Saturday, June 13, 2009

Today's Adventure

Today I planned on going to the Pokemon Centre in Umeda (North Osaka) 
and to go up the Umeda Sky Building (41 floors! and featured on that 
race around the world show). I went to Osaka-Namba first and walked 
through Shinsaibashi to the Apple Store to see the new Macbook Pros. 
After checking them out, I took the subway to Umeda. The station was 
really big and I just wandered out an exit, and realized I didn't know 
where to go from there. I remembered that I had written down that I 
needed to go out exit 6 from Midosuji subway station, so I walked back 
and found the exit. I still didn't know where to go, but I was looking 
for the Umeda Center Building which in Japanese is Umeda Sentaa Biru. 
I can read it so I started looking at the buildings nearby. The 
Pokemon website said it'd only be an 8 minute walk away. Well two 
hours later I had not found the building, and I couldn't even see the 
enormous Sky building either. I was very frustrated so I found a 
subway station and went back to (you guessed it!) the Apple Store!! I 
google mapped where the Pokemon Centre is and it looks totally obvious 
on the map, but what Google maps doesn't show is all the people and 
the construction. So I just decide to hang out in Shinsaibashi. I 
start to wonder around through the covered mall area, and it's 
insanely crowded. Hundreds and billions of people moving through very 
quickly. You barely have enough time to glance at the shops you're 
passing, and it's almost impossible to stop and enter one. This is 
when I notice a lady walking beside me. She says konnichiwa to me, and 
I say it back. Then I see that she's dressed in a long plain dress and 
is accompanied by a little black boy (possibly? lol not sure where 
he's from but he was cute and really dark skinned). Then the alarms 
start going off in my head right as she tells me she's from the 
Jehovah's Witnesses. Oh geez. You just can't get away!! So we stop, 
and all the people around us are getting angry and have to flow around 
us. She tells me that God says that money is root of all evil, and I 
nod my head. She talks a bit and tries to ask me a question, but she 
couldn't think of the right English word. Oh well. Then she asks how 
long I'm staying, and I sorta lie, she asks how long I'm in Osaka, I 
say just for today. Then she gives me some of those infamous Jehovah's 
Witnesses magazines. Only they are outdated!! They're from March and 
April of this year. Geez again. Anyway, I take them, and go on my 
merry way.

Now I'm getting hungry, still upset about no Pokemon, and a little 
peeved over the whole Jehovah's Witnesses thing. So I turn down a new 
street I've been down, and end up in Pachinko world. It looked like a 
crazy part of Las Vegas. At least there weren't any shops for me to 
spend money in. So as I walk some more, I start looking for places to 
get something to end, preferably something not very crowded. And then 
I see it. WENDY'S!!!! I was soo happy!!! And of course, I ate there. I 
got a spicy chicken set (not combo, they call them sets). It was 650 
yen (kinda pricey I think), but I was starving! I got the sandwich, 
fries, and ginger ale (ginger ale is good in Japan, I suspect it's cuz 
they use real ginger). I decided to sit in the smoking section because 
I wanted to sit next to a sumo wrestler!! How cool. He had a yukata on 
and everything. So I ate my food, and smiled real big. It tasted the 
same as home, but the Japanese love their mayonnaise a little too much 
so it was covered in it. And I think the sandwich was a little smaller 
than at home too.

So I set off pretty happy, when the next awesome thing happened!! A 
five-story 100 yen shop!! Oh boy! Must restrain myself!! So I looked 
at everything on all 5 floors of course. And I am proud to say that I 
only bought 5 items. :)

Okay, so I left, and walked further, and realized that I wasn't sure 
where the station was, but it was still kinda early so I didn't want 
to go home yet. I kept walking and ended up in a nice shopping area 
again. It was starting to cool off, so I enjoyed the walk outside, 
when the next great thing happened!! Toys R Us!! For real! Of course, 
I went inside and looked! About 2/3 was toys and the other 1/3 was 
like a Babies R Us. I was disappointed that I couldn't find any Legos, 
and I was about to leave when I walked closer to the cash registers 
and ran into the Lego section, it was pretty huge! Probably 2-3 times 
the size of the Lego section in our Toys R Us-es. They even had models 
set up and a large Lego person. I looked around some more at the toys, 
and found a box of miniature food, not just any food, airplane food!! 
So I bought it, it's kind of a surprise because you don't know what 
you're going to get until you open it! I haven't opened it yet.

After that I walked around some more before finding the station and 
going home. And here I am! I will post about last weekend's trip to 
Kurashiki soon!! (Oh and pictures too!)

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