Ah, four days has passed since I last posted about my first trip to Japan. I promised myself to write it every day. This simple self-promised might be a small matter for the others, but for me, this is as simple as having my own vow broken. 😥
Finally we come to my last day in Osaka. Let’s wrap it in once post since I’ve already written about Osaka few times.
When my travel mates and I were in the waiting room of Kansai International Airport, Osaka, we came to a really simple conclusion about three Japan’s tourist main destination cities that we’d visited; Tokyo, Kyoto, and Osaka. We simplified our strongest impression there with our impression to few cities in Indonesia. The hectic and crowd Tokyo with the capital city, Jakarta, while cultural Kyoto had a bit similar ambience to Jogjakarta, and last the bustling Osaka yet its more laid-back character (compared to Tokyo) offered the things that Bandung could offer, the similarity vibe of Osaka-Bandung was strengthened by the similar wide variance of culinary. Yes, our thoughts were that simple. That was really subjective perspective, not for the whole things we had seen, just our outermost and first strongest feelings.
Even though it’s now changing, upon my first arrival, I was falling deeper in love with Osaka among the other few areas/cities that I’d stepped on in Japan. It’s related to the previous paragraph about the feeling that I felt while trotting along Osaka, especially Doutonbori. I liked the vibe there and I also liked my various culinary tasting. It all reminded me of Bandung, the place where I spent about my one-fifth of my life, when the other places were divided into much lesser decimal than that (so far).
My strong impression of how vibrant Osaka had appeared since travel mates hopped off of shinkansen that delivered all four of us all the way to Namba Station from Kyoto Station on April 29th, 2013. The digital clock on my mobile phone showed me that it was already 9 p.m. It wasn’t that late to have a taste of Osaka’s night life, but our tired bodies didn’t allow us to do so. After spending the previous night for about 7 hours in sleeper bus from Tokyo to Kyoto, then continuing half day trotting around Kyoto, we just gave up having the night tour. Therefore, we decided to directly go to our hostel in Shinsekai area and had rest.
On the next day, with a very fit body, which also additional energy booster for remembering that day would be our last day Japan, we woke up as early as possible, when even the rain that had been pouring down since early morning was not going to stop us for walking around few touristy areas in Osaka, which then left me with few remarkable things.
Icon for Icons
Trotting around few Osaka touristy areas, one thing that would be hard to avoid was the existence of Osaka’s icons like Osaka Castle and Tsutenkaku Tower. It kept on appearing wherever I went, even though I wasn’t in both spots. It came in various other things like key chain, billboard, chocolate, fridge magnets, and many other forms, which mostly came in cute and attractive package and made me facing a hard time to avoid the temptation of bringing it back at least one.
One hardest part was various package of Glico Man confectionary. Why, why are you so cruel to me? It was really hard for me. It was.
Cute Things and those glittering neon and billboard
As if the icons were not enough, Osaka kept on bothering me with those eye-catching billboards, glittering neon, or the eye-candy cute things. The last one was so bothering because I traveled with limited budget and language, so I couldn’t buy it all. So bothersome.
Food (Okonomiyaki and Takoyaki were the things)
It’s widely known that Osaka is a place where we can make our wallet empty, but stomach full merely by food. So a trip to Osaka would be less completed without tasting any of its delicacies. Liz (my best travel buddy) once told me that the boys who did Japan trip with us were wondered with my ability of tasting various food in one day. Why wondered when you were in one of the best places to do it. It was hard to resist when the seductive smell from street vendors of takoyaki and yakitori covered all of your smelling ‘s sense and the long queue in front of so many okonomiyaki specialist restaurants seemed so tempting, and added those alluring oden to warm your body from the cold breeze of Osaka’s Spring season, especially at night. Tell me how to resist it, I’m curious.
Fashion at Shopping Streets
This actually not only my feeling while in Osaka, but the whole trip in Japan. I liked walking along in any of shopping streets in Japan, as though I was attending a live fashion show. Amusing.
Yeah, those four remarkable things during my first trip to Osaka. What about you?
Little Orange World 