Osaka

In our travels today, we returned to Nara for me to buy another amazing kimono. I am sure you will see me sporting it over summer. It is one of the most beautiful things I have ever bought in my life. You'll just have to come visit me :D. Nara is my favorite place in Japan so far. There is a really great shopping scene there and we also visited a shabu shabu restaurant today. I was reluctant at first because of the idea of mass amounts of meat, but it's a kind of fondue meat Japanese style. There's a plate of vegetables and a whole plate of meat that you cook in the pot before you. With chopsticks, it was just too much work for me, with all the splattering of the water by noodles and attempts to grab the right pieces of meat. During a meal that I wasn't too hungry and could take my time, I would have enjoyed this a bit more.

Yesterday, we traveled to Osaka to see the Osaka Castle. This is a castle that was built by Hidiyori Totoyomi during the Tokugawa Period. The Tokugawa Period is marked by a sense of militaristic rule by the shogun. Ieyasu Tokugawa decided that he was going to kill off the Totoyomi clan...The castle had amazing views of the city of Osaka in addition to the actual castle itself. The castle was phenomenally decorated...

 Above, is the moat surrounding the castle. It's probably about 50 feet high. The actual castle complex itself is much larger but I found this to be a pretty beautifully intimidating view of the castle.

 At the bottom right, you can see Sean. Sean is a pretty tall guy, so just to give you some idea of the scale of this castle...

 This is my epic looking over Osaka picture taken by Troy from the top of the Castle. It reminded me of the Empire State Building for this view. Notice the Captain Morgan pose haha!

 Here's a picture of me and the guys. From left to right, Jon is sticking his leg out, me, Dustin, and Sean.

Finally, the most amazing thing that I was the most excited about in all of Osaka- The Apple Store. I found the Shinsaibashi Apple Store all the way across the world. Because we stumbled on the Apple Store, we were able to navigate to a particular locale in Shinsaibashi that I'm sure I will tell the story of many times over when you come to see my awesome black kimono :-D

Seven more days. <3