14 March 2014
The tiniest place on earth
I knew that I had booked a tiny hotel room in Osaka, and thats exactly what I got.
I also knew that finding it was apparently quite difficult, because its on the top of Shin Osaka station, which is a maze. When you arrive its hard to work out what level you are on, and then parts of it were closed for refurbishment.
It took me about 30 minutes to walk around it and find the futuristic spherical entry to the lift to take me to the 12th floor ultra modern reception complete with ambient new age music and Phillips Hue changing color lights.
I did considerably better than one couple who I read about who searched all day, couldnt find it, gave up, went and stayed somewhere else and swore never to return to Japan or leave Ohio again.
Early in the day, I walked another big lap of Kyoto, this took me to the top of the station, before returning to my hotel to get my bags, then returning to the same station to take the train to Osaka which took all of 30 minutes despite being a local train.
To kill time I have had 3 coffees and now I can zoom in without using my camera, its quite a weird feeling!
The roof of Kyoto station above the Isetan department store. I took this photo last time I was here also, later I will do forensic comparison to make sure I am at the same Kyoto and they havent made a replica.
The happy terrace. See how happy I am?
My lunch from somewhere far under the Osaka station. Probably the worst meal I have had in Japan so far. I dont think I got what I pointed at, and it was largely instant noodles with no soup which left it quite flavourless.
The other bowl contains various parts of the ocean compressed into a block, sliced into a sheet, then shredded with mayonaise on top of cold rice, with some kind of fish tasting scrambled egg as a bonus.
There were many other places here I want to eat, but it was ridiculously busy when I arrived at 13:00
Too early to check in, I went for a walk. The is the outside of my hotel. Astute Adelaide based observers might notice it belongs to the Remm group, the same people who built the Myer centre.
The Myer centre construction was a debacle that involved the state bank collapse and is listed on Wikipedia as one of the top 10 costliest projects in the world! Right in tiny little Adelaide! I call bullshit on that claim.
Now some photos of the room. The bed is fine, its bigger than a normal single bed and very comfortable. I spend most of my life in hotel rooms smaller than this in the desert.
I kind of doubt my Osaka hotel room will be full of lizards and or frogs and or mice and or cockroaches.
The tv and fridge are built into the wall. Dead poets society is on, in English.
The bathroom as viewed from the bed through the picture window.
This is a common feature in Asian hotels to stop people sleeping 10 to a room sold for one person. At least thats someones theory.
The view out the window is decent, but if I was on the other side I could watch planes descending into Itami airport which seem to pass very close by.
Despite being on top of one of the worlds busiest train stations which includes freight trains, bullet trains, regional trains, local trains and multiple subways, the room is eerily silent.