There and Back Again

Sunday morning the guesthouse manager loaded our luggage in his very spiffy compact van and drove us to Kitaoji Eki. We thanked him for all his help and kindness--he had helped us book a hotel for that time, and by helped, I mean he pretty much did all the work--and then we said goodbye. This time we took the right train from the Kyoto Eki to Kansai International Airport, unlike when we came to Kyoto, and took a taxi to our hotel. The drive didn't take that long from the airport to the hotel, but it was still a bit expensive; the trip was deceptively short due to the long, long bridge from the airport to Osaka-proper.

We mostly rested at the hotel, although we went to check out the mall right down the road. I don't think you see too much in the way of malls here--at least, not like those in America. Japan tends to build up, not out and across. Still, this one wasn't unlike an American mall: a couple of floors, but decently sized in the horizontal direction. I tried curry for the first time at dinner, which really reminds me of Cincinnati chili for some reason. I suppose it's the combination of sweet and spicy. Anyways, it's definitely a new favorite. The mall had a slightly different collection of stores than you might expect at a mall. Clothing stores of course, but there was also a hyaku-en shop, a dollar store basically, a grocery store, and a jewelry-crafting shop. I couldn't understand any of the people in Osaka though...I suppose they were all speaking Osaka-ban, their dialect, though.
After dinner, we watched some more crazy Japanese tv that evening, tail end of a sumo tournament and an obstacle course game show, and went to bed early--needed to be up at 3 in the morning to be ready to call a taxi to go to the airport at 4. We managed to get up early enough, got to the airport in more than plenty of time. (KIX does not open at 4 am, like we were told, but at 5. So there was quite a bit of waiting, but at least we weren't running late.) So, I saw Robert and Gerry off at the airport--my goodbyes were not manly and tearless--and managed to make back to Kyoto Eki, then Kitaoji Eki, and then to the bus stop in front of the university.
Then I realized I didn't know which way to go to get to the I-house.