Winter Break Trip - Osaka/Nara/Kobe Part 2

Second day in Osaka was spent at the rather famous Osaka Aquarium.
(Osaka Aquarium - Otters, dolphins, sharks, rays, penguins, jellyfish etc...and more. )

Ate 串かつ(ku-shi-ka-tsu) for lunch. Kushikatsu is apparently another Osaka specialty, where most of the food is served on skewers and you dip it in batter, then panko flour (something like bread crumbs) and deep fry the stick in a small fryer in front of you at the table. Interesting.


(The number of skewer/sticks on the girls' side of the table. Yum.)

After that was mostly spent walking around in Ame-mura (short for Amerika Mura; mura = village) which is a shopping area. Osaka fashion is somewhat louder and more colourful than Tokyo's - almost like an ahlian version, but it could be said that it's a much more individualistic and self-confident image than Tokyo's depressing sea of black coats. The people seemed more friendly and direct too, quite in contrast to Tokyo's politeness and keep-to-oneself feeling.

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Day 3 was spent at Nara - famous for its free-ranging deers and ancient Buddhist temples/shrines. Visited Todaiji, apparently the oldest and biggest wooden temple in the world maybe? Very pretty. The deers were some sort of nuisance though, especially if one was carrying a handful of the deer crackers - they'd come chasing after you.

(The beautiful Todaiji - biggest wooden Buddhist structure in Japan and maybe in the world too.)

Can't say I really liked Nara much - seemed too much like a tourist town, a town that never developed it's own modern character beyond displaying it's old glories. I had very yummy omu (shortened from omelette in katakana) rice there though. Omu rice is usually a fluffy fluffy (japanese call it fu-wa fu-wa) creamy omelette atop a mound of 'chicken rice'. Their chicken rice is basically rice with chicken meat and 'fried' in tomato sauce. The whole thing is then topped with demi-glace sauce. Somehow the whole dish just came together as a pretty delicious combination. No pictures sadly - ran out of battery and too busy eating heh.

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Day 4 was mostly spent walking around Namba/Amerika-mura area for shopping since one of my friends really liked to shop there. The 3 of us spoke to a shopperson for almost 1 hour. Osaka people really seem more curious towards foreigners - perhaps maybe because Osaka isn't really crawling with foreigners like Tokyo sometimes seem to be.

In the evening, took our backpacks/duffels and boarded the local train for Kobe! Kobe - port city with the "exotic" atmosphere - was quite a change from either Tokyo or Osaka. Dinner was at a small individually-owned (not franchise yay!) and dinner was good. =)


(The menu was written/printed in beautiful calligraphy script on what seemed like shaved wood.)

(My dinner - The lovely udon set meal. Came with so many things - rice topped with 1 prawn and omelette shreds, abit of tempura, udon and a mix of sushi!)

(A sashimi mix that I ordered and we all shared. All was good except for the squid/ika.)

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Day 5 was for Kobe and it was a surprisingly very likeable place! Despite all the 'what are you going to Kobe for? it's boring...' responses that we got prior to the trip. Beautiful mixture of architecture, many tooth-decay inducing patisseries, restaurants of various cuisines, a quietly vibrant frequency, sake breweries, the red port tower... and last but not least, KOBE BEEF.

(The entrance of the sake brewery museum we visited. Free entry and free sake-tasting. I like!)

(Before dinner, we went walking about Kobe - saw the European houses, Kobe's signature Red Port Tower and Nankin-machi, Kobe's Chinatown. As gaudily red and exaggerated as the place was, there was a sense of familiarity and comfort. =) )

(Last dinner of the trip in Kobe - went to a steak place and despite the hefty price tag of 4,500yen, I decided I really just had to try Kobe beef because once I got back to Tokyo, I just know I would never be able to willingly spend so much on it again. Normal price of 1 piece of Kobe beef is about 10,000yen anyway, so I went ahead and tried it. The moment I bit into a piece, I immediately thought: "I am NEVER going to be happy eating any other type of beef again...". It is THAT good.I still think about it.)

Winter Trip 2009 - Osaka/Nara/Kobe Part 1

So on the night of 22 December, Isabel, Dhani, Yang Chen and I boarded the night bus at Shinjuku bound for ....-drum roll-.... Osaka! The night bus was, well, quite bearable actually, except that I probably should bring a neck pillow if I ever repeat this experience - which I probably will since this is the cheapest means of transport for domestic travel... =/ Poor Dhani was not so lucky though, as he sat next to a rather (surprisingly) big-sized Japanese who kept talking with his friend the whole night. Arrived in Osaka the next morning at about 6am, and so the trip began!

23 Dec - Sze Ping, Osaka Castle, Peace Osaka, Namba, Okonomiyaki
Our hostel (Guesthouse U-en) was such a cosy place! We managed to book the private triple room for the 4 of us and paid just 300yen more than if we were to get the dorm beds. The whole place had an almost bohemian-feel and yet traditional Japanese style to it. Our room used to be part of a family home, so it was styled in the traditional Japanese decor of tatami mats, futons, and paper sliding doors. Nice!

Managed to meet up with Sze Ping (!) at the Osaka Castle Park, which was just a 15 minute walk from our hostel. Went into the main hall of the Osaka Castle as well, which has been converted into a museum of sorts, mainly detailing the life and exploits of the founder of the Osaka Castle - Hideyoshi Toyotomi. Pretty interesting but then again probably because I'm a history student heh =P.
(The Osaka Castle Main Hall - a converted museum about Hideyoshi Toyotomi.)

(Taking a photo together at a random face-cut-out in the Osaka Castle Park!)

Next up on the outskirts of the Osaka Castle Park was the Peace Museum Osaka, which I found to be a highlight of the trip. Having been to the Yushukan (War Museum @ Yasukuni Shrine) and seeing how amazingly biased it could be, this was surprisingly refreshing, with a whole exhibit on the WW2 atrocities as committed by the Japanese. At 250yen, this was probably the cheapest admission fee of the whole trip too.
(A pamphlet from Peace Osaka, of which the logo apparently reflects the whole universe if you look carefully.)

Went back to the hostel for a bit of much-needed nap, before heading out to Namba - one of the main nightlife/shopping centre of Osaka - and had Okonomiyaki dinner with Sze Ping! Unlike the bounenkai one at Chofu, the staff made the okonomiyakis for us here. I had extra cheese topping with my order and it was heavenly. Cheese = <3! Sze Ping and I were both lamenting that cheese in Japan is so darn expensive though blah. After dinner, Sze Ping went back to pack for her trip to China the next day, whilst we 4 walked around for a bit.

(At okonomiyaki dinner - Sze Ping!)

(Hungry Isabel, Yang Chen and Dhani looking sad whilst waiting for their okonomiyakis to be done.)

Winter Break: Osaka/Nara/Kobe Trip Confirmed!

Was planning and settling our rough itinerary with Isabel earlier just now - and so now winter break trip is confirmed!

We will be going to Osaka for 4 days 3 nights, of which one will be a day trip to Nara, then on to Kobe for 1 more day before coming back to Tokyo. Tried to get the cheapest hostels available and transport as well, so we're staying in dorms and taking night buses (8-9hours) rather than the Shinkansen which would take a mere 2.5 hours but cost about 2-3 times more. Nevertheless, this 'cheap' accommodation and transport still cost about 20100yen (~350sgd) so I'll be leaving myself about 200sgd more for food, admission fees, subway tickets, souvenirs and miscellaneous expenses.

This is so exciting! Will be my first ever trip in Japan - yay!