Im back in Osaka for just a couple of days. There’s not much I wanted to do here but its a cheap place to take it easy for a bit.

Im renting a room in some lady’s house. I thought it was a hostel but its just someone’s spare bedroom. Its kinda charming and very homey. She’s just as sweet as can be.

Yesterday’s activities included a bullet train ride, a trip to a free museum, and a walking tour. Nothing too exciting, but i did learn that someday Im gonna have to find a way to see a baseball game. They are nuts here about the local team.

There’s three things to do here, and it was delightful doing them.

The castle itself was crowded but not too bad. I got there early. You basically had to climb a ladder to get from one floor to the next. Bonkers. I was mega impressed and a little shamed when I watched an old lady climb the  stairs after arriving in a wheelchair lol.

The garden next door features a teahouse that’s a certified national treasure. Not too impressive to my eyes but then what do I know? Any original wood structure that old is to be preserved.

Jo-an – Wikipedia https://share.google/rQ5xIFXIFyRZrjomB

The tea ceremony i had was pretty casual but the lady knew enough English to explain a lot. I appreciated it.

On the way back to the station there’s a shopping street with lots of places to eat. The shops themselves are pretty old and survived the firebombings in ww2. Inuyama got off easy, unlike nagoya.

I was able to try something new here. The miso in nagoya is kinda special. Its made into soup, dressings, meat sauce, and its used to stew stuff in as well. In this case, some stuff with a firm texture. Not super yummy, but the stuff had protein in it, which I needed, lol.

It was still kinda early, so I went to the other super important Shinto shrine. This one isn’t as popular with the tourists, so it was super peaceful. Atsuta Jingu. I was full of fishcake so I didn’t eat what you’re supposed to eat there, which is these special kind of noodles.

That was pretty much the day. The weather was glorious.

Well, the main reason I came to Japan this time was to go to Ise Jingu, and now I’ve been.

There isn’t a lot to exactly see, as such, because everything important is hidden. But the train trip was relaxing and the grounds were enormous and peaceful. I also watched a ritual food carving ceremony, hochoshiki. That was neat

I spent some time at a second-hand kimono shop. Such beautiful clothes, and not necessarily cheap either.

The most interesting thing of the day was a kind of show at Bansho-ji, a popular temple in a shopping mall nearby.

Not my video, but here it is. There’s also a mechanical man.

There’s almost always some kind of shopping street or arcade near shrines and temples. So that’s convenient for worshippers. They can pray and then get the cabbage needed for dinner. At this particular neighborhood, theres three very popular shrines or temples and 1200 shops.

It got cold so I called it a day after that.

Today I’ll go to Inuyama, a small city nearby that has the oldest remaining castle that’s never been burned down or rebuilt.

Rode the bullet train to Nagoya yesterday. What a delight! So convenient.

My hostel is very small and very quiet…except for the musak. It’s in a shopping street and the canned music plays nonstop. It took about 2 hours to learn to ignore it.

Had a great afternoon at the Toyota Museum in town. The company got started by making spinning and weaving machines. All of the displayed machines were working, and the dudes would operate them if you looked interested. Neat!

On the car side, there was the original prototype, the A1. The guy bought a 33 Chevrolet and just copied it, lol. He thought “I wanna make a car. Ill just copy this one.” It took a year to make the first one.

Anyhoo you can read about on the he internet.

Today I’ll go to Ise Jingu, a very important shrine in the countryside. Its two hours away, a bit far but ive got a book to read.