Himeji castle
Stepping out this morning, our first thought was breakfast.
Earlier that morning, I’d received a comment from Gary: “Good diary so far. A bit food themed but that’s no bad thing as far as I’m concerned.” The thing is, this holidaying lark is all about killing time between one meal and the next.
After a pachinko hall, the first thing we saw outside the hotel was a bakery called “Bake Shop”, so that was breakfast covered. We both had pain au chocolate, and I had some coffee. When you ask for coffee, they ask whether you want it iced or hot.
Our mission today was a daytrip to Himeji castle — generally accepted as the best Japanese castle there is. Despite our JR passes, paying for a subway ticket to the Shinkansen station was well worth it. If only we’d known that yesterday, when (did I mention?) we had heavy bags.
The Shinkansen was a delight, and we were very soon in Himeji station. The castle has pleasant gardens, we were told, so we bought bento at the station to eat as a picnic.
We had chosen Sunday for this trip, because the Lonely Planet guide said there were more English speaking guides on the weekend. The thing is, on this particular Sunday the sakura was in full bloom, and the Japanese had descended in their hordes to hang out on tarpaulins beneath the blossoms. Not having tarpaulins of our own, it was hard to find anywhere to sit.
Immediately I started to photograph the castle and the blooms.
We found somewhere to sit and eat on the other side of the ticket barrier, where the crowds were slightly thinned out. The bento was lovely.
Despite the guidebook’s promises, there were no English speaking guides, so we guided ourselves. Much of this involved shuffling around behind large crowds, or joining motionless queues. Nonetheless, the castle is beatiful and interesting. No scribbling allowed though!
We saw some ninja and a samurai. Possibly these were people dressed up for the tourists…
We toyed with taking a slower train back to Osaka, since it left sooner and might have different views, but there were crowds queueing for it, and our passes entitled us to the comfort and space of the Shinkansen for free, so we waited for that, and probably got back sooner for it.
After yakuta hour (during which I wasted an hour diagnosing an obscure web hosting issue, which prevented me from posting any blog entry on my own site, containing the word casin<!– this is silly! –>o!), we went in search of Den Den Town again.
The map that comes with the AA Travelpack Osaka guide is wrong – it places Den Den Town North of Namba station, when in fact it’s some way South. We found it, and it’s much like Akihabara, with numerous shops stacked full of what can only be described as nick-nacks.
We worked our way through a toyshop. On one floor, it looked as if someone was playing Densha De Go (the inexplicably popular train driving simulator computer game) - but something was strange about it. Something was different about the quality of the image. The depth of field was strangely low. The train approached a platform, and the waiting passengers were motionless and lacking in detail. I thought I’d cracked it: this was a model train simulator. Then I spotted the train set in a glass case beside me. Evidently there was a tiny camera mounted in the nose of one of the model trains. Sure enough, as the train rounded a corner, I could see Debbie’s jumper in the background on the screen. Fantastic.
We browsed some more, including a noisy second hand game shop with a plethora of interesting controllers for sale, and eventually found ourselves back near our hotel. We went in search of dinner.
On the way we passed a juggling policeman not solving crime.
This part of Osaka has a lot of restaurants. This is a problem. In a town with one restaurant, it takes no time to choose somewhere to eat. In Osaka it can take hours. Eventually, in a flash of genius, we chose an Indian restaurant called either Mithira or Mithila, depending on what part of the menu you read.
The Japanese Indian restaurant experience was slightly surreal. The staff spoke English almost as well as you’d expect a British Indian waiter, and in the same accent. So was I supposed to speak to them in Japanese or English? The right answer seemed to change from moment to moment. The food was mostly just as you’d expect, but just as we’d get into the curry comfort zone, there would be a surprising touch: sticky rice, chopsticks.
To our disappointment, there was no Japanese analogue to the “English dishes” section ubiquitous in British Indian restaurants. I really wanted to see sushi on there, for when one Japanese group member won’t eat foreign food.
“Sumimasen! O kanjo kudasai”. “I’m sorry sir?” “Er, the bill please” “Of course!”