July 11 - Walking around in the heat

Today we had western breakfast for the first time since the start of our trip. You could have toast, a boiled egg and either coffee or some juice for 300 yen at the cafe nearby, and since we've been having department store bakery for some time now, we decided to have something different for a change. It wasn't the best breakfast you can get, but it was good.

Later on we walked to the Shitennoji Temple. We didn't enter, but we walked through the gardens for some time. There was a nice small pond with a lot of turtles in it, and a lot of birds and other animals making the typical ambient sound you get to hear in animes at summer. We rested there for a while while watching the people passing by.

After that, we took the Osaka Loop Line at the next station and got off at the Osaka Castle. I really enjoyed walking through the park, watching all those different people. At some point we met a group of skaters. Later on, we met a clown. There were some people drawing portraits, and others taking photographs of the beautyful views over the city you can get from the top.
Instead of walking the same way back, we decided to take the train at another station. Half way there, we found ourselves surrounded by a crowd of people wearing t-shirts, bags, and all sorts of merchandise saying "Exile The Monster". Apparently some group called "Exile" was doing a tour around Japan and, today, they were here in Osaka.
When we finally arrived at the station, we took the train to Umeda, where we walked around in the very large underground shopping center. We couldn't really have afforded anything, but it was interesting nevertheless. We then bought something to eat at a restaurant in Umeda and headed back to the hotel. If you're asking why, well... Even though we didn't do much these days, me feet don't seem to fully recover from all the walking around before we came to Osaka, so even after a short walk my feet start to hurt. I just hope this doesn't last the whole trip...

The rest of the day we simply stayed at the hotel and rested. At 8:00 pm we walked to the nearby store to buy dinner and tomorrows breakfast, and came back to the hotel again. By the way, I bought "melon pan" (for those who speak spanish, yes, you can take it literally), something I've been wanting to try since I saw it in "Beck, Mongolian Chop Squad" (which is a really cool anime series, for those who don't know it). I also bought some orange juice. You might be thinking "why is that something worth writing in a blog?". Well, remember that thing with the low budget? We've been drinking only water (and eventually a small can of coffee in the morning) all these days to save some money. Everywhere I saw orange juice it costed 300 yen or more per liter, which is half of our daily expenses for food (I told you, we can't afford much)... I found it for 105 yen at the shop nearby, so I had to buy it. It took me around 5 minutes to drink the whole liter by myself. That might give you an idea of how I missed it...
By the way, the cool thing about department stores here in Japan is that, in most of them, there is free hot water and a microwave you can use to cook your ramen or whatever you've just bought. This proves specially useful when you don't have a public kitchen in your hostel ;P .

By the way, I already said this before, but I want to make it clear. Due to tiredness, my way of expressing myself can be really weird. Please take this into consideration when reading. Furthermore, since it already takes a lot of time to write the entries, I don't have time to read them again looking for mistakes. If you find something that might be confusing or misleading, please write a comment and I will fix it. Thank you!

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The pond with the turtles
Osaka Castle
At the park around Osaka Castle
Watching the city
The crowds waiting for the concert of Exile