Thursday 26 January 2012

Osaka!

I didn't do any travelling over the christmas break so when Kaisu my Finnish friend said she would like to go to Osaka to vote for the Finnish election i thought i would tag along for a two day trip!

We stayed one night at a hostel and the other night was spend on the night bus.

We got the JR bus which is actually very comfy and there is lots of space for you
 We got the 9am bus which meant us getting up early to get the 8am bus to the centre of town, I'm glad that i'm one of those people who can nap :P the time went quick on the bus because of that!
 One of the bus stops to pick up people was near the sea 
We arrived a bit dazed and I seriously felt like a country bumpkin who has arrived at the city for the first time because i was used to Kanazawa low buildings compared to Osaka's skyscapers. We managed to find our way to the Consulate for Kaisu to vote even though we totally missed the entrance and managed to find ourselves at the car park around the side of the building. :P we were both to busy looking around to notice the little Finland flag on the door.
Then we made our way to the hostel which was nice and basically was an apartment coverted into a hostel.  We dropped our stuff and explored! 

Our hostel was near America town so having not able to find the Statue of Liberty that was somewhere we decided to eat at Burger King! My first time ever in Japan and the chicken burger i had was good! Especially with my melon soda! But the onion rings were a big disappointment :(
 Then we walked to Namba and did some shopping.  Below is the famous lights of Namba

 After some walking around and uncertainty from two other finnish people in Osaka as well we decided to eat and of course eat what Osaka is famous for: okonomiyaki! We found this information booth which basically you tell them what you want and they take you there.... we got 10% off as well!
 After spending some time in the restaurant and then probably half an hour trying to find where to meet and find each other we joined together and got the night started!!! Nomihoudai!!!! (All you can drink!) Afterwards doing some Purikura (picture taking in booth) we did some karaoke
We didn't get back to the hostel until 3am :P Surprising the guy who owns the hostel was still up at this time too...

When we woke up we both were really tired... Kaisu wasn't able to sleep and i was just tired :P, after slowly getting ready and leaving the hostel with our stuff we decided to eat and then head to the Osaka castle area


 I had to eat the second thing i find Osaka famous for: Takoyaki! Even though you can go anywhere in Japan and buy this i thought i had to eat some here in Osaka. We walked around the area and then decided to head for the Osaka Museum of History. Where in four floors it explained how Osaka developed in different eras.  It was interesting but at this point we were really really tired.

We stayed until the museum was going to close at 6pm and had about 4/5 hours to kill before our bus.  We headed to Umeda where the bus stop was and hanged around, drank coffee/tea to keep alive and walked until we got on the bus.  It took me a while to get to sleep, i think it made it easier for me to sleep when they finally switched off the lights.  We arrived in Kanazawa at 6am.... sooo early! We had to wait for like a hour for a bus to get to the bottom of the hill but luckily that day was still the examination weekend that was happening nationwide and extra buses were put on so we could get a bus to get back to Kanazawa Univerisity!!! The enabled to have a quick shower and then get out again for 8:30am to go to Toyama for my group project....

Tuesday 24 January 2012

Shirakawa go

The 9th January was a national holiday of coming of age day.  This is where people who have turned 20 celebrate them becoming an adult basically.  The girls wear these beautiful Kimonos and go around and celebrate with their friends.  I saw one or two girls wearing these beautiful kimonos but did not manage to take a photo :(

As it was a day off for us at university we decided to go to Shirakawa go.  It is a UNESCO heritage site in Gifu Prefecture.

We started the day quite late and didn't arrive at Shirakawa go until about 2pm.  The scenery is very beautiful with snow everywhere!!!

 One of the shops you see when you get off the bus. 

 The amount of snow that the guy has to shift is huge!
The picture doesn't show well but that is the height of the snow, about as tall as people! 

Then we had about 2 hours to explore and look around the village.  
 This is the bridge that connects between the village and the bus area
 A small cute store house maybe?
As the pictures show the roofs are a distinct style as there is so much snow it helps the house roof not to collaspe and they say that it looks like Buddhist monks in prayer with the /\ shape. 
We were told that you should eat two things here, first dango! It is sticky rice coated with soy sauce.
 I found these snowmen soooo cute! especially the expressions!
 After more walking around we ate the second thing we got told to eat the beef croquette!
 It was really nice!
 The girlies!
The famous symbol of Gifu prefecture! It is called Sarubobo which means 'baby monkey'  They were originally made by grandmothers from leftover cloth to be given to their grandchild or daughter for protection or having a good marriage and good childbirth.  Today it is deemed like a good luck charm.

Soon after we left on the last bus of the day and made our way back to Kanazawa!

I've got two more trips to write about! One to Osaka and then the day i came back from Osaka i went on a group trip as part of my project work. 

Sunday 1 January 2012

Welcoming the new year!

I haven't written a blog entry for a long time!!! I haven't been anywhere really substantial for me to write a post.  But as the memory is still fresh i thought i'll write about today's adventure!!!  Today was mixed of waiting, waiting and discovery of different readings of kanji!

Last night of course involved drinking and surprisingly i managed to wake up at 10am and we were meeting at midday so was able to get out even though i was a little zombified for the rest of the day.

I had no clue where we were going or what the Shrine was called so i just followed, we waited for the bus to Kanazawa station and then ask how to get there, bus wasn't an option as the next bus was at 5pm! So we thought train and we were told to go to West Kanazawa station.  We missed the train by a minute and had to wait for the next one..... then when we got to the station we then had to wait again for the next train there.... alot of waiting was done....

Finally after 3 hours we got there!!!!

 The special ticket that you can buy which combined the train and bus to take you to the shrine.

snowy mountains!!!
 
 
The main shrine! I also learnt how to properly do the wishing, throw your money in then you bow two times, clap two times, make your wish and then bow again!!! 
 
 
After taking pictures and looking around we decided to eat at the many stalls that you get around the shrine, there was too much choice!!! I decided to go for fried chicken as there was no queues i think i really wanted the big meat of the stick but oh well there will be a next time! Hopefully in the summer!

There is sake in those rows of white things with all those kanji, there are offerings for the temple from what i remember reading up on.

Our journey back was much quicker as we were lucky this time and not much waiting maybe because of what we got as a free gift? 

This was inside the box jingling, isn't this cute!!!!!! And probably gave us luck!

So a short post but at least the first one of the year!!! I'm really glad i wasn't too hungover to go out today as last time i was in Japan i went to a shrine too on new years day!