Work ended and I flew out the door. Taxis were abundant, thankfully, and I arrived at the train station in plenty of time. Laura and Jon had the tickets ready and the train quickly sped us to Gupo, the suburb of Busan closest to the airport. Upon our arrival there we immediately procured hotel rooms and dropped off our bags. The rooms were nice enough, in a Korean love motel kind of way and the beds were slighty bigger than Laura's apartment (the blankets, however, were considerably smaller).
After a cold and fruitless wander in search of food, we decided to just get some chicken fingers from the nearby burger place and bring it back to the motel. Then we slept.
We woke up at 6:21 and proceeded to get ready to go to the airport. All went smoothly. Even what could have been a terrible snag turned out fine when we discovered that Laura didn't have a re-entry permit for Korea. Immigration took care of that problem quite swiftly and we were ready to take off.
Customs in Korea was a complete breeze and we went out to board the plane. At the gate they put everyone on a bus to get to the plane. The plane was only about 30m away, but I guess the bus was necessary for some reason. Next time I expect piggy-back rides from the pilots to and from the plane. That's about the only way to top a 30m bus ride.
Upon arrival in Japan (Kansai Airport, near Osaka, to be exact) we again zipped through customs and immigration then obtained our Japan Rail Kansai Pass which would give us rail access to the whole Kansai region. Then we were off to attempt to figure out the Japanese train system and find our hotel.
It was all too easy. We showed the attendant our passes and went through the gate, down the escalator and onto the waiting train. We were sure we were forgetting something important, but no, it's just that easy and we were on our way to Osaka.
After the train ride came a short subway ride, which was also frighteningly easy to figure out, followed by a brief period of confusion as we exited the subway station and tried to figure out where exactly we were and what direction we were facing in order to find our hotel. Luckiliy, there was a map at the top of the stairs. We soon realized that all maps are oriented so that the direction you are facing is at the top. For some reason, it took contorting ourselves so that north was up to navigate the map properly, but once that was done, we found our hotel on the map and made our way over to it.
We arrived an hour early for check-in, so we gave them our bags and went to get some lunch. Nearby was a relatively cheap restaurant (by "relatively cheap" I mean it was cheap for Japan, expensive everywhere else). We sat down at a table and were immediately corrected on this assumption. Apparently, our first task was to look at our food choices on a coin operated vending machine, put in our money, make our selection from the pictured choices, obtain our meal tickets, and then sit down. We randomly chose a few appetizing looking things, sat down, let the server take our tickets from us, and waited for their arrival. It turned out well as we ended up with a sort of tonkatsu (breaded and fried pork) with what I think was a teriyaki style sauce. The coleslaw and tartar sauce was odd, but it all tasted good.
After lunch we cruised the stationery store to kill some time then went up to the hotel rooms for a brief rest before setting out to explore the city.
The rooms were quite small, but that was to be expected. They weren't capsule rooms, by any means, but still small. The bathtubs were deep and short, more like glorified buckets, and the bathroom itself was reminiscent of a bathroom in a motorhome, but it all worked and was clean and comfortable so there were no complaints.
Exploring Osaka was awfully cold. It was great, for sure, but cold. The wind blew pretty strongly the whole time and the sun peeked through the clouds only intermittently. The day would have been much more pleasant if the weather had cooperated, but it was still a good time.
Osaka Castle (Osaka-jo) was really cool, from the outside, anyway. The grounds around it were gorgeous. I loved the dual moats and the huge stone walls rising out of them. The castle itself looked really impressive. Japanese castles are really tall and basically built like fortified pagodas. Unfortunately, it's a rather new, concrete reconstruction of the 16th century castle, but it looked good. The museum inside was pretty, but as it was all in Japanese, it was informationally useless to us. At the top, the observation deck gave us some great city views, but I'm not sure if it was all worth the 600 yen (about $6) entry fee. The park grounds and exterior viewing were all free, so all we paid for was a museum we couldn't understand and some pretty views. Oh well, I've spent $6 in worse ways before, so no harm was done.
After the castle we made our way to the Minami district of Osaka in the hopes of getting some automatic sushi (sushi made by the chef in the middle of a conveyor belt loop where the customers sit on bar seating and grab what they like as it goes by, paying according to the number of plates you finish with - more on this later). We searched and searched in the cold wind, but found nothing. We ended up at a small place serving a variety of things we couldn't read but where the staff was extremely friendly and helpful (the waitress even went so far as to imitate a chicken for us so we knew what we were ordering). We ended up having skewered chicken wings (yakitori) and the best sashimi I have ever tasted. The wasabi was obviousy freshly made and the fish was just perfect. As well, I ordered a beer, a draught Asahi. It was great. I've had Asahi before, from a bottle, and was never that impressed, but on tap it's rich and creamy and oh-so-tasty. Yum. We ended up paying about 3000 yen ($30) for a what basically amounted to a light snack then went off on a quest for more sustenance as our hunger lingered.
During our search, we stumbled into the Apple store in Minami and witnessed a live "Glitch" music performance. This was basically some guy with computers (Macs, obviously) hooked up to a PA system making computery blips and bleeps into a sort of arty electronic music type thing. It went from intriguing to mildly irritating to fascinating to slightly dull, all in about a half hour. Then we left.
We ended up on the Dotonbori Arcade which is the busiest, mostly brightly and crazily lit street I've seen yet. It was absolutely full of people and was basically walls of light and glitter. It was quite overwhelming. After a short wander through there, looking slack-jawed and over-awed, we made our way underground, found a cafe and had another snack, then went back to the hotel.
At this point, I would like to point out how much cleaner Japan is than Korea. There are no giant empty lots filled with trash, and streetside litter is minimal. Even the really busy areas and side alleys are exeedingly clean. The air even smells and tastes cleaner. It's a good way to be.
Anyhow, Laura was still feeling a little sick (mostly just quick to tire) so she decided to stick around the hotel after our venture through the craziness. Jon and I felt we needed another Asahi, so we went off in search of a bar near the hotel. We were successful in our search, finding a small, cozy place with Asahi on tap. On the way there, we found a vending machine on the side of the road that dispensed a wide variety of beer and other liquors (including Suntory Whiskey, among other brands). I have been searching for just such a vending machine all over Korea, feeling certain one must exist. So far, nothing in Korea, but there one was, in Japan, just outside our hotel (we later found one in the hotel lobby, too). Anyway, the Asahi was just as good as at the other place (but twice as expensive) and we were satisfied.
We stopped at 7-11 on the way back and marveled at the unidentifiable things, some sponge-like, some string-like, some like no other thing seen before, floating in water at the counter. They were all translucent and completely hideous to look at, never mind imagine eating. Blech. Other notable things at the 7-11 were the bowls of noodles topped with what looked to be raw bacon, an unrefrigerated shelf full of chili dogs, and Pringles with such flavours as "Cheese Fondue" and "French Consommee." Asia continues to surprise in the snack food department.
That's about all for day one in Osaka. One last observation is how quiet things are in Japan. Traffic is virtually noisless, people seem to shout less, and there are no random vegetable trucks or politicians with loudspeakers roving around, at least from what I could hear. The shopping areas certainly have their product hawkers, but all in all, it's a rather peaceful kind of place.
Guy
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