Osaka, Japan

Well, we got off the longest plane ride I have ever been on, a 6 and 1/2 hour flight to Doha, Qatar, then right on to a 10 hour flight to Osaka, Japan. It wasn't too bad except when the food came around, my first choice was already gone, twice! I was a little bummed. Anyway, after we got off, we went to get our bags and go through customs. The first thing we did was to get our phone out to try to find a place to stay for the night. Well... to make a long story short, our phone was stolen from our bag. And that bummed us out again. But we moved on and found a place to stay in Osaka.
We hopped on a train and went to our hostel. On our way there we walked through an underground shopping street. I was amazed by the lights and sounds that came out of every building. It was like Vegas times 1,000! WOW! I thought it was really funny. As we walked into our room we realized that we were staying in a traditional Japanese hostel. Which sounds very fancy, but means you sleep on the floor! It actually wasn't bad. We decided to stay two nights there.
The next day we slept almost half the day away. Well, we did stay up late the night before, had a long overnight flight in which we didn't sleep much, and we had to adjust to a new time schedule that is 7 hours ahead of the last time zone we were in. (We are still trying to adjust.) We decided to make our way up to the shopping district of Osaka again. On our way we were hungry and stopped at a noodle shop. It's funny because you order from a vending machine. The machine gives you a receipt and you give it to the chef. He, or in this case she, makes your food. We had a hard time picking what we wanted because we don't read Japanese. In the end we made good choices. I had noodles that you dipped in broth, beef I think, and Josh had traditional ramen and a rice bowl with fried ?something? on top. We walked to the underground mall and walked on the shopping streets. I bought a shirt that I really liked. (When the pictures are posted I have a picture of me wearing it. It is yellow kinda plaid. Check it out!) We went back to our room and cooled down for a bit. The weather here is really hot. Later we went and tried to go to these magnificent temples, but they were all closed. Instead we found a 100 yen shop, it's like a dollar store, and bought gifts for our nieces and nephews. So kids if you are reading this, expect presents from Uncle Josh and Aunt Val! We thought it would be a good idea to try to go to sleep early that night, to try to get on the time schedule... however we found ourselves awake for a good portion of the night:(
The next morning we HAD to get up early to check out, and catch a train to Kyoto, our next stop. At the train station we met many helpful Japanese people. The Japanese people are very funny. EVERYONE is overly happy all the time. They say EVERYTHING as if it was the best thing they have ever said. I think it is hilarious! We got on a train to Kyoto and we will tell you about more of our Japanese adventures later.