will i am's delayed diary

How could one week go by without visiting the market? Even on vacation in Japan we did no break this routine. LOL. Kuromon-Ichiba Market is one of the must-see places near our hotel. Dubbed as "Osaka's Kitchen" its just a short walk away. We were all very excited at the prospect of fresh seafood! Along the way there we passed by many restaurants that no doubt get their fresh ingredients from the market. An old man was also walking in the same direction and he made small talk with us in broken Mandarin. Ojiisan: Going to the market? Moi: Yeah. Ojiisan: The seafood is very nice. But expensive! Expensive coming from a local! Yikes. But anyway, we were prepared to gorge. The market looked like the shopping arcades of Shinshaibashi-Suji but with a difference in decoration. Giant seafood replicas were suspended from ceiling. The place was orderly, clean, dry and odourless, unlike the markets in Malaysia. Upon arrival at the market, SK immediately went for ...

Woke up bring and early the next morning to have breakfast at the 24 hour Yoshinoya just outside the hotel. A very small place with about eight seats at the bar. Got the beef bowl ( extra beef ) and unagi with rice. The beef was so tender and juicy. Much better than the Yoshinoya in Malaysia. And no weird smell in the shop. The next city in our list was Kyoto ( The Tribe went to Kaiyukan instead ). Took the Keihan Railway from the Yodoyabashi station to Fushimi Inari station. Another fifty minutes or so. True to the weather forecast, it started raining at 11:00 am, just as we alighted. The station is just walking distance to the Fushimi Inari Taisha shrine, dedicated to Inari Ōkami, the Japanese kami of foxes, of fertility, rice, tea and Sake, of agriculture and industry, of general prosperity and worldly success. The walk was pleasant, passing quaint little shops, a railway crossing and a river. The main feature of the shrine would be the vermilion torii lining the mountain path ...

At KIX, we cleared immigration pretty quickly contrary to SK and KH's experiences ( both of them had visited Osaka before! ). Perhaps it was due to the arrival delay. The airport is pretty simple with no eye-catching features. Our first order of business was to purchase the Kansai Thru Pass. For just JPY5,300, one buys unlimited passage on trains and buses operated by forty different transport companies in Kansai. The pass lasts for three days, and the usage need not be on consecutive days. The only limitation is that it does not cover the Limited Express trains of Nankai Railway or Kintetsu Corporation. Doesn't really matter anyway as the Limited Express trains are just faster by ten minutes compared to the slower trains. Took about an hour for us to arrive at the Osaka-Namba station. For the whole ride, there was only one eye candy-- Kintetsu Karl, a tanned fella with big arms. Not very cute, but I'm sure some can appreciate his straight-ish charm. From the station, the...