Back in Miyama

Yesterday was a holiday. So on Monday night I caught a train to Osaka and met up with a Japanese friend of my brother. He is from Tokyo and was in Osaka for a toy show. I also met up with his buddy from Kyoto. Together they showed me around town it was a great time. We stayed in Osaka at a cyber-cafe-hostel place. It was a really cool place underground where you rent out a cubical for a certain number of hours. In the normal cubical you get a computer with broadband access and a comfy chair. The larger cubical is for 3 people and has a small floor with two computers, a tv, and a playstation 2. These weren't seperate rooms, but rather cubicals. So if you stood up you could see arcoss the room and above all the cubicals, however you can't see inside the cubicals. You get free drinks, movies, magazines and manga. One long night in the large cubical was about $35.
Later in the day one of the guys took me to Kobe and showed me around. It is a cool place, but still felt like we were in Osaka. The Kobe/Osaka area is just one gigantic metroplois. However, from what I saw, a part of Kobe was set in the mountain side and reminded me of Monte Carlo or San Francisco.
We went back to Osaka and ate at some Asian/French restaurant.
I never realized how long it takes to get home from Osaka. It took me almost 3 hours to get from Shin-Osaka to my house last night. It always seemed shorter than that. I am hoping to now go to Kyoto one of these weekends.