Kobe: Historic Houses and Beautiful Ocean Views

Kobe is a half-hour from Osaka by rapid train, the same distance as Gifu to Nagoya, so we traveled to Kobe twice over our short trip.  We went the first evening as an extension of our nori-hodai tickets and explored the pier pictured to the left.  Kobe is a true port city, and this is only one of many piers.  This one seems mostly for tourism now, but before the earthquake in '95, we think it was used for business also.  Now on one side there is a big memorial park with amazing statues and dedications to the quake victims.  There's also an incredible hotel that looks like a ship.  Below, Matt and I pose in front of the view of Mosaic, a fun shopping, entertainment, and eating pavilion.

We loved Kobe so much on our first night there and we were excited to visit again.  Kobe is known for its old Western-style houses (remember: port city; all the foreigners used to live in Kobe back when foreigners were first openly allowed in the country at the start of the Meiji era).  The houses are built into a mountainside, so we hiked up quite some ways and then found ourselves in mansion central.  

  

Looks familiar, doesn't it?  We were able to go into one free of charge, but all the others were charging and one is actually a cafe, so we opted out of those.  It was fun to walk around the free one and see areas where Japanese and Western design synthesized (it's all in the decorations, the buildings are very much Western in construction and layout), but we didn't feel the need to pay to see things we grew up around.  It was more fun to see them within the context of the traditional Japanese shrines and houses that surround them.

After a delicious lunch and dessert (that will be talked about in another post) we made our way back down the mountain to the lower-lying historic downtown.  We found ample shopping, mostly upscale, and then wandered into Chinatown.  I feel like this is my first genuine Chinatown experience in Japan, even though the woodblock print museum in Osaka was technically in that city's Chinatown.  Osaka's Chinatown is barely a few streets, and Kobe's is actually a district.  There were more food shops than I could count, lanterns and pagodas everywhere, statues of the Chinese zodiac, and novelty goods stores, among much else.  There was even a Bruce Lee statue Matt wanted to see, and I found it in a back alley.

Here's Matt squaring off against an invisible opponent with Bruce.  He was really excited to find the statue, and the store behind it also turned out to be a fun adventure.  There were all sorts of silly t-shirts, Mao Zedong paraphernalia, and martial arts gear.  They even had the yellow track suit Bruce wears in "Game of Death."  The store attendant offered to let Matt try it on, but he wasn't feeling quite that silly, so he passed on it and bought a shirt where Bruce has a panda on his head instead.  Because, let's face it, that is more dignified than a bright yellow full-body track suit.

We finished our evening by walking back to the harbor from our first night and seeing some wonderful sculptures in the memorial park.  We picked up some good eats in a small store in Mosaic, and headed back to our hotel room for some much-needed R&R.  Our final analysis on Kobe: it's a great place with amazing sights, nice people, and interesting food.  We both want to go back and experience more, and we also recommend the city whole-heartedly to anyone who's thinking about a trip to Japan!