Japan Trip Day Two, Kaiyukan Aquarium Osaka

Our first full day in Osaka was spent at the Kaiyukan aquarium and in the Umeda district.
I just love visiting zoos and aquariums! And Kaiyukan was no exception. The place is divided in the different seas of the world and the animals living there. The great thing is that it wasn't limited to fish but there were also some cute penguins and mammals like monkeys and capybara which are cute huge hamsters. But Kaiyukan is most famous for the whale sharks. When I saw them is was amazed, they are huge and beautiful. It's a pity they are stuck in a tank. But it is a few stories high, so that's a good thing. And the design of the building is great because all the floors are centered around the tank with the whale sharks so you can view them from different places. The exterior of the building is horribly ugly though. But at least you can't miss it.

I don't know how I was able to take this picture, but it looks cool right? Like the turtle is flying in front of me.

So Japan is known for the cute culture right? The Japanese name for this is 'kawaii' and there are many different kinds of kawaii but you can bet ya that almost anything in Japan is related to kawaii in some way. Kaiyukan couldn't miss out on this surely, so there was a 'kawaii collection' at the aquarium. It seemed like a temporary collection of fishes, but I am not sure. Basically it was a collection of small and colorful fishes, and yes, they were cute indeed.

I loved this little one. He would pop out his head from his home once in a while.

After the aquarium we did little bit of shopping at a nearby small shopping mall with a great clothing shop and a 100-yen shop (so many cheap things!). And we took our first purikura, a cute photo sticker. I really miss purikura and can't wait to take them again this September. Not only is it kawaii,  it is also fun to do and you can let out your creative side. Plus it is a great commemorative! You can even give yourself fake make-up, a new hair color or you can put on some cartoonish eyes and bunny ears. At some point during our trip we started making really weird purikura, but those are the best kind :)

Our next stop was Umeda for HEP Five. It is a big Japanese shopping mall with a whole bunch of girly clothing shops. This is when something interesting happened. One of my friend wanted to try on some clothes in on of the shops. They usually sell one-size clothing and for us western girls we really don't trust them, because one size doesn't fit all. But the shop staff girl was making a fuss and was saying all kinds of things in Japanese and we just didn't understand. Then she pulled out this big card with pictures on it and English descriptions and a list of sentences. She pointed at a sentence and we understood that we couldn't fit the clothes because make-up could get on it. I was just amazed by the fact that they have a card like that and it's the first time I ever saw it. And I haven't seen it since.

There are not just shops in HEP Five, on top of the building there's also a Ferris Wheel. I imagined the view would be amazing and wanted to ride it. It was a little bit scary but cool. The view would have been amazing if it hadn't rained and wasn't as cloudy. But the rain on the windows added some charm to the pictures in my opinion.

Photo not by me

Shopping this much makes you hungry, so after you have made your way up the building through all the shops there are conveniently placed restaurant in the top floor. We were also hungry at this point and it was time for dinner. We chose a family restaurant on the top floor where we had tonkatsu-don with kimchi. This portion was so big that we thought we had ordered for two, but it turned out it was for one person. But we shared anyway. And it was delicious! After that day tonkatsu turned into my favorite Japanese food (together with okonomiyaki later) and is a great combination with curry.

Back in our room our beds were already made for us, heavenly! But first we enjoyed some tea and snacks (they refilled our snack box for us, it doesn't get any better than this), while checking our buys of the day and writing in our dairies. We both like to keep a travel diary, so we are great travel buddies. Instead of partying or going out we like to take a rest in the evening and watch some tv or chat while writing our diaries.

Our hotel was next to Dotonbori street, a nice are to explore before heading back to our hotel.

Notes;

• Japan has a lack of public benches and trash cans.
• Japan does everything cute, even their fishes (see kawaii collection at Kaiyukan)
• Foreigners are still very 'foreign' in Osaka despite being a huge city and we got stared at a lot. Sometimes to the point where we felt very uncomfortable (because of people turning their heads or taking photos of us).
• Fitting clothes in Japan is not as common as back home and is a huge fuss
• Japanese shops are opened until late (in comparison to the Netherlands)
• Purikura is awesome
• Tourist traps in Japan come in the form if obligatory photos at famous places. Before you enter or after you exit they will take a picture of you (usually forcibly) and try to sell it to you. This was the only tourist trap we encountered though.