Belated Post

Takakura-Jingu
~ or ~
The Case of the Missing Shrine

Pretty fun day today, despite starting to feel a little sick. (Colds are rough.)

When executed properly, poorly-planned days become grand adventures.

After a (really) late (illness-related) start, I went out to find Atsuta-jingu with Iain; we were unsuccessful and it was brilliant. A gorgeous, picture-taking day.

Found Iain as I walked down a side street taking photos of a building which is either an Eastern Orthodox Church or a mosque, though the designs on the side throw some doubt on any monotheistic affiliation. Seems he'd gone in before and found, after a brief tour and gift-giving, that it was not, if fact, Atsuta-jingu. So we took a little walk through southern Kanayama, towards Nishi Takakura. Eventually we found something that looked promising; tree tops poking above suburbs are usually one of two things: shrines (or temples) or parks. In our case, it turned out to be the former; and a cool shrine it was.

Unfortunately I don't have any photos of it, because I was too busy being taken on a personal tour by the monk-on-duty to take any. Iain and I walked into the shrine grounds, washed our hands at the spring, and then were flagged down by the approaching monk. He talked to us in Japanese far too fast for my contextual-Japanese-listening-ability to process, then switched to some basic English. Cool guy. Cool guy, even though he mocked my Japanese ability, my taiko drumming, my lack of golf knowledge, and told me I smelled the wrong end of a broken leaf. Still.

He seemed a little surprised that an American and a Scotsman were visiting a shrine in the suburbs in Nagoya. We didn't tell him we thought it was Atsuta-jingu. Anyway. He showed us the proper way to wash your hands before entering a shrine: first you dip the wooden ladle in the spring and tip it up to pour the water down the handle, purifying the ladle. Then you dip it in again and pour some water over your left hand, then switch hands and pour the rest of the water over your right hand. Then take another ladleful of water and rinse out your mouth. And finally, take another ladleful of water, tip it back, and pour it over the handle again. Hands and mouth (and ladle) clean, and you're ready to enter the shrine.

So we did, after being handed gifts of hashi (chopsticks), sweets, and tea. In the shrine, the monk asked us if we knew taiko. Well, not personally, but yeah, we've heard of taiko. Taiko, drumming, involves a person - usually a monk or priest - hitting a drum. Very, very hard. Apparently I don't hit it hard enough. "No! Battle! Battle!" Great advice for drumming. A few more demostrations and we were good to go.

Next step was a blessing; which, from what I could gather, went like this: "Oh great Takakura Kiyomi, I humbly ask you to bless this American guy and this...you're Scottish right? this Scottish guy too. Please give them good luck and good health, and help that American guy hit the drum harder next time. And sorry for waking you up; it was their idea."

After that we headed out to see a "two hundred and one thousand year"-old tree. He had us lean up against the tree to feel "the old spirit" that was supposed to "refresh your heart". I was missing my apple and book - it would have been perfect. As a gift, another gift I guess, the monk broke off leaves for Iain and I; "Smell" he said, so we did. I was holding the wrong end of the leaf. He growled a "Bah" at me and turned the leaf around so I could smell the broken end, where it had until recently been attached to the tree. It smelled like Life.

As we were walking back across the courtyard, the monk told us his children were in the U.K. "at the famous golf course in England." Nani? (what?) He yelled to the woman monk manning the souvenir stand something that I can only guess was "Hey ____-san, what's that famous golf course in England; the one near where my kids go to University? These guys want to know." The "famous golf course in England" is St. Andrews, actually in Scotland, actually 45 minutes from Iain's home. His kids went/go to St. Andrews University. "My children English para para." Random.

Iain and I left amid much bowing and "arigato gozaimasu"s and went to see if we could find the actual Atsuta-jingu. We did manage to find Atsuta Jingu Koen (the Park), which is quite nice and a ten-minute walk from Jo's flat. It's also the home of the Nagoya Congressional Hall (or something like that), which looks like it dropped out of future and landed in a field without disturbing the homeless population too much.

After walking around for a bit, becoming frustrated with our lack of shrine-finding ability and getting rather hungry, we wandered back towards Nishi Takakura. On the way, we found an interesting possibility: the "Sherlock Holmes Beer and Restaurant". Sandwiches and coffee later, we decided to call it a day. Came home, forgetting to book tickets to Sendai, and spent the evening wondering how, exactly, one human head can produce so much snot.

Thank goodness for the five million Nova tissues I got from the staff.

Get Ur Travel On

I despise it when people spell 'your' 'ur'. For those of you who don't know, 'Ur' was an ancient Sumerian city located near what is now Basrah, Iraq. Gah.

Rant over.


The natives are on the move. Make that the foreigners; the foreigners are on the move. Ooooh yeah.

Jo departed on Tuesday for two weeks in Thailand. From the emails, it sounds like she's having a great time! Perhaps we could have a little "Jo in Thailand" foreign correspondent segment for the ol' TIJ.com

I miss her. Lots. :(


Rob left early Friday morning for his first trip home in almost a year and a half; I certainly hope he has eaten his own bodyweight in pizza by now - anything less is utter failure. ;)


As for yours truly, the limit on travel right now seems to be set by how much money I can make and how many days off I can get. The plans right now include Tokyo for New Year and Hiroshima either before or after, and - I hope I hope I hope - Sendai and maybe even Kyoto again too next month. We'll see how the "fundraising" goes.

Add the Mogwai show on the ninth, which I still need to get a shift-swap for, and we get a very busy month. Maybe I should get some sleep...

Gambatte.
t.i.j.

Autumn

What a great country. I woke up at 10 this morning (not having to be at work til 5 tonight), and the temperature was in the low 70s. The sun was shining. I walked to the store in a t-shirt, jeans, and sandals. Today was the 19th of October.

It's currently 34 degrees in Minneapolis.

What a great country.


Went out for Mexican last night with Jo, Fi, Jo's housemate Junko, and Junko's coworker Sayaka. Probably the best Mexican I've had in Japan; amazing corn tortillas, good mole sauce,
guacamole, and tortilla chips. Even won a Dos Equis bottle opener! Fi ordered something "con queso" and ended up with the biggest bowl of melted cheese anyone had ever seen - and she did a damn good job eating it too! It came with an oven-mitt full of tortillas, which almost did the job containing the cheese. Good times. Fi also won a bright red beer coaster which provided us with an evening full of "million uses for beer coasters" entertainment. More good times.


In other travel news, Iain's back from Hokkaido tonight; so there should be some good stories from him soon. Francis is scheduled to return, him and a cold, from England via China tomorrow, so I suppose I should clean up the mess from the party in his room. Getting the jello shots off the ceiling should be a doozy. I love you, Francis.

Well, off to bed; work starts in about 9 hours, and I really should sleep some before then.

Say goodnight Gracie.

Ise-jingu

Ahh. Another good day.

Went to Ise-jingu (Ise shrine) in Mie Prefecture with Jo yesterday. After a rough start, including jumping off the right train at the last minute due to confusion over price, we finally got started on our way around 11am. And it was a great day for a trip: mostly sunny, around 70 degrees, and dry.

Ise-jingu is amazing for many reasons; one, it's Japan's most holy Shinto shrine, housing the "sacred mirror of the emperor"; which hasn't been viewed in 1700 years. According to Lonely Planet's Japan guide, "since being enshrined here in the 3rd century, this mirror has not been seen by human eyes. Members of the Imperial family technically have the right to see it, but apparently none of them have ever tried to exercise this right. It stands on a wooden pedistal wrapped in a brocade bag. As each bag wears thin, the bag with the mirror inside is simply placed inside another bag. This ensures that the mirror is never sullied by the gaze of a human and has resulted in what one writer has suggested must be the world's best collection of Japanese brocade weaving." Cool.

Another cool thing about O-Ise-san (as it's "affectionately" called) is the shrine's impermanence. Jingu is torn down every twenty years, only to be rebuilt alongside the original site - as it has been for the last 1700 years, making it one of the best - if not the best - example of pre-Buddhist architecture in Japan. Depending on who you believe, it's rebuilt - down to the last peg - either to keep the carpentry skills alive, or because Shinto tradition holds that when the Emperor dies, his possessions (and hence, his shrines) are defiled, and each new Emperor needs clean new shrines, a tradition which has become embedded in shrine-building. Ise was last rebuilt in 1993 at a cost of over 5 billion yen.

And so we went to Ise and walked through the grounds, through trees that are as big around as cars, through buildings that are the same as those built 1000 years before Europeans discovered America. And what a perfect autumnal day for it! The sun fell down through trees older than systems of government, and priests walked along trails groomed in the same way they'd been for millennia.


Jo really wanted to take pictures of the amazing scenery, but I thought that might not be such a good idea: every report I'd read said that Ise is sacred, and there's no photography anywhere on the grounds. Apparently I was wrong though; literally dozens of people were walking around with cameras big enough to hold sake bottles. So, after asking some official-looking people whether or not it was okay to take photos, we started to snap away.

(Me [holding my camera]: Sumimasen, photo okay?
Official-looking security guard, while monitoring eight video cameras [laughing]: Hai, okay.)

One thing I wish I'd done, was ask for permission to photograph earlier in the day; we watched a procession of about 25 priests walk by - most in plain white robes, but some in beautifully bright colors - and I don't have any photos of it. Apparently it happens at least twice a day; priests deliver food to the main temple as an offering to Amaterasu Omikami, the sun goddess.

After walking through the grounds for a few hours, we decided to check out the town outside. So we walked off the front bridge of the shrine grounds and just about right into a parade. Unbeknownst to us, there was a matsuri, a local festival, going on that day. I'm not sure exactly what festival it was, but WikiTravel suggests - along with many other interesting facts - that it might have been one of three days of the Kagurasai Ceremony.













While we were watching the festivities, Jo was finagled into participating in the matsuri: a very nice woman saw us, came over and grabbed Jo (who hates to be the center of attention), gave Jo her coat, and pushed her into the line to help carry a mikoshi, a small poratable shrine, "that holds a god". But it was loud, and we were trying to understand a mix of Japanese and English, and some confusions arose.

"Oh," Jo said, "I thought you said it holds a goat!"







After the parade ended, we met some random towns-folk who very kindly served us some sake. They seemed thrilled to meet a Brit and an American in one go! Very nice folks; wanted to know what we thought of Japan, what we did, where we went, everything. Did I mention we got free sake?

Halfway between Jo's festival initiation and our final cups of sake with the our new friends, we stopped at a small stand on the side of the street for some local specialties: fried oysters on a stick and oyster croquets. Oh, so delicious; Ise, located on a peninsula in Mie, is "famous" (as everywhere in Japan is for something) for it's seafood.

After some food and some shopping, we decided to call it a day; we caught the train back to Nagoya, bought some french bread, cheese and olives, and watched some English-language TV. Good times.

The "Home" Photo Issue

Various shots in and around the ol' homestead.

More stories below...


View from the "courtyard": Nagoya Station.


View from the roof: The Wrong Side of the Tracks.


"You Should Go If You've Never Been"


View from my balcony: "The Cage"


Plants on a nearby cafe.


A street near my apartment.


My apartment. Kinda.


The Remains of the Yakisoba: Nijyu Maru.

And Again

Profound apologies to all of you who felt abandoned by my long absence. Due to popular demand (Iain, Lindsey), I AM back and writing. Took you long enough to complain. *smirk*

Francis is back home in England right now. All of us here at Thom In Japan (mainly me) hope that he has an absolutely great time, and that he remembers to bring back some chocolate and tea for us. Rob and I promise not burn the place down in your absence.


I had an August post in the works, but September ended before I could get it up, so I'm hoping to have that up at some point. September itself was both good and bad, with many adventures taking place and a really difficult three days with my ever-patient girlfriend.

September is was actually pretty quiet following the busy August. Did a lot of walking around with my camera, taking pictures of random stuff that I know I'd wish I'd taken pictures of while I was here, as you've probably seen. Spent the 20th getting my ears lowered, then basking in a perfect late-summer afternoon in Noritake Gardens. Noritake, as some of you may know, is known for beautiful, delicate china; and, as I didn't know, was originally based here in Nagoya, about a ten-minute walk from my flat. They moved in the late Seventies, but the original site has been turned into a museum/gift shop/restaurant/visitor center/park (the Japanese are very good at multi-tasking). And the park is beautiful. It's amazing what a year and a half of little grass can make do to lower your standards and make you think an open area with actual green grass is beautiful, but that's where I am and I think it is. And it was a perfect day, so all was right with the world. The "Garden" features six "trimmed" smokestacks, originally used with the tunnel kilns where they fired the ceramics; a donors wall, listing the names of all the people who helped support the building of the park; and some bizarre artwork on poles, apparently designed by schoolchildren. Nice though.

Late September, Iain and I went to see the Chunichi Dragons, Nagoya's home team, play ball at the Nagoya Dome; which was an absolute blast. I haven't been to a pro ballgame since the Twins game (go Twins!) in June, and seeing the Dragons play was high on my list of things to do in Japan. And I good game it was: the Dragons took an early lead over the opposing Yokohama Baystars, who eventually caught up, and ended up taking the Dragons into nail-biting extra innings before leaving two men stranded in the tenth, thereby setting up a game winning double by Kosuke Fukudome to give the Dragons a much-needed victory. Ace time all around. More photos of the game here.



Okay kids, it's bed time two hours ago. The work week has begun again, and I just haven't adjusted my sleep schedule for it. Again. More news/photos forthcoming, which, I know, you'll believe when you see it. Patience, my friends.

-thom (still) in japan