puppet dance
In the hopes of jumping right into Spring, I headed down to Osaka so I could see the things I missed the first time around. This time I took the overnight bus from Sanjo to Osaka and let's just say that the seats are not made for people that are six feet tall. I did manage to get a little bit of sleep before arriving in Osaka at seven in the morning on Friday. Luckily I was crashing at Blaine's apartment and new my way around enough to get myself at least the right train stop before having to call. We took a quick nap before connecting up with my good friend from college, Lindsey West, and her friend from Okinawa, Dave. In true foreigner form we all had Subway for lunch and it was amazing.
It turns out that there was a famous park just outside Osaka, called Minou, that was supposed to be beautiful so we headed there. After a quick train ride we arrived at Minou and began the long walk to the waterfall at the end of the red brick trail. It was a very peaceful and scenic walk although there were sadly no sakura (cherry blossoms) out for us to see in full bloom. We reached the waterfall and proceeded to act ridiculous while having a good time. The sun was beginning to set so we decided to head back into Osaka for dinner.
We actually ended up eating at the same Mexican restaurant that we ate at last time I was in Osaka but that was fine because they have really good food. Afterwards it was time for the 500 yen martini bar. Cheap good martinis are hard to come by and we definitely had our fair share. Somehow by the end of the night I had got a lap dance by Lindsey, engaged to Blaine, and hit on by a Japanese man. I don't even know what time it was when we finished but we crashed hard when it was all said and done.
The next day Blaine had to work early while Lindsey and I had the day all to ourselves. Needless to say Lindsey's encounter with Jose Cuervo the night before wasn't making her feel too great but we explored anyway. First on our list was bunraku (Japanese puppets) and luckily they gave us earphones that played an English translation for each of the three plays. It was an amazing cultural experience and one of the things that I really wanted to see. One thing that differs about these puppets is that there are three puppeteers operating each main half life sized puppet. The stage is sunken so that the audience cannot see the puppeteers legs. However the rest of them is seen throughout the whole play but somehow you don't even notice them after a while. When the play was finished Lindsey and I did more exploring but mostly eating. We had takoyaki (battered octopus balls), blowfish sushi which can actually kill you with its poison if cut incorrectly, and ice cream. Also, we went to Amerikamura which is an area devoted to American pop culture. It was interesting but mostly full of shopping. I did however eat a McDonald's hamburger in front of a big clown, and his name wasn't Ronald.
After a long day and not much sleep the night before we met up with Blaine and all headed to his apartment for a "quick" nap. And by quick nap I meant 3 hours worth of laying there. However we did need as much energy as we could manage because we were headed to a place called pure for some all night dancing and drinking. We managed to have some gyudon (sauteed beef and onions atop a bed of rice) before enjoying the free drinks at pure. The place only played hip hop music but it was still worth it to get some dancing out of my system since there really aren't any clubs to speak of in Niigata. We finally called it a night at around 5 in the morning and caught some stand up ramen before returning to Blaine's apartment to crash.
The next morning Lindsey and Dave had to leave for Kyoto in the early afternoon so I said my sleepy goodbye before crashing again. A little bit later Blaine and I woke up and Blaine made a late breakfast for us. There wasn't a lot of time left in the day before I had to leave and the weather wasn't really cooperating so we were pretty slow to get out of his place. Later we did some wandering around Amerikamura before eating at a random restaurant in the HEP5 building. It was some great Italian food and by the time we were finished it was time for me to leave on the bus back to Sanjo. Another crazy fun weekend in Osaka. The only thing I didn't do while I was there was go to Osaka castle but I already saw the best castle in Japan last time so I'll live.
posted by Aaron @ 1:13 AM
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