In the late afternoon we trekked to Osaka Castle.
Like many Japanese castles the inside has been butchered to look like a museum, making it hard to imagine yourself gliding in silence along the nightingale floor, like a ninja trying to set your enemy's castle ablaze. Nope, none of that here.
Instead it looked like we were filing in a line for a Smithsonian museum. We followed the horde up the floors of the castle, glancing at the glass cases and the redone floors and walls.
For this reason we hightailed it to the top for the 360 view of Osaka city. The highlight of this castle was of course, like any enormous ancient castle, the view of it from a distance, but even more it was the grounds around the castle and the plum bloom.
Japanese plums typically blossom in February and March. As it is well-known that a Japanese past time is eating and drinking with friends under the cherry blossoms, allowing the falling flowers to rain on your party, it also used to be customary to relax and celebrate the plum blooms.
The vibrant hot pink rigid branches and the weeping white blooms were all captivating on a pleasant afternoon.
3 comments:
Sounds as though the Osaka Castle was thumbs down, but the back yard - thumbs up!
I can't wait to see the pictures! Wherever you go, you find the beauty!
So you've read those books as well. What did you think of them? I thought the plot was very interesting so I enjoyed the read, but wasn't overly impressed on the writing style. To me, it was too much of a "try hard" Japanese book by a white foreigner... But that's just my opinion...
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