Silver week

So let’s see.. if I’m correct I left off shortly before my vacation, so I might as well just start with that. Mind you this is not as detailed as I can be, could be due to illness and me simply blanking on things ^^:;; Gomen Nasi!!

September 19th (Saturday): So around six something in the morning I woke up, grabbed my bag and keys and headed out the door to the train station. The ride from Kurobe to Toyama was relatively easy and so was the transfer to the JR Express to Osaka. I ended up sitting next to African mother with two kids who were speaking fluent Japanese. Apparently the mom was from Africa and moved to France and now is living in a Japan. She was nice but her kids were a tad bit annoying.
The rest of the train ride was fairly normal. Listened to my MP3 player and slept a bit. I arrived at the station twenty minutes or so later then the scheduled arrival time, but it was ok since Phage hadn’t gotten to the station to pick me up yet. However that was shortly remedied as we met up giving each other big hugs, and this was the start of one jam packed vacation. We headed out, and checked out the stations closest Mall at Umeda and looked at Gatchipan (sp??), Video Games, Cell phones, and Camera’s before we both agreed on the need for food. We ended up going to this Ramen shop and it was the first Ramen I’ve had in Japan. I’m sure those would ask what took me so long… well I was too busy eating raw things in the country ^^;; After walking around we found ourselves in this park-ish area and talked for a few hours about various things; mostly our views on Japan as a whole. Then we got up and from there and walked around more and then we went shopping! Now, I am not a person that really shops, but this was the first mall I’ve seen since the states so I was more than thrilled there was a place I could buy stuff. The mall had lots of floors and was rather large. We ended up on this floor which should have been called “We like Black Culture floor” because everything there had some relation to African hip-hop/rock culture. So needless to say they were a bit friendlier or at least intrigued to see me walking in and out of shops there. I ended up buying a hat and some bracelet at this one store because the salesman was so enthusiastic and thought I was the coolest thing since sliced bread. After that we checked the top floors where all the photo booths are at and other arcade games. We played a bit and lost some money in other things trying to win stuff, but it was all fun.
With this we headed to shin sai bashi where we were trying to check out the club scene. With this we ended up running into some gaijin who were on holiday much like I was and were all from Michigan. One looked like he stepped clear out of “That 70’s Show” and the other two just well… weird. Nevertheless we followed them to a Mexican bar where we had drinks and met a cool waitress who showed us where all the clubs were in the area. I remember that we didn’t actually manage to club but after walking around and stopping here and there for random foods we ended up in this lounge place called “Open End.” By this point it was near four in the morning, and we decided it was much better to relax and have a drink at this lounge because we were tired as all hell. The waitress was cute as she could be while she was DJ-ing the rap music and bouncing to it all at the same time. It wasn’t long before she closed up shop and we had to find somewhere else to wander until the trains started running again. Luckily for us we walked into a massage parlor that was still opened. We managed to get some deal to share an hour between us for a fee that wasn’t too bad. We were shown up to our room, where we had personal showers, face creams and hair products, changing robes, the whole nine. Even though we both got treatments that didn’t require lack of clothing, we both were made to put on the robes and then half-way de-robe during the massage process. That massage was nice as hell, and that is all I can really say to that XD. Once it was over I hoped in the shower, changed clothes and felt ten times better and much more awake then I had a little over an hour before. When this was done they gave us tea to drink and beckoned us to come back. It was a wonderful experience, and one I surly wouldn’t mind doing again. With this we caught the train, got home, and took some well deserved rest.

September 20th:
With a good amount of sleep under my belt, and feeling physically less sick because of it Aaron and didn’t start out the day till well after 4pm. The main goal of the day was to get to Den Den town. Basically DenDen town is supposed to be the mecca of Anime and Electronics for the area. So getting to that part of Osaka we took a walk towards everything shinny. This ended with us poking around in an arcade for around three hours. I lost money trying to win things out of those machines and I almost won that Monster Hunter plush doll. I also found this one arcade called Jubeat which was rather fun. Here is a video of someone playing here I wouldn’t mind if this game came to the states. I think people would like it. After playing around in the arcade we spent the majority of the next hour or two trying to find DenDen town. Apparently this was a ghost town because no one knew what we were talking about. So after a while I said let’s give up and we focused out attention to finding food since neither of us had eaten the entire day. After denouncing squid we ended up in this restaurant that serves all you can eat meat. Of course this was right up my alley. The man who owned the shop could speak English perfectly and was a great help to us, and was very kind. We even landed a free drink because we went to a restaurant guide corner to find this place. It was quite fun cooking the food, and it was all very delicious. I ate my full and more. The music was nice and I recognized several songs. I topped the night off with mango or was it green tea ice-cream. The ice-cream was accompanied by the owner whose name was Harry. He told us about how he started his business and how he learned English so well. Apparently he spent 12 years in New York, and liked it very much. Needless to say this resulted in us missing the train again, and we went back to the main area in Umeda and located a manga café which we booked for five hours.

September 21st:
I managed to check my email and listen to some music before attempting sleep. Manga café’s are cool, but it would take another go at it to get the hang of it. It didn’t help that by this point my illness was getting worse. Around 5-6 am we left the café and attempted to get money from the ATM. Apparently my bank is strictly local and does not allow money to be taken out of the bank from other areas. Needless to say this leaves me without much money. Thankfully the money for transportation was given to me , and after some running about and cursing the bagle bagle place for not being open we caught the train to Kyoto for this big outdoor flee market. It was nice to see the shrines and all the vendors. I had to rest for a while cause I felt pretty sick but at the end I scooped up two plush phone/key charms and a kimono. No time to wear it now, but perhaps next summer I’ll have a chance to wear it. We could only stay a few hours because Aaron had class. We made it back on time and walked to his campus which is RIDICULOUS! It is like Princeton/Harvard rich people campus. Those campuses you see on TV shows and movies. Needless to say I waited in the lounge and talked to a Texan for a while, while waiting for Aaron to get out of class. Once he did I met his French friend whose name escapes me and we headed for the train station to eat dinner at Aaron’s former host families home. They were a very nice family, and the father looks like a lot of fun. We had rice and okonomiyaki and sake and wonderful Indonesian snacks. Most of the night was spent talking in Japanese so I stayed quiet and watched the crazy Japanese game show that was on TV. I did chime in every now and again, but I’ll just have to practice more so I can get somewhere near decent at Japanese. After dinner coffee Aaron and I headed back home. When we got there we took showers, talked for a while and slept.

September 22nd:
I stayed sleep for a long time while Aaron went to school. When he returned home we chatted together and then headed to the train station to see me off. I would have like to stay a bit longer for his birthday but schedules and such kinda made it impossible. Needless to say I got my bagel sandwich and got on the train back to Kurobe. Thanks for a good time Phage ^^ and happy B-day ^^