The last full day in Japan, and the Osaka Castle 3D illumination was a pretty spectacular way to end it.

The day started off, again very slowly. In general, unless you're a businessman rushing to catch a morning train, days begin much later in Japan than they do in Australia. Shops seem to start their trading hours around 10am, and even at that time there is still very few people at the shops.
We've slowly become accustomed to these hours too. Unless we're traveling somewhere specifically, we haven't been rushing in the morning. That was the case today, and we were still lazing around in the (quite comfortable) hotel room at 11am.

Isabelle has now become very used to watching Japanese kids shows on TV in the morning, and she has learnt which ones she likes more than others. She even asks me to turn the volume up on her favorite programs, even though it's all in Japanese and she can't understand a word of it anyway.

Veronica and Charlotte went for a walk to the Starbucks to get coffees, while I stayed behind in the room with Angela and Isabelle. At around midday we were ready to go. We knew there was a massive series of shopping malls surrounding Osaka station, and since it was close, we headed there.
What we didn't bank on was the shopping areas being too massive. Also, it appeared that every person in Japan thought that it would be a good idea to go shopping at Osaka station while we were there.

We explored the shops for an about an hour, but a lot of that was spend elbowing our way through the masses of people to find something interesting to look at, or somewhere comfortable to sit and relax. After finally trying a McDonalds, the last refuge of the desperate, we gave up. Even McDonalds was full of people. Most patrons, I would guess 90% of them, were by themselves, and having bought a small menu item such as a small coffee or a small fries, were seated at a table, with their head buried in their mobile phone while they used McDonalds wifi. I'm pretty certain I could have strolled around the dining area naked and nobody would have noticed, because nobody looks up from their mobile phones.

Having had just about enough of the Osaka station area, we hopped on a train, and were soon back in the familiar surroundings of Universal City, or Universal ****** as every Japanese train announcer and conductor pronounces it. I know it is childish, but I still laugh every time.

We wanted to try a particular Tonkatsu on Universal Walk called Wako Tonkatsu. We entered there, and immediately I didn't feel comfortable. All Japanese restaurants, from McDonalds up to the most expensive, with the exception of the stupid Hard Rock Cafe, make a fuss of the customer. The staff at this restaurant took a look at us, led us to a table, dropped some Japanese only menu's on the table, and walked away. She returned a very short time later and said what Veronica translated as "What is your order?". We hadn't even had time to browse the pictures in the menu to guess what we wanted.

I took the girls outside to look at the plastic food in the window, and not being able to identify half of what was on the menu, and realising that we wouldn't enjoy the miso soup, since it has clams in it, I began to doubt that the girls would enjoy eating here.
Lunch shouldn't be this ***********ica wasn't comfortable being there, but didn't want to cause a fuss by leaving, but I'm at the point where I'm less worried about politeness, so I told her to follow my lead as I picked up my jacket, thanked the curt waitress and left. As I was kind of expecting, all I got was an exasperated sigh as she rolled her eyes at me when I walked past. We're probably lucky we left. I don't think we were worthy of eating in her establishment.

I'm almost embarrassed to admit it, but we had a great time at TGI Fridays, and the food was really delicious, so with the young girls begging to go back Veronica and I didn't argue too hard.

We had the same very chatty waitress that we did for dinner last night. She's 20, went to high school in Adelaide for a year apparently, and really loves to talk. At one point we almost had to gag Isabelle so that she would stop asking the poor girl questions, so that she would walk away and let us eat our food.
We ordered virtually the same things we did last night, except with different entrees. For today's entrees we got nachos and a serving of deep fried macaroni and cheese balls. So insanely bad for you, but very delicious.

Proving that last night was no accident the burgers were extremely good.
After dinner we got a photo with the waitress, which was very humorous, since Charlotte was a good couple of inches taller than her. Charlotte is 9. She is 20.
Very full, but since it was only mid afternoon, and still too early to head to Osaka Castle, we went back to our room for a rest, and to get some warmer clothes, before heading back out into the cold night air.

Through what is hopefully our last peak hour commute with a billion other Japanese businessmen, we caught the trains we needed to Osaka Castle park.
I'd been looking forward to the Osaka Castle 3D illumination, and I wasn't disappointed.

The train station for Osaka Castle park is on the exact opposite side of the castle to the entry for the illumination, so after a fairly decent hike into the castle grounds, and then around the outskirts of the castle along the moat, we arrived at the ticket gate.

Apparently we were there on a "Special" night. I'm not sure what a "Special" night was, but if the prices were anything to go off, it was apparently around 25% more special than a regular night. There were also "Premium" and "Regular" entry tickets, with very little actual explanation of what the difference was, except that the Premium were almost double the price. We opted for the Regular tickets, and were soon on our way inside of the door.

It quickly became obvious that this illumination was very well done. Immediately after entering you're led into a giant room of lights, which leads you into a tunnel of lights which snaked through the castle grounds, past many other mini lighting displays.

Once the tunnel of light ends the pathway opens out into a wide area, probably about the size of a football field, with rolling blue lights spread out across the field, rolling in waves and giving a fantastic illusion of water.

Along with many other people we made our way through the water lighting, and arrived at a field with loud music playing. I could see it was a lighting display, but couldn't get near it, since the crowds had obviously queued there in anticipation waiting for it to start. I filmed what I could over their heads, and once that lighting display was finished, drums began to beat loudly behind us, which had the desired effect of startling everyone and making them turn in the direction of the castle, at which time the 3D illumination of the castle began.

I've got to admit that the Osaka Castle illumination was very well done. It was apparently designed by the same people that design the Huis Ten Bosch illuminations each year, which consistently win Japanese national illumination awards.
The Osaka Castle illumination basically uses the castle as a canvas, and projects a whole series of imagery onto the castle to make it appear that it is moving. Effects included the castle burning, or being cut in half by a samurai sword or at one stage changing into a transformer which twisted and turned and reshaped itself.

Words can't really describe it. Only with pictures or even better, video, can you begin to understand just how well done the illusion was.

The illuminations run on a cycle of around 20 minutes of running time, and 40 minutes of waiting time. After the castle fell silent, having seen it once, most people headed for the exit, only to be replaced by new people.
We knew they would do this, so we moved to the edge of the musical illumination display to get ourselves a perfect position for when the illumination cycle started again.

Japanese people are on the whole very courteous and considerate, except when they think they're missing out on something. As more and more people gathered around us we stood our ground with the girls between us so that they would have enough room, and would be able to see the illumination. Still that didn't stop a woman behind me trying to make a space to see the lights between me another another lady who was also waiting patiently beside me.
The more she pushed and prodded me trying to make a hole, the more I leaned on her. I imagine it would have been very uncomfortable for her in the end.

Similarly, Veronica told me afterwards, she too was being pushed and adjusted by people desperate to get a better view. So much so that Veronica moved her arm to fix Isabelle's earmuffs, and when she moved her arm back into it's original position, there was no longer a vacant space where her arm used to be, and it instead had someone's head in it. Veronica's elbow made fairly solid contact with this woman's nose. I guess that will teach her not to try to make peep holes through crowds with her face next time.

On the second playthrough, I was in a perfect position to film the entire presentation of both light displays. As I was more comfortable the second time, I was able to actually watch the Castle light display as well as filming it, which I couldn't do the first time since I was holding the camera in the air above my head.

Having watched the illuminations twice, and having come to the realisation that we've really had enough of the crowds for this trip, we headed for the exit. By the time we left it was absolutely freezing as we undertook the long walk back around the castle to the train station.

After a very simple dinner, for the final time we performed our nightly ritual of visiting the local convenience stores for coffee milks for the morning, and headed back to the hotel for our last night's sleep in Japan (for this trip anyway).