As soon as I posted the last blog, I remembered a story that I wanted to include in it. Dang it! While we were at the park in Nara, we encountered a very Japanese situation. The Japanese don’t like to acknowledge mental retardation. If you have a mentally challenged person in your family, that person is generally kept at home and not seen out in public. Mental retardation is seen as a burden and disgrace for most Japanese families because it goes against perfectly conformed Japanese society. As we were walking to the shrine in Nara’s park, we heard a mentally challenged boy behind us. He was probably about twenty-years-old, capable of movement but incapable of speech other than moans and groans. He was following behind us and groaning gradually louder and louder until it became a scene and people were looking at him. At that point in time, a couple walking in front of us stopped walking, waited for him to catch up, and shut him up. That couple was walking so far in front of him because they didn’t want people to associate him with them and only stopped walking when they realized that he was causing a huge scene and drawing too much attention. Once the kid quieted down, they continued to distance themselves from him again. How sad is that? That is something fairly normal and typical for Japan……
Anyway…..on to something a little more happy! Our final day in Osaka was spent exploring Osaka castle. Ian and I went there last New Year’s when we were in Osaka, but we really didn’t explore the park and castle very much. It always amazes me the stark contrast between the park and the city that surrounds it. The park is green, lush, and thriving while the city around it is skyscrapers, trains rumbling by, and men dressed in business suits. I also enjoy the contrast of the skyline. Within the same view lies the castle and skyscrapers. Ancient history mixed with modern architecture. I love it!
Since it was a holiday weekend, there were TONS of people there. We went into the castle, but it was really hard to enjoy it because no matter where we turned, we were constantly in a crowd. We did get Margaret dressed up in a samurai outfit which was AWESOME! 
We soon got bored of the castle displays. It seemed like it was one boring thing after another: a letter written by so-and-so for what’s-his-name, a scrap of clothing worn by who-was-it, a book owned by some-guy. Instead of looking at every single little thing, we powered through it and made our way to the top for the view……and what an amazing view it was!! We could see all the way across Osaka from the downtown business district to the mountains in the distance. It was a beautiful view!!
Our final stop in Osaka for the day was at Hard Rock Café. Although the prices there were quite pricey, it was delicious greasy American food that we just never get here: chicken fingers with honey mustard, tacquitos, potato skins, and chicken wings with BBQ sauce. YUMMY!!!! All of us split a giant appetizer and ordered our own meal. I thought it was funny because I watched the three Japanese girls beside us split a salad that by our standards was a normal size salad for one person……however, they were splitting it……three ways…… 
Each of us was stuffed tighter than a tick when we left.
We made our way to the Shinkansen station, got our stuff out of the lockers we had placed it in earlier that day, and attempted to go through the gate, but the machine wouldn’t accept our tickets. The gate attendant looked at our tickets and told us that the last Shinkansen to stop at Shin-Yatsushiro had already left for the day. NOOOOOOOOOOO!!!! We thought we had read the train schedule correctly, but as it turns our, we didn’t. 
Therefore, we had to quickly make a mad scramble to the ticket counter and change our tickets from Osaka->Hakata, change trains in Hakata, Hakata-> Kumamoto, change trains in Kumamoto, Kumamoto –> Shin-Yatsushiro. We made it to the platform and got on the train OK, but unfortunately there were no seats. We found one for Margaret, and then Ian and I made Camp America on the floor in the space between two cars where the bathrooms were (picture below). We were literally smashed up by the door with all of our crap, but others were doing the same thing as well. Gradually as we got down the line, people got off, and we were able to sit beside Margaret. We had to make a mad dash to catch the next train in Hakata and narrowly missed it. By the time we rolled into the Shin-Yatsushiro station at 12:45, we were exhausted. HOWEVER, since it’s an hour and a half drive from Yatsushiro to Yunomae, we didn’t actually get home until about 2:30AM, and after showering and washing a load of clothes, I finally hit the hay at 3:30AM.
……and that concludes our weekend in Osaka! In the next blog, I’ll write all about Margaret’s first week in Japan and some of the highlights from that!
No comments:
Post a Comment