris wheel. For 500 yen I got to ride the Ferris wheel around for exactly one cycle. However, it was very slow, taking about 15 minutes to complete, giving me more than enough time to look around and take pictures.

For my last full day in Osaka I wanted to go to yet another observatory, but this one was on the 55th floor of a building standing right next to the bay. This was the suggestion of Shota and Sae, a young couple that I had met the night before. Shota had approached me with an unsteady “How are you?” to try out his English, which wasn’t bad, and after talking with them about the castle and Ferris wheel I solicited some recommendations. A glass elevator took me up to the 52nd floor where an escalator would take me the rest of the way. The observatory of this building, the Cosmo tower, offered great views of all of Osaka and across the bay to Kobe, with mountains in the distance on almost all sides. Just to the north I spotted another Ferris wheel, but I figured one Ferris wheel ride was probably enough.

Back at the hostel I found myself talking with Thomas and another German, Simon, who had just arrived that afternoon. We made plans to go back out to Namba, where we could show Simon what it was all about. Also, Thomas and I had seen many steak places and were set on a nice steak dinner. We found such a place featuring plates of meat on the menu outside. Thomas and I split a plate of about 1.5 lbs. of beef including a strip steak and many smaller cutlets smothered in barbecue sauce. The meat came out raw, and a small charcoal grill was placed on the table in front of us. Thomas, being a chef, manned the grill and I simply ate cut after cut right off the grill. As I enjoyed the steak, I explained to Thomas and Simon how this would never fly in the US because of the liability, which made the experience more satisfying. Even though this was clearly a steak place, they still only gave you chopsticks to eat with. This was fine for the cutlets, because they were small enough to eat whole, but the strip steak needed to be cut first. We noticed that they did give us a pair of scissors on the tray of meat. It felt weird and a bit awkward, but we used the scissors to cut the strip steak as we ate it. While I was eating, I was once again complimented on my use of chopsticks. The first time I thought maybe the waitress just thought I was cute, but this time the compliment came from a dude. Maybe somewhere I had in fact mastered the use of chopsticks… or maybe he thought I was cute too…

Eventually we found ourselves at, surprise surprise, a karaoke bar. This time we took the all-you-can-drink-for-an-hour deal to prepare ourselves for some good karaoke fun. The karaoke setup was permanent and included an electronic pad that patrons passed around to search for songs. It was all in Japanese, but Thomas had found the correct combination of buttons to get to an English search screen. Once your song came up, there was no stage to stand in front of everyone, but you were just handed a microphone and sang right where you were seated. The songs went fast and before we knew it our hour was up, and it was time to head home.

My last morning before I took the train to Nagoya, I walked through a covered alley which was apparently the longest stretch of market in Japan, and possibly the world, or at least that was the word at the hostel. And at a little over 3 miles long, I found it easy to believe. I was searching for some food when I came to a very small stand with a grill full of okonomiyaki. The easiest way to describe okonomiyaki is a pancake omelet. It’s a mix of meats and vegetables cooked in an egg batter, then topped with mayonnaise and a sweet sauce that may have been eel sauce as I remember from eating sushi. The portions are more than enough for a meal, and these were only 200 yen. I brought it back to the hostel where I was repeatedly asked where to find this okonomiyaki. After finishing it, I gathered up my things and made my way toward the train station.

Though not quite as big as Tokyo, Osaka can be just as populated and brightly lit in certain areas. Namba reminded me a lot of Shibuya with its many love hotels right in the mix of bars and restaurants. Osaka Castle was just about on par with the Imperial Palace of Tokyo. The moat and outer wall may not have been quite as big, but the Tower in the middle was much more impressive than the bare platform at the top of the Imperial Palace. What made my experience most memorable was the good people I had found to explore with. I probably have the hostel to thank mostly for that, for it was a true backpacker hostel.

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Photos

Namba
Its hard to see, but that is a climbing wall out there on the balcony.

Namba
Seriously?

Osaka Castle
View from the tower.

Ferris Wheel
View from near the top of the cycle

Cosmo Tower
View across the bay. Kobe is in the distance on the other side.

Cosmo Square
And I thought we put up Christmas decorations early.

Comments

[sk]

raw meat
you've obviously never been to (or simply forgotten) the korean/japanese places in Annandale where you get a plate piled with raw meat and seafood, and get to put it on the grill / in the boiling broth yourself if you choose