Sunday, May 27th .....

When I book international flights, I’ve always had in mind that, after 7 hours, the seats become hard, the aisles constricting, and the joints start to complain. For this reason, I booked our flight to Osaka over two legs: Sydney to Singapore (7 hours, 25 minutes), and Singapore to Osaka (6 hours 30 minutes), with a four-hour stopover in between. I know I’m slow on the uptake but that’s a whole lot harder than a single journey of 10 and a half hours even on JAL which might have the least amount of leg room of any major airline.

I know we started off tired but by the time we got to Singapore, all I wanted was a shower and all Marilyn wanted was a sleep. The onward flight to Osaka was scheduled for 1.25am (is there such a time?) and we were told that boarding would begin at 12.15. That gave Marilyn just two hours to nap in the Nap Room at Changi Airport.

As you would expect, with even the best of airlines, there can be delays and we didn’t board until 1.15. Marilyn missed out on an extra hour in bed and at her level of exhaustion, that was significant. Good old Singapore Airlines boarded us efficiently and we arrived in Osaka 15 minutes early. It’s great to be back in Japan. We left our luggage at the hotel as we couldn’t book in until 4pm and went off to get our bearings. The underground shopping mall is all that had been promised: really nice little shops, hole-in-the wall restaurants, and access to the high-end department stores with their fantastic food departments.

There’s a kind of auditorium which we walk through on the way from the hotel to the mall. On display there are two fantastic balls made out of pieces of wood which won the Grand Prize at some exhibition in 1998. The photographs don’t show the level of detail and the complex way that the pieces have been fitted together. It’s so typical of what happens to art which wins an exhibition. For a time the artist is applauded and the pieces get the attention they deserve but, after a few years they are stuck in a corner to gather dust. A bit like people, really.

We had dinner at a tiny restaurant in a side-alley off the main avenues of the mall. The menu had pictures so we could point to what we wanted and there was white wine available, of unknown vintage. We ordered sets which are a staple of the railway station restaurants in Japan. You order the meat you would like and it comes with a salad, bowl of rice and a miso soup. We simply chose chicken and pork and they were delicious. It can be expensive to eat in Japan but our two meals with a glass of wine and a beer cost about $30. We can get breakfast at a pastry shop: ham and cheese sandwich, hard-boiled egg and a coffee for $4.50. Not bad!

The weather is good so far but rain is expected later in the week.