Osaka

Well we've had the Resident Evil stuff, and we've had some ranting about shopping bags, now it's time to talk about the city of Osaka itself.

Well, to be honest with you, because of time constraints I didn't really get to see all that much of it, but what I did see I really liked.  I actually felt quite at home in Osaka, I don't know if anyone would agree but to me it kind of felt like someone had taken London and Manchester, smashed them together and them cleaned them up so they looked all nice.

This view somehow reminded me of Manchester Piccadilly

But before I could really take in the city, I was on a subway train heading to an area that had a load of temples in it.  It looked like a place that would usually be quite quiet, but we were fortunate enough to get there on what I think was a festival day, so the streets and temple areas were little with stalls selling all kinds of junk.

The owner was really expecting this stuff to sell?

It was a really nice, vibrant area with a really strong smell of incense coming from the temples as people lit them and said prayers and whatnot.  There was also a really chill garden that you had to pay a couple of hundred yen to get inside, but it was a really nice escape from the festival crowds, and gave some much needed chill time after a day of walking around.

The whole thing was a really nice, chill start to the day that was going to turn into a hardcore shopping trip as we got on another subway to a place called Namba.  I can't remember if I've mentioned it here, but there is a place near me called Osu Kannon, which is this enclosed little street area filled with shops and stuff.  Namba was basically this on fucking steroids, it was huge and we basically spent the rest of the day there and still didn't get through all of it.

Near Namba is a place called Dotonbori, which fans of the Yakuza games might recognise since this was an area featured in Yakuza 2.  It's basically more of the same thing, but they have this famous sign for the Glico company, which makes pocky and shit like that.

So the rest of the day was basically spent shopping, so I won't bore you with details of our shopping trip.  That said, there was a funky little boat ride just near the sign in the above picture, and I recorded a couple of minutes of it before my cameras battery started to crap out, so have a gander at this video!

Following this post, the gaming shall resume!

The Grand Japan Road Trip: Part 3

Well, after finishing our Kobe home tours, we hopped in the car again and made our way to Kyoto.  Kyoto is a place that I always wanted to visit, so when I discovered that we were heading there I got quite excited.

After reaching Kyoto, our first stop was this huge temple thing.

This thing was absolutely huge, I have never seen a temple this big.  Unfortunately I'm not sure of the name of this place, but it was extremely nice to look at.  So we went inside where they had this huge hall lined with tatami mats.  We then approached a box, threw 5 yen into it and said a little prayer.  Now I'm not particularly religious or anything like that, but there was something rather pleasant about taking part in this little tradition.  Unfortunately, there was a big sign at the entrance that said you weren't allowed to take pictures inside, but this inside of this thing was somethin' else.

So after our little prayer session, we crossed the courtyard of the temple and went back to the car.  The courtyard itself was actually pretty big and considering that the temperature was about 35 degrees again, it felt like crossing the fucking desert.  We then made our way to the next Kyoto destination which I have forgotten the name of, but it was really fuckin' nice so shut up.

This was the start of a big long road that looked like something from old timey Japan.  There wasn't really anything particularly special about the street itself, but it was covered in shops and food places.  The thing that Kyoto is famous for as far as I'm aware is green tea, so we got to stop at a little ice cream stand and got some green tea ice cream.  If you think that sounds weird then shut up because it's actually fucking delicious.  To follow that up, I found this fried meat stand thing that was charging about 650 yen for a piece of steak on a stick.  It was a hugely expensive price for that kind of thing so I just had to try it, and what I got was one of the best bits of meat  I've ever eaten in my life.  If you find yourself in Kyoto, try and find the steak on a stick.

You would also see these dudes running around town with these cart things.  They would pick people up and taxi them around town.  It looked like really hard work and I would not want to carry 2 fully grown adults while I sweat my soul out in the Japan heat, these guys must be pretty fuckin' tough.

Anyway after doing a bit of shopping and eating, we ended up going to one of the most well known Kyoto locations, Kinkakuji, more commonly known as The Golden Pavilion

This thing is some kind of temple in the middle of a lake and it's covered in gold.  You can't go inside it but it has a really nice garden area around the outside.  I was actually very lucky to get a good picture of the thing at all since it was so goddamn busy.  There isn't really much more to say about this place than that, it's the kind of thing you really have to go visit for yourself, but if you want the history there is a wikipedia article avalaible.

So at this point you may be thinking, "well if you were staying in the car during your trip, how did you shower?"  Well good fuckin' question!  The answer is simple, we went to an Onsen

 The above picture looks NOTHING like the onsen that I went to, but I couldn't exactly take my camera into a place full of water and naked people, so deal with the picture I got off google.

Anyway, I was actually quite nervous going into this place, I'm not exactly the most attractive person in the world and getting naked in front of a load of people was quite worrying to me.  What I realised is that I was being extremely stupid, as no one gives a fuck, people are more concentrated on relaxing in this place. 

So for anyone who doesn't know how this shit works, it's very simple.  You get naked, go take a shower, and then relax in some piping hot baths.  It's fucking awesome and the place we were in had lots of different types of baths that did various things, the most enjoyable one I found was the electric bath.  This thing would shock you as you sat in it, it's sort of uncomfortable but your body feels so good after sitting in it for a while, it's fantastic.

Anyway, the trip to the Onsen concluded our time in Kyoto, we drove out to a service station, ate and slept.  Tomorrows post will be the final part of this story, and then the video games will return!