Nande ya nen?

June 6, 2008

Checked out of the hostel, but left our luggage in storage to go out for the day. I went to the Nishijin Textiles Center to look for hakama and haori. Saw kimonos but no hakama and they only had some plain haori so I left it alone. There wasn't much else there so I headed back to the hostel to meet up with Winston to grab our luggage and head off to Osaka.

We took the 2:30 rapid line to Osaka only to have our train stop at Shin-Osaka and wait for half an hour because we didn't know what was going on. When the train stopped, the driver made an announcement about something and just about everybody gets right off the train. I try to ask a girl what's going on, but she doesn't speak enough English and I don't speak enough Japanese to understand the situation. So we sit there along with a couple of other tourists for a while until we figure out that the train probably isn't going to be moving for a while and switch lines.

We get to Osaka Station but the closest JR station to the hostel was Fukushima. We figured it would be too much trouble to try and figure out how to Fukushima so we just get off at Osaka Station and walk to the hostel. Passing by a Mister Donuts, we hit a fork in the road and take the wrong path down to the end of the street. Luckily the hostel was really close by once we figured out where we were. I was really pissed off and hungry during the entire walk. Really need to stop doing that.

Checked in and find out they don't have an elevator. I'm really pissed off at that point after lugging our stuff up to the 4th floor, but a shower and some ramen make everything all better. It was good, but not nearly as good as the ramen back in Kyoto. There was a mall called Umesankoji on our way to the hostel from the train station so we head back to check it out. Inside was the wonderful store known as Sofmap. It's an electronics store like Best Buy or Future Shop but full of Japanese goodness. Metal Gear Solid 4 promo stuff was plastered all over the games section. I would later realize how small this branch actually was once I was in Tokyo.

Back at the hostel we ran into a couple of girls from Canada, one of whom had applied for ACAD as well but ended up going to Emily Carr. Small world?

A couple of things I'd forgotten to mention in earlier posts was that I had been doing a bit of research into Japanese culture/life in Japan.

Recommended listening:
1. Josh in Japan - He's got over 40 podcasts out about different aspects of Japan. The ones on trains, banking, vending machines and weather were especially helpful.
2. Of Rice and Zen - A podcast to by "A" to accompany his blog. He lives just outside of Kyoto, so I ran into a bunch of things he mentioned early on in his blog/podcast.

Additional Notes:
You'll randomly see people handing out tissue packets with advertisements in busy areas. Unless you have tissues on you, it'd be a good idea to pick one up. Most of the public washrooms don't have hand dryers or paper towels, so yeah...

Daily bus passes are a handy way of getting around in Kyoto. They're 500 yen and they were available at the hostel as well as at Kyoto Station. The bus pass will get you basically everywhere you want to go, but there a a few private bus lines that you'll have to pay for if you happen to get on one.

The hostel we're staying at in Osaka is J-Hoppers.