Wednesday 27th December 2006

This is my second day is Japan. The first day I spend all day on a plane squished up in a tiny space for about eight and a half hours. When we got on the plane, I started reading my Japanese phrase book and I spoke my first Japanese phrase to the flight attendant: “toy-re-wa-dokko-des-ka?” (Where is the toilet?) She was so impressed that I spoke in Japanese and I was chuffed! Then she spoke in Japanese to me for the rest of the flight and I had no idea what she was saying so I just nodded and smiled most of the time!

We got off the plane at the Kansai airport and met up with Yujin and his father (Hideo). We sent most of our luggage to the apartment we will be staying in and then we drove to our hotel in Osaka (Metro The 21 Hotel), which was right in the heart of the nightlife in Osaka. The girls were all so pretty and trendy – dressed to the nines in their beautiful formal dresses (in the freezing cold, mind you!). The Japanese men looked nice too dressed in suits (well, some of them did!).

Hideo took us to this awesome Japanese restaurant. We had to take our shoes off, sit on cushions and eat with chopsticks! Our first meal was DELICIOUS! I had pork cutlets, Tina had curry noodles and Steve had this mushy egg thing that was really nice. Initially, I was scared about meeting Yujin’s dad because Yujin said he was really serious, but he was so nice and talkative and hospitable to us that there was nothing not to like!

The streets in Osaka are awesome. People leave their bikes unchained on the side of the road, there are neon lights everywhere, and people walk on narrow streets where the cars have to dodge pedestrians and bike riders. It is a whole other world over here!