NICK: Boom Shaka, rump shakin' Osaka
Trip Start
Jan 25, 2006
1
28
106
Trip End
Ongoing
Osaka,
Japan
Wednesday, March 29, 2006
I bid my aunt and uncle's house farewell for a few days to head into central Osaka. I had two reasons for this: Swing dancing, and meeting Ash at the airport.
First I headed out to downtown Osaka, having fun getting lost along the way. I dunno if ya'll have guessed this, but I love getting lost. I like to put the map in my bag and just wander around looking at everything. I've been in Japan for a few months but things never seem to stop amazing me. Every one of these Japanese cities is a boring concrete jungle with skyscrapers, featureless black-suit businessmen, with occasionally some super small detail that just barely catches your eye. Those are the things I look for.
Wandering thru the city I ended up in the Umeda area
01 I know I know, I'm not 12 anymore
. This is shopping central, as my guide book has clearly decided that Osaka is nothing more than a financial district; I guess there's not a whole lot of sight-seeing to do here. I haven't seen nearly as many temples or old school stuff around here since I guess they only keep it in Kyoto. Umeda, Namba, and the Nankai district are apparently the red-light district. It's odd how the red-light district usually seems to take up most of each city. Kyoto and Tokyo's were huge. This place is no exception with it's dozens of love hotels and "juicy" (hostess) bars.
Being the idiot that I am, I'd set out from my Aunt's house without checking the location of where I was going. I'd only remembered that I was heading towards the Nagahoribashi subway stop, but I'd forgotten to remember the address on the webpage. I then remembered that I could find an internet/manga cafe, since I'd heard that they often have internet access.
Manga is what we typically call "Anime" or "Japanimation" I don't know what the exact difference is, but I think it has to do with "manga" = print, and "Anime" = animation/cartoons. I've heard American people call anything cartoony with big eyes as "anime."
I figured out how to ask where a manga/internet cafe is by practicing the line repeatedly in my head.
02 building with eyes
. "Ano, sumimasen, Een-tah-netoh Kah-feh wah, doko deska?"
Unfortunately, the most that I got out of their response was by looking in the direction they ended up pointing. I didn't want to trouble them to repeat what they said, full-knowing that I wouldn't understand it if they'd
a) slowed it down,
b) written it down, or
c) spelled it out for me, I just kept asking people the same question whenever I felt I was far enough away to be visible from whoever had just told me.
Stupid tourists.
I found the cafe and was greeted at the desk by some typical anonymous Japanese youth (they all dress the same/have the same haircut) and he showed me to my booth.
The manga cafe was not what I'd imagined - my guide book stated that they're someplace that you could crash if you ever got stuck somewhere without a place to sleep. I kinda expected it to be loud with movies and online games going, kinda like an arcade. This was quiet, and dark, like a library you're expected to sleep in. There were blankets, vending machines with food, and small cubicles in which to browse the internet, play games, read manga, or sleep.
03 once again, "cute"
I'm now a member. (the card was free)
On Weds here, there's a venue at an American themed (not sure if it really is American) disco/bar called Sam and Dave's. There's a big chain of them thru Osaka, and a couple of former Santa Barbarians teach swing there and have a small dance there. I found the address on the website and went to the class.
The class there focused on one of my dancing weaknesses: the charleston. I don't know why, but I always seem to forget what I learned. I think that's why I don't like the charleston and don't practice it - I forget the moves. I forget the moves cuz I don't practice them. It's a vicious cycle.
The scene there is small, but it's still bigger than SB's scene of regular dancers at our Jitterbug club. If we could have got the older crowd to come to the Jitterbug club, we'd have had a larger scene. Anyways, their group wasn't bad, the follows were a lot of fun. I still don't quite know how to ask "do you want to dance" in Japanese. I gave up pretty quickly and resorted to the sign language of two fingers dancing on my palm and a "Onegaishimasu" (no english equivalent, but sort of like 'will you do me a favor')
After that, I tried my hand at blues - this is a dance I can't make my body do. Charleston, I forget the moves; blues dancing, I can't DO the moves. Dax and Peter, the two former Santa Barbarians helped me out with some tips. I hope i remember them, I can never tell if I'm doing it right
04 Stupid stupid tempting crane games
. "Sex on the dancefloor" is what I've heard it described it feels like.
I MUST be doing it wrong.
Anyways, we all went out to eat at this posh little Italian restaurant. They had a nice wine and some awesome pasta and salads. It was kinda pricey, but I didn't mind since the company was cool and the food filled me up. We played some games with the chopstick rests, deodorant, and yakked about stuff. That was cool.
They were kind enough to walk me to the capsule hotel that I was hoping to stay at, somewhere in another seedy part of Osaka, known as "America-town." Takumi and the other girl (I couldn't ever hear waht she said her name was) took me in and talked to the front desk guy. I was glad that they did that..
Capsule hotels are hotels where businessmen usually stay if they miss the trains home. This one cost about 20 bucks, and they give you a small capsule (kinda like a coffin) for you to sleep in. You use a Japanese style bath, and have your own little bed with a TV, radio, lamp, desk, and alarm clock.
The TV was pretty funny - 6 channels on the thing and the only one with good reception was the porn channel. I was pushing buttons in the dark at 3 am and was appalled that the wall next to my pillow was squealing rhythmically (Japanese porn stars squeal, rather than grunt)
05 Claw on the crane game
. I looked up to see that i"d flipped the TV on and that there was some poor porn star, looking like she was in pain. Why does Japanese porn look like the girl is really not enjoying it?
Anyways, decided it was really too late to be watching porn (besides, they put those fuzzy "Cops" blur-blocks on the private parts to avoid really showing anything) and went to sleep. I had to try to lie diagonally to stretch out my arms and feet on my stomach. I dont' think that people much taller than me would be comfortable.
I think there are women's floors in this place too.
Comments
pr0n
I always wondered that too. Why does the girl always look like she's not enjoying it?
And the square-dot censoring is dumb too.
Re: Pr0n
I agree - I noticed that they do that in the seedy little video stores (I told you I'm curious about everything).
The video stores looked like the XXX videos were censored as well. Some odd laws in this country, if that's the case.
I also liked how the seedy little video store had copies of videos you'd never find in a XXX video shop back home. Fun titles like 'Beethoven', 'Throw momma from the train' 'The money Pit' and something else I can't remember that was just as obscure, and from the 80's.
Odd.