David Needham

I got up today and planned what I was going to be doing for the rest of my time in Osaka using the map, plan list of places I wanted to go, and the awesome travel book I got from Matthew and Alice for my birthday.

I found out that I could get a 2 day pass with free (or discounted) admission to a huge number of Osaka's biggest tourist locations, so I jumped at that and saved a lot of money. That included unlimited subway and bus travel for those two days, so it was really good deal.

My first stop was the NHK studio. NHK is a broadcasting company sort of like PBS. They don't really have commercials and they have a lot of educational programming. NHK is also famous for making the infamous character referred to as Domo-kun. They even had this huge life size version of him for photo ops, which I jumped at!

They also had a fake news set (with teleprompter, camera, desk, papers, etc), a small and large green screen, and a bunch of computers with information about all of their shows and characters. The small green screen let people pretend they were flying over Osaka. They even had a green blanket that let you do the cool "invisibility cloak" trick and disappear. The large green screen let the kids look like they were playing and singing on tv with their favorite morning tv personalities (like sesame street).

Up on the 9th floor of the NHK building, they had a tour area where people could view a real set as they were recording. It was really awesome to watch a live set while they were recording a show. I'm not sure what show it was, but it was a kids show, with some children dressed up as ninja in bright colors. They also had this digital time machine wall thing, where you could type in any year and it would take you there and show you the news and history from that year. It was pretty interesting.

Directly connected to the NHK building is the Osaka Museum of History. I got in free because of my pass. :-) First, you get on an elevator that takes you up to the top floor (8?). As you move from exhibit to exhibit, you progressively travel down the stairs until you end up back in the lobby. Each floor of the museum represented a different era in Japanese history.

The view of Osaka Castle was great from the museum. Also, there were some remains from a very old palace nearby which also had a great view.

Here is a scale model of what a village in Japan looked like many many years ago. I think it might have been Osaka, but it's hard to say (it wasn't in English).

There was also a scale model and cutaway of a temple. It was awesome to see both inside and out.

There wasn't much more that I could take pictures of there, but it was a really great museum. I'd recommend it to anyone heading to Osaka. :-p

After the museum, I headed to Osaka castle. I was really impressed with the castle walls and moat, which were huge. I'm not sure what those white buildings on the walls were. They were sort of like towers you might see in the corners of castle walls.

This is the "main tower" of Osaka Castle. It was the main attraction, sort of like the keep of a standard European castle.

There were a ton of these cows outside the castle. It was some sort of an art show or something. It reminded me a lot of the pigs spread throughout Seattle. :-)

Alf had a great time in Osaka! When he wasn't scoping out cats or mouthing off, he was riding in my backpack. I kept it open so he could breath, and every once and awhile he'd stick his head out to say hi to passersby. I sure did get a lot of looks (especially from people following behind me). :-) There was a place where we could climb up the walls around a section of the moat. The view was great. Alf especially liked it, so he asked that I take his photo for him.

After walking almost all the way around the moat, I was finally getting close to the castle!

I finally arrived at the castle and headed up to the top (which I could do for free with my pass). It was about 7 stories, and my feet still really hurt, so I took the elevator up. The view from the top was breathtaking. Every Sunday various small name rock bands come to the castle to perform for everyone. I'm not sure if that's what was happening below, but it sounded a lot like a concert for little kids.

After the tower, I headed to the Peace Museum, which was conveniently located next to the castle. I got in for free with my pass. :-) The Peace Museum focused on WWII, the dropping of the bomb, and lots of hardcore issues where Japan really messed up. It was refreshing to hear this Japanese museum talk to honestly and openly about their atrocities and mess ups. Occasionally it seemed a little defensive, but most of the time they were very honest and open with their epic mistakes and misjudgments. The biggest points they seemed to protest were the dropping of the bombs which they referred to as atrocities and completely unnecessary with the way things were going. With as much damage and as many deaths, disease, and injuries as they went through because of the bombs, I'm not especially surprised or upset about their attitude in regard to that. Overall, it was an extremely informative and accurate (as far as I could tell from my Japanese history class) account of their involvement in and results of WWII. I HIGHLY recommend you visit here if you ever go to Japan.

After the museum it was getting a little late and I was very tired (and my feet were in a lot of pain from walking / standing almost all day again). I headed back to the hostel and got ready for bed (even though it was about 7).

I met some nice guys at the hostel from somewhere in Europe (maybe Germany). They were playing the card game Magic the Gathering in the lobby when I went down to take a shower. I didn't really get a chance to play since I was so tired, but it was really awesome to be in that environment of meeting random people from literally all over the world.

Tune in tomorrow when I visit the Tsutenkaku tower, Osaka Aquarium, Osaka World Trade Center, and more!