Burgers and Broomsticks

Hindsight is a wonderful thing. When you're living in one of the most densely populated countries on the planet*, and one with an obsession with western culture to boot, then maybe you shouldn't be too surprised to find that Halloween weekend at Universal Studios in Osaka is absolutely chocka...

The idea was sound. Book a hotel just 500m beyond the perimeter gates and purchase a two-day pass. Make a reconnaissance mission on the Saturday, ready for a full-blown dawn attack on the Sunday. The gates opened at 9am, and we were at the ET - The Extraterrestrial ride at 9.07am. The queue time was already 60 minutes. Welcome to Japan.

I'd been to Universal Studios in LA before. It's got a - undeserved, I think - reputation for being a bit naff, possibly because Disney has got Mickey Mouse and Universal has got, well, Woody Woodpecker, a character who is indeed very naff. For a start, he doesn't even have an identifiable female counterpart. Who is Mrs Woody Woodpecker? We have to ask this question, as we saw Woody Woodpecker in a dress, and we have to explain this to our children. Is it Woody Woodpecker's transvestite friend?

But the films/attractions stand up well - ET, Terminator, Shrek, Jurassic Park, Spiderman, Waterworld... Ahem. Did I say Waterworld? Well, at least they've salvaged a decent attraction out of it.

Universal Studios Japan opened in Osaka in March 2001 and survived successive scandals over being built on top of a toxic waste pit, serving past their sell-by date burgers and not declaring the amount of explosives used in their shows, to attract over 8 million visitors in 2005. It is now the ninth most-visited theme park in the world. And it's far better than its US counterpart, not least because it has the advantage of being more modern, even if it lacks the Studio Tour element.

Jessica wigged out completely at 'Backdraft' (Sarah's favourite), freaked out on the 'Jaws' boat ride, but recovered sufficiently to enjoy Waterworld and Shrek before wreaking terrible revenge with a truly painful 'Toto and Friends'. Ouch! That one hurt... (see montage below). Something for all the family indeed...

* Actually, I was quite surprised to find out that Japan occupies a lowly 30th spot in the Most-densely-populated-countries-of-the-world League Table. Monaco is top, but I always thought that was a principality. Then there are quite a few other equally daft places, like Vatican City, Gibraltar and the Maldives, but it turns out proper countries like Bangladesh, Taiwan, Netherlands and Belgium all have greater population densities than Japan. So that's a rubbish theory then...