大阪城 [Osaka Castle] & Other Adventures in downtown 大阪

On Saturday, Lyさん was nice enough to accompany us on our trip of downtown Osaka. On our way to meet Lyさん, we went through a festival. It was called オーサカキング [Osaka King].


We were supposed to meet outside of the NHK building close to 大阪城, but it was too hot and we ended up seeking shelter inside the building. I thought it was pretty interesting how the NHK building (a television broadcasting station in Japan) was connected to the 大阪歴史博物館 [Osaka Museum of History].

The building in front is 大阪歴史博物館 and it is connected to the NHK building in the back by the glass dome which also serves as a lobby for both buildings.


Inside the sphere/dome lobby area:


There was an exhibition inside as well (that anime set in 鳥取... which I will fill in later):


They also had a performance like those asian dragon dancing ones:


We went into the NHK showroom, because it was air conditioned and free. Hahaha...

Me in front of the children's area (shameless, I know):


In there, we and Youngさん tried our very first television broadcast. I must say that being a news anchor is harder than it looks! You become super self conscious as you see a camera plastered on your face. Lucky for us, they had an English version for us to practice. If it was Japanese, I'm sure we wouldn't have been able to get through the first sentence in the amount of time we were given. After we recorded our broadcast, they played it back for us! It was a very unique experience. I think Youngさん has nice pictures of us broadcasting. I did not take any pictures, because I was too busy recording our broadcast. :)

The next showcase demonstrated the use of computer graphics, how you can use cloth to cover a portion of your body you wanted omited in the video. It was pretty awesome. Here's my decapitated head picture:


When we met up with Lyさん, we journeyed into our very first Japanese style castle. The castle was just as 伊達先生 stated, very modernized and museum-like. It was a shame, because though the architecture and the surrounded environment (with its crazy moats) felt very castle-like, the castle inside was basically just filled with short clips and models of the castle's history. Plus, the two staircases built right smack in the center of the castle along wit hteh addition two flights of stairs on the sides did not help bolster its authenticity.

I believe this was a picture of the inner moat:


Us in front of 大阪城:

There is a bit of a story behind this picture as well. The gift I made for our hosts at CMC was basically a picture of us in front of supposedly 大阪城 as seen in my previous post. The point was that it was supposed to be taken in front of 大阪城, because we were going to be staying in 大阪. Unfortunately, my amazing searching skills on images.google.com produced a picture of 姫路城 [Himeji Castle]. So, we tried very hard to retake the photo in front of 大阪城 to replaces the other one (which was intended to be replaced anyways, as the other picture was just photoshoped together).

There's a big canon outside the entrance of 大阪城. I have no idiea why it was there, but Lyさん persuaded me to take a picture in front of it. I found it hilarious how it looks like the canon was sticking out of my head.


Stuff you see inside the museum. Not much was translated (because they were mostly audio clips).


I forgot what it is, but I believe it has the head of a lion and a body of a fish (used to ward away evil spirits?):


Me and Youngさん on top of 大阪城:


The view on the top of 大阪城:



For lunch (which really didn't feel like lunch since we ate at ~4pm), we went to 鶴橋 [Tsuruhashi] to see the Korea town there. I have to say, considering that 大阪 has close to 1/5 of a million Korean residents, its Korea town was not terribly impressive. We've tried to verify the authenticity of the food we had in Korea town based off of Young-san's experience (as she is Korean-American). She told us that some of the dishes have been changed and modified. Of course, they still taste delicious, but a lot of the dishes were adapted into a Japanese-style (和風) cuisine.

My meal (I forgot what I ordered, unfortunately...):


Walking back from Korea town, I made Lyさん pose with her umbrella and fan:

It was raining a little outside during the late afternoon after a whole day of scortching hot heat & sunshine. Lyさん was telling us that the last two times she has visited 大阪城, it rained. It seemed like a curse, but luckily, because we visited the castle in the morning, it wasn't raining at the time we were there. :)

Later, we caught a subway down to 天王寺 [Tennouji] to explore. I think 市川さん reccomended visiting 大阪市立美術館 [Osaka Shiritsu Bijutsukan aka Osaka Municipal Museum of Art] located inside 天王寺公園 [Tennoji Park]. Unfortunately, by the time we had gotten there, everything in 天王寺区 was closed (at least the tourist attractions were). Apparently, most of the museums close around 5pm. It was probably a good thing, as 天王寺区 is a very questionable area. I hate to say it, but probably one of the poorest areas of 大阪 that I've been to. I probably saw more homeless people in 天王寺 than I did in all the other parts of 大阪 combined.

Me with 通天閣 [Tsutenkaku] behind me:


Lyさん posing for the camera:


Though we did not have an opportunity to do much else than to walk around the area, it was a good experience. The park looked really pretty from the outside (but no one really wanted to pay money to enter a park). It was definitely worth a second visit (but unfortunately,my time in Japan is limited).

Later that night, we went to Marshmallow Cafe. Davidさん tried to order a sake bomb just for the sake of seeing if they made it like the states. Unfortunately, he just ended up with a pint of beer and some gin. :D