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Osaka

Osaka was every bit as immense and noisy as Tokyo, but somehow it lacked a certain liveliness that made Tokyo such a great place to visit. At the same time, however, Osaka had a vibe of its own that made it more than just another big Japanese city. Its history dates back to ancient Japan when it was a vital port of trade and business for the nearby capital of Kyoto. From this heritage, the city grew into one of Japan's major business and financial centers, while its residents became the fastest talkers and the smoothest dealers in the land. Osaka is basically the center of the Kansai region, the second largest region in Japan next to the Kanto region centered around Tokyo. Despite the immense amounts of concrete that decorate the floors of both Tokyo and Osaka, as well as the rapid speed at which the cities run 24 hours a day, they are quite different, especially in regards to their residents. The people of each city speak differently, their attitudes differ dramatically in many respects, they have slightly different eating habits, and they tend to have drastically different personalities (people in Osaka, as can be witnessed by watching Japanese television for any length of time, tend to be much more humorous, at least from what I've gathered). The only thing these people do seem to have in common is that both groups think their city is better than the other.

I visited Osaka in late February and stayed with a homestay family for a week. Unfortunately, both the homestay mother and father worked during the day, so I was pretty much on my own to explore the city myself. As I was too stupid at that point to realize the beauty of using a guide book, I just bought a map of Osaka in Japanese and spent each day going to several new places on the map that looked interesting. One day I would be on the north side of town checking out a famous park, then the next day I would spend winding my way through the endless streets of the electronics district Nihonbachi. I must admit I was sorry when I later found a copy of the Lonely Planet guidebook in the Fukuoka library and browsed the section on Osaka to discover that I had missed out on some really good places in Osaka. Then again, there were several places I went that I really enjoyed that weren't listed in the guidebook. At any rate, I got out and saw as much of the city as possible and had a great time doing it. The only thing I'm really sorry I didn't have a chance to do was check out the nightlife in Osaka because I had to spend my evenings in my homestay. At least they fed me really good food and took good care of me. The son, who was already a grown adult with a chiropractor practice he operated in an annex to their already large house, gave me a professional chiropractic massage complete with bone-cracking and spine-twisting.

My homestay family didn't completely abandon me in the daytime either. My homestay mother took one day off work to show me around Kyoto, which was only 45 minutes away from their house by train. Also, when the weekend rolled around, they took me out to their 'mountain house' (they appeared to be doing quite well financially) in the adjacent prefecture. I was really looking forward to this, but upon arriving and unloading our things into the house, we discovered one of the water pipes had burst and we couldn't stay there, so we had to go check in a nearby hotel. They got me my own room and I spent an hour in the hotel's public onsen (hot spring) before retiring for the evening. The next day they drove me straight to the airport and saw me off to Fukuoka, wishing me good luck in the rest of my adventures in Japan.

The pictures of my stay in Osaka are divided up by day, so just click on the link of each day below to see all the pictures for that day:

  • Day 1 - I spent most of my first full day in Osaka in the Osaka Business Park and the adjacent Osaka Castle, one of my favorite castles in all of Japan.
  • Day 2 - This day was spent roaming the central part of Osaka as well as the electronics district, where I checked all the new computer and audio equipment that wouldn't be hitting the States for another two years or so.
  • Day 3 - The weather sucked this day, with rain pouring down almost the entire day, but I still ventured outside and braved the nasty weather for a trip to Osaka Dome and a few other places.
  • Day 4 - I actually spent almost the entire day strolling through a huge park that hosted the World Expo way back in 1972. I couldn't believe they still charged admission to get in the place - it was absolutely barren of visitors.
  • Day 5 - This fine day was spent in the beautiful city of Kyoto with my homestay mother.
  • Day 6 - This is the day we journeyed to my homestay family's mountain house.