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Kobe in the morning.
Not far from Osaka at all is Kobe. Sadly it's most famous for its earthquake 6 years ago.
Got here after a late night and a coffee and muffin breakfast to see the sun come through this webbed sculpture of a fish.
The city itself was a surprise as it was the first time I'd been here since before the earthquake. Kobe to it's credit, seems to have achieved being modern and planned without being sterile.
The earthquake itself realigned another of my previous myths about Japan - that it could do anything in a flawless display of efficiency and discipline. I expected, in the unlikely event that any building would actually collapse, hundreds of flagmen would come to life and save everybody. The relief effort of the earthquake though , at least as far as the efforts of the powers that be were involved, was little short of a complete fuck-up. It also flushed out lies about the safety of buildings and suspect public works projects.
Like after the first flake, this paint has been peeling off ever since.