Seoul, Kyoto, & Osaka Journal. June 18th, 2026
Shopping and Dotonbori
I spent the morning tracking down some model train shops. There were actually two near the hotel. There was a Popondetta in the Hankyu Sanban Gai building. I got some Green Max building models here that fit in well with the Showa era switching layout I want to build.
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| Railroad diorama in Popondetta. |
Then I went to Hobby Land Pochi Umeda in the nearby Akashi Building. This chain usually has a pretty good inventory of used model trains. I was looking for a DE-13 model locomotive and I found one there. I asked the clerk if it was new or used: “これ は 新品(しんぴん) です か、中古 (ちゅうこ)です か”. He said it was used, but the price was still good. So I tried to ask him if I could run it to check it out. I incorrectly used this phrase: “走ってもいいですか” (Is it okay if I run?), but he understood what I meant. I should have said “試運転(してんつ)してもいいですか”.(Is it okay to do a test run?). I ran it slowly back and forth over their test track, and it ran smoothly. I also bought a little model bus to go on the layout.
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| Hobby Land Pochi Umeda can be a little hard to find. |
After I was done shopping, I met up with my wife and sister-in-law for lunch in the basement of the Lucua Osaka shopping mall. We had planned to take the Limousine Bus to the airport the next day, because it meant a little less lugging of luggage, but the bus stop my sister-in-law’s family usually used was gone. So we went and bought tickets for the Haruka Limited Express. That night I noticed buses at the back side of our hotel. I went there and asked one of the employees if these buses go to Kansai International. He said no, they are only arrivals. Departures are from the Hankyu Sanban Gai building. So we went there and looked at the schedule. They were leaving every ten minutes. It was a little bit of a gamble, because there’s no guarantee there won’t be a traffic jam, but we decided to take the bus instead of the train. I went back to the station and got us a refund minus a small service fee.
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| Yakisoba for lunch at B2 "Barchika" (バルチカ) dining floor of LUCUA Osaka 1 Yakisoba Set (焼きそばセット) – ¥1,380 1 Fried Egg topping (目玉焼き) – ¥150 1 Ginger Ale (ジンジャーエール) – ¥500 Total: $12.63 in Yankee Bucks |
Back at the hotel we did some shopping at Uniqlo, where I picked up some nice travel pants.
In the afternoon we went to see Dotonburi, since it’s a must-see for Osaka visitors. It’s really a place people go at night to see the lights and to eat various Osaka specialties. But it’s also really crowded at that time, so we figured we would check it out in the daylight. So we saw the animatronic crab, and the Glico man. It was pretty crowded but not chaotic. Between the massive Don Quijote store, and the building topped with the angry Daruma Kushikatsu chef head, we boarded a yellow tour boat for a trip up and down the Dotonbori River. Our guide shouted “konnichiwa” at anyone on any of the many bridges, and led us in a song while she danced. We got the feeling she was a wanna-be J-pop performer waiting to be discovered.
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| Kani Doraku's famous animated crab. |
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| River cruise. |
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| The Glico man, who has been around in one form or another since 1935. |
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| The Dotonbori Street Western Entrance Arch (道頓堀西口アーチ) looks like it could have come out of a '70s pachinko machine. |
Dinner was at a pub under our hotel. I had potatoes and BBQ squid. Afterwards we went to a high-class department store in the Hankyu Grand Building. We were looking for Uji Tea and we found it. We also saw gift packs of grapes for sale arranged in groups of 4 in a checkerboard pattern of green and purple. There’s that checkerboard pattern again!
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| Hankyu Grand Building |
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| Grapes in a checkerboard pattern. |