Japan 2012: Osaka Day Two

Sunday, 11 November 2012

There were no breakfast arrangements in place for Day Two in Osaka, and in a way that was just as well. Given the way things had turned out over the preceding thirty-six hours a sleep in, a late checkout, a move to a third hotel and a rendezvous with The Sister at a French restaurant provided a painless way of filling in the morning, and we'd already planned to catch up with The Former Secretary some time during the day, so when it transpired she didn't have anything else on her plate we suggest she join us for lunch at the Bistrot des Mauvais Garçons.

There was a slight degree of confusion regarding the actual location of the Bad Boys' Bistro, but we arrived more or less on time, just before The Sister lobbed on the scene. There was no sign of Former Secretary, it was drizzling and we were standing in front of the door of another establishment (Bad Boys go upstairs), so de decided to follow the Bad Boys and head up, expecting Former Secretary to find us upstairs.

As it turned out, FS had done been there earlier and gone to check on something or other when we weren't there well before time and made it back late, by which time we were upstairs and she was scratching her head wondering where we'd got to. A quick text message, one of a couple she'd sent without Someone noticing, sorted that out, and we were all set for a lengthy and leisurely lunch, with a bottle of quite acceptable Pinot Noir from your actual Burgundy.

The wine went down very well, the lunch (salad, cream of pumpkin soup, squid in a tomato sauce, beef slowly cooked in red wine, dessert and petit fours) delivered a pleasant combination of tastes though the portions weren't over-generous. The conversation kept things rolling along to the point where, having been the first customers to arrive, we were the last to leave.

The attempt to find the lunchtime venue had delivered us onto the famous Ebisubashi bridge across the Dōtonbori Canal, just underneath the legendary Glico Man billboard. The bridge was originally built to provide access to the nearby Ebisu Shrine, and is associated with a legendary curse on the Hanshin Tigers, Osaka's baseball team. Given the familiarity of the Glico Man and the fact that it lies between the Shinsaibashi-suji and Ebisubashi-suji shopping districts the bridge is a popular meeting place and it's known as nanpa-bashi (by foreigners) and hikkake-bashi (by native Japanese), both of which translate as the pulling bridge due to the alleged ease with which girls can be picked up in the vicinity.

We went back and forth a couple of times over the course of the afternoon and evening, which was largely spent in the Ebisubashi-suji shopping district, which opens off the street that takes its name from the Dōtonbori canal, which means it's time for another excursion into the realms of history.

While it's the main destination for food travel in Osaka, Dōtonbori owes its origins to a decision back in 1612, when a local entrepreneur, Dōton Yasui, decided to connect the two branches of the Yohori River, which run north to south, with a canal. He set out to do this by expanding the Umezu River, which ran east to west, and the intention was to increase commerce in the region. Along the way, Dōton became involved in the Siege of Osaka and died defending Toyotomi Hideyori, but his cousins finished the project in 1615 and the new ruler in Osaka Castle, Tadaki Matsudaira, named the canal and avenue beside it Dōtonbori (Dōton's canal) even though he'd been on the wrong side of the result in the siege.

Six years later the Tokugawa Shogunate designated Dōtonbori as Osaka's entertainment district and by 1662 the street had six Kabuki (classical Japanese dance-drama) and five Bunraku (traditional puppet) theatres, and the Takeda Karakuri mechanical puppet theatre. The theatres were so popular they encouraged numerous restaurants and cafes to open, catering to the flood of tourists and entertainment-seekers who poured into Dōtonbori, and while there has been a decline in support for traditional forms of entertainment and Dōtonbori's five remaining theatres were bombed and destroyed during World War II it remains a prime attraction for culinary tourists.

Today Dōtonbori is famous for its shops and restaurants, and the neon and mechanised signs that line the canal and feature in the shopping areas. For a start there's snack/candy manufacturer Glico's giant runner crossing the finish line, though he's just one part of a formidable barrage of electronic advertising. Inside Ebisubashi-suji there's s six and a half metre mechanised crab that moves its arms and eyestalks in front of  a crab restaurant called Kani Doraku that dates back to 1960 and spawned a number of similar creations, including a squid that puffs steam.

We took a leisurely ramble through Dotonbori, along the arcade that leads to Namba station, where The Sister bade us farewell, and back through a major electronics store and Tower Records, eventually looping into the hotel to check in and looping back out to chase up a Wi Fi hotspot and dinner.


The pursuit of Wi Fi and the need to contact the Kyoto-based Sponge meant we neglected to book seats at the preferred eating destination (Pieno, just off the arcade-type thoroughfare) and while we'd planned to land on their doorstep around five, Wi Fi matters delayed things to the point where we could either spend a lengthy wait in the drizzle waiting for space to become available or look elsewhere.

Predictably, we looked elsewhere, but only as far as the Mar Bar, which was conveniently celebrating a fourth birthday and supplied us with complimentary Cava as we surveyed the menu. That's not quite accurate, of course.

The two girls surveyed the menu, passing comments and requests for guidance across the table. Really, I wasn't particularly concerned about the actual dishes involved, since we were in tapas territory, and if I didn't like one I'd be right with the next provided no one headed off into extreme territory.

Everything, however, proved quite toothsome, and while the glass of white that followed the Cava was a little on the sweeter side of what I'd prefer, an unidentified fuller bodied red was quite tasty, to the point where I ended up with a third glass.

Having seen Former Secretary off at Namba Station we made our way back to the hotel, making a final pass past the psychedelia alongside the canal with a diversion along the way to take a look at Hozenji Temple, all that's left of a major  17th century site after the main hall was demolished during World War II. Decorated with paper lanterns and tucked away in a relatively quiet neighborhood on an alley paved with stones and lined with old-style Japanese restaurants and bars. It's one of those places that's definitely worth a revisit, preferably when tiredness is removed from the equation.