One OK Rock concert, Osaka [1st June]

Yet again, I flew over to Osaka for the weekend for a concert (previously, I went to see Daesung in Kobe). I was up at crazy-o'clock on Saturday to get the bus to the airport... but it was lovely and quiet in the middle of Gwangju at 6am!

A very quiet Gwangju

I met up with Jess at Incheon and we flew together. Sam had caught a slightly earlier flight, so we were able to meet up with her in Kansai Intl instead. We had a hotel very close the venue, which was really convenient so we could drop our things and go straight to Osaka Castle park.

By the time we arrived at the venue, there was quite a long line for merchandise, but luckily it moved quickly and we weren't waiting all that long in the end! We had a lot of stares from others in the queue, especially as it doubled back on itself. No-one was brave enough to talk to us though everyone was clearly curious about us... ^^;

Osaka-jo Hall

We all bought tour t-shirts and slogan towels! Someone kindly took a quick photo for us~ We went in the venue fairly early because we weren't sure where we had to go as we had 'block standing' tickets and entry numbers. It turned out we could go in straight away, which was good as we could stick together easily. Our tickets were for standing up at the top, behind the seated rows so our view was of the entire arena. We were able to find one of the last spaces without standing behind other people along the side and towards the front. This was fine until the girls in the seats in front of us came along and one was really tall and right in our line of sight..! Typical~

Jess, Me and Sam outside the venue

We managed to each find a spot where we could see the stage at some point, usually by leaning forwards or going and standing behind some guys to the right of us. It was actually nice to be in standing but still have room to move around, where we could jump about and have fun. We also had plenty of space behind us, so we didn't get squashed.

As the concert ended, we moved pretty quickly to get down the stairs and out of the venue.. I didn't realise that this photo was so blurry, oops! Still, we were much further forward than from where I took this picture, but it was quite a big venue. The standing zones were arranged pretty well on the arena floor - they blocked off many smaller segments to stop the crowds from moving around too much. It still looked like they were quite squished but at least they weren't able to move very far (like arena standing I've seen before, back home).

View from inside, sorry it's super-blurry.... :(

Last week, they also announced a European leg of this tour later in the year with stops in Paris, London and Berlin. The London concert is perfectly timed for me, as it's about a week after I will be back in England in October. Izzy managed to get us both tickets already when they went on sale the other day. I had felt a little guilty, that I would be able to see this band live and without Izzy and Winnie, and now we can all go together!! To say I'm excited about that would be an understatement... It also gives me something to look forward to after going back home!

I think it will be awesome to see them in London, and see the difference that a London crowd will have. In Japan, everyone stood and applauded nicely after songs... there wasn't really any yelling as such, although every time I heard "TAKA~~~" (the lead singers' name) shouted out in a deep bloke's voice, I found it pretty hilarious. I should think London will be more... boisterous, but that's certainly not to say that by the end of the night, the Osaka crowd didn't have energy. You could see the band really played their hearts out on stage and everyone responded to that. There were some nice acoustic songs too, as a break at one point. Taka just seemed to keep going - his voice is incredibly powerful and he seemed to do the majority of the talking as well. He only had a short break during an instrumental piece, whereas other members did have a chance to take a breather during different songs; one played the piano at one point, high up in the back of the stage, which was pretty cool.

After the concert, we went and got some stuff to eat and drink outside the Family Mart (or whatever it was called) by our hotel and chill out. It was strange because it still kinda felt like I was in Korea but the area we were in was nice and new-looking, I think they recently built that business park.

Shopping mall outside Osaka station

Oh, look! I found Topshop! And Topman!

On Sunday morning, Sam had an earlier flight again so me and Jess very quickly had a look in shops by Osaka station. I bought a plushie phone charm and a cushion purely because they were cute; turns out they're from a game called Puzzles and Dragons (which I have since downloaded on my phone but hardly understand because it's in Korean and won't let me download it in English *sigh* ).

So cute and fluffy! He needs a name though.

We also bought Kit Kats from the 7-Eleven in the airport terminal which were blueberry cheesecake flavour! They were quite expensive though... :'( I also bought some cool-looking Pocky, which was really nice too.

Chocolateeeeeee

After landing back in Incheon, I missed my bus to Gwangju by about a minute (saw it driving off, argh!), so Jess stayed to keep me company and we grabbed some food. We also stood and watched some very talented singers belt out some classic musical numbers, which was a fun distraction until my next bus!

Seoul from my bus on the way home

I also had a quick chat with Chrissie on Facebook on the way back through Seoul; I love technology~!!