Japan: Evenings in Osaka

Dear loyal readers,

So let's continue from my previous post on Kobe. If you read my past entries on my Japan trip you would know I stayed at Itami temporarily and only went out when my husband comes back from work and during weekends. So in this post, I will share with you some evenings I spent at Osaka. It was a vibrant and lively city full of night activities. For full plan and details, read Where to go in Japan. I listed maps, budget, hotel etc.

Here's an evening scene at Shinsaibashi and Dotonbori as we hunt for dinner.

Hubby purchasing JR tickets. You can choose English. Read on How to ride a train in Japan.

Welcome to Osaka. The castle is the symbol for Osaka.

We came up at Daimaru exit. Whichever exit you go up from Shinsaibashi subway station will eventually lead you to the most happening shopping district in Osaka.

I believe here's the grand entrance of Shinsaibashi.

The subway exit in front of Shinsaibashi Tower was where I expected to come up from.

 Everywhere you will see pachinko (slot machine center) and some so huge they take up the whole building. 

 This custard cheesecake shop caught my nose. I was walking fast but reversed to its smell lol!

 You are expected to see cosplay everywhere in land of anime.

 Can't help to act cute.

 Hubby was excited to be surrounded by Japanese girls.

The next long stretch of shopping is Ebisubashi which we will not explore or else it will take the whole night. Maybe we will come again next next week. I discovered Shinsaibashi is connected to Dotonbori and you can walk all the way to Nipponbashi (DenDen electronic town) too!

Epic face of the red shirt guy. He was like whoa this is heaven.

Finally I'm here at the famous landmark, the original Glico Man advert. This was first installed in 1935 featuring a runner finishing a race. After 80 years, it has started running on LED beginning 2015. The one you see in this photo is the 5th edition running on neon lights for 16 years.

Night view of Dotonbori canal.

The crab legs can move.

We saw an interesting cabin themed restaurant that serves hamburg steak just at the start of the street and we immediately decided to try.

Super huge menu. Thank God for illustrations. We prevented from going into restaurants without pictures.

Yours truly enjoying the canal view.

Our hamburg rice arrived.

Hamburg steak is one of a must try food in Japan. We ordered 300g giant one each. Hubby ordered hamburg steak with mushroom hayashi sauce while I had the steak topped with a sunny side up. Btw this restaurant is called Bikkuri Donkey meaning surprised donkey. 

Yummm...totemo oishii desu. If you slice the steak into quarters you will have 4 big macs.

Not bad for a comfy environment and tasty meal.

Outside of Bikkuri Donkey. Didn't realize we were lucky to be seated next to the window coz window seats are limited.

The biggest and the most well-known shop in Dotonbori is Don Quixote. Being the prominent landmark of Dotonbori, it has a unique one of a kind oddly shaped ferris wheel in the world. The capsules surround the man called Ebessan and the penguin called Donpen. Ebessan is the symbol of business success and Donpen is Don Quixote's Penguin. Donpen is also the company's mascot.

You can easily find out about the original Glico ad from the web but do you notice the octopus? Try aiming your fingers in a gun motion and shout bam bam then see what happens to one of its eye. We were thought to do this on the river cruise.

Looks empty right? There's actually a huge crowd above on the left.

Back to the station feeling lost.

It's a rat race.

So tired... I need to go back to Itami. We'll continue another evening in Osaka below...
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We thought since Osaka Station is so huge with about 5 linked malls we should explore the place. So I waited for hubby to come back from work again and went together with him.

Here's another evening in Osaka. We decided to explore the main station as it is so huge.

Hubby couldn't resist taking pictures.

I'm singing in the rain...

There's a mini concert.

Count how many tracks are there. One wrong platform and you are lost forever...just kidding. Do read my guide on riding trains in Japan before you go there.

We are now in Daimaru for a mission but we can't help to snap this cute corner.

Pokemon center is located at the highest floor if not mistaken 7th or 8th floor in Daimaru which is a mall connected to Osaka Station. There is a mini arcade and uncles were playing Pokemon games like kids but dare not take photo of them la. They used their cellphones to collect points. I don't really know how the game work.

Loads of plushies in store.

It's time for dinner! Found an omurice outlet. OMG I've been looking forward to try this dish for a long time.

My regular demiglace sauce. Heard that omurice must be eaten with demiglace and not ketchup from a Japanese drama long time ago. If not mistaken it was Ranchi no Joō a.k.a Lunch Queen (ランチの女王) .

Hubby ordered large sized half tuna cream half hayashi sauce. What's with him and hayashi? If you read somewhere above he also ate hamburg steak with hayashi sauce.

Oh my I feel hungry just by looking at this.

 Next we headed down to Yodobashi, an electronic mall like Low Yat.

I think it was 4 floors or more. Lot's of gadgets to fill your nerdy needs.

Back to Osaka station.

We went to the park in front of the station and it was so huge.

The staircase is grand af. Wish they installed piano on the stairs that can make melodies as you step on.

This is what we call dating site lol.

Last photo of the night and we returned to Itami.
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We arrived again at Osaka station for dinner on another day.

This one looks interesting but we were not up for a buffet. Perhaps next time when we revisit again.

We spotted this ramen outlet that always has customers lining up waiting to be served. As they say, the most crowded places has the most delicious food so we followed the locals.

What a creative concept. It's special to us coz we never seen this before.

Our ramen finally arrived and we had the tastiest ramen in the world I'm going cray cray! I have never had a ramen so delicious in Malaysia or anywhere else. It's indescribable. Kamukura can you please open an outlet here??? Btw this was somewhere at the top floor of Lucua mall. So glad we walked into Lucua.

We discovered another linked mall called Eki Marche. Gosh, how many malls are there actually?

Hubby feeling amazed. Ok we had to get back to Itami again...
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One evening we got lost while trying to ride the subway. We wanted to go to happening Namba Walk but ended up at the wrong Namba station which looks creepily empty.

Some wall art in the station.

Some hipsters practicing break-dancing.

Nothing to eat so ate Mcd. Coincidentally they just launched their limited time only bacon burger.

Hubby so happy to try their bacon burger. You definitely can't get this in our country.

Here's the limited time only bacon egg burger with pork patty larger than the bun.
And so this ends this long long post. We shall continue with a full day tour in Osaka.