Kansai

Kansai is the western region of the main Japanese island of Honshu, second only to Kanto region of Eastern Japan in population. The area is also known as Kinki District, literally "near the capital", and its three big cities — Osaka, Kyoto, and Kobe — as Keihanshin.

Differences between Kansai and Kanto are slight but numerous. Kansai people speak a distinctive dialect of Japanese, use lighter-colored soy in their cooking, ride on the other side of escalators and are renowned for humor and their love of food.

There are three major airports in the Kansai Metropolitan Area. International flights land at Kansai International Airport. The primary domestic airport is Osaka's Itami Airport. A new regional airport opened in Kobe in 2006, right across the bay from Kansai International — in fact, Kansai was originally supposed to be built there!

Kansai cooking is subtly different from the Kanto style, although the average short-term visitor is unlikely to spot many differences. Perhaps the most visible differences are a tendency to use light-colored soy instead of dark, especially in soups, and a preference for thick white udon noodles over the thin buckwheat soba noodles of eastern Japan.