Unbelievable! It is customary in China at least in our industry, to go on a company trip abroad that does not involve any work whatsoever. To my delight, we all voted for Japan. A combined Osaka, Kyoto trip that, as these things do, ended up beeing timed exactly when my friends were coming over from Guangzhou to go with us to the Paralympics. Classic!
Luckily we arranged it so we could come back a day earlier than the others and arrive at the airport at the same time as Ethel and Jorge on the Friday.
Sadly this meant no Kyoto for me, but two and a half days worth of Osaka. Believe it or not, everyone in the office wanted to go to Japan to shop. Japan, famous for being the most expensive country on earth is actually shoppers paradise for the Chinese. A week before the trip everyone was staying late in the office to download pages of shopping lists, descriptions of cosmetics and generally anticipating a major shopping spree which considering that everything is made in China anyway, came as quite a big surprise.
And so, off we went on Wednesday morning for our flight to Osaka from Beijing's Terminal 3. Incidentally my favourite terminal in the world. It looks like a huge dome of a sky, just like being in the Australian outback. The flight is about 3 hours long and we arrive to a practically deserted airport. Again, not conforming to my stereotype of a Japan where employees have to shove people in trains, they are so crowded. First stop Osaka castle. A green, white and gold layered cake-looking building where even the moat walls look "Japanese" style curved and slanted. And then off to Dotonburi, the pedestrian shopping and food street.
First thing about Osaka. It is very modern. It is also very quiet. It is busy and animated and trendy but hushed. I guess coming from China where everything is noise, the contrast is very strong. The people are also impossibly well turned out and groomed. Not a hair is out of place and make-up is applied in a very sophisticated way, even by the men, well, some of them.
So off we wondered to the sounds of Rokotoro miko buto koro or something like that which is what Japanese sounded to me. Surprisingly very few people speak English. And they do all go "Hai" = Yes/OK every few sentences. They are actually very friendly, smiley and polite and talk at you constantly even though it is clear you do not understand a word. I loved it. Yet again like descending on a very polite version of Mars. The young are uber trendy and some really push the boundaries of what anyone would consider weareable. Big poofy hair, impossibly long nails, frills, socks over shoes under tights, inside underwear. Anything goes really. Exactly like big dolls dressed by a 3 year old. Quite fun!
The experience travelling with the entire office was quite dull in that we ended up constantly waiting for people to finish off their purchases but on the couple ocassions where we had a few free hours, it was heaven. In fact I had the best experience culinary and cultural experience ever, on an afternoon of sneaking away from the pack in Dotonburi. Other highlights include going up the floating garden tower to look at a magnificent sunset view of Osaka, wondering around trendy and modern Umeda and seeing the seedier side of nightlife in some dodgy area of Shin Osaka that looked very much like a red light district where unbelievably our second hotel was - cost cutting how you command us -. All in all just an appetizer for future incursion to Japan. My appetite is whetted !!!!!!
