Today was extremely fun! It began around 7:30am where I got up and cooked breakfast and got ready to be out of the accommodations by 8:45 to meet with Mika. We met around 9ish in Karasuma station and got on the train that headed to Umeda Station…aka Osaka. The train ride took about 45 minutes and time passed by quickly as I made small talk with Mika.
When we arrived the first thing we set out to do we see the Floating Garden Building, which was a 30 minute walk because Mika and I have no sense of direction whatsoever (thank god for GPS). The Floating Garden is very misleading, because there is no actual garden floating anywhere in the building…it is just a really tall building with a whole in the middle with a really awesome view of the Osaka city line. We spent about an hour there chatting and staring out into the distance ( I nearly lost my hat to the wind twice)
Oh…by the way Joe and Franz were with me too.
Anyways, after that we were all kind of hungry since most of us ate at 7ish and it was already 11ish. We found a restaurant called Ai and it was pretty good! I ate a Japanese burger, I know it is not very Japanese but i was craving a burger, but I forgot that Japanese burgers are bunless so it was a bit disappointing to just eat burger meat drowned in some sort of sauce.
Once all our bellies were full we headed to the Pokemon Center, and we got lost made a full circle around the street we were on before we found the building where the Pokemon Center is located. (A++ on directions for Mika and I).
I did not take any pictures of the inside of the Pokemon Center because I was too busy FaceTiming my younger brother as I showed him all the neat stuff that they had and trying to figure out what he wanted from the store. It was pretty neat and I spent a tad too much money. To feel a bit better about ourselves we bought belgium waffles as snacks…and let me tell you…that was the best freaking belgium waffle I had ever eaten in my life.
When we all finished spend a ridiculous amount of money in the Pokemon Center, we headed to a really tall electronics center in Osaka, because Joe and I were in the search for amiibos. Much to our surprise they did not have any amiibos other the common ones…just like the States…Then the boys splurge a bunch of money of figurines. They were really neat to look at especially since they had so many anime, movie and video game figurines, but i would never buy stuff like that…at least they were nice to look at.
Soon after we met up with Daisuke and hopped on a train to head to Osaka Castle. We unfortunately arrived too late to actually enter the castle, so hopefully in another opportunity when can go inside and see its historical beauty. The five of us did spent some time in the area, most chillen and resting our feet because we were all dead tired. Daisuke had just finished getting out of his part time job and Mika, Joe, Franz and I had been walking all freaking day. I got blister on my heel and Franz got me a Pokemon band-aid. ( I chose the wrong shoes for walking)
When hunger hit we headed back to the main station so we can go eat Okonomiyaki. And this time they made it right infront of you which was so freaking amazing! I split my meal with Mika because I was stuck between two things and she said she’d get one of the two things I wanted that way I could try them both. (She is so nice, and she also invited me to her Kendo practice!). I really like Mika, even though there is a language barrier between us we were still able to talk about all sorts of things. And when there were words I did not understand she would look them up for me on her phone so I could understand, and that was so sweet of her.
After our dinner…we returned to the waffle store once more…because we were weak and we all really liked how delicious those waffles were. On the way to the store we found a pizza place called Miami Gardens which was hilarious because it is an actual place in Florida. It was fun explaining to Mika and Daisuke that Miami Gardens was an actual place and it does not have a famous garden or anything.
Daisuke really wanted to take Purikuras of all of us together…and we did just that…and it was freaking hilarious. Purikuras are a Japanese photobooth that is oriented to young girls in order to take prettier pictures of themselves. We all became pretty girls.
[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rey36bG0zHs&w=320&h=266]