I'm a huge fan of Japan. For years before I got here, I studied it, read about it, lived it, breathed it, ate it, mostly through what I saw in anime and manga. So when I finally got here, I didn't really experience the type of culture shock that most new arrivals do. I knew everything already, right?
Japan can be wacky, and many books and webpages are dedicated to the wackiness, but there're just some aspects of daily life that are just aren't talked about because for people here, it's just common sense.
Everyone parks for action.
Yes, everyone backs in when they park their cars. They say its easier to leave. I think it's harder to do. I'm usually running a little late, so that extra minute or 2 it takes to back in would be maddening for me.
I admit I do it sometimes, though. My excuses: my car is small and easy to maneuver and parking lots here are often too small for backing out.
Women are vampires.
They fear the sun. Once summer rolls around, despite 35℃ weather with 80% humidity, all women over 30 are covered head-to-toe with hats, visors, (no sunglasses, that's rude), neck scarves, long sleeves & pants, and long gloves.
Japan is still very much an agrarian society, so, much like classical Europe, pale skin is considered beautiful. It means that you are not a laborer, working under the hot sun, getting tanned.
The lengths they go to are far worse than any goth I've ever known. I have to be careful when buying skin cream because many have "whitening" agents, and it's hard to find sunscreen with less than 5oSPF. (I've seen as high as 200SPF.)
True story: I once saw a woman power-walking around the lake. She was totally dressed in white workout gear, gloves, etc. But under her giant hat she had a towel tied around her head so that it hung down around her face and neck. It was tied in the front so she could see through the flaps, but her face was completely covered. Totally crazy.*
Tabasco sauce is Italian.
If you order spaghetti or pizza at a restaurant, you will be given a bottle of Tabasco sauce as a condiment.
On the subject, it's rare to find any kind of pasta other than spaghetti at an Italian restaurant. No fettuccini, linguini, ravioli, or lasagne. :(
More to come...
* This actually creeped me out a lot. It stuck me as a giant step back for women's equality here. This woman was wearing what amounted to a burqua but of her own volition (rather than having it imposed on her by religion or government) out of a desire to adhere to society's standards of beauty. This makes the ganguro style so much more revolutionary and counter-culture to me.
Monday, January 19, 2009
Monday, November 24, 2008
Happi Sankusugibingu!
This year, I had an actual Thanksgiving dinner. It was a 3-day weekend, so I had it last Sunday.
Many western foods are hard to come by here.
It's not as bad as I was told before I got here. I can find flour tortillas, cheddar cheese, maple syrup, and peanut butter at the big supermarket in the center of town. Sometimes I can even get a whole bunch of celery (not just one stalk) or even cilantro. (Though all these things are impossible to find in the rural areas.) But the one vital thing you can't get anywhere is turkey. The only place I've ever seen it is at Subway, and the closest one is in Chiba City.
No one here knows what Thanksgiving is, and though they know that the word for turkey is "shichimencho" (seven-faced poultry), they don't know what one looks like. There is a "Labor Thanksgiving Day" in November, but it's more like Labor Day, and it's really just one of the monthly days off for government employees and students.
Pumpkins in Japan are the small, green kabocha you see sometimes in organic supermarkets. They're sweeter than American ones, and you can't get canned pumpkin for pumpkin pie. You also can't find canned chicken stock, anything cranberry (except dried or watered-down "juice"), fresh herbs, stuffing, or Redi-Whip.
Last year's Thanksgiving was pretty dismal. There was a charity buffet at a Chiba gaijin bar, though I use the term buffet loosely. It started late, the table was tiny, there was no gravy, the stuffing was awful, and we had to wait 1/2 hour to get more of anything after it ran out. That wouldn't be so bad except that while all us foreigners made a nice orderly line to get even portions of everything, these all these Japanese chicks who'd never seen turkey before bum-rushed the table and piled their plates high with it,ignoring the stuffing and cranberry sauce. By the time half the line got through, it was all gone and everyone had to wait. Each time they brought more turkey out it was the same thing.
I'm all for helping out charity, but I left there that night feeling disappointed and empty.
So, yeah, it was pretty sad.
This year, I decided that there would be none of that foolishness, so I wanted to host my own Thanksgiving dinner with my friends. I could get everything I needed through the Foreign Buyer's Club, which is awesome.
But Japanese cuisine doesn't have a lot of baking, so most Japanese kitchens don't come equipped with ovens. Luckily, I have a microwave/oven combo that's a really neat wonder of Japanese technology, but it's only 30cm wide. (Look at me, thinking in metric!)
Hoping they would fit, I ordered 2 turkeys the size of large chickens; only 7 lbs. each. Tiny!
They arrived Saturday morning in the mail, frozen solid. So I spent all Saturday defrosting them in the sink and running around town, looking for all the cooking hardware I didn't have and ingredients I doubted I would find.
What I found by pure luck and ingenuity: a cooking pan and rack (supposed to be for draining blood from fish or oil from tempura; a rolling pin (supposed to be for making noodles); a bunch of celery (imported from America); powdered sage; a meat thermometer; butter
What I didn't find: fresh herbs that weren't ricola or basil (they love basil on pizza here, and tabasco on spaghetti); pie crust; a pie pan larger than 12cm (luckily my neighbor had one)
I spent all Sunday cooking those little turkeys. I was afraid they wouldn't fit in my glorified microwave, but they did. I was afraid they wouldn't cook evenly, but they did. Though I had to tilt the pan a little because it was too long.
I'd never made a Thanksgiving turkey before; usually that's my parents' job. (I'm usually in charge of mashed potatoes and gravy). But luckily, my dad taught me how to roast a chicken when I was 16, so it went off without a hitch.
And don't worry that I did the whole thing myself. I'm not so naive to think that I could. I set it up as a potluck, and everybody signed up for a different dish. I helped with the pie, and we had all 4 kitchens in our building going at once.
I was really worried that there wouldn't be enough for everyone. But since everybody made a lot of food, there were actually leftovers! (Except the stuffing I made, I'm proud to say.) Everything was really delicious, and it felt like a real Thanksgiving. Not just because of the food, but because it was all us good friends together, enjoying each other's company.
Many western foods are hard to come by here.
It's not as bad as I was told before I got here. I can find flour tortillas, cheddar cheese, maple syrup, and peanut butter at the big supermarket in the center of town. Sometimes I can even get a whole bunch of celery (not just one stalk) or even cilantro. (Though all these things are impossible to find in the rural areas.) But the one vital thing you can't get anywhere is turkey. The only place I've ever seen it is at Subway, and the closest one is in Chiba City.
No one here knows what Thanksgiving is, and though they know that the word for turkey is "shichimencho" (seven-faced poultry), they don't know what one looks like. There is a "Labor Thanksgiving Day" in November, but it's more like Labor Day, and it's really just one of the monthly days off for government employees and students.
Pumpkins in Japan are the small, green kabocha you see sometimes in organic supermarkets. They're sweeter than American ones, and you can't get canned pumpkin for pumpkin pie. You also can't find canned chicken stock, anything cranberry (except dried or watered-down "juice"), fresh herbs, stuffing, or Redi-Whip.
Last year's Thanksgiving was pretty dismal. There was a charity buffet at a Chiba gaijin bar, though I use the term buffet loosely. It started late, the table was tiny, there was no gravy, the stuffing was awful, and we had to wait 1/2 hour to get more of anything after it ran out. That wouldn't be so bad except that while all us foreigners made a nice orderly line to get even portions of everything, these all these Japanese chicks who'd never seen turkey before bum-rushed the table and piled their plates high with it,ignoring the stuffing and cranberry sauce. By the time half the line got through, it was all gone and everyone had to wait. Each time they brought more turkey out it was the same thing.
I'm all for helping out charity, but I left there that night feeling disappointed and empty.
So, yeah, it was pretty sad.
This year, I decided that there would be none of that foolishness, so I wanted to host my own Thanksgiving dinner with my friends. I could get everything I needed through the Foreign Buyer's Club, which is awesome.
But Japanese cuisine doesn't have a lot of baking, so most Japanese kitchens don't come equipped with ovens. Luckily, I have a microwave/oven combo that's a really neat wonder of Japanese technology, but it's only 30cm wide. (Look at me, thinking in metric!)
Hoping they would fit, I ordered 2 turkeys the size of large chickens; only 7 lbs. each. Tiny!
They arrived Saturday morning in the mail, frozen solid. So I spent all Saturday defrosting them in the sink and running around town, looking for all the cooking hardware I didn't have and ingredients I doubted I would find.
What I found by pure luck and ingenuity: a cooking pan and rack (supposed to be for draining blood from fish or oil from tempura; a rolling pin (supposed to be for making noodles); a bunch of celery (imported from America); powdered sage; a meat thermometer; butter
What I didn't find: fresh herbs that weren't ricola or basil (they love basil on pizza here, and tabasco on spaghetti); pie crust; a pie pan larger than 12cm (luckily my neighbor had one)
I spent all Sunday cooking those little turkeys. I was afraid they wouldn't fit in my glorified microwave, but they did. I was afraid they wouldn't cook evenly, but they did. Though I had to tilt the pan a little because it was too long.
I'd never made a Thanksgiving turkey before; usually that's my parents' job. (I'm usually in charge of mashed potatoes and gravy). But luckily, my dad taught me how to roast a chicken when I was 16, so it went off without a hitch.
And don't worry that I did the whole thing myself. I'm not so naive to think that I could. I set it up as a potluck, and everybody signed up for a different dish. I helped with the pie, and we had all 4 kitchens in our building going at once.
I was really worried that there wouldn't be enough for everyone. But since everybody made a lot of food, there were actually leftovers! (Except the stuffing I made, I'm proud to say.) Everything was really delicious, and it felt like a real Thanksgiving. Not just because of the food, but because it was all us good friends together, enjoying each other's company.
Sunday, June 8, 2008
On the massacre in Akihabara
7 Dead, 10 Wounded in Akihabara
I'm at the start of a strong "it could have been me" panic because I was there that day.
Thankfully, I was nowhere near the mayhem at the time it happened. I arrived at around 2pm and spent an hour or so at the new Burger King and Yodobashi Camera, on the complete other side of the station and train tracks from where it all went down. News reports will only say it happened at "lunchtime", so I have no way of knowing if I was actually in the vicinity at the time. Glad I decided to shop for English books before looking for a DS hack cartridge. There was no indication there or at the station that there was anything unusual.
I decided to head to Chuodori via the railway underpass on Myojin Street and saw that part of the street was blocked off. People were swarmed around, dead silent, taking cell phone pictures of seemingly nothing.
I saw the truck.
Thought it was just a traffic accident, nothing to see here.
As I made my way closer to Chuodori, I saw more and more emergency personnel, more of the street blocked off, clusters of people being interviewed, CSI evidence tags on the ground in the alley by Asobit City.
Was able to squeeze my way through the looky-loos on the sidewalk of Chuodori. The street was blocked like any other Sunday, only no pedestrians were being allowed on it, only cops. Some stores were open and conducting business as usual, others with their night shutters down.
Checked the Internet on my cell phone for any info on what happened. Nothing. And no one I asked seemed to know much either. In the distance, a small lumpy shape covered in a white sheet. I tried not to think what it might be.
I remember thinking that the usual sewerey aroma that wafts up from the gutters in Akiba seemed stronger than usual. Decided I'd find out what happened when I got home and to get the hell out of Dodge.
A friend and I have plans to go back and pay our respects next weekend, leave some flowers.
Wednesday, April 30, 2008
Coming out of hibernation. Like a bear, rawr.
So it's finally starting to warm up around here, and I'm finally starting to feel human again as a result. It's positively balmy at 75°F when it was just 10 ° colder a couple days ago.
One of the things you get told over and over again when you get here is, "Did you know? Japan has four seasons," as if it's unique to this country only. At first I thought it was one of those weird conceits that most cultures have. Here, specifically, "Japanese is soooooo hard. It's the hardest language ever, and no foreigner can ever hope to understand it," or when people are surprised you know how to use chopsticks.
But coming from So Cal, where we have nothing that really resembles clearly defined seasons (apart from it reaching 32° a couple times in winter and and really hot in summer, spotted with the Santa Anas in September and some times in March/April where it probably might rain a little - and don't forget June Gloom), the changes are pretty drastic here.
It's, like, it was the 1st of October, and BOOM, it was a cold day. Or now, May rolled around, and I could go outside without a jacket. Not to mention the beautiful changing leaves in fall, the couple times it snowed in winter, and the beautiful early spring where everything just CAME BACK TO LIFE. It was still kinda cold, but the light was brighter and all the flowers just popped open (including the famous sakura). I didn't think I was depressed at all, but, somehow, I just felt happy to be alive again. Really weird.
In any case, it's nice to experience actual seasons, but when I move back to the States, I'm going somewhere with no winter.
One of the things you get told over and over again when you get here is, "Did you know? Japan has four seasons," as if it's unique to this country only. At first I thought it was one of those weird conceits that most cultures have. Here, specifically, "Japanese is soooooo hard. It's the hardest language ever, and no foreigner can ever hope to understand it," or when people are surprised you know how to use chopsticks.
But coming from So Cal, where we have nothing that really resembles clearly defined seasons (apart from it reaching 32° a couple times in winter and and really hot in summer, spotted with the Santa Anas in September and some times in March/April where it probably might rain a little - and don't forget June Gloom), the changes are pretty drastic here.
It's, like, it was the 1st of October, and BOOM, it was a cold day. Or now, May rolled around, and I could go outside without a jacket. Not to mention the beautiful changing leaves in fall, the couple times it snowed in winter, and the beautiful early spring where everything just CAME BACK TO LIFE. It was still kinda cold, but the light was brighter and all the flowers just popped open (including the famous sakura). I didn't think I was depressed at all, but, somehow, I just felt happy to be alive again. Really weird.
In any case, it's nice to experience actual seasons, but when I move back to the States, I'm going somewhere with no winter.
Thursday, February 7, 2008
My kids are only slightly twisted
Long before I came to Japan, some good friends introduced me to this blog, (now called) Gaijin Smash. It's effen' hilarious, and since I got here, I started following the writer's habit of giving my students nicknames that never leave the inside of my head.
But first I think I need to explain. I'm horrible at learning someone's name. Now multiply that by about 270, in a new country, with names that are foreign to me and are written in difficult kanji, for kids I only see in class about once a week, so I need a way to try to remember at least some of them.
So yeah, mnemonic device is my excuse.
And it's fun.
Ernie - No kidding, this kid looks just like Ernie from Sesame Street! Even down to the sideways-oval nose and bushy hair. He's a sweet kid and really good at English. I once spent an entire cleaning period playing tag with him around the shoe cubbies, and not a word was spoken. It was legendary.
Satchmo - She's always got this sour look on her face, and her real name kind of sounds like her nickname. She's got not motivation to do her classwork and hangs out with the mean girls who tease her. I can't describe it, she just is a "Satchmo".
Yotusba - It means 4-leaf in Japanese. This girl wears her hair in 4 ponytails every single day (though sometimes just the top two). She also looks a little like a grown-up version of a manga character with the same name and hairstyle.
The Masked Mumbler - That's exactly what she does and is. People here wear surgical masks whenever they're sick, and some kids wear them when they don't want to get sick. She's worn one since November.
So that, together with the fact that her shtick is to always answer me with a rough, mumbled approximation of English while bouncing up and down and flapping her hands, makes her the perfect 1960s Batman villian.
But her other name is: I Love Porno.
Wait, let me explain. Emblazoned on her pencil box, in big, Arial font letters are the words, "I <3 PORNO". And it's, like, handmade. As in, she traced and cut the letters out of colored paper and carefully taped them onto her pencil box.
One day in class, I picked it up and started looking at it. I didn't say a word or make a face, just picked it up. She immediately called for the English teacher and asked him to help her explain. Apparently she's a big fan of the band Porno Graffitti. -_-;;
Hold on. So that means she understands what it means and what people's first thoughts will be when they see it and she still displays it proudly on her desk every day? Yeah, she's a silly kid.
Keep in mind I don't actually call them this. And, yay, it works! I can remember every one of these kid's names.
(Except for Masked Mumbler. Sorry, Porno-chan.)
But first I think I need to explain. I'm horrible at learning someone's name. Now multiply that by about 270, in a new country, with names that are foreign to me and are written in difficult kanji, for kids I only see in class about once a week, so I need a way to try to remember at least some of them.
So yeah, mnemonic device is my excuse.
And it's fun.
Ernie - No kidding, this kid looks just like Ernie from Sesame Street! Even down to the sideways-oval nose and bushy hair. He's a sweet kid and really good at English. I once spent an entire cleaning period playing tag with him around the shoe cubbies, and not a word was spoken. It was legendary.
Satchmo - She's always got this sour look on her face, and her real name kind of sounds like her nickname. She's got not motivation to do her classwork and hangs out with the mean girls who tease her. I can't describe it, she just is a "Satchmo".
Yotusba - It means 4-leaf in Japanese. This girl wears her hair in 4 ponytails every single day (though sometimes just the top two). She also looks a little like a grown-up version of a manga character with the same name and hairstyle.
The Masked Mumbler - That's exactly what she does and is. People here wear surgical masks whenever they're sick, and some kids wear them when they don't want to get sick. She's worn one since November.
So that, together with the fact that her shtick is to always answer me with a rough, mumbled approximation of English while bouncing up and down and flapping her hands, makes her the perfect 1960s Batman villian.
But her other name is: I Love Porno.
Wait, let me explain. Emblazoned on her pencil box, in big, Arial font letters are the words, "I <3 PORNO". And it's, like, handmade. As in, she traced and cut the letters out of colored paper and carefully taped them onto her pencil box.
One day in class, I picked it up and started looking at it. I didn't say a word or make a face, just picked it up. She immediately called for the English teacher and asked him to help her explain. Apparently she's a big fan of the band Porno Graffitti. -_-;;
Hold on. So that means she understands what it means and what people's first thoughts will be when they see it and she still displays it proudly on her desk every day? Yeah, she's a silly kid.
Keep in mind I don't actually call them this. And, yay, it works! I can remember every one of these kid's names.
(Except for Masked Mumbler. Sorry, Porno-chan.)
Wednesday, January 16, 2008
SNOOOOWWWWWW!!!!!!
I was running late for work today. I opened my curtains to let in enough light to hunt for socks like I always do.
And this is what I saw:
These past few days have been especially cold, and last night it was drizzling a little bit.
Is this what happens when it rains and the temperature is at or below freezing? Impossible!
Scraping snow (not just frost) off my windshield made me a couple minutes late, but I've been just giddy all day. My students think I'm crazy. But I got to teach them the words "snowy" and "melted snow" today. I, in turn, learned "yuki dassen." It means "snowball fight." Oh, and a big, tough judo club 3rd year told me in English that he made a baby snowman in his yard this morning. Yay!
And this is what I saw:
These past few days have been especially cold, and last night it was drizzling a little bit.
Is this what happens when it rains and the temperature is at or below freezing? Impossible!
Scraping snow (not just frost) off my windshield made me a couple minutes late, but I've been just giddy all day. My students think I'm crazy. But I got to teach them the words "snowy" and "melted snow" today. I, in turn, learned "yuki dassen." It means "snowball fight." Oh, and a big, tough judo club 3rd year told me in English that he made a baby snowman in his yard this morning. Yay!
Thursday, January 10, 2008
Happy New Year!
A bit belated, but .... Akemashite omedetou gozaimasu!
I don't know if I've ever had a two-week vacation as long as this one. The Friday night of the last day of school was the office Bounenkai (end of year party). I got really blitzed and had a lot of fun. As you've heard happens here, my normally straight-laced co-workers really let loose, one guy donned a reindeer mask for the gift exchange and spent an hour crawling around like a reindeer. At the after-party (yes, after-party) another teacher kept sitting on every other male teacher's lap and even licked the vice-principal's glasses at one point. Wild.
The next day was spent with a massive hangover. Sunday, I went to Shonen Jump Festa, the expo put on by the biggest publisher of boy's manga. So, lots of Dragonball, Naruto, One Piece, etc. It was kind of like Comic-Con except admission was free. The booths didn't really sell stuff so much as display their product, and most everyone there was school-aged. I went with my friend Australian Chris who's big into video games & just went for a fun time despite not being a big manga reader.
Next day was Christmas Eve. I got up at the butt-crack of dawn to catch the first train to Tokyo, then the Shinkansen to Kyoto!
Kyoto was beautiful! After checking into a backpacker's hostel (which was pretty nice), I went walking to try to find the Kyoto Costume Museum. No such luck! It was closed. So I hopped on a bus (very convenient in Kyoto since the streets actually make sense) and tried to find the train to go to Arashiyama. I finally found it (an old electric train), and it took me out of the city and to the west. It's a touristy but pretty spot. Lots of little shops and stuff - reminded me a lot like Big Bear or Slovang, CA. It's right by a river crossed by an old wooden bridge - very famous. I had lunch there, crossed the bridge, came back, and had maccha tea and sakura mochi for desert. I had also read about a bamboo grove in the area and took a nice walk there.
On the train back, I saw on the bus map that there was a Kyoto International Manga Museum. Of course I went. It's inside a remodeled old elementary school. The exhibits weren't really the focus there. (I didn't pay the extra to see the temporary exhibit.) The big appeal there is their massive manga library of current and out-of-print stuff that lines the hallways of 3 floors. People can stay and read for as long as they like. The treasure I did find was in the out-of-the way basement. Behind reinforced glass were the shelves of the museums archives, and a small, unassuming display held the Choujuu-giga, considered to be the first manga.
Then, after getting lost a couple times, I hopped back on a bus and made my way to Gion, hoping it wasn't too late. See, the early evening is when the Geisha go to their appointments, and they're easy to spot. Gion is the old entertainment district and home of the floating world. The main street is pretty touristy: bright lights, pachinko, souvenir shops, etc. But once you duck into a side street, you're back in time. Wooden buildings, lanterns,... like in the movies.
Getting back to the main street, I spotted 3 Geisha across the street, getting out of a cab. They quickly ducked into a club, and it was too dark and they were too far away to take a good picture.
I hung around a bit more, shopping and hunting for a place to have Christmas Eve dinner. I walked slowly towards the center of town. Along the way, there was a brass jazz band by a subway entrance, dressed in Santa suits and playing Christmas music. I stayed for a few songs. I gave them my loose change and left before I got homesick.
I soon found myself in the upscale shopping district. There, I spotted a sign for "Christmas Dinner" in front of an Italian restaurant. I figured, "Why not?" For $24, the set included a glass of wine, salad, antipasto, soup, crab and scallop pasta, baked chicken with tomato, and tira misu with ice cream. Not a bad Christmas dinner.
After, I hopped back on the bus, and went back to the hostel. I lingered for a bit in the lobby before going to bed and talked to some stoned Japanese kid.
The next morning I had a half-day tour. They took us to Ryouan-ji, home of a famous Buddhist rock garden; Kinkaku-ji, a gold-covered shrine; and the Imperial Palace, which you can't visit without being part of a tour. I made friends with a couple of ladies who teach school at US military bases. At the end there was a buffet lunch at the Kyoto Handicraft Center, which isn't as cool as it sounds. While there are some artisans there, it's really a bunch of shops filled with tourist tchotchkes. Part of my tour was a craft session making either a woodblock print or a cloisonne pendant. I chose the latter. Turns out there were only 3 people who signed up for that part of the tour, and they all got there at different times, so I was left to myself. I ended up making a really detailed picture of some torii gates out of the colored glass sand which got totally blurred in the firing process. Oh well.
If I wanted to get home that night, it was time to go, so I picked up my bag at the hotel, and took the shinkansen home.
I had planned to do some Tokyo sightseeing the rest of the week, but spent it recovering from the trip.
The next weekend was Comiket, the big bi-yearly small press fanfiction comic convention. It's the biggest fan-based anime/manga convention in Japan. I met up with some American cosplayers the first day. They were mostly annoying guys, but I made a new friend and cosplayed with her the second day.
New Years Eve, I spent the traditional way: watching the NHK big Red And White music "contest" and eating mikan. I fell asleep on the couch sometime after 11pm.
Jan. 3rd, I again took the 1st train out and went to Hakone Hot Spings with my friend from another town, Diana. We took this route and stayed at a ryokan. The next day, we visited Odawara Castle and the Hakone Open Air Museum and came home. I would have liked to have gone to more hot springs than just the one at our hotel, but it was cold and we ran out of time. I want to go back for spring break.
Phew, I wrote way too much.
I don't know if I've ever had a two-week vacation as long as this one. The Friday night of the last day of school was the office Bounenkai (end of year party). I got really blitzed and had a lot of fun. As you've heard happens here, my normally straight-laced co-workers really let loose, one guy donned a reindeer mask for the gift exchange and spent an hour crawling around like a reindeer. At the after-party (yes, after-party) another teacher kept sitting on every other male teacher's lap and even licked the vice-principal's glasses at one point. Wild.
The next day was spent with a massive hangover. Sunday, I went to Shonen Jump Festa, the expo put on by the biggest publisher of boy's manga. So, lots of Dragonball, Naruto, One Piece, etc. It was kind of like Comic-Con except admission was free. The booths didn't really sell stuff so much as display their product, and most everyone there was school-aged. I went with my friend Australian Chris who's big into video games & just went for a fun time despite not being a big manga reader.
Next day was Christmas Eve. I got up at the butt-crack of dawn to catch the first train to Tokyo, then the Shinkansen to Kyoto!
Kyoto was beautiful! After checking into a backpacker's hostel (which was pretty nice), I went walking to try to find the Kyoto Costume Museum. No such luck! It was closed. So I hopped on a bus (very convenient in Kyoto since the streets actually make sense) and tried to find the train to go to Arashiyama. I finally found it (an old electric train), and it took me out of the city and to the west. It's a touristy but pretty spot. Lots of little shops and stuff - reminded me a lot like Big Bear or Slovang, CA. It's right by a river crossed by an old wooden bridge - very famous. I had lunch there, crossed the bridge, came back, and had maccha tea and sakura mochi for desert. I had also read about a bamboo grove in the area and took a nice walk there.
On the train back, I saw on the bus map that there was a Kyoto International Manga Museum. Of course I went. It's inside a remodeled old elementary school. The exhibits weren't really the focus there. (I didn't pay the extra to see the temporary exhibit.) The big appeal there is their massive manga library of current and out-of-print stuff that lines the hallways of 3 floors. People can stay and read for as long as they like. The treasure I did find was in the out-of-the way basement. Behind reinforced glass were the shelves of the museums archives, and a small, unassuming display held the Choujuu-giga, considered to be the first manga.
Then, after getting lost a couple times, I hopped back on a bus and made my way to Gion, hoping it wasn't too late. See, the early evening is when the Geisha go to their appointments, and they're easy to spot. Gion is the old entertainment district and home of the floating world. The main street is pretty touristy: bright lights, pachinko, souvenir shops, etc. But once you duck into a side street, you're back in time. Wooden buildings, lanterns,... like in the movies.
Getting back to the main street, I spotted 3 Geisha across the street, getting out of a cab. They quickly ducked into a club, and it was too dark and they were too far away to take a good picture.
I hung around a bit more, shopping and hunting for a place to have Christmas Eve dinner. I walked slowly towards the center of town. Along the way, there was a brass jazz band by a subway entrance, dressed in Santa suits and playing Christmas music. I stayed for a few songs. I gave them my loose change and left before I got homesick.
I soon found myself in the upscale shopping district. There, I spotted a sign for "Christmas Dinner" in front of an Italian restaurant. I figured, "Why not?" For $24, the set included a glass of wine, salad, antipasto, soup, crab and scallop pasta, baked chicken with tomato, and tira misu with ice cream. Not a bad Christmas dinner.
After, I hopped back on the bus, and went back to the hostel. I lingered for a bit in the lobby before going to bed and talked to some stoned Japanese kid.
The next morning I had a half-day tour. They took us to Ryouan-ji, home of a famous Buddhist rock garden; Kinkaku-ji, a gold-covered shrine; and the Imperial Palace, which you can't visit without being part of a tour. I made friends with a couple of ladies who teach school at US military bases. At the end there was a buffet lunch at the Kyoto Handicraft Center, which isn't as cool as it sounds. While there are some artisans there, it's really a bunch of shops filled with tourist tchotchkes. Part of my tour was a craft session making either a woodblock print or a cloisonne pendant. I chose the latter. Turns out there were only 3 people who signed up for that part of the tour, and they all got there at different times, so I was left to myself. I ended up making a really detailed picture of some torii gates out of the colored glass sand which got totally blurred in the firing process. Oh well.
If I wanted to get home that night, it was time to go, so I picked up my bag at the hotel, and took the shinkansen home.
I had planned to do some Tokyo sightseeing the rest of the week, but spent it recovering from the trip.
The next weekend was Comiket, the big bi-yearly small press fanfiction comic convention. It's the biggest fan-based anime/manga convention in Japan. I met up with some American cosplayers the first day. They were mostly annoying guys, but I made a new friend and cosplayed with her the second day.
New Years Eve, I spent the traditional way: watching the NHK big Red And White music "contest" and eating mikan. I fell asleep on the couch sometime after 11pm.
Jan. 3rd, I again took the 1st train out and went to Hakone Hot Spings with my friend from another town, Diana. We took this route and stayed at a ryokan. The next day, we visited Odawara Castle and the Hakone Open Air Museum and came home. I would have liked to have gone to more hot springs than just the one at our hotel, but it was cold and we ran out of time. I want to go back for spring break.
Phew, I wrote way too much.
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