there is more you should know PART 2

let's start off where we left off.

the osaka aquarium has this as their first tank, and it is really one of the best moments you are going to experience there. you realize "hey, i am at an aquarium".

maybe a stingray will swim by. anything can happen at the aquarium.

if you are really lucky, a middle-aged man will coax the japanese giant salamander out of its little hiding hole, and you will get to see how immense and weird this creature is. these really exist.

this is called the arapaima, a giant prehistoric fish found in brazil. it is one of the largest freshwater fishes in the world, thanks wikipedia. i saw an episode of river monsters devoted to these guys. basically, they are all tail, as you can see in this next picture.

they flip boats over because they are so strong. the head is all flat bone. i was very excited to see these fish.

there were some dolphins swimming around too. i took video of these and other spots, but i haven't uploaded them to youtube yet, because i have to convert them and i am too lazy for that right now. one day, you will get a link to these dolphins swimming around. until then, enjoy this photo of a japanese man capturing the moment.

these are two whale sharks. they are fish, not whales, and they aren't aggressive, they are nice. they can get much bigger though i think. the little fish swim around and clean them up. got some video of these two. basically they seem fake, too big to be real.

the osaka aquarium is famous for its whale sharks. they are kept in the second biggest tank of water in the world. it is very tall and large.

this is a poor picture of a manta ray. its called manta because of those mouth parts in front, also it is very big.

this is the mola mola, or ocean sunfish. it is one of the ugliest things in the entire aquarium. imagine being that thing. oh, thanks wikipedia. the heaviest known bony fish. nice.

yeah, you would probably just hang out in the corner all day too. these also get much bigger.

there were lots of jellyfish in different little tanks, but this picture came out the best.

outside the aquarium, i told liz to look stoic, but my hair kind of ruins it.

this pachinko place was closed, probably because of their catchphrase. It is strong in time, and it is gently to time tough at time. maybe this helps you understand why teaching english here is basically a lost cause.

this is just all kinds of wonderful. someone painted david's napoleon on a horse, but added a pocketbook, i guess because the store sells pocketbooks. i did this painting as a 5 layer stencil once. we walked around tokushima city on new year's night, when nobody at all was around, looking for this, and we found it.

we also found the only blue moon on new year's day to occur since japan started using the gregorian calender in like the mid 19th century, and it was really bright. it looks like a light fixture, but it is the moon.

then on the way to the airport, i got liz to take a picture of this boat which is actually a restaurant.

and then we were both very sad that liz had to go home. it's already been a week since she left but it feels like years. this concludes my photoblogging of our trip together. when you take 3 weeks off, japanese people expect you to visit every major urban area and every major shrine temple and place of historical significance, but we took it slow and mostly just slept til noon, played videogames, watched youtube, and ate food. it was wonderful. she is one of the main reasons why i don't want to stick around here next year.
great!

there is more you should know

hello blog,
i still have to post the rest of the pictures from when liz came over. i figure this is a good time to do so, because it is the first tuesday of the third semester of school, and there are just tests today, and i don't have to do anything at all today. here we go!

when we last left our blog, we were on top of osaka castle. here is another view. you can see the courtyard where we ate takoyaki and drank milk tea afterwards.

we took these pictures on the way out. liz is excited to see a very old cannon.

and here we are standing on the main platform. my skills at taking a picture of two people with one hand have improved, i think.

but sometimes, you just need to ask two japanese people to take a picture for you, so you can see the castle in the background.

that night we walked around town, and we saw glico man. i love him, even though he is just an advertisement for the company that makes pocky. we went to a cozy little yakitori place, and then we went to a tapas place, and it was a lot of fun.

also, this happened.

do you think she wants to eat tapas?

she looks more like she wants to go inside in this picture.

okay liz, fine. we will eat tapas.

then we saw this cool bike. it was awesome.

this is from inside a shopping arcade, long outdoor malls where rich people go all of the time.

i do not remember the occasion for this photo but it's pretty nice.

me chilling with some creepy mannequins.

this picture is from the middle of the longest shopping arcade in japan, in northeast osaka. we walked the entire thing, and it didn't seem that long. \

this picture is from a weird section of osaka that a guy led us to when we told him we wanted to eat shabu shabu. that big thing on the left is a fugu, pufferfish. you might think its poisonous but thats just the liver, every shop serves it here. supposedly that needle thing is a symbol of post ww-2 osaka building.

this was on a pachinko place. every day, even out where i live, pachinko places are full of people. they are the loudest possibly places in the world. it is said that if you are not japanese and you try to go inside, you will instantly get a headache. This space overflows with the dream, hope, stimulation, and the excitement. Dramatic development waits for you. Please be released from everyday life and enjoy yourself free. May the fortune goddess smile at you!

this is the statue of liberty, in americamura, or america town, which was near our hotel in osaka. this is not the original statue of liberty, which is in america, in new jersey. it just looks like that.

remember that ferris wheel on top of that 8 story shopping center building? well once we found it again, we went on it. liz is afraid of heigts, so she shows anxiety in this picture. i love this picture.

here is the view of osaka from the ferris wheel. i do not think it is a very beautiful city, it is not uniform and goes on forever and has no sense of cohesion. but liz likes it.

see? she is holding in her fear of heights and suppressing it with her admiration of the osaka skyline for this picture.

yes, we are very high up.
i am going to post this one right now because it already has a lot of pictures. i have to stay at work afterschool to help grade english tests. no english conversation group today at night, that's next week, which is also the once per month recycling day. i just drank a cup of coffee so this next post should be no sweat at all. okay, see you on the other side.
great!

finally, some pictures for you

dear blog,
i think the best place to start photoblogging my 3 weeks with liz is at the beginning. i got facebook to accept more than 5 photos at a time, so this is going to be more interesting. let's go!

i am really sorry about this one. the day we went to the momofuku ando instant ramen museum, i forgot my camera. they probably have a website where you can see the wall of all of the different nissin brands of ramen displayed over history on a timeline. it's great and it was veru fun and interesting, and it made me appreciate instant noodles much more. these two things here are our 300 yen custom made instant ramen souveniers, which are packaged in little inflated bags that we carried around everywhere. as you see, we got to design the cups, and liz's has nice colors on it, while mine just has a big red skull. you got to pick your soup flavor and 4 little dried topping ingredients. we ate these towards the end of the 3 weeks, and they were delicious.

this is me at the bowling alley across the street from our hotel. i got a strike!

this is liz bowling. she got a strike too! just not in this picture.

this is liz looking...pensive? apprehensive? calm? in the far background, you can see osaka castle. it is going to get bigger as we get closer.

yeah, more longing, passionate in this one. she really wants to see the castle, go inside the museum and learn about history.

me wearing a cool shirt that liz got me for christmas, and the castle is a small shape on top of the hill in the light. it's hard to see. i look like i don't care about history.

that is much better. this is osaka castle. don't worry, this isn't hundreds of years old or anything, it was destroyed by war and fire a few times and rebuilt.

me again. i care slightly more about history in this one. it was a really nice day.

liz at the top of osaka castle! we went to the top. it was scary, but you could see the entire city.

both of us, at the top. the lighting is not great on this one, but you get the idea.

a little battle diorama in the museum? just be glad you didn't live in the osaka area in the sixteenth century, because you probably got your head cut off by a warlord.

i love this one. liz and some japanese little kids who only wear harsh pastels. they were not afraid of heights at all. photos weren't allowed in half of the museum, but you aren't missing much. i bet the wikipedia article on osaka castle is much more interesting and easy to understand.

and here is the view from he west side of the castle. osaka looks ugly to me, not very uniform and kind of all over the place. you can see the hep 5 building's ferris wheel in the middle, it's on top of an 8 story shopping center and we went on it! okay, enough photos for this post. let me get some more up and i will keep posting them.
all i have to do today is play ping pong with the girl's club. my forehand needs a lot of help. class doesn't officially begin until friday. this is one positive aspect of being a teacher - the school year is only part of the regular year. there was a former student who ran in a marathon this morning right by the school, so we stood outside in the cold and cheered. it was cool to see all the police escorts. going to do laundry and use the coin dryers at the laundromat today, which i didn't use until liz got here, when i realized that they get your clothes very dry. it's going to be great!

guess what! i will tell you things!

oh blog,
it has been so long. too long in fact. i dropped liz off at takamatsu airport a few hours ago, which makes me alone for the first time in three weeks. now i am going to type a short list of everything i can fondly remember doing over this long vacation. pictures are going to come later, and there are a few.
we slept til noon, went to the instant ramen museum, went on a ferris wheel on top of an 8 story building, went to osaka castle museum, went to my karate dojo's year end party and the after-party, watched dewey cox, wet hot american summer, an examined life, the king of kong, the sorpranos and the wire, watched lots of japanese tv including nanikore aka "what is this rare thing?", very young childrens' first experience shopping alone, and don't laugh or you will get hit on the butt as you pretend to work in a funny hotel game show. we ate takoyaki, ramen, tonkatsu, udon, gyoza, sushi, shabu shabu, nabe, curry, okonomiyaki, mcdonalds, subway, kfc, starbucks, pizza, squid, and snails, went to the osaka aquarium where they have 2 whale sharks and the second biggest tank of water in the entire world, walked around a lot, went to tokushima city on new years day when nobody was there, played a lot of new super mario brothers for the ds, played chess, badminton, ping pong (at gyoza stadium), drew pictures, and liz gave me an awesome haircut.
but now i have work tomorrow, which is why i have to go to bed like right now. i feel okay because this means that this year i am spending in japan is about half over. it is 2010 now, two thousand ten, a new decade, and i might be an adult or something. that is kind of exciting. more teaching english tomorrow. i have to study japanese at a triple pace because the test is due on the 20th and i have barely opened the book. i already miss my girlfriend, it was so much fun to have her here but it is going to be even better when i am back in america.
great!