Kobe

Today involved a day trip from Osaka to Kobe. The two cities are perched basically one beside the other and traveling (other than the crowded conditions) is quite short and easy.

Our first stop of the day was at Mt. Rokko which, similar to Mt. Moiwa in Sapporo, offers a cable car ride to the top and some excellent views of the city. The cable car in this case was one of the most unique that I have ever seen. Instead of utilizing a "tram" system with a car suspended from cables, Mt. Rokko utilizes a "street car" system with a car that sits on rails that ride the slope of the mountainside, somewhat like a street car in San Francisco. This was quite an extraordinary vehicle. The car is built at a 45 degree angle with seats set at each "step". All I could really think as we rode the car to the top was that I hoped it had a really good safety system. If the cables were to break the car would ride that 45 degree angle to the bottom at a frightening speed, killing everyone. I hate heights... Hey, this system was put in place during the 1930's, so I wasn't sure that we were dealing with a modern piece of equipment.

At the top the view of Kobe was okay but there was a great deal of humidity and smog in the air which tended to obscure the view. It was nice though to see the ocean and some ships coming and going to port. Kobe is a major port city and, you may remember, was the sight of one of the deadliest earthquakes in Japan's history: the 1995 Great Hanshin Earthquake in which 4,600 people were killed and nearly 240,000 made homeless. It was interesting to contemplate that this happened only 12 years ago, something that was definitely going through my mind as we were riding the cable car.

After some strolling and bus riding (Gravol anyone?) around the top of Mt. Rokko, we made our way back down the cable car to the base and boarded a bus for the Kobe Chinatown. Last year we went to the Chinatown in Yokohama and I've always found it interesting that there would be Chinatowns in other parts of Asia such as Japan. This is a complex topic but if you experience Japan and think about this for a while, you begin to realize that it makes a lot of sense. All foreigners (and even their descendants to some extent) are outsiders here, so it is very natural for places like Chinatown to have a great deal of value for the members of the community. We went mainly for the food though and we were not disappointed. Chinese food is obviously some of the greatest in the world, no matter where you find it.

We eventually returned to Osaka and spent the evening resting, watching more Hanshin Tigers baseball and eating at a pub -- actually one of the best evenings of our trip, despite the fact that Hana and I ended up getting lost while walking around Namba! No worries though. We eventually found our way back and did not encounter one bad neighbourhood...