Christmas Special

I will be leaving tomorrow for Tokyo for two weeks.  I'll be meeting up with friends, one who is studying abroad, one who is just traveling with family and two who are visiting me from LA. I’m hopeful for the trip and I’m sure I’ll have lots to say and write about when I get back, hence why first I want to wish everyone reading my blog a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Years and second why I’ve updated so much in the last 2 days.  This last one is a special Christmas post, I hope you enjoy it. 

A Fukuoka Christmas

A look at what Christmas in Fukuoka looks like.

The alternative reality is… in Holland

What if I told you there was another version of the man we know as Santa Clause?  This alternative Santa Clause has a similar wardrobe, a big hat and black helpers instead of elves.  I’m not just being racist, he actually has numerous helpers called “Black Pete”.  And his name is Sinterklass! 

 Sinterklaas vs Santa Claus

Zwarte Piet vs Elf (and a Reindeer)

This is not just some copy of Santa Clause, this was the inspiration and basis for the entire idea of Santa Claus in the western world.  But there are subtle differences that really kind of blew my mind when I first learned about him from my Dutch friends.  So they celebrate Sinterklass’s arrival on December 5^th.  He is supposed to come from Spain by boat with countless helpers named “Zwarte Piet” or “Black Pete”.  In stories and television shows, the Black Pete’s are depicted as slightly imbecile and often cause the shipment of presents to be late, and Sinterklass comes and saves the day and makes sure every household in the Netherlands gets their presents on time.  There is a strange parallel to the traditions but from an American perspective I can’t help but feel it sounds kind of racist… just kind of.  But then my Dutch friends explained it that they don’t really see race as the issue and even their black friends don’t seem to be bothered by it at all, it’s just tradition.  I guess in a way elves make fun of midgets just as much and nobody ever really makes a big deal out of that.  Holland actually has quite an amazingly rich history because it has always been a country open to ideas and trade.  In fact, The Netherlands was one of the few countries that exclusive trade with Japan in ancient times because they were one of the few western countries that did not impose religion along with trading.  Some older Japanese feel a bond to the Dutch and some very old generations even speak a little Dutch, or so I am told.  Now you know a little more, I hope I’ve been able to give you the gift of knowledge!  Merry Christmas everybody, see you when I get back in 2 weeks, sayonara!

Sound Experiment Exhibition

This was just a weird exhibition held at our school one day.  My friend Florian was performing also, so we went to support him and to see if there were any other interesting performances.   There was supposed to be one performer who I was really excited to see actually.  He was supposed to hook up electrodes to his face and each note he would play would send an electric shock to one electrode and his whole face would contort to music.  But he never showed.  Instead, most of the other performances were long, boring and mostly a waste of time.  I fell asleep for a lot of it.  One guy had set up a bunch of circuits, wiring, LED lights and motors.  At first it was interesting, but it soon became obvious that it was NOT interesting at all.  It was just a bunch of electric devices making clanging, clicking and tapping sounds.  But anyways, the pictures make it look a lot cooler than it was.  I think it was supposed to get us to think about the future of sound design, or music and even in a broader sense where design was going in the future.  We had a discussion about it afterwards that was actually much more interesting than the performance itself about the changing role of design and art and how this was more of a experiment to push some boundaries of design.

My friend Florian is the DJ, he had honestly one of the best performances of the night I would say.

School Festival: Day 4

Fashion Show

Again, the main showroom space is transformed, and for the last time.  This time, a catwalk extends around half the space and is elevated for models to parade on and strut their stuff.  The girls look almost bizarrely similar, but they were well choreographed and all had on a similar style of clothing.  I’m not going to pretend like I know anything about fashion, so this will be a very superficial skim through, but it was still interesting to watch.  They obviously put a lot of work into the show and some of the outfits were very elaborate.  Some of it was a little weird, but weird is kind of the norm here, so I’d be more disturbed if the designs were not weird.  I’m amazed at how talented all the kids here are at what they do, especially because most of the time I see these kids in class, they’re usually sleeping.

Fire Festival

This one’s a doozy.  I say that because this was just so crazy and beyond my expectations of what it would be like, I’m still amazed now, thinking back.  What I thought would happen was they would pile up a bunch of cardboard, maybe do some drumming and burn it.  Instead it was a complete reversion to a primitive time.  It was literally like stepping into a page of “Lord of the Flies”.  First, everybody passed out cans of soda to the entire school population which was now gathered in the central quad.  I was told that last year it was beer instead of soda, but that the school banned it because everybody became too drunk (more on that later).  Everyone then proceeds to shake their cans as much as possible and we (all the foreigners) soon realize we’re standing in the middle of a giant soda fight.  We retreat to a safe distance with our backs to a building and our umbrellas drawn and ready to deploy in self defense. 

Then the drumming starts…

A procession of drums played by a group of students wearing nothing but what seemed like painted potato sacks and war paint all over their faces and bodies marched forward with some people throwing firecrackers in front and behind the procession.  In the center sat a guy carried on a huge platform that was being carried by 6 more nearly naked guys.  They carried him to the other quad where he came down carrying a box in his hands.  To this day I’m not sure what was exactly in the box, but from what I’m told, the box contained a pig’s head.  (Sound familiar to lord of the flies yet?)  The “leader” carrying the head then walks to each of the potato sack clad guys and yells in his face.  The guy then each individually responds in turn with a loud yell back into his face.  Then the torch man who holds a huge pole commences the lighting ceremony.  He lights the end of the torch and walks towards the field where the bonfire will take place.  The leader and the platform are carried towards to the field and a few moments later, everybody unleashes the fury of soda.  We run to avoid splash damage and the whole school is not far behind us.  Everybody is laughing, screaming and yelling while spraying cans of soda and running all in the same direction towards the field.

The 30 ft. wooden structure is set ablaze…

And the drummers start a drum cadence that they will continue to repeat for the next 4 hours.  Inside the fire, cracks and pops start to go off as the fire reaches the firecrackers hidden inside the structure.   A group of the 10 potato wearing guys stand in a ring around the giant fire.  They begin a ritual that has been a long standing tradition that begins with them getting into a deep horse stance.  They then wave one warm, then the other in the other direction in a big sweeping motion over their heads and then open their arms swiftly while yelling “HEY HEY HEY” every time, then stand up erect, walk a few steps and repeat the same movements and yelling.  As they do it more and more, people start joining in slowly until the whole school is in a giant chanting, waving frenzy.  Yes I joined in, and honestly it was a lot of fun.  It felt primal, with no reason or logic except for the desire to yell at a giant fire to the beat of rhythmic drumming.  The beat stayed steady for a while and the tempo slowly increased as the night progressed until people were doing the ritual as fast as they could and running around disorganized and to no particular rhythm.  Then from out of nowhere people started circulating 2 liter water bottles that were not filled with water.  I watched from the sidelines as the Japanese students yelled, screamed and laughed with their friends taking large gulps of what I assume is alcohol from these 2 liter water bottles.  On numerous occasions I saw a few very small Japanese girls chug half the bottle and now I realize why this festival has the reputation of everyone ending up very drunk.  I and a number of other friends were getting very hungry around 9 and we almost left because there seemed to be no end to the shenanigans.  But then they stopped, and we went back to see what they would do.  They then unveiled another huge wooden structure that was built in the form of a kanji (Japanese character).  Each year they choose a word that represents that year and the festival.  I don’t remember the meaning of the kanji but they lit it afire and started the same chanting running ritual around this new fire.  The naked guys had now been outside in freezing temperatures wearing no shoes, no pants and sleeveless (probably itchy) potato sacks for four hours now.  One thing I will have to admit is they have stamina I would never ever want to try to imitate, but kudos to them.  And thus ended the closing ceremonies of the Ohashi School Festival 2009.

School Festival: Day 3

A totally normal card game... in Japan

Ridiculously awesome drawing by a student.

Professional Wrestling

This is the aforementioned beer case wrestling wring hand built by students.  Everyone is dressed up in ridiculous costumes (or lack thereof) and they make a real big show out of it.  A lot of it is slapstick comedy but they had some serious moves and actually do some pretty impressive wrestling throws.  The whole thing is accompanied with commentary by a panel of 3 judges who are also professors.  One in particular I told was making a number of dirty jokes.  He’s apparently known for being openly dirty and there was a lot of laughter coming from the audience (probably some nervous uncomfortable laughter as well).

Yeah.... no words.

Double trouble.  Told you they loved to be in their underwear.

Art Exhibition

This exhibition was really amazing.  It’s going to be difficult to even come close to doing it justice, but I’ll describe it to the best of my ability.  The building with the auditorium is turned into a gigantic labyrinth.  Every inch is designed, and every detail is painstakingly thought out.  The foam core boards directing the path is slightly raised so that under glow light shines through from underneath.  The lighting fixtures and everything inside is handmade and done from all affordable materials like spot lighting made from cardboard and aluminum foil.  Nearly every sense is satisfied in the exhibit.  Upon entry into a dark tunnel, there is a short digital animation film.  Through a door you wander through a maze and up stairs where the echo of your own footsteps are reverberated back with a slight delay.   Upstairs, a virtual forest is simulated with cardboard trees that reach up to the ceiling.  The ground is littered with ripped up cardboard to resemble fallen leaves.  The thick layer of torn cardboard brings you back to a time of happy childhood memories playing in piles of fallen leaves.  Through the forest and around the corner is a field of wheat complete with a water wheel and a digital projection to enhance the ambience.  Down the stairs is a beautifully lit cardboard structure that looks like a splash of water.  And then you enter the main gallery space which now houses a giant cardboard tree with hundreds of artistic “leaves” overhead.  A single red apple hands from a branch of the tree.  The name of the exhibit is simply named “N” which stands for Newton.  I’m not sure I understood the true significance of the exhibit but it was almost spiritual in its effect.  On three continuous large projection screens, a series of beautiful images played accompanied by calm music.  Just the technical aspect of how these KIDS were able to achieve such an extensive and professional exhibit blows my mind.  They apparently have hundreds of kids in dozens of groups working together for months to accomplish this feat and keeping in mind this all set up and torn down in one day and only for one day.  The exit passage is a winding path in a dark room filled with custom designed columns and tables that glowed with light.  I would never have guessed that it was the same space I had been in the day before.  I went back two more times and enjoyed every time just as much as the first time.  Good job Ohashi students.

It's much better to be experienced than to be caught on film.

School Festival: Day 2

Dance Party

As I said before, the students completely decorate the auditorium space from floor to ceiling.  One of the pictures is of the ceiling which was covered with a stalactite-esque décor.  Inside, there were two DJ’s on a 20 ft. platform and a stage for dancing.  Most people danced on the ground floor because soon, performers started showing up on stage doing choreographed pieces.  And as you would expect there was every type of dance and dancer from cross dressing toga clad classmates to guys dressed in many layers of tidy whiteys who proceeded to take off each successive layer of underwear as the dance went on and threw them into the audience.  There are a lot of guys in their underwear in this festival.  They seem to really enjoy it even when it’s freezing.  The rest of the party afterwards was simply everybody moshing up on stage which was luckily strong enough to withstand about 100 kids jumping up and down in unison.  (The video of the underwear dancing is truly priceless though.)

 

Stalactite

Decor

Hip Hop Poppers

School Festival: Day 1

At my university, Ohashi campus hosts an all weekend 4 day school festival every year.  This is a strong tradition and I’ve been watching kids practice for it since I arrived 3 months ago.  The entire school cancels class for one week and all the teachers understand that most of the kids will be too consumed building stages, exhibitions, practicing performances and setting everything up to come to class (which is quite nice of them).  Each day has a special feature and are as follows: Day 1 – Student performed concert, Day 2 – Dance performance and club, Day 3 – Pro Wrestling and special art exhibition, Day 4 – Fashion show and closing ceremonies culminating in a gigantic bonfire of all the material used throughout the festival.  This was in mid-November so I’m sorry for the late post.  This is my attempt at making sure my blog is completely up to date before I leave for Tokyo for Christmas and New Years.

 
The Set Up

All the kids pitch in to help set up this event.  It’s a completely student organized, student run event and I can’t emphasize enough how professional a job they did.  Majoring in architecture I’m no stranger to having to build crap, but these kids can do things I never knew possible.   First the main event of each day is all held in the same space.  That means everyday they set up, use it for one event, tear it down, and set up the next event.  Each set up was a massive undertaking.  The entryway is completely transformed; entry tunnels are created, careful attention to lighting and craftsmanship details and inside the space is completely unrecognizable as each new day brings a completely new space.  Outside, they’ve built a huge stage encircling in a large semicircle the school fountain.  I was particularly amazed at how they were able to rig the even stage on many different levels as the fountain steps upwards.  In the cafeteria they’ve made a coffee lounge where live music is scheduled throughout the day.  Some of the classrooms display student work from various design majors including industrial, sound, architecture and graphic design.  There was a main outdoor stage which had musical performances throughout the festival in the other quad.  The students built their own professional wrestling ring out of empty plastic beer carrying cases as the base and various tarps and metal bars.  HOW DID THEY DESIGN A PROFESSIONAL WRESTLING RING FROM BEER CASES?!  I have no idea.  But they are amazing.  All throughout the school are booths with all types of foods and even a small foreign exchange section where the (one) Dominican Republic, Chinese, Korean and American students cooked their ethnic foods.  We cooked “In N Out” style cheeseburgers with grilled onions, homemade thousand island sauce (they don’t have that here in the store) and melted cheese.  They were extremely popular with the Japanese students who had never experience the concept of special “In N Out” sauce.  And once we mentioned there was even cheese, many of them squealed for joy (literally, meat and cheese are kind of a commodity here).   

 

Day 1 – The Concert:

I arrived late because I was not aware of how big a deal this whole festival was exactly or how good a job they would do.  But I really regret not coming earlier.  The building had a vortex-like opening created by sheets of foam core that formed a winding tunnel with spirals of multicolored light leading into the main stage area.  (I have a video of just the entry cause it was so awesome)  When we walked inside, there was so many people that the tunnel itself was backed up with kids.  We could only see through a small gap and were quite eager to get in because we could hear and see glimpses of the crazy performance inside.  Eventually, some people left and slowly we made our way inside which was completely packed to the brim with kids.  Many of the performers in the concert (and throughout the festival) were students we knew and would see every day in class.   They are normally shy and mostly keep to themselves or some friends in class, but at this performance they completely different people.  The stifling restrictions of Japanese culture and daily expectations force the students and most working class people into two extremes: the quiet repressed individual in normal situations and the super crazy, borderline freakish (and often misunderstood by westerners) Japanese which are mostly what we see on crazy TV shows.  So whenever they get the chance to really let out all their angst, either in a school festival or in karaoke, they really let it all go.  The performances included every genre from sweet love ballad in huge flowing gown to heavy metal complete with full face paint and costume.  They also did many popular American songs from bands like Muse and Rage Against the Machines.  All the performers were very talented and I was surprised that somehow I had missed the fact that everybody in this school was either a professional dancer or singer on top of being full time students.

Those are all the performers and backstage hands.  There might be more people on stage than in the audience, it was a massive group.

A Post About Nothing In Particular

Food Sounds

Japanese love onomatopoeias.  One way to order crispy chicken is to simply say “sucksuck”.  To order runny sauce and egg you say “torotoro”.  Okay I’m not sure that’s what runny sounds like, but I couldn’t think of anything better either, so torotoro it is. 

The Worst Thing I’ve Ever Eaten – Nato

Okay, so perhaps there are worse foods I’ve eaten.  But this is the worst one that I can remember eating and definitely the worst thing I’ve had in my time in Japan and it is called Nato.  It’s a soybean product that is infamous for being hated by all foreigners and it seems, I am no exception.  It comes in a small 4”x4” Styrofoam package and looks pretty harmless.  A faint odor emits through the cellophane wrapper which is released to wreak havoc on the olfactory sense of everybody unfortunate enough to be on the same floor.   The smell is not immediate, but even if consumed, the smell from a remaining package will slowly permeate everywhere.  Within the package is also a small pack of an unknown substance.  It is squeezed onto the soybeans and soon a transformation happens.  It is stirred into a creamy frenzy of soybean and a white sticky film.  A white viscous substance engulfs the rest of the beans that resembles the egg sack of an alien species.  It can be pulled and elongated like pulling apart a cheesy pizza except this is a lot stickier.  The taste is kind of what you would expect; a strange soft chewy texture and a subtle salty flavor.  But now the awful intrinsic smell has turned into a lasting aftertaste.  One cup of coke later, I could still taste it.  This is definitely the durian of Japan.   But also one of those things you need to try just to experience it for yourself.  The Japanese believe it to be beneficial for the brain and it supposedly improves cognitive function.  Many Japanese have grown up eating it and it’s now a regular staple in their diet and some even like it.  It’s really like nothing I’ve ever seen or eaten and I’m glad I tried it, but I’m okay with not using this to supercharge my brain.  I’ll take my chances with regular food.

 Similar huh?

The Christmas Principle

This is Eddie’s idea that we all generally find some truth in.  Here in Japan, Christmas is an important holiday but it holds a different significance than it does for us in the US.  Most Japanese spend Christmas with their friends and New Years with their family.  For most of us in the US, that’s the opposite.  In fact we actually have a midterm presentation on the 25^th, Christmas day.  All of us (Americans) really wanted to get out of Fukuoka before that to various places to see family and friends so we decided to all ask the teacher at the same time to avoid the Christmas Principle.  The Principle states that the first person who asks for Christmas off will receive a pass with relatively little trouble, but the next person will start to annoy the professor and the next even more so.  By the time the last person asks the teacher, they will receive a lot of opposition and the teacher will be very annoyed.  In case you’re wondering, we did just that, and it worked pretty well.  The teacher didn’t seem to care too much and gave us an extentsion.  Tokyo is a go.

Origins

All the Americans were misinformed and we forgot to pick up our alien registration cards at the designated time (about a month late).  I went back first when I heard this and received no problems and got my card with no penalty.  Eddie went the same day a little later and had to wait a little longer than I did and were asked some questions.  Then Jose went and had to pay a 300 Yen fine and he’s not even sure if his card is valid.  Hence, the Christmas Principle was born.

The Plus Five Rule

Today I went to karaoke for the first time in Japan.  It’s a very popular past time for Japanese people and there are countless karaoke bars around my university.  Did you know karaoke means “empty orchestra” in Japanese?  Isn’t that hauntingly beautiful?   Anyways, we got a bunch of people together and I knew everyone except for Ai-chan’s coworker from her lab.  Her name is Baba which is kind of a funny name in general, but she seemed young, energetic and nice.  Hilde told me to guess what age she was so I knew she was older than she appeared.  Japan is the land of girls who are much older than they look.  So we devised the “plus five” rule to try to accurately guess the age of girls.  You take whatever age you would guess the girls maximum age to be, and then you add five.  Then you might start to get warm.  50% of the time, I’m still under-guessing.  This time, I thought she could be no older than 25, so I guessed she was 30 years old.  She was 35 years old and married. 

Origins

This rule actually comes from Baptiste.  One night we were out in Tenjin because he wanted to drink and I had nothing better to do that night.  We chatted awhile with each other without anything noteworthy happening and he suddenly makes eye contact with the girl sitting next to him.  He chats with these two girls in Japanese and I smile blankly as I’m used to by now.  They are friendly and seem like they’re in their early twenties.  They ask him how old we are and he lies that we’re 23.  They are 28 (now 29).  So we were still “young” even though he lied about our ages.  They also happened to both be about 4’10” which was hidden when they were sitting on barstools.

Guess who she is?  Clue: she's not white.

They had a surprisingly good selection of foreign songs.  We sang songs in Dutch, English, Spanish, French and of course Japanese.

I'm missing Yuki-kun but he left early.

First Day of Snow

Yesterday was the first day of snow.  It's been getting progressively colder every day for the last week and rain turned to hail and finally into soft powdery fun.  It's really fun to just watch it fall and slowly transform the urban landscape. I've spoken to friend's abroad in Italy, Denmark and London and everyone is experiencing the joy of snow right now and I'm glad to share the ecstasy.  And although I do miss the moderate climate of socal, it would be nice if we got a little snow once in a while.  It's just good natural fun.  But I guess LA's the center for pollution and global warming so oh well.  No pictures yet, its not cold enough where the snow stays very long.  Mostly it just falls from the sky and melts upon impact because it's still just above freezing temps here, but maybe when I come back from Tokyo, that will be different.  And yes, thin California jeans are no match for 0 degree weather combined with wind.  I'll get more thermals later.

Sumo

I went to see one of the last exhibitions of sumo wrestling this season.  I'm glad I did because I had missed most of the season by the time I arrived here and it would have been a shame to miss authentic sumo wrestling.  So we went with our usual hodgepodge team of gaijins and a friend of Hilda's who was going to be our guide for the day.  She asked if she could bring a friend or two, she brought ten.  I think we scared her friend a little when she showed up and was suddenly in the middle of a crowd of foreigners. 

The Fighters

We were pretty excited to see a sumo fighter on the subway on the way over.  By the time we arrived to the arena, they were everywhere and were all flocking towards the stadium.  They are all quite big, not just fat, but tall as well.  Some towered over us around 6 1/2 ft tall or so?  Most of them were over 6 ft tall and maybe 2 or 3 feet wide?  What was also surprising is that there were many white guys doing sumo AND they were good.  Most of them are leaner than the Japanese sumo wrestlers, but they were actually very good at the techniques of sumo wrestling.  And yes, I've saved you from the sight of some of the less flattering pictures I took.  I seriously was shocked and disgusted by some of the pictures which were not that bad when I took them on my 2 1/2" LCD display but when viewed on my 15.4" laptop was quite a different thing.  Some are very hairy, maybe so they gross out the opponent enough that they won't want to touch them or they'll forfeit. 

The Fights

We arrived in the afternoon after lunch.  But the tournament spanned about 2 weeks and started every day in the morning and ended around 6 PM.  Each fighter would fight one fight each day and would be paired up with a different fighter each day.  The fighter with the best record of wins-losses would be the winner of the tournament at the end of the 2 weeks.  There were a lot of fighters.  Two endless lines of fighters streamed out of the bowels of the stadium all day.  The fights in the beginning of the day were quick, fast paced and rushed along.  They performed very little of the traditional sumo wrestling motions before the fight.  I kind of liked it a little better because they just got right into it and there was less idle time in between fights.  On a few occasions some of the fighters actually tossed other fighters out of the ring which is just big enough to contain a ring and is elevated up about 2 feet at which point they tumbled into the crowd who paid literally hundreds of dollars for the honor of being smushed by a naked obese man.  I was thankful for my seat.  We had bought medium priced seats (for about $30) because the nosebleeds were sold out.  But we snuck down towards the middle isles and chilled there with no problems the whole time.  The seats were actually very comfortable and honestly the best seats in any other stadium I’ve ever been in.  There are tatami booths that can accommodate 2-4 people comfortably, we each shared one.  There’s plenty of room to spread out, relax and enjoy the continuous titanic battles.  But make no mistake, these guys are athletes.  They were not just fat, they were muscular and they ram right into each other head first.  Although, some were just too fat, one guy supposedly weighed 590 lbs... I'm not sure that's possible, but he was VERY fat.

The Main Event - Yokozuna

The main fights are a really big deal.  There are children in the back bleachers cheering with handmade posters, chanting and clapping.  The whole stadium got into an uproar about 3 fights in particular.  One was a fighter who was from Fukuoka and who was really representing.  He won and everyone freaked.  The other two were for two grand champion fighters known as Yokozuna.  It’s very difficult to become a Yokozuna and there have only been 68 Yokozuna in the 1500+ years of sumo wrestling and two of them were at this tournament, Asashoryu and Hakuho.  With an undefeated record, they were the two last fights.  The 30 or 40 fights before them were of intermediate and advanced fighters.  They performed a number of sumo rituals that the beginner fighters do not perform.  First the referee sings to the crowd turning to each side of the ring and holding a fan.  He then invites the two fighters into the ring, they stare each other down, get in a position as if they are going to fight, then stand up, go to their respective corners, throw a handful of salt onto the ring to give them fortune and protect their safety, wipe themselves with a towel (poor towel boys) and repeat the process over and over for about 4 minutes.  This is supposed to psyche up each fighter and builds the tension of the fight.  It did get a little repetitive eventually but apparently this process used to last much longer (like 10 or 15 minutes).  Both Yokozunas won their bouts not surprisingly and everyone left happy and pumped.

Look at how high that Yokozuna can kick! 

Kyoto: Day 4

Photo of the Day - Power Rangers

Late Start

So the day started later than we wanted.  But only had one stop that we wanted to make that day so it was alright.  The last night in Kyoto, we decided to have a small party.  So we went to the local Family Mart and got a bottle of what now has become our representative drink, Suntory Whiskey.  Why?  Not because it tastes good, or is particularly special or cheap.  Because that’s the brand Bill Murray promotes in “Lost in Translation”, so it must be good.  Anyways, after one bottle, the gang went out for more, but I opted to stay in, shower and sleep.  The rest of the night for them is only what I gathered from hearsay afterwards.  But somehow Baptiste and Axel road on one bike, Laura threw up somewhere by the shores of the Kyoto river and on her backpack strap and Jacob fulfilled one of his dreams and successfully accomplished a covert operation of what I shall call as freelance public wall decorating.  They came back safe and with some good stories, so it all worked out.

Torii tunnels in Fushimi-Inari Taisha

This temple may seem familiar for some of you.  It was featured in the film, “Memoirs of a Geisha” and is a pretty iconic image of Japanese temples.  The weather was pretty cold that day and the lighting was not all that great for picture taking but we made do with what we had.  It was sort of uncomfortable because the hike is really quite long.  A winding trail of maybe 2 or 3 miles up and down around a mountain, it’s a decent hike and in cold weather that means one thing, working up a cold sweat.  It’s pretty much as amazing as it seems in pictures.  These red hand-engraved arches just span for miles up and down a mountain.  It’s truly unbelievable how much work they’ve had to do to build this.  Each one is built out of wood and each one is unique.  There is a very obvious difference between some of the arches that have been repainted and preserved and those that still need work.  We passed a man painting one of the columns and it was interesting seeing the preservation work first hand.

The Tradition Continues

Of course, once we get into a decent clearing, we once again must attempt our group hand stand pose.  This time, it was just fated not to be.  We tried many takes and just could not get a very good shot, but at least we tried.  This is the best one we got.  After some other shots and one jumping shot that has become also an iconic shot, we make our way down the mountain.

Fail.

Labyrinth

I’ve actually always been a little fascinated by labyrinths.  I just to draw little mazes when I was younger and I would dream of designing some disorientating huge maze where people would get lost in.  Something about it just fascinates me.  So coming down we experienced our moments of being lost.  All the maps we read were in Japanese and every path were lined with the exact same red arches.  After a little debate, we eventually made the right choices together and made our way successfully down the mountain.  But I can imagine if you can’t successfully navigate out of the temple, it could be one pretty scary experience.  The repetitive read gates get almost hypnotic and at night, the temple can get pretty eerie.

On Top of the World

The last shot is at the middle summit of the temple.  It’s a great vantage point of the whole city and best of all has a great large red arch primed and ready to make for a great picture.  This was really a picture perfect ending to a successful trip.  I’ll be honest, I had my doubts when I first embarked on this trip.  Many uncertainties threatened the to make the trip an unpleasant one, but we made it a good trip thanks to a combination of good fortune and an insatiable spirit for adventure.
 

Kyoto: Day 3

Nara: The Land of 1,200 Deer


Nara is an ancient city about 1 hour south of Kyoto.  It is often overlooked in guidebooks and is usually overshadowed by the allure of bigger, more famous cities around it like Kyoto and Osaka.  Nara is a quaint little town that can be pretty fully explored in one day, which is good because that’s all the time we had.  First stop was Nara Park which is populated with roughly 1,200 freely roaming deer.  They are said to be very accustomed to human contact and are not shy at all.  We found out first hand how not shy they are.  Most of them mind their own business until you buy a handful of crackers and suddenly they’re upon you.  I watch at a safe distance as Jacob busily switches from petting, feeding and guarding his crotch from aggressive head nudges.  1,200 deer sounds like a lot, but actually spread out over a humungous park, we only really saw a few dozen at a time.  

   
Kasuga Shrine

This was a place recommended to us by Ai-chan.  It was a pleasant walk to the main shrine because along the way stone monuments lined the path on both sides.  These stone lanterns were aged, some with signs of damage or overgrown with moss.  The whole time, a single winding stone path weaved through a lush forest all around us.  It’s quite a remarkable and fantastic experience.  I know I’m not doing it justice by describing it and pictures don’t do much better.  But it’s really just an atmosphere you have to feel to believe.

7-5-3

So there’s this festival called 7-5-3.  I don’t know why they count it backwards, but I think that’s how it’s called in Japanese.  Anyways, it’s a festival that celebrates all kids who are the ages of 7, 5, and 3 years old.  Not sure why that’s so special, but apparently every kid goes through this 3 times in their lives and they are forced by their parents to dress up in elaborate outfits and do cute poses.  It’s really funny watching Japanese parents shoving their kids over towards some shrine and telling them to pose and taking a whole bunch of pictures.  Well we took a couple pictures to, and they were quite cute at least.

Search for the Giant Buddha

After eating a very satisfying meal of half raw egg over katsu-don (fried pork chop over rice bowl) we continued our search for the giant Buddha.  On the way, Jacob read to us from his guidebook that this Buddha was made of many kg’s of gold, tons of wax, bronze and iron and was housed in a temple so large, it was the world’s largest wooden building.  LARGEST IN THE WORLD.  Okay so we had to find this.  But along the way we found a giant bell and got distracted.  We all simultaneously contemplated ringing it and running away, but our diabolical plans were quickly foiled by a group of Japanese tourists who walked right under the bell.  

Found It!

Toda-iji Temple (The World’s Largest Wood Construction Building) is enormous.  The courtyard is a grand open space that makes its hundreds of guests seem like ants in its mighty chasm.  Entering the temple’s inner sanctum is even more awe-inspiring.  I’m compelled to make a small prayer in front of the Buddha.  Even though I don’t consider myself a religious person, I’d like to say I’m a spiritual person.  Architect or not, anybody would simply be amazed that human beings could or would ever build anything so large out of wood.  Somehow they did it.  And actually, this is a rebuilt version of an older temple that is only 2/3 its original size.  Yes, it was even bigger and older before.   Ridiculous.  Amazing.  Ridiculously amazing.  So I walk through the temple forward and back 3 or 4 times.  Marvel at the humungous wooden columns, the unfathomable foundations and the incredibly steep staircase.  Mostly I just try to take in the wonder of standing in what feels like an aircraft hanger built out of sticks from trees.

  Handstands at Buddha’s Feet

We stayed until they closed the doors and kicked us out.  I didn’t want to leave and neither did the rest of the guys.  Once again we had lost Laura (this seems to happen a lot for some reason) but we’re sure we’ll track her down later.  Being one of the last few people in the gigantic courtyard Baptiste has the great idea of taking some group shots.  So we take four, one jumping, one seriously kneeling, one waving (kind of) and the best spur of the moment quarto handstand picture EVER.  From this point on, handstands have become a necessary tradition to all great group photos.  But I feel none will ever be as legendary as this one.  The first and the best photo ever.  Legen- wait for it… DARY.  LEGENDARY.