Archive for January 2017

Is Nippombashi Denden Town becoming Akihabara?

1/19/2017 06:34:00 PM 0 Comments A+ a-

So, for my final full day in Japan, I've decided to visit the Denden town of Osaka, that was said to be the Akihabara of Osaka. First is to check out if there are anything worth buying, and second, to attend a screening event where I should not be spilling the contents of the event (but it's a lot of fun and laughter!).

Because I was very busy shopping, I definitely did not remember about taking many pictures around the area. In the morning, around 9am, I departed to Namba station and walked my way towards the event area to make some confirmation of entry, because to be frank, Denden town is unlike Akihabara. This place is not labelled as 'Denden town', and it's actually located in Nippombashi (or some of you spell it as Nipponbashi) of Osaka (hint: Nipponbashi is in Tokyo, in Osaka, it's Nippombashi even though the writings are the same). You can access to Denden town if you get off from Namba station or Ebisu station, whichever that is convenient to you.

Upon my event entry's confirmation, I walked around to look for local food such as Takoyaki and also filled my stomach with food that I bought from Tamade Supermarket, which is cheaper compared to convenience stores like Lawson or Family Mart, and went in and out of stores along the streets in Denden town. I also went shopping for different goods and played some retro games, then headed back to the event, and resumed my shopping in Animate, lurked around Namba to listen to indie bands, and headed back to Hanazonocho to pack for my leave on the following day.

Some of my friends have asked me if Denden town is really worth going, so I decided to continue writing about it in this post too.

So... Question time: Is Nippombashi's Denden Town becoming Akihabara?

In Denden town, there are electronic shops that you could buy home appliances, retro games and consoles, anime goods, materials for crafting for all your BJD's (ball-joint dolls) needs, and there are also many second-hand stores. Also, there are stores that sells items for your computers, but I never checked them out because I find the prices not exactly cheap compared to Malaysia (because there are factories that manufactures IT gadgets here) and I would like to avoid getting myself taxed heavily if I carry electronics home.

Because of the range of items that you could find in Denden town, it is why Denden town is called the Akihabara of Osaka as most of the stores in Akihabara are selling things that are either electronic-related or anime-related. There are also maid cafes, arcades, trading card stores, places where you can play card games with other players, etc. in both towns.

To be frank, I managed to haul a couple of figures that I've been looking for in Denden town, where the prices are cheaper than the ones I saw in Akihabara, but there are also a couple of things that I did not manage to find in Osaka that I did regret not getting them in Tokyo. I also found a bag that has a really beautiful illustration of Free! Eternal Summer in Denden town, but later of the day I realized that I didn't need the bag because I have a ton of bags at home, so I didn't get it.

The next question is... "Is Denden town as good as Akihabara?"

My answer? It depends on how you see it, though most (including me) would take "no" as an answer.

Many stores in Denden town tend to close around 8:30pm, though some (like Animate Nippombashi branch) are open until 10pm or later, but night time in Denden town isn't exactly a pleasant experience if you think that the dark is rather creepy. Unlike Akihabara, especially around the Akibahara station, you can see many giant screens and the area is generally very well-lit in the evening.

Besides, Akihabara of Tokyo is very crowded with both locals and foreigners and you could see many taking photos around, but in Osaka's Denden town, it's not as populated, and eerily quiet at night. If you wanted to see people, you might have to walk towards to the Namba station to see more illuminations and the opening convenience stores.

However, the plus point about Denden town is that it's close to Namba station that if you are visiting there in the evening, you could snag a chance to listen to various street performances, shop in shopping malls/streets (they are very close to each other so it makes shopping easy!), or viewing night illuminations in a walking distance. Unlike Akihabara, you might need to take a train to go to shopping districts. So I think Osaka would suit families pretty well where, the parents that have no interest in the Japanese anime culture could shop in shopping malls and the kids could spend hours in secondhand store for some treasure-hunting. (Well, if the parents like anime or gadgets they could just decide to go Denden/Akihabara together too)

In Akihabara, there are many high-rise buildings where you can see blocks of arcades, there are lesser buildings like those in Denden town. There are still arcade buildings, but it's definitely not as much compared to Akihabara, but most the games that are available in Akihabara are also seen in Denden town. Furthermore, if you walk along the alleys of Akihabara, you will also find a series of smalls that sells souvenirs, digital parts, home appliances, screws or tiny parts. It is, however, not a sight that you'd see in Denden town of Osaka, as the stalls are usually outside of a store individually.

Another question: Is Denden Town the replacement of Akihabara?

Of course, a huge no. Or at least, not in a short time period. I'd say that Akihabara is a lot more living and vivid compared to Denden town, and Denden town is definitely not going to be seen as a replacement of Tokyo's Akihabara anytime soon.

Then, the following question: So should I visit Akihabara instead of Denden town?

In my opinion, I think Denden town is good to visit if:
(1) You do not plan to go up to Tokyo for anything else other than Akihabara (you should visit Tokyo for many other things though!), since it's not economical to visit Tokyo from Osaka solely to visit Akihabara itself because transportation fees are not cheap at all.

  •       (1.1)  If you have less than 7 days in Japan...  It isn't very wise to go around from Tokyo to Osaka or the other way round -- You'll miss out A LOT. 

(2) You have nothing else to do in Osaka (lol)
(3) You wanted to see what Denden town is like (and shop there lol) :D

A reminder for those that are going to compare Denden town based on your expectations from your visit to Akihabara, PLEASE DON'T DO THAT, it's going to only bring you disappointment if you do so.

Why? Not just because you might think that many things you see in Denden town could be found in Akihabara, but also the significantly lesser stores compared to Akihabara, and the earlier closing hours of stores in Osaka as well. If you are a huge fan of Gundam or AKB48 and wish to visit their cafes in Akihabara (it's very close to the Akihabara station!), then I believe that Akihabara is a good place. However, if you are a lady that is more into otome series (reverse harem) then Ikebukuro of Tokyo is going to interest you a lot more than both Akihabara and Denden town.

Of course, I would like to strengthen the fact that Tokyo and Osaka are two different cities of different scales, different sizes, different history, and people with different cultures. Tokyo is a large city that offers a lot and it's the capital of Japan in the Kanto region, but Osaka is smaller compared to Tokyo, and has more of the traditional elements and is the Kansai region. Not to mention that Osaka is also closer to places like Kyoto and Nara. So don't impose your expectations from Akihabara to Denden town because these two places are different.

To conclude, if you could afford to visit both Denden town and Akihabara, good for you and I hope you enjoyed both places. If you can't and only visit either one, it's completely okay too, you can always visit the other one next time if you work hard enough for it. But always keep in mind that although they are places to shop for your favorite digital/ anime goods, these two places are not at the same scale. So please do not put the two places on a side-by-side comparison and place unnecessary expectations so that you won't be disappointed in your travel.

Jin, signing off!

Abusing Osaka Two Day Pass! (Part 2/2)

1/10/2017 07:52:00 PM 0 Comments A+ a-

I'm back to talk about how I used my Osaka pass! Read Day 1 here)



My Day 2 began with me waking up later than I should, but I made it on time to Tsutenkaku :D

Tsutentaku was actually reconstructed for a couple of times and this tower, THIS FREAKING TOWER. This FRIGGIN' TOWER tries to suck your money as much as possible by all the Pocky and gacha machines and photo-taking services like ugh I spent extra money over here too.


Tsutenkaku from Shinsekai

Upon getting your entrance tickets, you will be guided to an elevator ride and you could see the mascot of Osaka's god in the elevator beautifully illuminated! Upon your exit, you'll begin to see a lot of money-sucking activities lol

Glicoman

Tsutenkaku

Gacha Gacha

Touken Ranbu mini files _(:3J

You can go all the way above the observatory and view the entire Osaka and stamping your stamp collection books with different stamps available in different corners. There's also a corner where you can watch the history of how Shinsekai and Tsutenkaku reformed. The short clip I watched was in Japanese though.

aye have some view

more views

If you cheat in the system you get cursed

Beneath this statue there's a stamp

How is that a secret though

I never knew what you'd get if you can hit 11.11 though. 

A place to waste your time

Isn't he saying "COME TO ME, YOUR MONEY!" ?

After the observatory, you can go all the way down and find yourself a series of places talking about the history of Pocky, a Glico cafe and more souvenir stores. Money-sucker indeed lol. I wouldn't say that their Pocky is cheaper than places in Japan (Donquijote, for example) but there are definitely some versions of Pocky that you don't really see in convenience stores very frequently.


The illumination changes!

"What purpose does this serve when I'm here by my own?"


The base of Tsutenkaku

I actually spent more time than I thought I'd be in Tsutenkaku because of the video-viewing and reading some Pocky history. So after visiting Tsutenkaku and got out of the building, I looked around for kushikatsu. My friend living near Umeda told me to visit Daruma's place but it took me ages to know which one is the actual restaurant because there are just SO MANY uwu


I found Daruma regardless.

They have an English menu!

Before that, you are also served with cabbage.
You can eat it with the sauce or along with the dishes.

Add-ons

From left: Kushikatsu (beef), Ebi (prawn), Maguro (bluefin tuna), Renkon (lotus root), Tsukune (chicken meatball) 

To eat this, you dip the food into the sauce once (only do it ONCE per stick for hygiene purposes) and eat it. It's crispy and the sauce is salty-sweet and very delicious. I was served the above five types first, and later on I'm served with the other three sticks.


Left: Kisu (Japanese whiting fish), Right: Tonkatsu (pork cutlet)


Left: Kisu (Japanese whiting fish), Right: Mochi (rice cake)

You eat the mochi piece with this, not the sauce!

And there goes 1050 yen + 8% of tax. Also, don't forget to take a photo with the mascot in front of their door!


The mascot \o/

I also saw a lot of other stores with many signature boards too. I don't know them, but maybe you can recognize a few signatures? uwu






sdsa


Daimaru takoyaki
I actually past by Daimaru on my way to Shittenouji Temple, but the words 明太子 (Mentaiko /Pollock roe) attracted me so much because I absolutely love them. So I thought of just giving it a try!

The store operates based on a ticket machine - you buy a ticket using the machine and pass it to the staff, and it'll be prepared in no time! It costed me 360 yen, if memory served me right.

Though I think that it isn't the best takoyaki available in market I had because it is actually too soft - to the extent where the inner part feels rather liquidy rather than being soft, but eating here certainly gave me a really special memory for my travel in Japan.



I felt hungrier just by looking at these uwu

I have actually previously described (here) regarding an incident happened when I was eating in Daimaru. It happened that I just sat down and trying to eat, and there's this girl pulling a small trolley bag looking really lost and approached me and asked if she could use a charger.

I thought that there was a charging spot behind me so I was like oh okay sure go ahead lolol only then I realized that she saw my USB cable hanging on my bag and though I might have a power bank. So I asked here what happened and she explained that her phone ran out of battery and she wanted to contact her friend that went separated with her. 

Rather than thinking about eating, I took out my portable charger and charged her phone as well as sharing my wifi with her so that she could give her friend a call. So while she's charging her phone, we had a short talk and found out that she came from Korea and was staying around Tennouji area and she came to Japan with her friend. I continued eating as she was making a call to her friend, then I left my contact to her and we parted ways. :'D


Museum of Fine Arts Closed on Mondays


On my way to Shitennouji, I walked past Isshin-ji, got curious and walked in to see a series of tombs. The temple is further up, so I simply left my prayers and continued walking to Shitennouji.




One of the reasons I insisted to visit Shitennouji was actually Prince of Tennis. Not gonna lie. Besides that, Shitennouji is one of the oldest Buddhist temples in Japan. As it's name called, it's a temple for the four heavenly kings (shitennou). Their five-storey pagoda is very much inspired by the Chinese traditions.



Shitennouji itself is pretty wide, and it has different structures: Shika-in for Buddhism practice and studies; Keidei-in for worships and education; Seyaku-in for medicine dispense; Ryobyou-in for treating sickness; and Hiden-in that houses elderly and the homeless. It's heard that it was restored after being victim to wars and disasters, and the current reproduction is strictly following the original. 



The pagoda from outside



Golden lanterns

The outer areas of Shitennouji are free, but to have a better view inside the pagoda, you will need to pay a fee. I used my pass and climbed my way up in the pagoda (shoes off before climbing up!) and in the pagoda, there are many golden plates of Buddha on the walls, which resembles a lot with the Chinese Buddhist temples.



On my way to Osaka Castle

After my visit to Shitennouji, I headed to Osaka castle! On my way, I found the Osaka castle museum instead and had a super short trip there. I absolutely did not realize that my scarf had leaves caught on it and the staff kindly removed them (also disposed them) for me ;w;

On my way down to the exit, I was told by another staff that the view to Osaka castle can be really nice from the windows, and it really is! :D






Then, I ran all my way to Osaka castle and barely made an entry after knowing that the entrance will be closed at 4:30pm.

I barely made it. T_T

If I walked, I'll be completely late. 

The famous Osaka castle!


The Osaka castle has multiple floors and you can go all the way up to the observatory! Though the 6th floor is off-limits. Besides, the surrounding gardens are also stunningly beautiful! On each floor there were displays of historical items. There's also a theater on the first floor showing programs on the life of Hideyoshi Toyotomi (with subtitles this time, unlike Tsuteknaku lol). There are also many displays and replicas as you go up. Cameras are also off limits on the 3rd and 4th floors. 

The more you go up, it's all about Hideyoshi Toyotomi, the person that is responsible in this castle's construction, and how he's the reason that unifies the Japanese people. It's a little sad that I am not excellent in Japanese to understand everything written and it'd be really informative if they have English translations. 

I left Osaka castle and walked towards the bus stop to meet my local friend, Yuu-tan! Then as the skies turned dark, I could see the illumination on the Osaka castle, but my phone is acting up that I could not take a clear photo of it. I think it was also because of how I dressed on the day, I was mistaken as a local student by a tourist from Hong Kong that I also thought she's a local until she spoke lol 

We talked a lot in mixed languages - starting with (broken) Japanese, then Cantonese, Mandarin and English until we were dropped off in front of Umeda station. :D

Initially, I plan to go to the floating garden observatory and only meet her after my visit, but I missed the bus from Umeda station to the observatory and got a little lost, and even my GPS is acting up so I didn't know what to do. I ended up lurking around Umeda station and waited for Yuu-tan to come to my rescue,  meanwhile I had some food to snack on and got a huge bottle of water from Family Mart at 98 yen and when Yuu-tan arrived she was like "HOLY SH*T YOU BOUGHT SUCH A HUGE BOTTLE I THOUGHT YOU SAID YOU ONLY FELT A BIT THIRSTY" lolololol




And so as we took some time to rest near the express bus stop, we asked for directions towards the floating observatory and past by Grand Front Osaka. It's beautifully illuminated, and there's also a (pathetically) small skating rink that costs 1,500 yen per entry (?) and we both find it very, very expensive and escaped our way to snap photos around Grand Front Osaka instead. 


The rink is so small that Yuri can't even perform Eros on it

Cacti illumination on water

I wonder what they are made of. :O







We continued walking towards the floating observatory and before entering, we found ourselves a Christmas market! :D 

Like, free wine-drinking exists so if you actually like it, you can purchase it! 

I'm not much of a person that is good at drinking, but my friend likes to drink so we snapped photos around and I left her alone to drink her wine as I look around the observatory lol







While queueing to enter the observatory







Upon exiting the observatory, Yuu-tan and I had a short moment thinking of whether we should visit HEP FIVE ferris wheel first, or to have dinner before taking the ferris wheel because we are both confused about the closing time, but we ended up having dinner in Yamamoto's Negiyaki!

It's 980 yen for my negiyaki, and it tastes good! They also sell yakisoba too. I was hoping to get mustard sauce because I've been doing that to my okonomiyaki, but Yamamoto's place doesn't provide it and my friend was like "Huh why would you put mustard" lol (but I really love putting mustard on my okonomiyaki ;w;)


Pork (more like Bacon) Negiyaki


After eating on Yamamoto's place, we walked to HEP FIVE and hopped on it. The ride is rather short, and we were trying our best to take decent pictures but nothing came out great lolol. The ride was 500 yen if you aren't going on by the pass, but you certainly can see a lot around Umeda. :)


Got off from the ferris wheel :D

And right after our Ferris Wheel ride, we went to the 8th floor of the Hep Five building for purikura! :D

The machine that I choose is rather different from other machines. Usually, for purikura, the output has a couple of photos. However, for the machine I chose, I paid 400 yen to receive a postcard-sized photo with one main shot and other shots placed the corners, which are shrunk in size ; w;

The machine is called Princess Time! It's a collaboration with 2D characters voiced by Junichi Suwabe (as Luca), Hatano Wataru (as Ren) and Kishio Daisuke (as Yura). There are more characters that will be added soon too! At the time I used the machine, they had a promotion where I'll be able to get one random badge (out of the three characters) for every try in the machine. I had Suwabe-san's character, Luca as my 'escort' throughout the purikura experience because I love his voice so much. 

One main tip: LOOK INTO THE CAMERA. 
Second tip: Be fast and know WTF you are doing lol
Third tip: Enter your e-mail address quickly and correctly so you get a digital copy of the photo 

I was all confused at the first place so I wasn't looking into the camera for one of the shots I had lolololol 

But taking photos aren't the tiring part, the most tiring part is the decoration part. Yuu-tan and I partner-up so hard to decorate all photos and it took us more than 15 minutes to decorate all photos lol 


No automatic alt text available.
Princess Time w

Once we are done with decorating the pictures, which was almost 11pm by the time we realized, we waited for the postcard to be printed out and very soon a staff approached us and informed us that we could collect a badge.

I tried asking the staff if I can pick a character instead of having it random and she's like "I'm sorry, it's all sealed so I don't know which is which either, but I wish you the best of luck" and I was like amitofo guanyinma honey buddha jesus please don't get me the purple hair and boom!!

I didn't get Luca's.

But my badge was ending up as Ren's, which wasn't bad because I like Waccha too. :D

The staff was like "how was it?" and I was like "Not my favorite, but this is good too" and she was like pheeeew lololol

Image may contain: night, sky and outdoor


Then, our day ends with the giant whale where Yuu-tan will go home via the Hankyu line and I go home via the Yotsubashi line, and there goes our day!

In my next post, I'll talk about my entire day in Namba's Den Den town! Though I don't think I have very much to say because I was there for an event and we are supposed to keep quiet about the details, and the later part of the day I was shopping for second-hand goods but got chased out at 9pm and ended up buying NOTHING because I wasn't done shopping. T_T

Until next time! ☆
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