This is a LONG LONG LONG entry so I decided to break it up into four separate entries based on the days. It goes from Friday to Monday. I will post pictures to a shutterfly account, but most likely not until tomorrow or so. There are so many, it was taking too long to upload them here. So just be patient! Sorry this is such a gigantic set of posts. Anyways, enjoy the show.
So Chris and I had to go to Osaka for the weekend; from the 15th through the 18th. He was scheduled to take the GRE (the test you have to take before they let you in Graduate School) on Saturday and the only place you can take it in Japan is Tokyo or Osaka. It was also a holiday weekend so I thought we would make it a small vacation and go be tourists for once. Remember, Osaka is the city that we had to go to so we could get married and my visa stuff done. We never got to see anything though because we were always running to the consulate and then back to the trains. So Osaka it was!
About 5 weeks ago, I reserved hotel rooms so we wouldn’t need to worry. I got the confirmation email and safely tucked it away in my email accounts inbox so I could print it off the night before we left. We also bought train tickets a few weeks before we left. We went early so we could buy the extra cheap tickets. You see, if you buy a week ahead of your departure date, you will get a SIGNIFICANT price drop. The only catch is that you cannot change the tickets. You lose your money if something happens and you can’t make the train. It’s a little like an airplane ticket I suppose.
On Thursday night, the night before we were supposed to leave, I was printing out all the info I would need for the trip. List of things we have to bring? Check! Address and directions to the test center? Check! Address for the hotel? Check! Hotel voucher? Chec…wait a second…this hotel voucher says that I have reserved a hotel from the 25th until the 28th. Uh oh.
Oh yes, that’s right. Despite all the planning that has gone into this trip, despite the hours I spent making sure we would have an easy time when we got to Osaka, I booked the wrong days! I also never checked to make sure the dates were right. It’s 11:00 pm at this time and we are sort of screwed to book any sort of reservation on the internet. I check around as much as I can, but we are out of luck. I message an online friend of mine in Osaka and ask him for advice. He just says that we should go and see if we can’t book something in person. We are kinda wary because it IS a long weekend. However, what can you do?
So we nervously go to bed that night and wait for the morning so we can leave. We get off fine. We usually have no problems with the trains. I mean, we have done this same trip two times before, plus once to Kobe and twice to Tokyo using the same route. We haven’t had a problem yet. Just for cuteness. This is a picture of the Hikari shinkansen that was waiting when we got to the platform. It is a slower one than the one we take, but I am never in a position to take a picture of my favorite shinkansen. They are trippy though. They look like Amusement Park rides!
Ok, so we get to Osaka. We go to the information center to see if they have advice on where to look for hotels. The lady speaks ok English so that’s one good thing. She gives us a free map (which I think we already had but someone didn’t have to foresight to bring it) and a list of hotels. She says that we will have to call and see if anyone has room. We ask if she thinks it will be difficult to find a room and she pulls a face. “Well…it IS a long weekend…” We sigh and nod knowing that it makes things difficult. Then she looks at us apologetically and drops the bomb. “It’s also a big festival weekend, so most of the hotels will be full this weekend…”
GAH! I knew we were in trouble with hotels because it’s a long weekend…but a festival weekend too! Man. I really screwed up big time. She just nods sadly and we thank her and leave.
So we head on down to the ‘subway’ and over to the commercial/amusement section of the city. It’s close by where Chris’s test will be so we figure it’s probably the best place to look. Chris gets on the phone and calls around to a few hotels. They are booked, booked, booked. However, one hotel does have a room for Friday night. So we grab that room and hang on for dear life. We HAVE to stay Friday night. Chris has his test on Saturday. If worse came to worse, we planned to eat the cost of the non-refundable, non-changeable train tickets, and buy new ones home. It would be a lot to lose, but it was looking like it was our only option.
We go to our hotel. It was a nice little hotel in a good part of town. Not so out of the way that it took forever to walk to it, but not so in the middle that it was too hectic. The room was TINY. By far, the smallest room we have rented so far. Also the most expensive at $120 a night…When we get our stuff in our rooms and sit down, Chris picks up the phone list and starts calling around to hotels to see if anyone has rooms for the weekend. We really want to try to stay because it would be so expensive to get new tickets and whatnot.
Again, he calls and calls but is met with rejection. It’s a festival weekend! No one has rooms! However, on about the 5th try, he gets a hotel with a room for the entire weekend. It’s also a little pricey. For two nights it would run us $220, but what could we do? It would be more expensive to get new tickets PLUS we would be stressed and in a hurry to make it to trains to get back to Izumo. Boo! So we decide to go with that hotel.
So after all that, we finally decide to relax. We decide to look for some dinner and see some sights. We are in the middle of Osaka afterall! So we go out and get a WONDERFUL Italian dinner. I mean, it was really tasty. Chris had Salmon and cream sauce spaghetti and I had crab and creamy tomato sauce spaghetti. We ate so much we were close to bursting!
Then, we went to a giant Ferris wheel! It was so lovely! It was on top the 7th floor of a building and it was so tall. Giant even!
It was absolutely gorgeous riding the Ferris wheel at night. It was tall enough that we could see all of Osaka! Beautiful! The pictures aren’t great because we were enclosed in a big glass box-type gondola. Just know that the sight was much better than what you can see!
After that we went to Hagen-Das! Mmm! Such yummy ice cream. Too bad we don’t have one in Izumo (though I think I like 31 flavors better).
Stupid story time!! When we got back to the hotel, Chris decided to review his GRE test prep book and look at some of the vocabulary. I could tell it was kinda stressing him out. So I decided to cheer him up! When he got up to go to the bathroom, I saw a sheet of stickers that I had been using as a bookmark. It had two stickers that looked like eyeballs. So I got the ever so brilliant idea to stick each sticker on my eyelids. That way, it would be silly and stupid like in sitcoms where people color their eyelids so when their eyes are closed the sort of look open. Oh yeah. I am a bright one!
So I did. And Chris…well…he was stressed out and not really amused. So he told me to take off the stickers. Well, now, here is the DUMB part. I mean DUMB. These stickers came with a building block set. You are supposed to stick them on your pieces so when you build something, it has eyes or whatever. So these stickers are designed to not come off. Right? Do you see where I’m going with this? MmHmmm. I went to take the stickers off like Chris said, and they wouldn’t come off. They were good and stuck to my eyelids, like a really sticky bandaid. Crap. It took some pulling but I finally got them off. Boy, did that sure sting. I’m sure I had little circles on my lids where the stickers were. I sure am a genius. I’m sure it makes the family proud to know what a smart cookie they have. Woo!
That was Friday. It ended ok, but what a giant ball of stress!
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