The next three days I took a break from typical travel activities. That's not to say I wasn't still trying to familiarize myself with Japan or its culture! I learned how to play go and began researching and organizing my plans for the Tokyo segment of my Japan trip. For the most part, the Osaka area continued its trend of overcast weather and highs near 15 degrees Celsius, so I wasn't missing out on any pleasant outdoor strolls.
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| I may have inadvertently taken a pleasant stroll at some point |
Since I didn't do much in the way of travel activities during this period I'll talk about my observations of Japan so far. Residential units are small. Each floor of a single family home is maybe 400-500 square feet. Even doorways within the hostel are too small to walk through without ducking my head. Roads in the neighborhood my hostel resides within are only wide enough for one American made car (or maybe two slim model cars like the ones popular here).
One of my favorite things about Japan are the super cozy restaurants. They're usually built like old American diners and can seat a bit over a dozen people. The interior is often decorated nicely and most of the time you are steps away from the proportionally small kitchen. My first night here, me and some other guests had drinks at a pub that was the size of a sauna. But this doesn't mean everyone is crammed together or that service is slow. Because restaurants are so small, they're also extremely numerous -- and people usually spread out between them rather than be crushed inside any single one of them. Contrast this with the US where there's often a few restaurants that are overwhelmingly popular at certain times of the day and/or on certain days of the week so that -- while larger in space -- they feel more cramped. Smaller restaurants also mean your server is physically closer to you and doesn't waste as much time going back and forth delivering orders to the kitchen or bringing out food for other customers.
As for transportation, most people get around by foot, bike, and metro.
I learned that the hostel I am staying in is actually in one of the "seediest" parts of Osaka but, knowing that, it's almost laughably safe at night. Streets are nearly always empty by 11. Nobody is on the streets selling drugs, drinking, or otherwise causing a disruption late at night. While the streets of the nearby entertainment pavilions are noticeably worn, they're also inexorably clean. Osaka's red light district is a five minute walk south from the hostel, but I never visited the area.
The drinking and smoking age in Japan is 20 years old, but vending machines on the streets will sell you cans of beer for less than ¥200, or packs of cigarettes, without any need to verify your ID. "Casual Wine" is also marketed and sold at convenience stores. About ¥200 will get you a small (I think 150ml) plastic wine bottle to go with your on-the-go meal. The really casual wine that you can get in small plastic bottles usually has a lower alcohol content -- between 8 and 12 percent -- than regular, glass bottle wine so you can drink during the day without actually day drinking. Sodas with 5 to 9 percent alcohol content are also fairly common in convenience stores.
Osaka isn't actually very touristy, contrary to what I'd learned to believe from watching films before coming to Japan. But with prices for dorm rooms in nearby Kyoto over ¥6000 this time of the year, I can see why ¥1500 a night in Osaka and a two hour, ¥1000 round trip to Kyoto instead would be appealing. Osaka is also centrally located with respect to other cities on the tourist circuit in the Kansai region, and is the closest major city to the two international airports in the prefecture.
On my last day in Osaka the sun finally decided to show its face and made me a little bit regretful that I was leaving so soon to spend the last eight days of my Japan trip in Tokyo.
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