Culture Day in Japan! Today is Monday Nov 3rd, and it’s a National Holiday. Most offices are closed, and all the workers are downtown Osaka, specifically filling the closed off street of Midosuji.
We did our homework this morning (social studies with a bit of math added on), ate some lunch and then headed downtown. When we got off the subway, we were met with this sight:
We were handed bright green wristbands on our way into the fenced off area (you were not allowed to loiter on the sidewalk, the Japanese know how to organize crowds!) and then we waited. Everyone around us waited. There was loud music coming from speakers all along the avenue, and we waited some more. After about 15 minutes, we see movement and a couple of floats heading out way. Hey, we know them! Look who it is:
After Snoopy and Charlie had rolled on past, dancing and “singing”, Mario characters followed. After the two floats, a whole bunch of uniformed teams walked by to cheers and waves, and we had no idea what’s going on. None of the announcements are made in English, because why should they? This is not for tourists, this is not for foreigners, this is for locals. (Off topic, but same in Disney and Universal, at no point do the staff ever say anything in English. All announcements are made in Japanese only.) From Snoopy started and the waving people left, maybe 5 minutes passed? But the crowds are still standing here, and we’re back to waiting.
At this point, Maylin says to me “Mommy, I have to go pee”. Oh no! There are no open stores, because of course, we’re in the middle of a parade on a public holiday. I spot a café and go in to ask to use the washroom, Maylin in tow. It took two employees and their translation devices to tell me that washrooms were only for paying customers, so of course I promised to buy drinks to go on my way out, but PLEASE could Maylin just pee somewhere other than her pants?
It took 15 minutes to get our to-go drinks, and during that time, Joe and Téa were chased from the sidewalk several times by strict looking security guards. No loitering! When Maylin and I finally emerged, she had a banana milk drink, and I had an iced matcha latte. The latte also came with the cutest little cookie man, and it had better have, at that extraordinary high price… But, all is well that doesn’t end with wet pants, and we continued on our way heading for Namba.
We glanced over towards the parade route, and now it’s a fashion show. Some of the models are waving and smiling and maybe they are celebrities? Others are looking like they’re hating every second, keeping their heads down and just trying to get it over with.
We were aiming for Namba Parks a few blocks further down, and along the way there’s so much to see and do. Amongst other fun things, we found this different-looking vending machine:
By now it is getting darker, and we are getting hungrier. We walk through the covered shopping alley Shinsaibashisuji, where you have everything from tourist traps to familiar brand names. We’ve walked through this many times before, and prefer quieter neighbourhoods to the busy tourist central areas.
We are starting to get hungry, and our focus is now on finding a restaurant not inside the market alley itself. We venture out into a side street, take a right here and a left there, and then we see a sign about sukiyaki at an affordable price. YES let’s go here, I say, and we head on in.
Only once our food hits the table do I understand why my meal was so reasonable – it’s all tapas sized! I’ve had sukiyakis three times the size of this, so Joe ends up ordering me a bowl of rice to go along with it. Half way through my meal I remember I’m supposed to be a blogger, and bloggers need photos, so I pause to take a picture. Joe had almost finished his sushi and sashimi by this point, but you can see his two plates are also tiny.
The girls happily shared fried octopus, french fries and chicken nuggets.
Dinner done and dusted, we kept on walking down towards Namba. Dotonbori sure is a sight after dark, with all the lights! About half a million other tourists agree with me, so we were lucky to find a space by the railing for this unobstructed family photo.
It’s quite a trek down towards Namba, especially with all our stops and browsing along the way! Almost there and we hop back into the bakery café that serves the city’s best (well as far as we know anyways) truffle croissant. I decide to try the Dubai chocolate croissant sandwich (underwhelming) and a craft cola. Craft sodas are quite the thing here, and yet this is my first one. It was surprisingly delicious, especially as I don’t enjoy the spicier sodas at home!
The Cheng Family are rarely out exploring after dark, but Joe had read somewhere that the Christmas lights would be lit at Namba Parks starting on November 3rd, so we came to marvel at the lights. They were not yet lit, so we had a very calm evening (why would there be crowds if there was nothing to see, right?)
