Wakayama day one - Apr. 28 2007

Today marks the beginning of Golden Week, next Monday there is no school and Thursday and Friday are national holidays. This a time when Japanese can start enjoying the nice weather and go on small trips in Japan. Most of the traveling is done on the long 4 day weekend, but because we have school off on Monday, so I planned a small trip with three friends in Wakayama, the southern most area of the Kansai region, and the last area of the Kansai region that I have not yet visited. I also tried to arrange a trip in Kyuushuu for the second portion (4 day weekend) of golden week, but that was not possible because all hotels were already booked and the traveling price was pretty steep.

Our first stop in Wakayama proved to be an inspirational and spritual journey at the top of Kouyasan, the center of the Esoteric Shingon school of Buddhism in Japan. This was a special place with nice surprises.

Not even 10 minutes after our arrival, an aged man with good English skills proposed to give us a tour of the main points of Kouyasan and became our defacto tour guide. He said he was a volunteer tour guide and learning the history and important facts of every location to be able to give good tours. This was a very kind gesture of pure generosity that we often encounter in Japan.

The first location we visited was a small living quarter for monks and one woman monk felt bad there was no information available in English and she referred to us as "Gaijin-san" (Mr. Gaijin), that was the first time we had heard that, we thought it was quite funny. We had a nice treat at this place, as we were allowed to go in an enclosed room that is usually closed-off from general public but that day marked an important date where the doors were kept open. This room was special as it displayed the images of gods and descendants of the founders of the place, but it also felt special to be allowed to be inside. The room was dark and the smell of incense made the experience even more special. There was a feeling of serenity and I could feel my body and my mind relax while the monk was explaining the room, the statues and rites. This site was not an important site to visit (not on tourist maps) but it was worthwhile stopping by, just out of curiosity.

Next we walked down a 2km path that goes through an imposing cemetery that had interesting tombs, statues and stupas. There was also a big sculpture to commemorate the deaths of the kamikaze during the Second World War, but it didn't seem to have its place in this cemetery. There were also navel Japanese flags that symbolize the military strength of Japan during the Second World War. Obviously, a part of Japan has not come to terms with the post-war identity and direction of the country.
At the end of the path there is a temple that marks the end of a pilgrimage (and there were many pilgrims). Kouyasan is one end of a path called the Path of History that goes through 5 provinces and can take weeks to accomplish. Inside the temple there were monks chanting prayers and ringing a small bell at the end of each prayer.

On our way back we saw another piece of landscaping that really seemed out of place (see pictures) but we were not surprised because up to this point we have seen all sorts of strange things in Japan.

Before we left we visited a boutique with incredibly high prices for various items, mainly dealing with Buddhism. One of my friends was interested in buying incense and when the store clerks saw that they started filling our hands with boxes and boxes of incense saying "Doozu, doozu" roughly translated to: please, be my guest... and when we understood they were actually giving out all that incense, we felt really bad. To make me feel better I bought two pairs of chopsticks with the name KOUYASAN engraved on them.

We left the place around 4 PM satisfied that we had came to this remote place of Wakayama where many go to seek answers, and where we experienced the more religious side of Japan.

The remainder of the day was spent traveling to the small city of KII-TANABE (5000 inhabitants). Many mishaps happened on our way there. First, at the first exchange, in Wakayama city, we decided to stop by at a Lotteria (Japanese fast food store) but by doing so missed our transfer train. Because of the low frequency in local transport, we had lots of time on our hands so we walked in all four corners of Wakayama city in 1 hour. There was nothing much to see and around 8 PM the city was already dead! The only action came from an aspiring pop artist on his guitar at the train station. The next mishap came from the fact we then waited for our train on the wrong platform and missed it! We actually hurried and got in another train, thinking it was the right one, but after questioning the on board staff, told us this train stopped 15 stations before ours! We were very fortunate to be able to catch up with our missed train and transfer at the terminal. We eventually arrived at KII-TANABE at 11PM when we told the hostel owner we would arrive a 6PM. We never thought we could arrive in KII-TANABE, we were planning on sleeping the night out or in a Karaoke box stuck in the middle of nowhere when we had taken the wrong train. To add to the complications, we got lost on our way walking to the hostel so I called them and the owner came and greeted us on his scooter. The next hour I spent discussing with the owner about our travel plans in Wakayama and how we could minimize travel time and expenses (we found out it was difficult to get around in Wakayama) and by midnight we were sound asleep in our futons in a pretty cosy, comfortable and friendly place (for 30$ a night).

Elections - Apr. 22 2007

Today is the second election day in 2 weeks in Hirakata. The first election was for governor of Osaka prefecture and this one that is happening today is for Mayor of Hirakata city. There are a few interesting things to note about the electoral process here.

First, there are rarely debates during electoral campaigns and the main aspect of campaigning for politicians is to go around in cars with speakers and yell out their names. The concept of democracy here is quite different and a large majority of Japanese don't really care. Some people think that the elections are decided before the elections between companies. I read that some companies encourage their employees to vote for a certain candidate.

In the case of the mayor elections, there are no limits to the number of candidates there can be.. for example, for the city of Hirakata there are nearly 60 candidates. (see picture) one of my friends was telling me of all the candidates for the mayor of Tokyo, only a handful are serious and the other contenders, mostly business owners, use the opportunity of the campaigning to promote their business more than their political platform. The reality is that promoting oneself in the context of a campaign (on posters, in the streets and on the radio) is much cheaper than advertising specifically for a product.

I was happy to hear that today was election day because the small streets of Hirakata have been noisy lately with all the trucks running around yelling slogans and candidates names over and over again with speakers that can be heard kilometres around.

Hirapa - Apr. 21 2007

I am dead tired, but what a great day to visit Hirakata Park, a local theme park.. the weather was great, not too hot, not too cold, partially cloudy with parcels of sun. If we backtrack one more day, yesterday I went to an Okonomiyaki place (Japanese pizza) and I had the best I ever had! The restaurant boasts that they preserve the traditional taste of Osaka. (Osaka is known for Okonomiyaki and takoyaki - fried octopus dumplings).

But back to today, I havn't been in a theme parc for a long time, so this was very refreshing and the parc itself is very beautiful. I took many videos and some during rides, I hope I can post them soon.

This theme parc was pretty standard except for a walk-in ride that you literally walk in a giant fridge with fake-oversized food. The second weird thing was the samurai-themed haunted house that features a Kill Bill style beheading at the end! There was one special 4-D ride where you have to go in an egyptian coffin and look through a virtual-reality mask and you see images and you have to keep your hands outside the coffin. At some point you see scorpions in the screen and you feel something pointy hitting your hands! From that point I did not have the guts to leave my hands outside the coffin. You later find out that they were monitoring your heart beat ect.. and they give you the results of how brave / wimp you are when you get out!

Also Japanese "fear" of water was also apparent in this park since in every ride where you had the possibility of getting wet, they would take all the precautions to make sure you don't wet: in the amazon rapid ride, they put tall plastic sheets around the vehicle to the point that you cannot see anything outside and they even offer ponchos at the beginning of the ride. In the log ride with a big drop, they put a large plastic window at front to prevent the water from falling in the log when it does its final drop in the water.

For a nice Saturday, the parc seemed pretty empty; there was practically no waiting time, but rumors say that this park is usually closed until the beginning of May, but because of the exceptionally mild weather, they opened a little earlier, so most people might not be aware of that.

Apparently there is also a slump in domestic travel and it has lead to the closure of two theme parcs: Nara Dreamland in Nara and Festival Gate in Osaka. I might visit 4 more theme parcs in Japan: Expoland in Osaka, Parque Espana in Mie prefecture, Universal Studios in Osaka and the Disneyland resort in Tokyo.

Parc visit in Osaka - Apr. 14 2007

We visited a nice park today in the outskirts of Osaka... highlights in point form:

1. Small earthquake scares my American friend and I for a few seconds but the Japanese barely seem to care

2. People singing Karaoke all over the park (they bring their own equipment and have Karaoke rounds)

3. The park is big but there are so many people that to play ball, frisbee etc, there is a very limited amount of space but everyone seems to manage to get along well (they have to be used to small spaces)

4. We end up in downtown Osaka and I spend a ridiculous amount of money in Taiko and Drumset simulation games at the arcade

5. We see a cool taiko performance in the park (real taiko, not simulation!)

Campus resuscitates - Apr. 11 2007

Today school started again for Japanese Universities. After over 2 months of a near deserted campus with mainly foreign students, the campus suddenly became packed with Japanese students... to the extent that sometimes we have to eat outside on the floor and there are now bicycle traffic jams and shortage of bicycle parking space! It might be a hassle sometimes, but at least the campus is alive and there are opportunities to meet with Japanese students everyday. For the first week there will be tables set up to join one of the many clubs or circles. From traditional instruments to Spanish conversation club, there is something for every taste. Clubs seem to be super important in a students life and they take a huge commitment from the student: meetings or practices everyday and various team building events outside the campus.

The freshmen stand out because they seem shy and lost, but some of the courageous, outgoing and confident ones come to the Center for International Education (CIE) and chat with the foreigners. One of my Japanese friends told me that during his freshmen years, everyone talked about going to the CIE as if it was a big mission to overcome.

Identity Crisis - Apr. 7 2007

For my 60th post, I will talk about a major issue in Japan that will dictate the direction of the country in the future.

After the crash of the Japanese economy in the 1990's the Japanese have been under pressure to change their way of doing business, but that also means their way of thinking and their culture. Attacks from global competitors, acquisitions from foreign companies, kidnappings from the North Korean regime, constant tension between Japan, China and Korea because of their troubled past has all contributed to this issue of identity crises. I think that most Japanese understand that they must change in some way, but how and where to start is such a delicate question. There are movements who are for the preservation of traditional values and a nationalist Japan with its own military power. Nihonkaigi is an important right-wing lobby group. The above picture is a propaganda vehicle that is most often operated by Yakuza. Other important organizations such as the Japanese Business Association seem to be more for reform in order to refresh the economy. (Keiranden)... they have recently proposed a plan to reorganize the government so it does not play such a big role in business.
The core values of core Japan are also being put to question... gender inequality for example, seems to be tied to sex education in Japanese high schools and some lobbyts warn the public that gender equality rhymes with androgyny.

The demographics of Japan is also creating a shortage of labor and the government is very reluctant to look towards immigration, which would in fact question who is a Japanese?

With the present government, Japan doesn't seem to have a chance to change in a rational way, but the government is not popular at all which is an indication that the people of Japan is looking for change, but the bureaucracy is not.

Sakura - Apr. 2 2007

I am extremely tired. Saturday I woke up at 7 am and did not go to bed before 7 am on Sunday morning, then slept all day, woke up around 7pm and of course had difficultly sleeping: I only slept two hours before waking up at 7am for class and here I am at 9:30pm working on my blog. I will go to bed early tonight.

The big day on Saturday however is justified. I went to yet another interesting trip to Kyoto, this time with 7 friends; 4 foreigners and 4 Japanese. The day started at Heian shrine, famous for it's secret garden, that I completely forgot about and thought it was quite an ordinary shrine! However, there was the biggest Torii gate I have ever seen before and cherry blossom had started, adding some beauty to the site. I indulged in some kanji writing in the pebbles of the Heian shrine court. I wrote "HANAMI" which means viewing the cherry blossoms.

We were supposed to head straight to the Silver pavilion, but the buses were so full (Kyoto is a very popular spot for foreign and local tourists during cherry blossoms) so we first went to Heian shrine. Still wanting to walk down the famous "Philosoper's walk" we managed to get crammed into a jammed-packed bus and we had a pleasant stroll and saw postcard-beautiful spots for hanami. After walking down the 2km path, we stopped to regain some energy at a little local restaurant where I had fried noodles.

We were then ready to climb up the Daimon-ji yama, a mountain famous for the enourmous "dai" kanji on it (chinese character for "great"). The character is lit on fire every year as part of traditional celebrations to scare away bad spirits. The climb was not too tiring, but we had to stop several times to catch our breath, the climb was fairly steep at some points. The climb was definitely worth it as we had one of the best views of Kyoto at the top. From the top we could see Kyoto tower and the gigantic Torii gate infront of Heian shrine (try to spot them on the photos).

Once we were back down we were all tired and ready to soak in the hot spring. For most of us it was our first experience... again, I did not feel comfortable taking photos so here is a link for a photo google search on Kurama Onsen: Photos.

After spending 30 minutes soaked in the extremely hot water, we headed back to hirakatashi for some Japanese-style partying: Karaoke! My first time since in Japan! This was a great place to spend the whole night: there were pool tables, darts, ping-pong and a comic-book viewing room as well. Although juice and softdrink was unlimited, we preferred sneaking in some alcohol and getting drunk on the spot.

Karaoke was so fun, everyone participated and I even tried singing two Japanese songs (terrible!) I was having too much fun to bother taking photos or videos, but we already decided to return, so next time I will try to post a video of my Karaoke-singer skills. The whole thing is so technologically advanced! You have an electronic touch-tone screen device to choose your songs from and the songs line up as we choose them. There are options to give scores on the performances. This was the most luxurious karaoke I have ever been to. We are also in private rooms, which is great.

Around 5 AM the Japanese were all dead tired and were sleeping in the karaoke room and I left with the last foreigner that was still there playing pool by himself, half falling asleep.

The staff obviously knew we had sneaked in beer but they did not say a word, they seemed to ignore it and the other Japanese customers (all around our age) did not seem to mind either.

I walked back to the dorms and went to bed around 7am...