Osaka Castle
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| Hotel Misano Osaka |
As we were planning to spend the rest of our stay in Akiyo home, we only booked Misano Hotel for 3 nights and had to check out on Saturday. Akiyo arrived 10.30am as planned. We left the luggage with the hotel and went out for breakfast.
Had takoyaki again for breakfast at the same stall. It was the same plain takoyaki with mayonnaise, spring onions and dried tuna toppings. Ordered and ate them behind their seated stall. While having breakfast, we made friends with a nice friendly family from the south island of Fukuoka visiting their daughter graduated from Okayama University. We exchange emails and contact address.
After breakfast, we visited Osaka Castle. Cherry blossom is 2 weeks away. Fortunately, plum blossom is in season. Osaka park is full of plum trees. We walked to the closest subway station at Nipponbashi, taking the Sakaisuji train to Honmachi. Changed to another train which takes us to Tanimachi 4 Chome station close to Osaka Castle.
Right outside the train station is Osaka museum of history which also house NHK boadcasting station. It was raining heavily with strong wind. We took shelter at the Osaka museum. When the rain subside, we walked Osaka castle ground. We passed by a wedding ceremony and took photos with the kimono-dressing guests. The ground was huge and quite tiring for the wife to tour the castle proper. We spend some time in the plum garden and proceed to the other side of the castle to take the subway at Osaka Business Park station.
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| Takoyaki Stall |
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| Family from Fukoaka |
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| Fukuoka sisters |
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| Osaka Castle |
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| Osaka Museum ground |
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| Japanese wedding in Osaka Park | |
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| Plum blossom |
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Plum Blossom
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| Plum blossom with Akiyo |
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We return back to the hotel to pick up our luggage. Took Hanshin train to Akiyo house in Nishinomiya about 45 minutes away. Exit at Korean Station. Akiyo father, Katsuyoshi 63 was at the station waiting for us with their family Subaru car. They had reserved 2 room one for me and the other for the wife since either room does not have a double bed. However we decline and move into one room.
Akiyo mother Yoshiko 60, prepared dinner for us. We had rice with fish, vegetable and miso soup since we had mentioned earlier to Akiyo that we did not consume meat and chicken to avoid non halal food.
We talked a lot over dinner. Katsuyoshi had made some research about Malaysia and we chat about families, politics and life. We had difficulty to communicate and frequently had to refer to Akiyo and the dictionary.
