I got up early to get ready to go to Osaka today. I’m not sure why I bothered, since I did a lot of putzing around and then realized it’s less than an hour from Nagoya to Osaka on the Shinkansen. And the Shinkansen station at Nagoya is small and very, very close to the Toyoko Inn.

Well, fortunately, I’m feeling comfortable here in Osaka (since I did live here in my 20’s and even got engaged). Maybe a bit too comfortable. I’ve eaten too much and feel like passing out. Fortunately the intarwebs are a normal speed here and my pictures are uploading quickly so I won’t have to stay up late to wait for that.

There’s this tea I’ve seen the past two days that has the big characters describing what type of tea it is. Yesterday I had “SHIZU” or Shizuoka tea. Today is “KYO” or Kyoto green tea. I looked carefully and it’s special tea that they make for JR.

I got to the hotel at 11:30AM, way before the 2PM check-in time. I spent an hour in the hotel lobby (free wifi) and in the station near the tourist information bureau trying to figure out where to go today. I usually sit in front of my computer all morning trying to figure that out. I finally decided just to start walking south, towards the Bunraku Theatre since I promised my mom I’d get her a calendar there. I called and found out that the person who knows about that stuff isn’t working today, but I figured I’d go anyway.

On the way through the station, I saw a couple of Asian guys that looked a bit off and I just started talking to them in English. They were lost and North American and I actually knew where they needed to go. After helping them down into the weird subterranean world that is Umeda, I kept heading south. This whole area always seems shuttered up.

 

Up into the sunlight and down southward ho!

There were lots of sculptures of naked women on the route. I’m not sure what the deal with the sculptor is.

Across several rivers, too.

Past the sculpture of some old-timey Japanese dude.

And down the street with lots of empty office buildings. But oddly enough, every few buildings there’d be a store or series of stores open. I saw a bunch of people waiting to get into Butter Pancake and it was 1PM and I was hungry.

Here’s where I was waiting for my $20 pancake.

I can’t tell you how good this pancake was. The coffee was tasty too. That’s a block of creme brûlée on the pancake too.

Around the corner was a coffee shop that looks interesting as well. It seemed odd that there were all sorts of people going into building in an otherwise empty neighborhood.

These three guys came out of the coffee shop.

Then it was off to find Goryō Shrine, as the map said it was close by.

The main shrine.

Two sub-shrines.

Looks like this shrine is popular enough to have an electric sign.

Off in the distance I saw a huge old Japanese roof, so I had to go see what that was.

It was Osaka Kaikan, undergoing repairs.

Then I headed back to the hotel. On the way I saw these dragon boats, but they were being towed!

Big blocky government building.

Old-timey government building I’ve seen on the TV news.

I got back to the hotel using an underground route. Looks like the old convenience store that they tore down is back again.

I went to Yodobashi Camera for dinner. There’s used to be one-and-a-half dining floors and they were fixing them up the last time I was here. Now there’s only one floor. I picked the diner by picking a semi-long line for food that looked good. The place I picked also had all-you-can-eat bread which was a mistake.

I had something called a fondue hamburger or something. It was tasty. If I lost any weight with all my walking, I’m going to regain it in Osaka.

I found my favorite t-shirt shop and bought a couple more t-shirts (the weird Japanese ones I always wear) and then went to drool at the same watch I always drool over (a Grand Seiko). The price is down a couple of thousand dollars, but that still means it’s several thousand dollars. I’ll go drool on it a couple more times, I’m sure.

Tomorrow it’s supposed to be hotter than it was when I was in Tokyo! I’m not really sure what I’m going to do with that.

Oh, and finally, I’m a cheap bastard and I’ve been carrying two pain-in-the-ass umbrellas, each costing ¥105, from Tokyo. I FORGOT THEM ON THE TRAIN TODAY. Plus I carried my leftover laundry detergent from Tokyo and the washing machines at this hotel automatically dispense soap! (On the plus side, the washer and dryer are industrial-sized at this hotel and it only took 30 minutes to wash and 15 minutes to dry my clothes!)