Saturday, November 28, 2015

Osaka '15, Day 4 – Shopping at Shinsaibashi and Amerikamura


The next morning we woke up a bit later. After our nightly adventures of shopping for plugs at Don Quijote, we needed a bit more rest. x) For our last day in Osaka we had planned a shopping day and since the shops wouldn’t open until 11 am, we had plenty of time. ^^
We got dressed and bought some things at the 7/11 for breakfast. It was actually very good!
Our tasty and fairly cheap 7/11 breakfast.

Because we were going on a shopping spree, I wanted to wear a cute outfit. Actually, I put a lot of effort into all my outfits upfront, but for this day I wanted to wear one of my favourite outfits, so I went with my light pink, ‘Très Cool’ outfit, as I called it. My mom also wore one of her favourite dresses. ^^
Our outfits of the day!

Do you see the cute, matching shoes my mom and I are wearing? We both really loved those shoes so much we both bough them, but unfortunately, this is the only day you will see us wearing them. I hadn’t walked enough on them back home, so my feet started hurting pretty early on and I never wore them again during our trip. My mom did wear them at home before our trip, but somehow she had the same problem. So we carried them in our suitcases for nothing! Oh well. x)S
We tried to get rid of the last sleep we felt and then went on our way to Shinsaibashi. Shinsaibashi is a long, roofed shopping street right across from the Glico man. The sun was shining and the colours of the advertisements looked so pretty, I couldn’t help but pose in front of the Glico man again. Initially I did the traditional pose, but I ended up liking a different picture better! ^^
With the Glicoman! ♥

Beware: my mom took a lot more pictures than I did that day, so you’ll be seeing more of me than of her. ^^’ Sorry.
The sun was shining so brightly all the neon advertisements looked so colourful! It was like a rainbow! It made me feel really happy and excited for our shopping adventure!
My mom taking a picture of the Dotonbori canal.

We entered Shinsaibashi and so began our first shopping day! The long street seemed to be endless! Up until far in the distance I could see people walking and shopping. I got very excited!
Before our trip, I had looked up all the touristic attractions we wanted to visit, but I had also made shopping maps! It took a lot of work, but it helped me focus on where to go without having to look (too much) for the stores we wanted to visit. So we went on our way!
Shinsaibashi, the longest shopping arcade I’ve ever seen! ☆

There were many, many shops in Shinsaibashi, most of them unknown to me. One of the first shops we entered sold fairly normal bags, however they were all completely blinged up with sequins, rhinestones and sparkles. They were very pretty, but also very expensive! Other shops we entered sold socks and tights or cute frilly underwear. I also spotted a café called ‘Maison de Gigi’, which I recognized from one of Deerstalker’s videos.
Some of the shops at the beginning of our Shinsaibashi adventure. ✧

We continued our way and soon arrived at a Sega arcade. It was absolutely huge inside! The first floor, on Shinsaibashi level, was filled until the furthest wall with UFO catcher machines that contained the most varying items! It was amazing. And there were so many! At the front of the arcade were taiko drum games and big billboards indicated there were special purikura floors as well.
Me taking pictures of the purikura billboards. You can see the shopping street behind me.

Both my mom’s and my attention were drawn to a young man who had just started playing the taiko drums game and he was so goood! It was truly mesmerizing to watch him play! He also continued for quite a while. Such dedication!
The guy playing the taiko drums game. He was so fast!

We entered the arcade and just walked around, looking at all the cute items inside the machines. The noise was incredible! There was loud music and lots of different noises coming from the games themselves as well. I quite liked it actually, haha. x) It’s such a shame I am absolutely no good at catcher games; there were so many amazing items that you could win! The cutest plushies, aaah!
Some of the contents of the catcher machines. Those little dogs! ♥

I also spotted a Lolita dressed in Putumayo playing one of the games by the way, she looked really cute. :3
We left the arcade again (we would keep the purikura in mind for later) and walked on. We soon arrived at… the Bodyline store! Bodyline has a really big, two floor store in Osaka and it was hard to miss! The typical Bodyline red with typical Bodyline gold letters greeted us from the left.
The Osaka Bodyline store.

Some people hate Bodyline, but I love their shoes and blouses and I definitely wanted to shop there! I was hoping to find the gold shoes I had wanted for so long there. We browsed the ground and second floor for a while and I saw some cute items, but nothing I really wanted to buy. I did, however, notice the same hyper Disney music they have been playing at Bodyline in Harajuku for years here as well! Those poor staff people. x)
Browsing the second floor with all the dresses and blouses.

After browsing for a while, I asked a shop girl dressed as Snowwhite whether they had any gold shoes in my size. The only gold shoes they had on display were just a tad too small. Unfortunately, these were apparently the last ones and since they didn’t fit 100% right I didn’t buy them. I hoped to find them in the second Bodyline store that was apparently also in Osaka, according to the site.
I really love Bodyline shoes! Although that bright
yellow pair in the corner looks pretty awful! x)

We continued our way and passed several amazing shops and cafés. I did spot some shops I had seen at the beginning of the street as well, which saddened me a little. Big cities in my country often have several shops of the same brand, which I really dislike. But well.
We walked on for a while and arrived at the Disney store! I absolutely love the Disney store, in whichever country I visit it, because we don’t have any in my country. But the Japanese Disney store really is the best of all (in my opinion)! During our trip we visited several Disney stores actually, but since this was the first one everything was new of course.
The Disney store in Shinsaibashi. ☆

We entered the store and my God… I fell in love! ♥ I swear, everything they sold was amazing! The Japanese Disney stores are really focused on young adults, selling the most beautiful jewelry and accessories. Wherever I looked, I fell in love with something. One of the first things being the Baby, the Stars Shine Bright x Disney collaboration. Baby had designed a beautiful Alice in Wonderland set, with a blouse, a skirt and an adorable soft bunny capelet. That capelet and me? Love at first sight! I absolutely adored it and almost hugged it, haha!
Hello, it’s me~! ♫
Aaah, I loved this bunny capelet so much! It was so soft…

Before jumping on buying things, we walked around the store for a bit. They had several cupboards filled with amazing jewelry and I didn’t know where to look. Beautiful pastel bags, statues, jewelry boxes... We didn’t take many pictures at the Disney store unfortunately, we were just too amazed!
We walked up the stairs to the second floor, which seemed a bit different from the ground floor: there was a desk where you could buy Disneyland tickets (I think) and the cupboards on the walls were less full than downstairs. However, they had a sale corner and when I walked up to it my jaw dropped: there were items from the Angelic Pretty x Disney Rapunzel collaboration there! The dress had been incredibly popular so of course that one was sold out, but the amazing lavender hoodie that I had loved so much when I saw it online was for sale, 50% off!
50% off!? Uhm… are you sure? *_*

I could barely believe it and had to check the tags (and my eyes) twice! I tried it on and it fit really well despite being a small size! Naturally, you can tell what my first purchase was going to be. :3 I also spotted the Rapunzel rings (that I also really liked) for 50% off and decided to get those too. I felt like I was dreaming, it was such a steal! I went to get a basket and had a feeling I was going to need it. XD
Meanwhile, my mom had found an adorable Chip & Dale camera bag, also 50% off, and I managed to convince her to buy the amazing Snowwhite bag that was also for sale as well (my mom has a thing for bags). <3
We went downstairs again and went on to browse the rest of the store.
Browsing, browsing… There were many too cute things! I didn’t know what to choose.

I found some amazing The Little Mermaid earrings and a darling perfume bottle-shaped Marie from the Aristocats necklace. My mom, who is always a little doubtful about whether items are ‘fitting for her age’, needed some persuasion again but ended up with a gorgeous Chip & Dale acorn necklace that was cute yet subtle. I discovered a nice special deal that offered three rings for the price of two so I went to browse for a bit as well. I have to admit I had misinterpreted the deal as ‘two for one’, but it didn’t matter since I found some really sweet rings. I ended up with a little crown (from Elsa I am guessing), an Ariel one and a Tinkerbell one. Finally, I also bought a beautiful shell-shaped Ariel key chain. I really had a thing for shells this trip. Stay tuned for more shell-related items!
I decided to postpone buying the cute bunny capelet until I was certain I absolutely wanted it. It wasn’t cheap and the price of the items in my basket was quite adding up.
I went to pay and skipped out of the store, I was so happy! We walked on, past an amazing display of Randa x My Melody shoes and soon arrived at the Sanrio store!
This picture was actually taken after we visited the shop and not before, but sssh!

Whooaaa, that store was so cute! You really couldn’t miss it! It was pastelly, had colour changing light in the walls of the entrance gate and the sign saying ‘Sanrio’ sparkled! Inside, everything was just stuffed. Everywhere you looked there were pastels. Cute items, utensils, plushies, hoodies, pyjamas, jewelry, bags, suitcases, so many things! Ad these were just some items I named from the top of my head. So many cute things!
My mom shopping at the Sanrio store. ♥

There were three floors in total: the ground floor carried mainly clothing and bags, the second floor jewelry, more bags and cute utensils and the third floor had many Japanese-themed items, key chains and Funassyi items. I couldn’t help but laugh at a ‘praying in front of a stained glass window Hello Kitty key chain (we called her ‘Holy Kitty’, I thought it was hilarious). My mom ended up buying a mini plushie of Bon Bon Ribbon. It may or may not have been my fault a bit… It was cute, ok?
We left the Sanrio shop and by then our poor feet started to hurt really bad from our shoes, so we decided to return to the hotel, rest for a bit (go us!) and change shoes. But of course, while walking back, we needed to pay the purikura floors at the Sega arcade a visit!
Which purikura booth to choose..?

Apparently there were two floors, but we only browsed one. There was even a sign with a floor plan showing all the purikura booths! We didn’t have much trouble picking our booth: we chose the ‘Twinkle Twinkle’ one, a forget-me-not blue booth with a Western model on it. You could choose between two styles of shooting: cute or cool. I didn’t really see any difference between either (heck, the girl wore a ponytail for the ‘cool’ style and her hair down for the ‘cute’ style, that was it! XD) so I went with ‘cute’. Always a good idea. ^^
The inside of our purikura booth (in case you’ve never seen one yet). ^^

We took pictures (man this always goes so quickly!), I managed to film it and then the decorating started. Since it was a quiet moment we had plenty of time and we took a while to look through all the stickers and pens. We did our utmost best to decorate our pictures the best we could. There was also a shell pen, yay!
Our pictures came out quite cute, despite our alien eyes hihi!
I adore doing purikura! It’s so much fun. ♥

On the way back to the hotel we got some drinks from a vending machine and then took a bit of rest. Our poor feet. And our pretty shoes. :( Oh well.
After a bit of rest, we went on our way again! Direction: Amerikamura. Amerikamura is like the Harajuku of Osaka: lots of shops and very fashionable. Or so I had read, I didn’t know what it would be like yet of course! ^^ We decided to walk there from our hotel and even though it looked like quite a distance, we arrived there quite soon. We walked through a long street, which was clearly ‘the upper class street’, judging from the Dolce & Gabbana, Chanel and Prada stores. Also, there were high, green trees on both sides of the broad street. Usually, that’s an indication as well, believe it or not!
I tracked our footsteps on my map, we went left a the Apple store and soon I spotted a familiar building. It’s called Tom’s House and undoubtedly it sells clothes, but I didn’t enter it. However, I have seen it on many pictures of Amerikamura and therefor made me happy!
Toms House, a sign you are in Amerikamura!

And suddenly, we found ourselves in front of Maiden Clothing. Maiden Clothing is like the Closet Child of Osaka: it sells second hand Lolita clothing. I knew there were two stores. One a bit shady and the other much better. I had no idea which one of the two this one was, so we went inside to find out.
The bright pink Maiden Clothing sign. Despite its colour, it’s easy to overlook.

We took the tiny elevator up to the second floor and entered… the most terrible shop ever. It reminded me of the Closet Child in Ikebukuro, only worse: it was filled to the brim with CDs, second hand rock and gothic clothing and black and grey colours everywhere. The wall on the right was filled with racks of Lolita clothing, but somehow it just didn’t feel right. And the music… they were playing an awful scream CD. It surprised me the singer didn’t choke on his own voice, it was so awful! Nevertheless, my mom and I bravely tackled the second hand Lolita clothing racks. We found some nice pieces, but they were rare: most of the clothing seemed old, wrinkled, sometimes even torn. They sold terribly mistreated brand bags for low prices, but they were looking so awful I still didn’t want them. In the end I did find a really nice dress: Angelic Pretty’s Sugar Time jsk in white. I tried some other things on but this dress fit me quite well and looked nice, despite the minor flaws the shop girl managed to point out. By this time (we had spent quite some time at the shop), the noise of the music and the claustrophobic layout of the shop almost drove me crazy, until I remembered there was a second shop, which I had somehow forgotten (a small flyer next to the counter also spoke of it as far as I could read it). I told the shop girl I would return later and asked for directions to the second shop. She kindly explained it to me as best as she could and my mom and I left the shop. I was hoping with all my heart that this had been the ‘bad’ shop. Surely the second shop couldn’t be worse! Right..? Only two shops away we spotted a sign that said ‘Maiden Clothing, 4th floor’. We walked up some stairs past a nail salon, entered the even tinier elevator and went up to the fourth floor. The doors opened and… Calmness. Peace. Quiet. A mannequin wearing an Angelic Pretty navy Dream Marine jsk next to a classical picture frame framing the words ‘Maiden Clothing’.
The view right out of the elevator when you arrive
at the 4th floor where Maiden Clothing is.

My mom and I warily looked around the corner and we almost squealed. A hallway led directly into a neat, tidy store filled with pastel Lolita dresses. Sweet garlands hung from the ceiling and soft harp music was playing. We had arrived in heaven! *o* Okay, yes, that is exaggerated. But compared to the previous store this place was like a sanctuary! We walked into the store and I couldn’t believe my eyes. Rows and rows of dresses, neatly hung by category of brand and even colour! The store was absolutely lovely! ♥
Maiden Clothing from the inside. ✧

Of course, I was immediately drawn to the Angelic Pretty wall on the right and my mom and I started browsing. I saw a lot of gorgeous dresses, rare ones even, but they were quite pricy. Some were even very overpriced. I had already read about this fact, but I was still a bit surprised. I browsed through the dresses and spotted a lot of nice ones, including two dresses I know are on my friends’ wishlists (Merkator Antique Shop in mint for example). However nothing really drew my attention. During my trip I really noticed I am not drawn to every single sweet Angelic Pretty dress anymore. My style is slightly shifting. However, of course I was hoping for a dream scenario.
A big row of Angelic Pretty dresses does make a pretty sight though.

And then it happened. In between the blue dresses I spotted a strip of royal blue beaming at me. It was as if time stopped for a moment and my breath stopped with it. Dramatic much? I can assure you this is how I truly felt, because between the Angelic Pretty dresses hung Crystal Dream Carnival.
Now, in order to understand how I felt, I must tell you a little story. Ever since this print came out, I have loved it. I loved the cuts of the dresses, I loved the colours it came in, I loved the print that was both that mature sweet and that classic princess-like that I had been looking for and slowly shifting to. Yes, Crystal Dream Carnival became an instant wishlist item to me. However, it wasn’t until I got to try on my friend Iris’s princess one piece that I knew how amazing this dress truly was. Of course, the princess one piece had a truly stunning cut, however I would never wish to own it in that version. But I felt so beautiful wearing it. This print didn’t give me the feeling I was cute or pretty. It made me feel elegant, refined and beautiful. Ever since that day I have wanted this dress more. I have literally dreamt at night of buying this dress, whether navy or blue. In the depths of my heart I dreamed, imagined, hoped I would find this dress during my trip to Japan, but hoping for a certain dress has never resulted into finding it before. And now it did.
Crystal Dream Carnival, the print that captured my heart. ♥

You might think I am overreacting and perhaps I am describing what happened a bit more poetic than it actually did, however this really was a very special moment for me and this is how I felt. ♥ Back to my incredibly humoristic self now. *shoop* Time started ticking again and I walked up to the dress. I wished for it to be a cut that would fit me, to be a version that would look good on me, to be affordable. I pulled the clothing hanger from the grasp of the other dresses and quickly realised it was a set! It was the special set, released for the big New Year’s sales. Not only did the dress come with a small, matching side bow and matching socks, the cut and colour were also different from the ‘normal’ line of this print. This version was fully shirred! And if there is one thing I know it’s that fully shirred Angelic Pretty fits me guaranteed! But would it look good on me too? I chose another dress to try on and asked the kind (and adorable) shop girl whether I could try the dresses on. She prepared them for me and left them in the spacious dressing room. While my mom waited outside I put the dress on over the shirt I was wearing and over the petticoat provided. Then I stepped out of the dressing room. I vaguely remember quietly fearing when I walked up to the mirror. Then I looked up.
Despite wearing my non-matching shirt, non-matching necklace and non-matching socks the dress looked great, even without a real Lolita outfit. Even I, despite all my insecurities, could see it. My mom agreed and when she heard it was one of my Ultimate Dream Dresses, she said something along the lines of ‘Well what are you waiting for!?’ The price, really. Because this dress was indeed overpriced compared to the price it went for when it was in stores. It is against all my principles to buy a dress that costs more than retail price and this dress was. It wasn’t an enormous difference, but enough to make me doubt. However wearing it, holding it in my hands and realising I could buy it here and now (plus the positive exchange rate and my mom’s encouragements) I went for it! And so, Crystal Dream Carnival became mine!
Crystal Dream Carnival, finally mine! ☆

I didn’t need to try the second dress on anymore and I barely browsed the rest of the store. We had spent enough time there already, plus I was about to spend a big amount of money too. I walked up to the counter and the adorable girl smiled and wrapped the dress for me. A small moment of stress occurred when the credit card machine didn’t work, however apparently only a button needed to be switched and I was good to go. I told the shop girl this was my Dream Dress and started crying, oops. x) She was very sweet about it. ^^
She walked us out of the store and we took the elevator down, back to the street.
Happy with my purchase~! ♥

I never went back for the dress in the first Maiden Clothing by the way, haha.
We continued our way to our next destination: Angelic Pretty! I was very excited to visit this store, because this shop is actually an acual store in a street and not a corner in a shopping centre. We followed my map and soon I spotted a bright pink shop front!
Walking through the streets of Amerikamura. Can you spot the Angelic Pretty store?

We had arrived at Angelic Pretty! Its pinkness was hard to miss in the otherwise pretty grey street. Aaah, the store was so gorgeous! And you could easily take pictures in front of it, so great!
The Angelic Pretty shop in Osaka. Isn’t it amazing!? ✧

Two mannequins in the shop window wore Whip Jacquard coats and dresses and the other window contained a cupboard filled with the typical old-fashioned toys found at every Angelic Pretty. It was so cute!
Some more detailed shots of the incredibly pink shop!

We entered the store, where the shop girl dressed in a sweet black-with-pink-polkadots dress was the only person present. We walked around the store, which was very spacious and so wonderful. They had beautiful items on display, a classical coat called ‘Lacy Mademoiselle coat’ being at the top of my favourites. They had gorgeous bags, lovely dresses, beautiful blouses… I didn’t know where to look!
While planning our trip, I had found out that we would actually be able to visit five Angelic Pretty stores if we wanted: one in Osaka, one in Hiroshima, a new one in Kyoto and two in Tokyo. My mom really loved the idea of visiting them all and agreed, so the Osaka store was the first one we visited! Since I like making memories, I decided to buy something small (as far as that’s possible) in every store. So I went on the hunt for a cute item. Luckily, it wasn’t hard to find something I wanted. There was some jewelry on sale, but nothing really drew my attention. However, to my great happiness they still had the ginormous Angelic Pretty shell necklace in pink! Another one of those items I loved online but couldn’t buy and now it was right in front of me! Naturally, my choice was made. ♥
Luckily, something I was hoping for happened as well, although earlier than I expected: my mom fell in love with an Angelic Pretty item. The Dolly Cat special edition in ivory had just come out and there were some lovely Whimsical Cat necklaces on display to match. Both my mom and I immediately fell in love with this sweet little kitten, with its bonnet and bows and sparkly round eyes. I had secretly planned to buy my mom a silly gift: something Lolita and very eye-catching, because she is the best Lolita mom in the world! And this was perfect! So I offered to buy her the blue version of the Whimsical Cat necklace and although she was a bit flabbergasted at first she was super happy!
Finally, we left the Angelic Pretty shop.
With my pink Angelic Pretty bag. ^^

We went into the building next to the Angelic Pretty shop, because located there was the second hand Lolita shop called ‘Near’. Despite the kind of creepy looking hallway we had to enter, the shop was kind of neat. They did have a lot of dresses, but nothing caught my interest and we left quite soon. Also, I was still elated by Crystal Dream Carnival: nothing could live up to that!
The second hand Lolita shop ‘Near’.

It was getting dark by now and we decided to quickly visit Baby, the Stars Shine Bright before grabbing a bite to eat. We walked through a super cool and fashionable street, our attention briefly drawn by the incredibly colourful shop called ‘Kiitos’. They had such amazing clothing there and the shop girl was just too cute!
This amazing picture needed a spot in this blog post!

We also passed Putumayo. I took a picture of the shop front, when suddenly a shop girl appeared at the doorstep. It turned out she wanted to show me the newest collection in the shop window, haha! She looked super cute as well.
We soon found the Baby shop and took some pictures before we entered.
The BtSSB shop is not on street level, but you need to go down some stairs.

I have to say: this shop was beautiful! Not only was it big, with lots of racks of clothing and an enormous glass jewelry cabinet, but they also had a corner filled with old fashioned furniture that looked perfect for a photoshoot! The walls along the counter were filled with posters and I got an overall happy feeling. However, the two poor shop girls made me feel a little awkward. I had read blog posts about girls visiting the Baby Osaka store and having bad experiences with rude shop girls ignoring them. I am not sure whether these girls were more attentive or were just forced to cater to me since I was the only customer, but they didn’t ignore me at all! x) I felt very watched. I walked around the store and wished for something to pop up that I wanted to buy, however I barely dared to ask anything because I felt so awkward in front of the shop girls. However, I soon spotted a gashapon machine that contained cute buttons! One of the shop girls explained to me it was an exclusive machine, only found in Osaka and Kyoto. I decided to get a set for myself!
Finally, I left the Baby shop and joined my mom (who was sitting on the outside stairs
by now).
Some more cose up shots of the Baby, the Stars Shine Bright store. ♥

We went to get something to eat and decided on fast food. Initially we wanted to go to McDonald’s, however I spotted a poster at Burger King that drew our attention: the black burger, a special burger with black meat, black sauce and black buns. I didn’t think we had this burger in my country, so we decided to go for it! After we ordered our burgers, I got to pick a ballot from a box as if I was joining a lottery. I guess because it was a special deal, you got to join a little game. ^^ My winning ballot contained a discount for the next menu I ordered, haha!
We took our burgers up a floor and sat down, admiring our… interesting meal.
Our Burger King ‘Kuro’ burgers. That sauce looks so disgusting… x)

The burgers turned out to be really good actually! We had to get used to the taste, but they were quite nice (despite the… interesting colour).
While eating we discussed on what to do. I suggested to ride the Ferris wheel on top of the shopping centre Hep Five. It might have been better to return to the hotel, but we were stubborn and went on our way anyway.
We took the metro to Umeda. My mom was very amazed by the ‘woman only boarding points’that led to ‘women only’ cars. We arrived at Umeda and when I finally found the right direction, we arrived at a very high roofed shopping centre with a gigantic hanging sculpture of an orange(?) whale. We went to the toilet and then went to visit Liz Lisa (after asking for directions again. XD) Aaah, this store. These clothes. I adore Liz Lisa, they always have the most beautiful clothes. But I think that, no matter how much weight I lose, I will never fit anything from them. x) Oh well.
We also visited Axes Femme, which has an amazing store in Paris as well, but didn’t find anything to our taste at that moment.
We took the escalators up, but before we went to the Ferris wheel we got distracted by a Disney store. They had the cute bunny capelet for sale as well, but because I was very tired (and didn’t like the store as much as the one in Shinsaibashi) I decided not to get it, even though I got to try it on. Yes I am weird. ^^’
Finally, we went up to the floor of the Ferris wheel and bought two tickets. We followed the small line and were asked to pose for an official picture in front of a green screen. Then, finally, we could enter our car.
The Ferris wheel on top of Hep Five.

The bright red Ferris wheel moved very slowly, so the ride took quite a while. Usually, my mom is the one who doesn’t feel very comfortable in Ferris wheels, but this time I was the one who was actually scared! Ok, I wasn’t really scared, more a bit nervous. This Ferris wheel was on top of a building, don’t forget that! It went up really high! Nevertheless, I enjoyed the ride a lot because the view was very nice.
Views from the Ferris wheel.

Finally, we arrived back and left our car. We passed the official picture stand and our picture had turned out so nicely, I decided to buy it as a souvenir (something I rarely do)!
It took us a while to find the way back to the subway and once we got back to Nanba, it took a while until we found Dotonbori. We walked back through the busy street and realised we would be leaving tomorrow. I felt a bit sad: I had to come to really love Osaka despite our rough start and slight ups-and-downs. I hope to one day return!
Walking through Dotonbori at night one last time.

We bought some snacks at the 7/11, including a bag of matcha Kitkats and went back to our hotel. The Kitkats were really nice and so were the cute pancakes we had bought. Almost everything we bought on a whim turned out to be really nice actually!
Evening snacks. ^^

I took purchase pictures (which took a while), packed a little bit and then we went to bed. I was super tired, but super happy! I normally don’t show purchases I make online during my trip, but afterwards. But Crystal Dream Carnival needed a special spot on my Instagram. ♥ Finally, I went to sleep. It had been an eventful day!
Purchases of the day

Purchases of the day

And to end this post with, here is the video I made about our adventures in Osaka! I filmed a lot and tried to make the best videos I could about our trip. I hope you will like it! ♥
You can find day 4 from 6:50 until the end. Please take a look if you want! ♥


Thank you for reading! ~☆~

Friday, November 20, 2015

Osaka ‘15, Day 3 – Osaka Aquarium, Osaka Castle and Traditional Food


Monday October 12th was our first full day in Osaka and we had a very exciting thing planned: we were going to the Osaka Aquarium. This aquarium, also known as ‘Kaiyukan’, is one of the largest aquariums in the world and I since I love aquariums I have been wanting to go there for a very long time! So when we woke up, I was quite excited despite still being a bit tired. I took a shower and put the mermaid-themed outfit I had come up with at home: ‘my ‘Mermaids have more fun’ shirt, my favourite long skirt, a pair of shiny earrings and necklace I borrowed from my mom and my Jule et Lily shell necklace. My mom wore her blue shirt outfit, because… well blue. ^^
Our outfits of the day!

I am really happy you can actually see that magic that is my skirt so well in this picture! When I saw it during shopping a couple of months earlier, I immediately fell in love with it! The gorgeous see-through overskirt is made out of that typical scratchy material cheap Barbie clothes used to be made of, you know what I mean? However, it has a beautiful mint (and sometimes pink) shine to it in certain light conditions and it rarely shows up on picture, but this time it did! I call I my mermaid skirt and I adore it! ♥
During the booking of our hotels, we made sure all our stays were breakfast included, except for the hotel in Osaka. So we went on our way to the pancake restaurant we had spotted the day before, called Honolulu Coffee, to have breakfast at.
We walked into Dotonbori and walked to the restaurant, which was quite close to the Glico man. The line was quite short but gave us enough time to choose our pancakes. There were only three choices, although I initially thought there were more. But since we wanted simple pancakes it was fine. We also got a coffee for my mom and a can of ‘Hawaiian Pineapple Orange Nectar’ for me. Since the pancakes weren’t ready yet, we received a small sign that said ‘1’ and sat down. We chose a seat next to the window with view upon the Dotonbori canal.
Honolulu Coffee from the inside and me and my tired face with our order sign.

We waited for a while until finally our pancakes arrived. Whooaaa, there were so big! And we got three each in a neat pile. It was so much more than we expected haha! The kind waitress showed us where to find the syrup and coconut syrup(?) with a bit of non-verbal pointing and so on. We thanked and then went on to inspect the dot white cream on top of our pancakes. At first I thought it was some kind of ice cream, but it turned out to be salted butter or something? I quite liked it, my mom ended up nauseous. x)
My pancake (after putting syrup on it). ♥

The coconut syrup ended up being nice as well. ^^ A great, but very heavy breakfast.
We paid and went on our way to Nanba station from where we would take the Sennichimae line to Awaza station and then the Chuo line to Osakako. I had researched in advance, which of course helped a lot. However, when we arrived at the tixket machines at the station, I immediately spotted a problem: everything on the subway map was written in kanji. Unfortunately I hadn’t copied the kanji of the station names as well, but we were lucky: there were two English speaking guides to help us! During our days in Osaka, I really felt like people were generally helpful wherever they could. They really tried to cater to tourists which was really great!
Waiting for the guide to help us out.

We got our tickets and went on our way to Kaiyukan~! After a while we arrived at Osakako and followed the stream of people to the exit. I immediately noticed the amounts of parents with children. This has surprised during previous trips to Japan as well: it was a normal school day, did these children have to go to school? Oh well, it didn’t bother me. Just a thought. :)
We started following the signs and flags that were basically everywhere, guiding us into the Osaka Bay Area.
Flags welcoming us into the Osaka Bay Area.

In the distance we could already see the Tempozan Ferris Wheel. It was really big and striking against the grey sky. We followed the signs and soon I spotted the enormous building of the Osaka Aquarium. We walked up some stairs and walked past a bunch of Lego giraffes, promoting a big Lego shop in the building next to us I believe. And then, there it was: Kaiyukan! The outside of the building is hard to overlook: first of all it’s huge, stands freely and with its bright blue,red and glass walls it really stands out. The blue walls are covered in mosaic-like depictions of all kinds of fish, almost like a children’s drawing. I really like this building, it’s so different!
The Osaka Aquarium. Doesn’t it look interesting?

I was very excited at this point and really wanted to go in, however we went to find a toilet first (haha). These things seem so normal, but as you probably know: going to the toilet in Japan is never normal! By now I am used to the heated toilet seats, handy children’s seats and panel with buttons for sounds and the bidet, however the sinks not only had a built-in soap dispenser, the hand drier was also built in! The future is upon us! Also, the lamp was really pretty, with sea animal-shaped ornaments hanging from it.
The beautiful lamp at the toilets of Kaiyukan.

We went on our way to the ticket counter, which was just across from the aquarium. While standing in line I spotted an adorable girl wearing pastels from head to toe. Fluffy hair pompoms, a sailor collar cutsew, a polkadotted skirt and platform sneakers. Her outfit was such an inspiration to me! I saw her several times while wandering around in the aquarium.
We bought our tickets (I was jumping around) and took some more pictures before we went through the ticket gate.
Taking pictures of Kaiyukan and the ferris wheel! ☆

We entered the ticket gate, which was surprisingly not at the big colourful building you see in the pictures above. It was actually in the middle of the square. We walked up some stairs and passed a statue of a whale shark that you could take pictures with. Of course, everyone who wanted to stood neatly in line first. ^^
Before we entered my mom and I walked to the fence and looked upon the bay. We spotted the Universal Studios park in the distance (I saw the Harry Potter castle!) and enjoyed the view. Then we turned around and entered the aquarium.
We walked through the welcome hall and followed the crowd of people through a following hall. I spotted the gift shop on the left, but of course we wanted to check it out after our visit. We kept on walking, turned left and suddenly found ourselves in a water tunnel! There were sharks and rays swimming around in it. It was very unexpected, but it got me even more excited!
Walking through the first water basin of the Osaka Aquarium!

We exited the shark tunnel and walked past a display of more whale shark statues that you could take picture with. They were decorated with garlands and hats because of Halloween, It looked quite funny! XD
We followed the signs and went up a huge, narrow escalator. It took quite a while before we got upstairs, but it quickly became clear to us that were all the way at the top of the building! Then we entered… a jungle?
I didn’t really expect to walk into a jungle in an aquarium!

It appeared that in the glass upper parts of the building, a jungle was built! We followed the sign of a waterfall and spotted a small crowd looking at something. After waiting for some people to leave, we could see for ourselves: they were otters! They were all lounging on top of a tree trunk and looked very cute. ♥
We walked on past a basin holing a Japanese giant salamander and past another waterfall that had a whole group of adorable little crabs clinging to the wall. There was no fence or glass surrounding them, so I wondered whether they ever escaped? I guess they always stay close to the water though. ^^
We walked on and entered the darkness that you always have in aquariums: dark rooms so you can see the basins well.
The aquarium consisted of basins of several different seas and places in the world, like Monterey Bay, the Gulf of Panama, the Tasman Sea and the Pacific Ocean. Unfortunately, I don’t really remember which animal belonged to which area, but I’m sure you will
forgive me. ^^
Several different animals we saw at the Gulf of Panama,
Great Barrier Reef and Antarctica areas.

Taking pictures at an aquarium can be really hard for amateur photographers, so we don’t have that many good pictures. However, I think we have some at least decent pictures so I will be glad to share them with you in this post! If you want to get a more ‘moving’ image of Kaiyukan, check out the video I made below! ♥
We walked on and soon arrived at the biggest attraction of the Osaka Aquarium: the giant 5400 cubic water tank with two whale sharks in them.
Before I go on, I would like to ask you not to start up a discussion with me about whether it’s ok or not to keep these animals inside a tank or any discussion of the sorts. Yes, I have an opinion about it, but it’s complicated and knows many sides and I am really not up for it. If you start a discussion anyway, I will not approve your comment. I’m sorry. It’s not that I am not open to opinions about this matter, but not here on my blog. Now let’s go on!
The giant tank was overwhelming and felt strange at the same time: because of its size, it was hard to see the other side of the tank at times. However, it really is huge. I mean, it fits two whale sharks, several sharks and a group of manta rays and lots of fish! It was massive and massively impressive!
One of the whale sharks inside the giant Pacific Ocean tank.

The glass of this tank was sooo thick! I mean, of course it was, but you could really tell when an animal swam close to you: the window was so thick their size sometimes changed depending on the angle you were looking at them. ^^
My mom especially liked the big rays. Some had such cute noses! Like a pig. :3 They swam so elegantly through the water.
Rays are like floating dresses… Does that makes sense? *o*.

We walked around the tank and passed several other basins as well, with sea lions swimming gracefully around. These basins were all placed around the giant Pacific Ocean tank.
The fish in this tank all swam synchronously. It was so beautiful! ♥

The interesting thing we found about Kaiyukan is: in comparison to some other places they don’t have that many different basins. However, almost all of their basins are really deep and while walking through the aquarium, you go down and pass all these basins several times, but on deeper levels. For example: we had passed a basin with sea lions chilling on some floating platforms, but we passed them two more times while walking around: once just swimming past and once swimming around the bottom of the basin. I thought that was actually really cool and different!
Taking pictures of one of the whale sharks

We walked around and around the biggest tank until we finally reached the bottom. A diver was cleaning the pebbles on the bottom, while another was feeding the rays. Rays being fed always looks so cute! The last time I had seen that was during my first trip to Japan, when my dad and I visited the Sunshine Aquarium.
One of the divers feeding the rays and sharks.

We continued our way and passed a basin filled with giant spider crabs. Now, I am already not a big fan of these creepy animals, but one was being particularly creepy. He kept on touching his belly and acting all weird! I can’t really describe it, it was so weeiiirrd! x)
Uhm… hi. ^^’ Sorry, we’re never going to be friends.

We walked on and officially left the side of the Pacific Ocean tank. Writing this makes it sound like it was short, but we actually walked really slowly, rested a few times and it was really big there, so it actually took a very long time!
We then arrived at the jellyfish exposition! There were a lot basins with different coloured and shaped jellyfish. Some were super cute, others elegant and graceful!
Jellyfish are such cute animals! ♥ Well, from up close and
without the possibility of stinging me. ^^

We walked on and arrived at a dark tunnel with illuminated (fake) ice blocks in the ceiling. The mirrors in the wall suggested a much larger space which was really cool. We then arrived at the Arctic.
The ice hall leading us into the Arctic. ❄

We entered a big room with illuminated ice blocks, where the main source of light came from the ceiling. It was a large, dome-shaped window. I walked underneath it and saw water wrinkling around more blocks of ice, when suddenly a seal swam pas! It was an amazing sight!
Filming the seals swimming above me through the window.

We continued our way and went up a floor, where we finally entered the light again. There was a small exposition about narwhals (damn they’re big) and I quickly discovered the source of the dome we had stood under: a small basin housed a couple of adorable ringed seals. One of them smoothly swam back and forth over the window, while another one was just relaxing partially supported by a rock. He was really so super cute! He reminded me of my dog Catootje, a pug: big, fat, round and cute.
Isn’t this seal adorable!? ♥ He was so sweet!

we walked on and arrived in an area I was really looking forward to: the ray and shark petting area. I have been dying to carefully touch a ray for so long; I was so curious to what it would feel like! I was nervous at first, but finally got my chance! Not everyone was equally careful unfortunately, so I decided to be extra gentle.
After years and years, I finally petted a ray!

The ray felt so different from what I expected! I thought rays would be rough, like sandpaper. Instead, it felt soft, slippery and almost slimy, like soap! It was amazing.♥ I also petted a small shark, which was as sandy and rough as I had imagined a ray. It was incredible!
We walked on, through the temporary shark exhibition (they had really cool machines showing how a shark jaw worked for example) and finally, we were at the end of the aquarium. And you know what that means: gift shop!
Some of the cute items in the gift shop.

They had a lot of cute things in the shop. Not only plushies, but also bags, key chains, magnets, utensils and other random cute things. I adore key chains and was immediately drawn to the display. Almost every animal I had seen in the aquarium was represented by a key chain, some even had several! Naturally, I had a hard choosing the key chain I wanted and I ended up with two: a ray and a seal. ♥ Not the seal from the picture above by the way, haha! You can always view my purchases of the day at the bottom of the post and of course this time is no exception! ^^
‘Which key chain shall I buy..?’

My mom bought one of the soft seal bags you can see in the collage above and also a ray key chain. ^^ Our first real purchases of our trip!
My mom holding her purchases.

We finally left the gift shop and followed the stairs down, where there were more gift shops! We didn’t buy anything, but we did check them out. I really fell in love with a jellyfish plushie, it was so cute! Even cuter than in real life. :3
Isn’t this jellyfish super cute!? Aaah, I should have bought it. XD

Then, we finally left Kaiyukan. Whoa, we had spent so much time there! It was much later than we thought! We sat down on a bench for a few minutes and then decided to go get a drink somewhere. We entered the Tempozan Food Village. I had read this was a shopping centre with lots of restaurants and even a small village inside! We suddenly passed a Sanrio store and I couldn’t help it: I needed to take a look. Sanrio really has too many cute things and of course I immediately spotted something. It was an adorable pink head band with My Melody ears on it. I decided to think about buying it while looking for something to drink.
We soon found the small, old fashioned village.
The Tempozan Food Village. For a moment I really felt like I was walking in a small village!

We walked around the village for a bit. It was very cute, but somehow I didn’t feel drawn to any of the foods. I wasn’t very hungry I guess. We did take some nice pictures, also of each other. ^^
Taking pictures of each other. ♥

We ended up getting drinks at the ‘First Kitchen’ a little further away. They had some interesting-looking drinks with ice cream on them. They looked quite tempting, so my mom and I decided to go for it. I chose a bright green drink, my mom a white-with-something-that-looked-like-fruit drink.
You have to admit my drink looks way cooler than my mom’s! ;)

My drink was pretty nice, but my mom’s won! Ok, in terms of looks, mine was way more awesome, but mine didn’t taste as good as my mom’s. :3
We sat down for a while and just talked, until we felt reenergized. Even though it was quite late already, I really wanted to visit the Osaka Castle too and since we already had plans for the next day, this day was the only possibility. So we decided to go there! But… after I bought the cute ears at the Sanrio store. :3 I ended up buying a cute Kiki&Lala clear folder as well (it was just too cute)! ♥
On my way to the Sanrio store.

Then we went on our way to the Osaka Castle! We walked back to the subway, passing some interesting buildings and houses. We took the metro straight to station Tanimachiyonchome. We are used to all the station having escalators, but this one had none and my mom was feeling not only very tired by this time, but she is also asthmatic. So that was not so great. ^^ It also turned out we had to walk quite far before we finally reached the outer walls of the Osaka Castle. But well, in the end it was worth it. :3
We walked away from the station and followed the signs, passing several huge modern buildings, one belonging to NHK. In the distance we spotted the first walls of the castle, surrounded by trees. We crossed the road (when the annoying light finally turned green) and entered the park. We spotted quite some people walking their dogs (mainly Shiba Inus) and followed the small stream of people to the entrance.
Walking up to the entrance to the Osaka Castle grounds.

The great and annoying part of this castle (and I am sure it’s the case with every castle in Japan) you have to walk quite a while before you reach the actual castle. There are a lot of giant, stone walls and watchtowers to protect the inner part of course, but because we were quite tired the walking seemed endless. From our previous trip we had learned we needed breaks regularly and we certainly tried to incorporate that into our days, but today’s rest hadn’t been enough apparently.
We walked on, passed a bunch of cute shops and food stalls, walked through another gate, around a corner and finally I spotted Osaka Castle! It was so beautiful… I had seen it on pictures many times and wanted to see it for myself so bad. And now I finally could! The walls were white and the roofs were mint. It was so pretty! ♥
Someone was kind enough to take a picture of my
mom and me together. I adore these pictures! ♥

We walked round the castle for only a bit, because dusk was already setting in (somehow the pictures all look lighter than it actually was, which is great for the pictures though). We didn’t want to follow the path down since it would take us further away from the station. We walked up some (giant) stair steps to look up at the castle, when an old Japanese man started talking to us. At first we were a bit wary. Did he want to sell us something? But he turned out to be a funny, nice guy telling us stories and listening to ours. He said Osaka people were much nicer than Tokyo people and he was very happy to hear we would visit Hiroshima as well. He also wanted to know what you say in Dutch at a café when you toast. He already knew it in English, French, German and Italian, so we taught him how to say ‘Proost!’ It was quite funny! ^^ Then we said goodbye and walked back to the station. That sounds like we did it in a minute, but it took quite long. x)
Bye bye, Osaka Castle! ✧

It took me a while before I found the right station and fare on the sign above the ticket machine. While I was studying the map, my mom went to get a drink. Finally I managed and we went back to Nanba station. Unfortunately, I directed us to the wrong exit, so we had to ask someone to point us in the direction of Dotonbori. The poor guy I approached seemed so scared at first, but he turned out to be very helpful. ^^ After a bit of walking, I spotted a big neon sign saying ‘Dotonbori’ and we walked through a street in that direction.
This sign is pretty clear, huh? XD

The street we were walking in was such a weird place! There were lots of love hotels, weird hotels and small shady cafés. It was great, I absolutely loved it! XD We also found a dog café! The pictures of the cute and well-groomed doggies were so tempting! Maybe one day I will visit it…
We arrived at Dotonbori and also at our next task of the day: finding a place to eat. But before we did so, I got myself a Sailor Moon gashapon!
I love how focused I look in the first picture. All I had
to do was insert money and spin a wheel. XD

I was so excited and ended up getting Sailor Moon’s Crystal Star (I had to ask what it was before writing this since I don’t know anything about Sailor Moon). It was so cute, I was very happy with it!
We walked around for quite a while. Somehow we weren’t really tempted by anything in particular. Many restaurants had lines in front of them and we weren’t keen on the idea of eating at a street stall. And although the giant canons to roast chestnuts looked awesome, they didn’t really provide a full meal.
This is how they roast chestnuts! How cool is that!?

Finally we got tempted by a sign with an okonomiyaki picture on it. It turned out we had to walk through a small bar first, go up some stairs where the kitchen was, go up another stairs and then sit down. Everything was so small and a bit shady, it was weird but also great! We sat down at a table with a griddle on it and for a moment we thought we had to bake our food ourselves. But the griddle turned out to be a tool to keep your food warm. ^^ We were handed an English menu and ordered a plate of takoyaki, okonomiyaki for me and yakisoba for my mom (or ‘worms’, as she calls them).
Our takoyaki arrived first and was really good. :3 Then my mom’s yakisoba arrived and soon my okonomiyaki too. Oh okonomiyaki, how I had missed you… ;_;
Dinner time! Apparently, without knowing, we ate
three specials of Osaka traditional food that night.

While we were eating, we heard quite a noise outside. We couldn’t really look outside, except for a side street next to the restaurant, but we would find out later what was
going on. ^^
We finished our dinner, paid and left the restaurant. The noise was still going on, so we decided to follow it to its source. It turned out to be… a girl group performance! A group of hyper, young girls all dressed in white were dancing, singing and jumping on a stage in front of a big group of mainly shouting men. I was handed a flyer showing pictures of the members in the same outfits and the name of the group, but unfortunately I cannot find the flyer right now. So I will edit this later. Apparently, doing cartwheels was sort of their trademark, because the girls often jumped and cartwheeled past each other on the (quite small) stage. They even had pictures of them cartwheeling on the flyer! A guy who spoke a bit of English told me these girls were touring Japan and were becoming quite popular!
Not my best picture, but just to show you a bit of the girl group we saw performing.

My mom and I kept watching for a while and finally left for our hotel. We were super tired! We quickly picked up some drinks and desserts at the 7/11 next to our hotel and then went up to our room. I took purchase pictures and we changed into our pajamas. It had been a long, amazing day.
We had the same desserts as the evening before! ♥

Oh, wait..? You think this post is over now? Ha, I wish! Because then something happened. In order to charge our electric devices, I had brought an international plug, or international converter (not sure what to call it). All our devices worked on it, however… my laptop did not. I needed my laptop for everything: contact with home via Skype, storing my pictures, as a Wi-Fi spot, internet source, everything! And it wasn’t charging. We tried everything, but the plug just didn’t want to work! My mom went to ask at the hotel reception whether they could lend us a plug, but they didn’t have any that fit our plugs. They suggested to buy one a Bic Camera or another electronics shop. Perhaps they even had some at Don Quijote. It was quite late already, so we decided to do so immediately the next day. However, I was so stressed out at that point sleep would have been impossible, so we decided to go to Don Quijote (which was open 24/7) in our pyjamas past midnight! When we arrived at the shop I was overwhelmed by all the items, but a kind staff member directed us to the 4th floor. There, they had every kind of cable and plug imaginable… except for ours. I checked every plug but ours was not there. I asked for advice at the desk but through very broken English of the staff I understood they didn’t know how to help me. Luckily I had brought my laptop charger and went to secretly test it on all the plugs available, just to see whether they fit. None fit but one: ‘region SE to region A’. I had no idea what that meant but when I got to the desk, the staff members said ‘No, no, abunai, dangerous, fire!’ and made explosion movements and sounds. Of course I didn’t think my laptop would blow up the hotel, however I didn’t trust it completely either and decided to listen to these men’s advice. So no plug. My mom and I walked back to the hotel and once we arrived there, finally my father called back (I had been calling him multiple times. Our provider is able to connect to the other side of the world!). He said it wouldn’t be as dangerous as the staff men had said and advised us to get the plug that fit. So we went back to Don Quijote (it was sooo late now) and I called my dad again just to verify once we were there. We bought the plug (the staff must have thought we were freaking nuts XD) and returned to the hotel. There, I attached my charger to the plug, plugged it in and… it worked! My laptop was charging! Perhaps a bit slower than usual, but it didn’t matter! I was so happy! Looking back at this situation I can laugh about it, but man was I stressed out during it! The good side is: we did find some matcha Kitkats and the candy we liked so much at Narita airport. XD
Finally, we could go back to sleep. It had been a very long day!
Purchases of the day

And to end this post with, here is the video I made about our adventures in Osaka! I filmed a lot and tried to make the best videos I could about our trip. I hope you will like it! ♡
You can find day 3 from 2:55 until 6:49. Please take a look if you want! ♡


Thank you for reading! ~☆~