hello tokyo bye bye osaka

Day 13: Shopping in Osaka - Namba Station - Shinsaibashi - Umeda - Den Den - Kani Doraku - Dotonbori

This whole day was spent running around Osaka in a mad dash to do some last minute shopping and find gifts for family and friends. We first hit the closest station to us; Namba Station. This is a massive station filled with shops and two major department stores, Takashimya and O1O1. 

Next was Shinsaibashi which is Osaka's main shopping district then Umeda, the business district of Osaka, where we spotted even more department stores like Hankyu and Hanshin. Then it was off to Den Den, Osaka's equivalent to Tokyo's Akihabara. This was my last ditch to find cool Naruto or Bleach merchandise and I failed spectacularly!

By the time we arrived back at our Dotonbori neighbourhood, the day felt like it was almost gone. The crab meal we had on our first night in Osaka was so good we thought, "Why not do crab again?" This time we decided to check out the other crab restaurant (FYI: there are two crab restaurants, one on each end of the same strip). This crab restaurant had a bigger venue than the other one and offered much better views of Dotonbori at night. 

"OISHII!!" And so began our second love affair with crab. We started off with a cold crab dish. This was followed by sashimi crab, which we put aside because we wanted to grill it only to discover that their crab dish came out pre-grilled (....and to think we were so looking forward to grilling our own crabs again!)

Instead, we got hotpot crab which was still very good. After this, the waitress used the remaining stock in the hotpot to make a congee like dish with eggs. By this time, we were both so full and decided to save ourselves for dessert. For dessert, we got to watch the waiter artfully mix the green tea matcha into the water before pouring it over our vanilla ice-cream, this was such a delight in itself.

It was hard to believe our last night in Osaka and really our last night in Japan had finally come. It felt like we had been living in Japan for ages and not just holidaying for two weeks. This was also the last chance to explore our colourful neighbourhood and its equally colourful people. I really didn't want to go back to our hotel, I was trying to prolong it as much as I could because I knew I would really miss this place, the food, the friendly people and the energising atmosphere so prevalent in the night. Only a few places ever put a smile on your face when you recall them, Dotonbori is one of those places for me.