Today was a slow day, I was still a little hung over from last night and had to run around a bit today to sort out the rent and deposit and then a few forms for my new digs in the Tennoji area of Osaka. I arranged for me and my bags to be picked up midday on Sunday the 11th and by early afternoon I should be all settled in my new place. I've paid to stay in the hostel until then which for 7 days is costing half a months rent at my new place.

I wandered shinshibashi for the rest of the afternoon and had a look around the various shops and boutiques. I found a seven story store of pcs and cameras, games etc and it even had a 100 yen shop on the top floor where I bought my self my own chopsticks in a little carry case.

With my Head still pounding a gave up on window shopping at about 3 and started walking back, it takes about and hour from there and on the way back I noticed loads of statues which I took pictures of. most were of women but one was a disturbing image of a guy in a box with big feet, screaming as he's impaled by a fish. Very strange.

I went home and uploaded the pictures and had a kip to try and get rid of the headache. A few hours latter The British guy I had met the day before (ben) emailed me and we decided to meet up for some food. I went down to Namba to meet him and we looked around for a place to eat. One place we went into looked fine but turned out to be an omelette restaurant and nothing looked very nice. We lied and said we thought it was a sushi place and tried to leave. As communication was an issue it took 3 members of confused staff to get one that spoke enough English. They bought the fib and we left.

Finally we found a nice place hidden in a basement we both ordered a shushimi platter and some rice. I had only at this point tried a little bit of sushi and some soups. Nothing too scary, the meal came and was well presented. it was on a rectangular plate made to look like wood and was covered in grated radish there was a sea snail shell packed with the same radish and slices of raw snail Laid on a leaf on top. There was some opaque fish sliced and served on ice and what looked like mackerel tuna and salmon also raw. Finally there was octopus winch was sliced but still had lots of little suckers on it. I poured some soy and mixed in some wasabi as advised by Ben and I started with the snail. I actually enjoyed the meal and I think I likeed the octopus the most. it was actually the raw salmon I disliked and ate the rest happily. none of it was slimy as I thought it would be and actually the snail and octopus were quite tough. I would eat it again.

We paid up and left. Ben told me he had spent the three hours before I arrived in a little karaoke bar he waned to show me. I followed him to a little door that had a sign out side all in Japanese and a big circle with a cross on it. There was nothing to say that his was a karaoke bar or for that matter even a bar. I wandered what had made him go in in the first place. We took off our shoes and ducked under the half curtain most places seem to have, the bar area was a small and the floor was covered in traditional tatami mats. Stools at the bar had a blue lit trough below them for your legs but it felt like you were sitting on the floor. The bar was being run by two women one older and one younger and there were two flat screens on the wall. There were two business people in the bar a girl and a guy and the girl quickly moved to sit between me and Ben and started asking where we were from. Her English was quite good. The barmaids served us a free beer and said welcome. The business guy who was quite drunk at this point waved and continued to sing an Olivia Newton john song very badly. Ben who I was to find out fancied him self as a rock legend arranged to sing a song with the business woman. He had chosen Barbie girl and I cringed as he put on a deep voice for the role. After a couple of drinks and about an hour chatting with the business couple I was convinced to sing bohemian rhapsody with Ben and actually enjoyed myself. The bar its self was only meant to be open to half 11 but when the time came and the owner arrived he simply locked the door pulled the shutter and bought us all a drink.....I was at a karaoke lock in.

We stayed till 2 and I spent all night chatting to the staff and the business couple. The business man spoke little English but seemed to like my name as whenever he caught my eye he would shout it out and laugh at one point he even snuck up behind me and tickled me. Which was freaky he apologised (gomen nasai) and I got to say (do itashimas***e) which means no worries. It was a good night and when we finally left, the barmaids kneeled on the floor to help us shoe horn on our shoes and gave us umbrellas to leave with as it was raining hard. We realised after our goodbyes that there were no trains and we began an hour and a half walk in the rain back to the hostel. Stopping only for a cornetto on the way.