Night of Day Five - 8/27/09

Osaka was, well, kind of boring.  I'm sure there's a lot going on that I didn't get to see, but even the most active part (Dotonbori) of it was filled with hostess bars, massage parlors, and whorehouses.  However, we still managed to have a good time in Osaka (without any payment for pleasure, unless you count karaoke or the video games).

Either way, like the rest of Japan, it had good restaurants.  Actually Osaka has been called the "nation's kitchen" in Japan, at least Wikipedia tells me so.  After dropping off our bags in our room at the Swissotel Nankai, we sat down for a drink in the hotel's lounge, aptly called "The Lounge."  The deal I got for the hotel was quite good, it included two free drinks at "The Lounge" and a free bottle of sparkling wine (more on that tomorrow), among other hotel coupons.  I had two reservations and hoped that I'd get double the coupons, but that wasn't in the cards.

My brother was hungry in "The Lounge" and ordered what he thought was a meat, cheese, and fruit plate with a few pieces of bread for 1800 yen (about $18).  It turned out to be the smallest meat, cheese, and fruit plate you've ever seen anybody pay $18 for, so we finished our free drinks and headed out to find a restaurant.

On Anthony Bourdain's visit to Osaka, I had heard about the takoyaki at the Pizza Ball House restaurant which I thought to be near the Dotonbori area.  However, we couldn't find it, even with the iPhones, so we ended up another place.  I had a okonomiyaki with squid and other things and while it was good, it was awfully filling.  I've heard it's an Osaka thing to eat until you're utterly and completely full... well I certainly was.

After the restaurant, we walked around the Dotonbori, admiring the Glico man, and all the purveyors of the world's oldest trade, before heading to an arcade (game-station). 

First my brother and I played a traditional gun game which gives you five minutes of play before you have to start filling it with 100 yen coins constantly, and then we looked around for something else.  We found it in a purikura photo booth.

In this photo booth you take photos of yourself with a green screen behind you, you pick a setting for your photo shoot, take a few photos, edit the images to add text, clip art, etc., and then you print out stickers of your two best shots.  Did I mention that this is mostly used by girls?

Hilarity ensued, while I haven't scanned the photo stickers yet, I've taken the liberty of taking a photo of the two photos we chose.  Sorry it doesn't look that much better, but yes I am trying to eat the fish in the left photo, and yes that is takoyaki on my brother's shoulder in the right one.

Then we walked around the arcade my brother's girlfriend and I tried to play Super Mario Brothers songs on the drum game.  While she can read Japanese and I certainly can't, somehow we ended up in hard mode, guess which one of us chose that one...  It was fun anyway though.

We walked around a bit more in the arcade, admiring the fighting and racing games that were still quite busy, before heading back to our room to get some rest for Friday.  Also remember, my shorts still have Mega Tomago sauce on them.  Our suitcases wouldn't be arriving at the hotel till Friday...