If I've learned anything from this past weekend, it's the following: In Japan, at least, getting lost usually turns out to be a good thing. Hitting the road with some vague idea of a destination, and walking in its general direction, while usually not advisable if one is in a hurry, is a sure fire way to come across some amazing stuff.
On Saturday, Marshall and I decided to visit a Buddhist temple we read about near Dotomburi arcade. We got off the subway at the nearest stop and started walking. It's fair to say that we got fairly lost, but we found some great stuff along the arcade - a mexican restaurant (that was quite a find), some crazy shops, and a life-sized statue of Colonel Sanders.
The temple itself eluded us for quite some time though, and we spent much of the midday trudging through the busy Dotomburi arcade in the rain. There's quite a bit of interesting stuff around there just waiting to be stumbled upon, like the kabuki theater, the Dotomburi-gawa riverfront and these ... things. Thank goodness we only had a tiny unlabelled map and our own horrible senses of direction to go on, or we wouldn't have found all this cool stuff.
Eventually, we did find the Hozen-ji temple. Apparently, you splash water on this moss-covered statue for good luck. It has some other smaller temple buildings around it, but basically its
embedded in a tiny alley by the arcade. Pretty cool, if you ask me.
We spent the rest of the afternoon continuing to wander. We had some lunch at a ramen shop, but it wasn't nearly as good as last weekend's outing to Ippudo.
We then met up with Junko, a girl that Marshall and Robert met on the plane to Osaka. She took us around to several 居酒屋 (izakaya, japanese-style bars), and gave us an impromptu tour of
the Dotomburi area at night. It reminds me a little of the Las Vegas strip, except everything is squished together, and in Japanese. We got a good amount of Japanese practice in throughout the night, discussing politics, religion, and all manner of other things.
Sunday we got a later start, but our decided destination was Den Den town, a district famous for its many electronic stores (Denshi means electronic). But once again, we got lost. Very lost. We ended up going east instead of south. But once again, we saw some amazing things (<- a link to my tagged photos of the outing). There were tons and tons of Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples hidden throughout the area, and it was a very surreal experience walking down a narrow alley and ending up at a huge gated shrine complex, with ornate buildings, koi ponds, statues, and waterfalls. Our whimsy for exploration ended up getting us even more lost, and after a while we ended up at some sort of festival, with game and food booths, music, and everything. Talk about luck.
After asking for directions and consulting some subway maps, we did eventually end up in Den Den town - see the picture of the street above. It was fantastic, especially the vintage video game shops. It was a very nostalgic experience, and the sheer amount of games, consoles, and memoribilia was jaw-dropping.We didn't stay as long as we could have, so I'm definitely going back there soon, to oogle some more, and maybe buy some things.
Robert didn't join us for either of our adventures this weekend - instead he met up with a friend he met at UCSD and spent Saturday and Sunday with her. Cathy had gotten sick after the Welcome Party on Friday, so she stayed home the next day, but was able to get some fresh air with us on Sunday. She's still feeling a little bit under the weather, but I think she'll be OK. Marshall and I all have tons of pictures of our weekend adventures, so be sure to check them out.
Oh, and I almost forgot, today is the Fourth of July! While I must say that the nationalist rhetoric that usually accompanies most 4th of July celebrations makes me uncomfortable, I'd never miss the opportunity to light things on fire! To that end, I've convinced Tak (Tomomi's husband) to help us buy some fireworks and set them off at a park near his apartment. We'll see how it goes. And of course, there will be pictures, as usual.
On Saturday, Marshall and I decided to visit a Buddhist temple we read about near Dotomburi arcade. We got off the subway at the nearest stop and started walking. It's fair to say that we got fairly lost, but we found some great stuff along the arcade - a mexican restaurant (that was quite a find), some crazy shops, and a life-sized statue of Colonel Sanders.The temple itself eluded us for quite some time though, and we spent much of the midday trudging through the busy Dotomburi arcade in the rain. There's quite a bit of interesting stuff around there just waiting to be stumbled upon, like the kabuki theater, the Dotomburi-gawa riverfront and these ... things. Thank goodness we only had a tiny unlabelled map and our own horrible senses of direction to go on, or we wouldn't have found all this cool stuff.Eventually, we did find the Hozen-ji temple. Apparently, you splash water on this moss-covered statue for good luck. It has some other smaller temple buildings around it, but basically itsembedded in a tiny alley by the arcade. Pretty cool, if you ask me.
We spent the rest of the afternoon continuing to wander. We had some lunch at a ramen shop, but it wasn't nearly as good as last weekend's outing to Ippudo.
We then met up with Junko, a girl that Marshall and Robert met on the plane to Osaka. She took us around to several 居酒屋 (izakaya, japanese-style bars), and gave us an impromptu tour ofthe Dotomburi area at night. It reminds me a little of the Las Vegas strip, except everything is squished together, and in Japanese. We got a good amount of Japanese practice in throughout the night, discussing politics, religion, and all manner of other things.
Sunday we got a later start, but our decided destination was Den Den town, a district famous for its many electronic stores (Denshi means electronic). But once again, we got lost. Very lost. We ended up going east instead of south. But once again, we saw some amazing things (<- a link to my tagged photos of the outing). There were tons and tons of Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples hidden throughout the area, and it was a very surreal experience walking down a narrow alley and ending up at a huge gated shrine complex, with ornate buildings, koi ponds, statues, and waterfalls. Our whimsy for exploration ended up getting us even more lost, and after a while we ended up at some sort of festival, with game and food booths, music, and everything. Talk about luck.
After asking for directions and consulting some subway maps, we did eventually end up in Den Den town - see the picture of the street above. It was fantastic, especially the vintage video game shops. It was a very nostalgic experience, and the sheer amount of games, consoles, and memoribilia was jaw-dropping.We didn't stay as long as we could have, so I'm definitely going back there soon, to oogle some more, and maybe buy some things.
Robert didn't join us for either of our adventures this weekend - instead he met up with a friend he met at UCSD and spent Saturday and Sunday with her. Cathy had gotten sick after the Welcome Party on Friday, so she stayed home the next day, but was able to get some fresh air with us on Sunday. She's still feeling a little bit under the weather, but I think she'll be OK. Marshall and I all have tons of pictures of our weekend adventures, so be sure to check them out.Oh, and I almost forgot, today is the Fourth of July! While I must say that the nationalist rhetoric that usually accompanies most 4th of July celebrations makes me uncomfortable, I'd never miss the opportunity to light things on fire! To that end, I've convinced Tak (Tomomi's husband) to help us buy some fireworks and set them off at a park near his apartment. We'll see how it goes. And of course, there will be pictures, as usual.
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