Sake to me Baby – Japan Day Eleven

I’m so sad that today is our last day here in Japan. I’ve just loved being here. I wish I could take the whole country home with me.
While I couldn’t live here permanently, I could see myself living here a few months of the year.

We packed up and left our room close to check out time. I think we just wanted to make the most of it. Our Air BNB room was just fantastic! The only thing missing was an iron which I was silently happy about because I didn’t have to iron hubby’s shirt. I hate ironing.

And I know you’re just busting to find out… yes, the television is STILL on mute. We didn’t win that battle.

First thing we did was hop on a train using our wonderful JR West pass, to Osaka Station. From there it was a hop skip and a jump to Starbucks. Hubby hasn’t been as obsessed with Starbucks this trip as he has in previous years.

We walked to the Umeda Sky Building. We had no choice after a kind Japanese man saw us looking at an information board. We did want to go there, but just wanted to know what general direction it was in because apart from anything else, we wanted a bathroom break before going.
But he said “follow me” in a heavy accent and we had no choice. Every now and then he kept looking over his shoulder to see if we were following. He only had a few words in English so I didn’t know how to tell him we weren’t planning to go there just yet.

But, the bathroom had to wait as he led us most of the way there.
This is an impressive building no doubt! I didn’t take many pics as we have done this on a previous visit.

If you want to see my previous entries showing more pics, you can click here and here

Here are a few pics I took of the building today and around it as well.

Then we walked back to the station towards the Hep 5 building.
Here’s a few pics I took along the way.

Both ravenous and still in search of some Okonomiyaki, we stopped at a place in the Hep 5 building.

I thought we’d scored! There’s Okonomiyaki right there on the menu!

Now I know there’s lot of different types of Okonomiyaki. I don’t mind them as long as they don’t have anything fishy in it.

When ours came out, it was fishy. No!!!
I tried to eat it but I just couldn’t. And those little flakes on top move as if they’re alive and it’s just so off putting!!

Hubby and I asked for ours without any of the sauces because I just don’t like the heavy sauces they use. I find it ruins the taste of the food.

This is what ours looked like. Our cute little server couldn’t believe we didn’t want sauce and even brought our dishes out with sauces in little jars on the side in case she had misunderstood us.

I’m not sure what that thing the Okonomiyaki is placed on is called, but I can tell you it’s more or less a rice omelette. There’s rice inside that yellow stuff and THAT part was delicious!!!!

That’s what it looked like inside!!

It’s making my mouth water just looking at it.

They use egg with just about everything here!!

And meat is terribly expensive. Especially if you want anything of a half decent quality.

I’m not a big meat eater so I don’t mind but that’s probably why they have a lot of egg and fish.

We were just killing time so decided to get on the train to the airport. We’re always so unsure when we get on a train. Don’t let me put you off, it’s pretty straight forward but so often we find ourselves on the platform still waiting for the English to come up and there is the train coming! So we just trust our gut and get on.

We’ve only been wrong once and that wasn’t this trip but still… And even with this train to the airport. We got on it and after a few stops we heard the announcement that the first four cars of the eight car train were going to the airport, but the last four were going to be uncoupled at some stage to go somewhere else! I mean imagine we’d been sitting back there and hadn’t heard the announcement?

So now we’re at the airport waiting for our flight back to Australia.
I’m so sad this time is over. We’ve had an amazing time here and if you have a chance to come, I’d definitely recommend it.
You’re not coming here for shopping, you’re coming here to experience a different culture. We could all learn something from the Japanese.

Japan, thanking you for having us once again and we look forward to coming back soon!

Oyasuminasai

Vay Cay to Jay Jay – Part Seventeen

Our time, sadly, has come to an end.

I was excited this morning because today we were going to Rinku Town! And the thought of all the bargains that awaited me had me full of hope that I’d be filling my suitcase with all sorts of things

It didn’t quite happen that way.

Check out from our Air Bnb place was was not till 11am so as hubby wanted to stay there till 10.59am, I decided to go for one last walk.

Again I marvel at all the things I’m not going to see when I’m back in Australia.
Every restaurant (and there are many, no matter if you’re on a “main” street or a back street alley) has “food art” outside it’s doors. They’re sculptures of the menu so you can see what you’re going to be getting. I have never been tempted by any of these and usually find them quite repulsive but I guess that’s just me because they wouldn’t do it if it didn’t inspire the locals.

I see it every day, I’ve written about it but it still amazes me, the amount of people that ride bikes and the way they whizz around on the footpaths. I’ve been tending to walk close to the shops as there doesn’t seem to be a “keep the left” rule. Bikes tend to have the right of way. At least, that’s the way it seems.

And finally we were on the train to Rinku Town!!

Look at the happiness on my face!

Of course, once we got there, we had to walk around and look for a Starbucks before we could do anything else.

I was so excited to start shopping but I had to wait!

It took a little while but we did finally find one and hubby was drinking his Venti, Cafe Latte with Skim Milk – Making sure to keep his receipt so that he could get another one later that day for 216 yen instead of 486 yen.
This has been a daily ritual that I was very happy to have ending. Life will no longer revolved around Starbucks.

Rinku Town is an interesting place. Full of outlet malls but otherwise appears as a ghost town.

We started off (at the shops near the Starbucks) and walked.
I need to explain that I’m normally not a person who likes to shop for clothes, but I had it in my head that I wanted to buy something from Japan… So I was really in the mood to find something. I had worn my clothes and shoes that were easy to get in and out of on purpose!

You need to take of your shoes when you enter a dressing room in Japan. If you’re trying anything from the waist up, they’ll give you a “breast cover”. I should have taken a photo of it as I couldn’t quite work out how it was supposed to go.
I must admit, when the first guy handed me this folded up piece of something and said “please cover your breasts” I didn’t quite know what he was on about…

We had a late lunch in the foodcourt. We were enticed by this picture

Looks pretty good!! Yakisoba AND Okonomiyaki…

This is what it looked like when it came.

Still looked pretty delicious.

I keep forgetting how much the sauces don’t agree with me though. Luckily we had said “no mayonnaise” but there were other sauces on here.
It was really really yummy, don’t get me wrong, but afterwards my stomach didn’t feel right and I kept seeing other foods I wished we’d eaten instead….

Oh, and a little giggle at another translation fail spotted in the food court…

After shopping at the Premium Outlets for a few hours, I still hadn’t really bought anything.
We walked over to the “beach” outlet part. I forgot what it was actually called, and went into this cheap looking store. Finally I was picking out things I liked!! I ended up with four items and hubby, whose patience was being tested said “Can we please get out of K-Mart now”
He was offering to pay for today’s purchases so I don’t know why he was not happy!!!

It was almost time to leave Rinku Town, when I spotted the exact outfit I’d been looking for!! One thing I haven’t mentioned is that the sizing is much smaller here. If you’re an M (medium) in Australia, you’re at least a L (large) here.
It’s not good for the ego… And “Free” size means “one size fits all” but their “fits all” would not work in Australia.

So I found the outfit. It was a medium so it was tight but I really really wanted it. I went to the counter only to be told “cash only”. What? It’s amazing how many places in Japan are cash only.
So hubby and I hurried to find an ATM to get some cash out and in doing so, came into contact with an American living in Japan. He was the friendliest guy!!
He just had story after story to tell of his experience of living in Japan (for the last two and a half years) the Japanese culture (he’s married to a Japanese woman) and much more.
He came with us as we got money from the ATM, came with us as we went back to that store (so I could buy my treasured items) and walked with us to the train station, saw us right up to the platform gate! I’m kind of sorry we didn’t exchange information after all that time together. It was only as we were parting that we gave our names.
So Jacques, if by the remotest chance you’re reading this, please get in touch!

Our flight left Osaka at 10.30 pm. We had a bit of time to kill but we were too tired to walk around and look at the shops.

This instruction made me smile.

Just the fact that there’s a need to put that kind of instruction there is what I find amusing.

People hey….

And finally we were on the plane bound for home. We flew to Cairns then had to wait a few hours before our trip back to Adelaide.

Just thought I’d share the meal we got on our flight back.

I think it was chicken.
Funny how things always taste different when you’re on a plane.
I didn’t take an “after” shot in Adelaide but I’ll leave you with a pic from Cairns airport.
It’s been a long journey!!!

Regular restaurant reviews will be following.
Thanks for sharing this trip with us!

 

Vay Cay to Jay Jay – Part Eleven

Thankfully the rain cleared and hubby and I were able to have a relaxed look around some of our favourite spots from last year.

We walked to our favourite Aeon Mall and once we were there, kind of wondered why we’d come.

I mean, there is a Starbucks there so hubby was able to get a coffee but apart from walking down the same shops, we didn’t see anything exciting.

Oh, actually I’m wrong, we did see a bakery with an interesting sign out the front.

I keep forgetting to take photos of the interesting English translations that there are here.
I’m not having a go at the Japanese, after all, it’s not their language, I’m just having a little giggle. If I tried to speak Japanese I’m sure they’d have a big giggle!

After reading that sign I had to try some of their items and found that everything in that store was 100 yen!! That’s like $1.20 AUD! Bargain!!
I was so excited I forgot to take a photo of what we ate but here is a photo I took later. I wonder what they thought as they saw me come up and take photos shortly after purchasing and eating some of their goods.

The two things I photographed were savoury but they had amazing looking sweet baked goods too.

We went to a liquor store and I took photos of the giant (four litre) bottles of alcohol.

I got hubby to hold a smaller bottle next to them for some perspective.

I’m sure you can get that kind of stuff in Australia somewhere but it’s not as readily visible as they seem to be in Japan and they’re a quarter of the price that you’d get it for in Australia.

After that we walked back to Dotonbori. This place is just amazing. Any kind of food you want and always stacked with people!!

And a couple of interesting pictures along the way….

Hubby and I tried to take selfies along the canal. I think I took about fifty seven but here’s two that just made the grade. I’m posting them both even though they look the same and are not really showing scenery because it took us so long to take them that I feel they both deserve internet space.

And oh look, another sign that made us smile…

Lots of seafood here… if you love seafood you would be in heaven but unfortunately I don’t and was feeling quite queasy by the time we were walking out.

Look at all the people!! And this is on a Thursday morning. I think it was about midday…

We really really really wanted okonomiyaki for lunch and had passed so many places that were doing it, but when it came time to eat, couldn’t find one place. Unbelievable!!

So we went to Red Rock. A place we’d visited last time we were here and had had a really yummy beef bowl.

One is a “sliced beef” bowl and the other is “roast beef” bowl. We couldn’t quite work out which was which but pretty much shared them anyhow.

OH….  and I had the worst Sangria I’ve ever had in my life in this place. The food was good, the Sangria was crap. It was like drinking cask wine.
I’ve had Sangria a couple of times since I’ve been in Japan and every time it’s been amazing!! Better than I ever expected so my expectations were high today. I was really let down.

I had to giggle though because I took this photo as soon as they were put down on the table and doesn’t it look like one has been drunk already??? I gave that one to hubby… after all, he’s not the wine person in this relationship!

We went back to our apartment to recharge our devices (and ourselves) and set back out to see Dotonbori by night.

We walked and walked and walked. In fact we almost got to Osaka station!

Hubby was sorry he missed the AFL game last week and wondered if there was an “aussie” type pub here where he’d be able to watch it. Not only IS there a pub, but it’s pretty close to where we’re staying!!

The game is on tomorrow but we thought we’d check it out. It’s not traditional by any means by there were a few aussies in there and the soccer game they had was being played in Adelaide! So that made us feel at home.
The guy behind the bar said they’d be playing the Adelaide Crows game (AFL) tomorrow so no doubt we’ll be back!

Drinks were a little more expensive here though and I asked for a red wine which was 500 yen. I was more than horrified when I saw him take a glass up to a cask and pour me a red wine from that.
Cask Wine?
In full view of all the patrons?
I wanted to cry.
What did it taste like? Well, as it turns out, it tasted just like Cask Wine.
Okonomiyaki was still on our minds. We researched this a little bit before heading out and knew which Okonomiyaki place we wanted to go to tonight.

We watched the food being made as we were right near the kitchen

Pretty interesting place!!

While I was having mine I thought it was the BEST food I’ve had in Japan

Hubby had one too although I think his might have been pork.

We also got some rice to share.

The thing about the food here is that it can be quite rich and heavy with sauces. So it was great while I was eating it but it felt heavy on me for quite some time after.
In fact, I told hubby tonight that I think I want to eat “Western” tomorrow…

I may change my mind after a good night’s sleep! No plans for tomorrow yet although I’m wanting a trip to Osaka Castle so maybe it will be there!

Oyasumi!