Miyajima
By my 6th day in Japan, I had enough of temples and Kyoto was full of them. So for my last fully day in Japan, I sped to Hiroshima by Shinkansen and took a quick ferry to the island of Miyajima. After unboarding the ferry, I was encountered by “wild” deer that greeted the visitors to the island. They have become so used to humans, that the deer take naps in public parks and sometimes try to sneak into shops if incentive in the form of food appears unguarded.
I took a cable car to the summit of the island’s mountain Mount Misen where there were wild monkeys lounging around like a bunch of drunk teenagers on spring break in a summer beachhouse. With bright red faces and butts.
All round the park there were also brightly colored lizards, freshwater crabs in the streams, and cicadas that had a chant much different than those on North America’s east coast.
Most of the day was spent hiking in the forests, or cooling my feet in streams in the public parks. It was probably the only remotely-blue-sky day during my whole visit to Japan.
Kyoto
Vermillion Torii of Fushimi Inari temple complex in Kyoto
So, I’ll admit that my dad’s right. I’m getting a bit “hefty”, no thanks to long hours and fatty food at work. But after today, I should have lost at least 2 pounds. I woke up at sunrise and took a local train to western Kyoto to a neighborhood called Arashiyama. I took a morning walk through a bamboo forest and then along a river.
I made it back to the Shunko-In temple for the 9:00 AM meditation class led by Rev. Taka, who explained 2 types of meditation and led us through two 15 minute meditation exercises. It was pretty cool. Although I lost some blood flow from crossing my legs like a contortionist, I was able to hear a dragon fly amongst hammering and chirping and feel a fly weave its way through my leg hairs. (Sorry for the gross imagery?)
Hopefully to the relief of my crusading super-catholic parents, I didn’t become zen-buddhist. After the class, he took us on a brief tour of the temple grounds. Taka explained that some of the 300-yr old screen paintings in the temple’s possession belonged to Japanese christians that were living in hiding from persecution, and who hid Christian symbology in the paintings. The temple also has a bell from the 1700s, which has the Jesuit stamp “IHS” on it. As the story goes, Taka’s grandfather buried the bell during WWII to hide it from the Japanese army who sought metals to melt for weapons. An inter-faith delegation from the Vatican is scheduled to visit the temple to view the bell.
The class and tour ended with Macha (green) tea – like the tea in Japanese tea ceremonies, which is very different to what I drink day-to-day and some interesting tea biscuits. I was quite sad to leave the temple, but more of Kyoto awaited me.
Unlike my earlier experiences, my journey to my hostel in central Kyoto was pretty smooth. I didn’t get lost! I rented a mountain bike with good brakes (this time), and went to yet more temples called Kiyomizu Temple and Jishu-jinju Shrine. They were at the top of a very steep hill filled with tourist souvenir shops for good shopping. I had actually gotten lost in Kyoto’s Women’s University for about 1 hour and got lost for about 1 hour going up the steepest hill for about 2 miles before I decided I was lost.
I ended the day riding to Fushimi-Inari, which is a huge Shinto Shrine complex on a hill. Thousands of vermillion-red Torri gates arching over the paths that lead to the summit of Mount Inariyama. “Inari” was the shinto god of rice and sake, so to occasion I brought some Inari-sushi to eat along the hike amongst the many statues of foxes, which were Inari’s messengers.
Shinkansen to Kyoto
Kawaguchiko was quaint and relaxing but I was definitely glad to leave that that wet blanket. I hopped on the first train out to Tokyo, which was almost a 3 hour endeavour: Fuji-Yoshida Line to Otsuki, then transfer to the JR Azusa express to Shinjuku, then transfer to the JR Yamanote Line to Tokyo station. From there I caught the Hikari Shinkansen (bullet train) Kyoto. Along the way I ran into 2 other non-Japanese: Joe from Wales and Raquel from Brazil/Austrailia. It was good to speak with English speakers again, and share advice on what to do, where to go and how to do it. The conversation about Japan was always positive. I gave Joe a 15USD rain jacket that I ended up never using because it never rained, snowed or got colder than 50F on the mountain. I’m in denial about wasting money and try to recount it as “insurance”. Joe would have better use for it, since he’s been doing harcore hikes on the wettest and most distant areas in Japan.
The Shinkansen was ridiculously fast,and forking over the extra cash for the Green Car JR Pass – a.k.a. First Class! – was key in compensating for the abuse I imposed on my body for having to lug around the 20kg backpack from hostel to train station to hostel. I enjoyed my reserved seat in a 60 person-capacity car with only 4 people occupying it, while I ate my chirashi (a bed of sushi rise topped with the freshest of raw seafood like sea urchin, caviar, and yellow fin tuna) and green tea.
When the Shinkansen opened its doors at the city of Nagoya, my glance met a 6’2″ sumo wrestler dressed in a purple silk yukata and zori (straw japanese sandals). Contrary to some remarks made by ex-president George Bush, Senior; the Japanese are not actually that short, and this sumo wrestler definitely proved it. I tamed my paparazzi urges out of respect for this athelete, but managed to take a candid shot of him walking away at the Kyoto train station.
From Kyoto, I transfered to the local JR Sagano line a short 20 min ride/walk to Hanazono station in west/central Kyoto to the Myoshin-ji Temple (complex). Kyoto at first was a bit disappointing as it was not the picturesque Geisha-town that holywood had me believe. It was more industrialized, but when I entered the temple complex, I could not believe that I would be spending the night here.
When I arrived at the Shunko-In Temple (my accomodations for the night), I was met by a guy sporting a shaved head and wearing Abercrombie & Fitch t-shirt and shorts, watering the walkway and raking the gravel. I was expecting a greeting by a monk in traditional robes. Instead, I learned that Taka (Reverend Taka Kawakami) was the monk featured on the temple’s website. Taka had actually gone to Rice University and University of Arizona for his education.He led me to my room, which to my surprise was a traditional Japanese style room with tatami mats, sliding doors, elevated floors, and a sleep-on-floor style of bedding.
Shunko-In even had bike to use free of charge. I planned my route to Kinkaju-Ji temple, and had my first taste of urban riding in Asia – weaving through narrow streets, dodging pedestrians, and sharing narrow alleys with tiny Japanese cars. I took some time to figure out the rules of the road. The rules which are that no one follows the rules! According to the arrows painted on all the bike lanes, riders should stick to the left side of the path. Instead, it seemed to be a riders preference to choos to ride on the right or left-hand side of the path. Worse was that pedestrians didn’t really care about bike path vs. sidewalk. Somehow, everything worked out – the real rule was “survival”.
I made it to Kinkaju-Ji temple just 30min before they (and every other temple in Kyoto) close. This temple is also known as the Golden Pavillian, which was built as a retirement home for one of the shoguns. The main attraction is the pavillion, which is covered in gold-leaf.
With 2 hours left in the day, I rode like a madman through central Tokyo passing through the Imperial Palace grounds and Nijo-Jo castle.
I ended the evening by meeting up with one of my sisters roomates, Emily, who is doing a semester abroad and living in Kyoto. Eight of us met up at a real local’s joint called Jambo, which served Okonomiyaki. I’ve had this dish before in Manhattan, from a hole in the wall called Otafuku. But this was a real experience. 4 people sit at a table, with shoes removed and legs crossed (think traditional style). A grill occupies most of the table, where they cook right in front of you.
I ended the night taking some evening shots of the temple grounds in the dim light, and enjoyed my most relaxing night in Japan.
Mount Fuji-San
Summiting Mount Fuji was supposed to be one of the huge achievements of this trip. However, I’ve realized that you can’t expect public transportation and the weather to harmonize with a insanely-abbreviated itinerary.
I woke up around 4:00 AM – residual effects from waking up to go to the fish market the previous day – with heavy rain falling on the little town of Kawaguchiko at the base of Mount Fuji. I was supposed to wake up the frenchman on the top bunk, but horror stories from some hawaiians about freezing in the rain discouraged the thought of taking the first shuttle out to the trailhead to the summit. The weather decided to clear up after 10:00 AM, but by then it was too late to do the 9 hour roundtrip hike to the summit and back before the last shuttle back to town. To give you an idea of how important the shuttle is, it would add another 6-9 hours of hiking that would have to be done at night probably in rain.
One doesn’t realize how high Mount Fuji actually is until you get above the treeline and see miles of clouds blanketing the skies above the rolling hills below. I made it up only 600 vertical feet and Mount Fuji up-close is not the most scenic of hikes, but some of the photos were worth the trip.
I spent the rest of the day figuring out logistics for getting to Kyoto.
Tsukiji Fish Market
The subways don’t start running until 5:00 am. I don’t blame them, but that was no help to my plans of getting to Tsukiji before 5:00, to see the activity of the fish market. My body woke me up around 4am, just in time to grab my stuff and catch a taxi. The cab ride took about 15min from Asakusa and costs about 26 USD, but it was worth the trip and the cost.
The size of the fish market is hard to fathom, but imagine a foot ball stadium full of fishmongers.
Lights of Shinjuku (新宿区)
I met another American traveler at the Capsule Inn, Andrew on his last day in Japan. He bestowed upon me his wisdom from his last 2 and a half weeks of travel. For dinner we looked for Kaike Kamemoto – a purportedly very authentic ramen restaurant in the Shinjuku section of Japan – just a hop on the metro cross town. Shinjuku is reminiscent of the neon lights and adverts of Time Square in Manhattan, but perhaps on a broader scale as several streets had shining curtains of light.
However, signs for every restaurant were in Kanji. So instead, we took our best guess at the restaurant’s vicinity and settled on whatever looked good. I took a photo of the sign, so my sister’s roomate can translate.
Afterwards, we strolled through the seedier parts of town – Shinjuku’s red light district where photo albums of young womens’ photos were displayed outside for people’s picking. But this was no Bangkok, Amsterdam or Las Vegas. Peddlers were nowhere near as pushy and the streets were very clean and fully of couples and tourists. After 10 minutes the food coma + jetlag started to kick in so we went back to the hotel.
Back at the capsule inn, I encountered my first Japanese style bathroom. Showering is communal and you sit down on plastic stools and shower heads lined up along the wall wth a small mirror in front of you. The public showering was not as weird as sitting down for a shower; definitely not my preference, but it seemed authenticly Japanese I guess. The towel they provide have just enough area to cover up your personals but apparently nudity is not an issue here as is the case in Europe.
Unfortunately, I can’t install Picasa on this computer, so I won’t be uploading photos as I promised. If I find one of those 24hour manga/internet cafes, I’ll try again.
Lost and Found in Akihabara (秋葉原)
I finally checked into my first night’s accomodation – the Capsule Inn Hotel of the Akihabara district of Tokyo. I came through the door soaked in sweat after a 3km goose chase around the maze of Akihabara in the humid Japanes summer trying to find this place. As soon as I stepped off the elevated subway station and into the Times-Square-esque lights of Akihabara, I knew I was already lost before I ventured off the set of directions that I scribbled together to get this far. The trip from Narita airport was seemless enough, as I raced from customs to the JR Rail express line to the Tokyo Station within followed by a transfer 4min north to Akihabara.
I saw little English or romaji (japanese in the latin alphabet) when I first stepped into the Tokyo jungle. I chickened out fast and found the nearest police officer and asked “Sumimasen. Capsule Inn wa doko desu ka?”, which I hope meant: “Excuse me. Where is the Capsule Inn hotel?”. I awaited a response that I prayed would be in very slow Japanese so that I could pick up some common words I learned from “Japanese for dummies”. Believe it or not, he spoke great English. Too bad his directions were completely wrong.
1 hour later I was still wandering backstreets like a typical gaijin tourist. The streets were getting darker and less populated. I hailed the first cab I could find. As the automated taxi cab doors opened, I spoke into the cab: “Capsule Inn Hotel e itte kudasai.” I’m pretty sure that was wrong, but I was hoping it meant: “Please go to the Capsule Inn Hotel”. The man had no idea where that was and called HQ for reinforcements. We drove off and 2 blocks north back in the direction I came from, we found the place on a corner that I passed about 5 times. “WTF” I said to myself – the fare was about 710en (about 7 USD). Most expensive 2 block cab ride ever but I was going in the complete opposite direction anyway. When in doubt, hail a cab and have lots of money.
Capsule Inn Hotel, Akihabara, Tokyo
So I’m here now. I didn’t get a chance to explain the nature of the hotel. Basically, it’s another manifestation of the sardine-like living conditions of Japan. “Capsules” about 3 feet x 3 feet x 8 feet line a wall, where people sleep. Imagine those steel body drawers in a morgue, but more comfy with windows and TV inside. They supposedly were marketed towards Japanese businessmen who missed the last train home and needed a place to sleep and shower for the night.
I’ll try to take a few photos and post some later. For the rest of the night, I might join another American (a student from Standord) who is looking up places that serve fugu (that poisonous blowfish that Homer ate on the Simpsons in season 1) and whale. Yes, whale. I’m against their whale hunting industry, but when in Rome…
Holy Crap! I have to Pack!
Phrase of the Day: いいえ、私には分からない
“Iie, wakarimasen” = “No, I don’t understand”
I have 6 hours until my flight, and people have stopped telling me: “You’re cutting it close, aren’t you? Go pack already.” They’ve stopped talking because it’s 2am, and I actually spent 30 minutes setting up this blog. Hopefully we all appreciate it when I come back.
My clothes are in a bag, my papers and directions are in a pile next to me with my passport, and the cameras – yes, cameraS multiple and yes, so asian – are charging.
I tried calling the 1 hotel I’m staying at, with the few japanese phrases I know. It was a complete disaster. I asked: “Anata wa eigo o hanashimasu ka? (英語を話せますか)”, which should mean: “Do you speak english?”. I was hoping to hear, “Yes” from the lovely lady on the other side of the line. Instead I heard a bunch of this:
申し訳ありませんですか？私には分からないよ。ご予約はお持ちですか
…
(awkward silence)
…
Me: “English?”
Lady: “no english”
(more awkward silence)
Me: “ummm…. sorry… ok, sayonara!”
(cursing while slapping the clamshell closed)
All this means is that I may not have a place to stay on night #5, or they have my credit card and will charge me a million yen when I get lost and miss check-in.
Yata! (“yay”!)
