In the summer, I took a little hike in Gifu and Nagano prefectures in central Japan. A travel article about that trip is in the October issue of Kansai Scene.
Kansai Scene is an Osaka-based English-language general interest magazine. This is my third piece for the magazine.
Here’s a link that will work only in October 2010 -
Before that night, I had never set foot in the little park by the Setagawa, the minor river that cuts through central Ise before winding its way to my apartment, finally emptying into the bay.
And before that night, that park had most likely never been so full, at least not so full of 20- and 30-somethings. About 20 people were already gathered when Sean and I arrived, winded from our 15-minute version of a 25-minute bike ride from Obata.
Winded and stuffed. Out in Obata, we had gathered for a small party at Charlotte’s; a barbecue featuring Real Sausages ordered online and delivered just that morning. But there was one hitch: Charlotte, lost in the excitement of planning a special barbecue featuring special meat, had managed to buy a shiny new grill and a useful fire-starter, but no charcoal.
After waking Sean from his mid-day slumber an hour before the start of Charlotte’s party, we learned of the charcoal problem via text message. Sean, the master of grilling among our friends, was upset. He commanded Charlotte to dispatch one of her car-driving friends on a mission to acquire charcoal. Meanwhile, Sean would clean himself up and we would prepare for the 25-minute bike ride through the side streets and across the Miyagawa, a major river that cuts through outer Ise before it too dumps into the bay.
But the thing about Japanese supermarkets — at least, one of things — is that they usually do not sell charcoal. It remains unclear to this day as to why Charlotte’s friend drove to a series of supermarkets before giving up. We thought we had made ourselves clear: a home center or bust.
Once across the bridge, finally ditching a bus tailing a bit too close behind, we weaved our way to the Gyutora supermarket for a couple beers and a just-in-case inquiry into the existence of charcoal.
Beer: Success. Charcoal: failure.
So Sean, the most-connected among our Ise friends, got on the phone with Estuko, who is from Obata, and whose parents live around the corner from the market.
She confirmed the worst: There was nowhere to go in Obata for charcoal, especially not at the late hour of 7 p.m.
Then, what happened next can only be described as … an Obata Miracle.
Etsuko phoned home, to the house just around the corner, where sure enough they had extra charcoal on hand.
We were ecstatic, embarrassed, and hungry as we parked in the lot out front. Through the glass door of the law offices attached to the house, we could see the box of charcoal already placed, waiting alone for our retrieval.
Sean, meanwhile, explained to me that Estuko’s parents were pretty much his Japanese family. When her father emerged from out back, carrying a flashlight, he inquired about our plans and expressed concern about my lack of a jacket. A barbecue, just over there, where Elizabeth used to live. And oh sure I’m not too cold. And then we bowed a few times. And we said thank you. And then we tossed the box of coals into my bike basket and wheeled away.
An hour after we arrived, with the last of meat cooked, we swallowed our final bite of sausage. Before we could say much more than thanks, we were off, shooting through the quiet streets, slowing down just enough at the dark intersections to know that it was probably safe to pass. We struggled up the incline, onto the bridge from Obata into Ise proper, but with more urgency and speed than we had shown on the inbound trip. We had only a few more minutes to get to the secret rendezvous in the park by the Setagawa.
—
Kentaro and Yonchan met in Canada, where they both were studying abroad near Vancouver. They were both there studying English, and that is the language which they used to communicate.
After Kentaro returned to Japan, they were still an item. Yonchan later came to Japan from her home in Korea, helping out at Kentaro’s new bar — named for an island off Vancouver — and preparing to teach Korean to private students.
Around 30 years old, everyone wondered why the steady and seemingly unbreakable couple was not married. Then, one day, their Facebook status changed. Nobody was sure if it was real. After all, Facebook is notorious for “fake” relationships. But a fake status update did not ring possible for these two. It must be true, we reasoned.
At the cherry blossom barbecue a few days later, we confirmed it, able to offer only a congratulations. There was no ceremony. No dress for Yonchan. No gifts or envelopes of cash (as is customary at weddings here). Instead, in the low key way you might expect from Kentaro and Yonchan, they were married.
Reaction was mixed, ranging from simple congratulations to selfish complaints of not being invited to a ceremony that did not exist. Essentially, they were already one of those couples which had reached a point of stability on par with marriage, certificate or not. Friends prod and query, but the consensus is, on paper or not, they’re a permanent couple.
But friends wanted to do something bigger. Which is why at 10 minutes to 10 we gathered in the tiny park, friends and acquaintances, regular customers past and present, married and single; among them old flames, forgotten names, and a few never met before.
Sean and Chiyo, the color therapist, waited for someone to call “go!” before they let loose and sailed down the zip line. Meanwhile, someone with a video camera solicited congratulatory messages. Another person handed out candles and collected 1,000 yen to go toward the main present. We posed for a group picture and then began the short march to Nanaimo.
The surprise, it appeared, worked. Two bartenders in the procession took over the drink-pouring, and Kentaro and Yonchan were whisked away to a back room to change. Yonchan was given a wedding dress complete with a veil, and Kentaro, whose level of formality rarely treads beyond T-shirt, was outfitted with a suit, his skinny tie and un-tucked dress shirt ensuring that he was still the same guy underneath.
Cameras clicked and flashed and recorded every frame of their walk — not down an aisle but instead through the front doors of their bar. They were ushered to the corner, near the cake, and they sat down. A few speeches were made, among a small slate of ceremonial features. Then, the party was open and lasted well into the night.
It was difficult to get any real face time with the guests of honor, especially with a party full of friends, many of whom live out of town or don’t come to the bar so much.
But at one point, when Kentaro circled around to the corner of the bar where I was perched, he looked across the room at Yonchan, and with a smile, he offered two simple but meaningful words: “My wife.”
A new school year is starting, and at work today I was somewhat busy getting ready for first lessons. One such lesson takes place in a computer lab, which is rare. In most public school classrooms, the technology does not extend further than the chalk board.
I’ve had the pleasure of teaching in the so-called “language lab” for my full tenure at Yamasho. Each student has a computer, and they can practice speaking through a program with textbook material included. I can monitor their practice and find areas that need work.
Meanwhile, we can do other things, like check out current events, news videos or articles, or other interesting things online.
Since the class I’m starting tomorrow is one of seniors, whom I sorta-kinda know already, I won’t spent too much time introducing myself, as I have to do with totally-new students. But I have this Google-doc presentation ready to roll.
TAKAYAMA, GIFU — We’re sitting in our ryokan (a traditional Japanese inn), waiting for our dinner, which will be served on the low table in the center of the room. On the underside of the table is a heating element, capped by a blanket which extends over our legs. This set-up, called kotatsu, is common in Japanese homes. My school provided me one, but it doesn’t work. The luxury is new to me.
We’re tired, after the early-morning bu
s ride and a half-day touring the city. It’s nice to be in our room, on its soft tatami floor, sitting by the window overlooking a garden with a natural stream flowing through.
But it’s also somewhat nerve-wracking. In a regular hotel, I usually lock the door and revel in the privacy. That works for business hotels, which all look and feel the same. In these places, the anonymity and seclusion and view-less windows can be comforting after a night out in the big city.
It’s different here, where the sliding doors don’t lock. Ryokan staffers announce that they’re coming in, but they don’t ask first if it’s OK. It feels more like unpacking your things at your grandmother’s house, which you only visit once a year. You wonder if it’s OK to use the bathroom (down the hall to the right). You wonder if you can lay down for a nap, or if you should stay up until dinner is served. You know that until the meal is cleared and the futon sets are spread out where the table once stood, your room is not your room.
As I adjust to the new environment
, my mind returns to the food. There will be beef. And any number of other surprise items. Japanese meals do not follow the Western standard of a large main course surrounded by sides. Instead, a thoughtful mix is presented, taking into account color, shape, texture and taste. The food arrives in waves. First comes the Hida beef, to be cooked on a mini-grill at the table, mixed with vegetables including tiny carrot slices which are for no apparent reason cut into star shapes. When complete, the spread fills the table, offering an intimidating presentation. Can all of this really be consumed?
It can. Except for the fish, whole and thinner than a cucumber, which we picked at but ultimately spared. Sadly, it was too late to through him back.
The Beef, about to be grilled
After dinner, with the bedding laid out, I tried out my yukata, a type of traditional garment that can be warn around the ryokan or even out and about (think of it as more formal than a bathrobe but more casual than a kimono). After securing help in tying my knot correctly, I examined my newly exposed figure in the too-short mirror in the corner. Never mind, I said to myself, as a I trotted downstairs to the traditional Japanese beer vending machine.
—
A temple near our ryokan
Takayama, a few hours up into the mountains from Nagoya, is sometimes called Little Kyoto. But unlike Kyoto, the main attractions are within a walkable radius. Near the station, business hotels and souvenir shops dominate, but a quick stop at one of the stores offering the two local craft beers is well worth it. Further into the city unveils the traditional stuff: old private houses; sake breweries, featuring free tastings; stores selling local arts, crafts and furniture; and a seemingly endless list of museums.
We woke up on Sunday a bit late, hitting the snooze on our cell phone alarms. Breakfast, served in a common room downstairs, was ongoing. We were the last of the guests to sit down. After checkout, we stashed our bags in a coin locker near the station and set out to fill a day in the city.
One of the morning markets
The first stop was two morning markets, like your standard Saturday market but running every day, sustained by a steady flow of tourists eager to taste and spend. The main offerings include small monkey-dolls with no facial features. Called sarubobo, these guys are all over the place, watching over the town as best a faceless creature can watch. Of course, to be a complete tourists, you must buy multiple colors, which each have different meanings. Green for health. Red for love. And so on. I bought two. Besides the no-face-monkeys, the old women sold local apples and juice derived from them, pickled vegetables, and a few other local foods and crafts.
There's beef inside
After eating enough stall food to take the place of lunch, we decided to get away from the city center and head into the hills. That’s when we accidentally found the northern head of the Higashiyama Walking Course, a two-hour trek which weaves through a network of temples along the city’s eastern hills. The area was born when the ruling lord, who admired Kyoto, built the town, which then was home to a castle (the ruins of which lie at the southern end of the walking tour). Although a Japan tourist can be forgiven for quickly growing weary of temple after temple, shrine after shrine, this walk was the highlight of our trip, mostly because aside from one of pair, all the other tourists in town that day were competing for space in the aforementioned “traditional radius.”
The walking course spills into Shiroyama Park, and from there we headed back into the city, crossing the same historical streets for the 117th time that weekend, finally landing at the coffee shop where earlier in the day we left behind an umbrella. The recovery was well-timed, because shortly afterward the sky let fall a wintry mix that did not let up.
Two hours until the bus home, we sought refuge in an Italian restaurant, which hung our coats and gave us pizza. The express bus back to Nagoya got caught in traffic, expanding the trip to almost five hours. Off the bus, I weaved my way around the slow foot traffic of Nagoya station to the Kintetsu line. I had a train to catch, to get to Osaka, where in the morning I would watch Day 9 of the sumo tournament.
A few shots from the day (not the ceremony):
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| Graduation at Yamasho 2010 |
It’s Sunday night before the second Monday of the 15-day spring Sumo tournament, and I’m on a rapid express train between Nagoya and Namba in Osaka’s bustling southern city center.
At a bar in a grid of shops and restaurants called American Village, Julian, De and Susi encounter a rikishi (a term used to generally refer to sumo wrestlers) in the flesh.
The rikishi in question is Gagamaru in the sumo world, which compared to his given name from Georgia (the country) is a breeze to pronounce.
The 6-foot-1, 400-pounder, taking a break from shots of hard alcohol, at some point picks up Susi and places her on his lap. You could call that a cute meet.
My train arrives, and I find an exit that leads me to nothing I recognize. A pair of cops direct me toward American Village, and I summon the trio to check in at our capsule hotel.
At the bar, on the way out, Julian slips Gagamaru Susi’s cell number. He’ll give a her call some time, he says, going back to his liquor.
—
It’s Monday morning, the ninth day of the tournament, and Osaka Prefectural Gymnasium is mostly empty. We’re led to our box seats, which at the Rose Garden I’d consider roughly to be toward the front of the 200 level.
We sit on mats on the floor, preferred seating in Japan, and nurse our hangovers. We scan the program searching for the rikishi from last night, whose name we had not yet confirmed.
Turns out, he won’t wrestle until the afternoon, since he’s a member of the second-from-the-top juryo division. When he finally does enter in the latter part of the juryo field, the excitement in our box builds. At 3 and 5, will Gagamaru be able to etch out a winning record by day 15? Today, his opponent is Chiyohakuho, who so far has lost only twice (they have only one bout per day). But Gagamaru wins, and we all agree that Susi should go find him and congratulate him.
Instead, it’s Julian who accidentally finds Gagamaru in the corridors. A trip to the toilet, and there he is. And the wrestler, who apparently did not drink too much, speaks first.
“Remember me?” he asks Julian in Japanese.
“Of course!”
They speak a little more. Later, Julian reports that the young Japanese boys nearby seeking autographs were dumbfounded. Who, they must have thought, is this guy having a casual chat with Gagamaru?
But in the end, it is Susi who won the most access. Her Facebook profile picture already changed to the lap-sitting incident, she manages to find Gagamaru’s profile. Friend request, granted. Skype chat, complete.
Now the question is, when sumo’s top men visit Mie next month on tour, will Susi and Gagamaru meet? Because that sure would be cute.
Things are looking busy in the next few days. I’ll take tomorrow (Friday) off, Monday is a national holiday, and Tuesday a vacation day for my school. A five-day weekend! Naturally, I’ll be traveling. And spending that forecast vending machine savings.
And now, in addition to the Takayama trip, I’ve added sumo in Osaka. More below.
First, here’s the schedule:
Friday: Mid-morning departure for Nagoya. Shopping (I need a shirt) and eating in the city.
Saturday: Early morning bus to Takayama, followed by initial sight-seeing
Sunday: Early morning start to a day in Takayama. Morning markets and more.
Sunday night: Train to Osaka, rendezvous with other Mie sumo-watchers, and who knows what
Monday: Sumo, in the flesh.
I am going to watch Sumo because Conrad went to Nara for a festival and met some people who he invited to come see Ise and who in turn invited him to visit them. In Korea.
So Conrad is in Korea. And that makes me the stand-in (sit-in?) fourth man in a C level box at the Osaka Prefectural Gymnasium for Monday’s tournament action. I did not know much about sumo prior to today. I’ve turned to a book (left behind by Conrad, who instead is probably studying basic Korean), Wikipedia, and official websites for an all-out information dump. And I’ve caught up on the tournament so-far via the Japan Times sumo page.
The Osaka event is one of six official tournaments a year. One each is held in Fukuoka, Osaka, and Nagoya, with the remainder in Tokyo. The tournament spans 15 days. Each day begins with lower ranked wrestlers, known as rikishi, leading up to higher ranked match-ups in the afternoon. In the end, the competitor with the most wins over the 15 days wins, and may be promoted to a higher overall rank. The top rank is called yokozuna, and presently there is only one.
Sumo itself, described in this New York Times travel essay, remains mysterious to me. As it should. I’ve seen it on TV at times, but until I had my ticket (figuratively speaking) in hand I had not even attempted to follow it. And after a day at the tournament, I certainly won’t be anything close to an expert. But check this space for some kind of description of what I saw.
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On slow days, that is, days with no classes, any kind of distraction is welcome. Last spring, there was a small fire in the nearby bamboo forest. Sometimes former students pay a visit. But on some days, there’s nothing but vending machines.
Japan is famous for its vending machines. They really are everywhere. You could be in the middle of nowhere, lost in the country-side, not another human in sight, and then, behold, by the seemingly abandoned shack, there’s a vending machine. For only 130 yen you can stave off death by heat for a little bit longer by way of a cold tea (or coffee, or Coca Cola, or a sports drink which is disturbingly called Pocari Sweat).
But back to campus. The photo above shows some of the machines on campus, mostly offering juice or juice-like products. Sometimes I go for the 20 percent juice grapefruit drink. Or maybe I’ll splurge for the 100 percent apple juice in a box that’s roughly the size of my iPhone. Sometimes, I feel adventurous, and I head to the just-off-campus machines offering a wider range of products (Corn soup! In a can!).
But yesterday, as I fed the campus machine another 100 yen (roughly a dollar), I paused to ponder how much I’m spending a month of vending. Let’s do the math. Factoring in 25 working days in a month, I’m spending, at least, 2,500 yen, or $25, on vending machine beverages. In my view, this budget area is bloated. Time to bring the hammer down, or something. Starting today, I’m off vending machines (at least during work hours). Instead of the vending machine coffee at 100 yen a can, I’ll settle for instant powder-hot-water stuff available in the teachers’ room for 20-yen a pop. Otherwise, I’ll stick with free water from fountains.
Which means that I now have a surplus of 2,500 yen a month. Should I use it to pay down my Personal Debt (credit cards) or invest in Personal Growth (beer)?
Next stop: Takayama in Gifu.
A popular tourist town, Takayama (literally tall mountain) is in Gifu prefecture, one of Mie’s neighbors to the north. About two hours out of Nagoya by bus or train, it’s perfectly situated for a weekend getaway, complete with old style shopping districts, natural hot springs, and locally created arts and crafts. I’m looking forward to the popular morning markets, touring a sake (rice wine) brewery and other random exploring. The trip is set for later this month, helpfully right after payday.
We stand up and bow, presumably to the flag, but more directly to the lectern and bonsai tree to its left. Then we sit down as the Head Office Guy brings the Big Folder Thing to the principal, who is fresh off an emergency trip home because he forgot his suit pants. The principal inspects the Big Folder Thing and reads from the set script, kicking of the graduation ceremony before the assembled students, parents and staff. We stand again. And we bow.
—
Part way through our joint speech, we realize we may have packed it too full of inside jokes. Know your audience, they say. We may not have been listening. Essentially, we had already peaked with our opening gag, which involved walking up to the stage with electric guitars and portable amps; then, after mock-preparing to strike the first chord, we set the musical equipment down without a word and began our speech.
—
The home room teacher for class 3-1 steps up to the Other Lectern to the left of the stage and begins reading the names of the students in his class. Each called student rises from his chair — or rather he is lifted out of it in a surge of excitement. Some offer a “hai” as they stand. Others shout it. Some, perhaps numb from the weight of it all, remain silent. When all have been called, the class leader steps out of his seat and walks along a prescribed line. When he reaches the area in front of the seated students, he turns and bows to the VIPs and PTA members to the right, then flips a 180 and bows to the administrators and home room teachers. Finally, he turns toward center stage, walks up the five steps, and along with his 39 classmates, bows to the principal.
—
Our names are read, one by one and we walk across the stage, collect our empty diploma folder, pose for a photo, and sit down again. Reality sets in. It’s over. The final call is made, and in a last bout of exuberance, we hurl our caps into the air.
—
Boilerplate speeches. How many people need to go over the highlights of the last three years? The PTA guy is holding his script inches from his face. Everyone speaks for too long. We wish we could stand and bow again. Finally, they’re done. The students start to file out. Each class, as a unit, pauses in front of the younger students seated in the gym. They cheer. And they launch candy and confetti and strips of colorful paper into the air. A huge weight is lifted. Formality fades into laughter. The band plays, and we clap.
