Fake History At Its Best: Toei Movie Land

Shortly before departing on our (g)weeklong adventure, I found myself discussing our travel plans with Tachibana-San while en route to one of my schools. He had actually made a trip out to Kyoto fairly recently and had a few recommendations for me. He took it as a given that I would be visiting the Golden Pavilion-everyone does-but recommended two slightly less popular attractions that I might otherwise skip; the Kyomizu-Dera and Kyoto Uzumasa Eigamura, known in English as “Toei Movie Land”. While we regrettably never made it out to the Kyomizu-Dera, we did spend most of our last day in Kyoto at Toei Movie Land.

Toei Movie Land is a theme park run by the Toei Company, one of Japan’s largest movie studios and owners of Toei Animation. Knowing very little about the park, we assumed that it would simply be a collection of old movie back lots that we would be allowed to walk through. As it turns out, Toei Movie Land is really a bona fide theme park of sorts, albeit without the rides. There are a number of performances scattered throughout the park in addition to the requisite movie sets and guys in samurai costumes. It was a strange and interesting place to wander around and was seemingly designed to provide an almost infinite number of hilarious photo ops. Luckily for Team Gweek, hilarious photos are our specialty.

According to the pamphlet, this robotic ninja constituted some sort of “show”. It took me a few minutes to figure out that it was, in fact, a robot and not an actor. I don’t know why I am so stupid.

Horse: The Ride!™

It has become increasingly clear to me, over the past few months, that Matt is much more skilled at looking threatening than I am. I really don’t know why I even try.

Here’s a theater that hosts an awesome samurai show, full of acrobatics, swordplay and evil monologues. The building itself is built to resemble a now defunct Edo period theater that once existed in what is now Tokyo. The entire park is actually built to resemble that city during the Edo period and it’s quite fun to simply walk around and admire the fake sights.

Here’s a replica of the famed Edo pleasure district, Yoshiwara, lined with okiya (traditional geisha houses). It's funny to think that what was once Tokyo's booming pleasure quarters is now the mostly quiet Asakusa.

Memoirs of a Geisha meets Mannequin?

Greg is really strong.

Rickshaws are fun for everyone! Well, everyone except for the poor soul that has to do the pulling.

This show was pretty interesting; the idea was to demonstrate how a samurai movie is made in about 20 minutes. The actors and director stood behind glass and acted out various scenes while cameras inside fed the “movie” to monitors mounted outside. Ever wondered how a little slight of hand and a quick panning camera can be used to create the illusion of a successful hit with a throwing star? Or how movie thunderstorms are made? Well, this would be the show for you. Just about the best thing about this show (and all of Movie Land’s shows, for that matter) was the comic relief-which was actually really funny.
Here we see one of the park's two “SFX” areas. As you can see, they were pretty convincing, as far as special effects go.
We were just about ready to leave when we discovered a whole area of the park that we had yet to explore: Super Hero Land. Packed to the gills with Power Rangers, Masked Riders and various other nondescript robots and men in tights.

[Insert Power Rangers theme song here]

OH MY GOD, SOMEBODY SAVE THAT SMALL CHILD!

If you really think about it, Team Gweek is a lot like Voltron: a powerful being fused together from disparate elements to defend the universe…or something.
Greg and Megan doing their bacon routine, as they are wont to do.

Well, that’s Toei Movie Land, providing a stark counterpoint to Kyoto’s places of historical relevance. The next morning we boarded a bus bound for the bright lights of Tokyo, our final Gweek destination. Stay tuned for the chilling conclusion!

Triple Cheeseburgers, Dancing Geisha and 8000 Buddhas: A Tour Of Kyoto

Ah, Kyoto. Japan’s capital for almost eleven centuries, one of the nation’s ten largest cities and essentially the only major city whose historic landmarks were spared during the Second World War. Or, as Matt put it, “Just another big Japanese city with a bunch of castles and stuff”.

It’s no wonder that Kyoto is often considered the cultural heart of Japan-its 1600 Buddhist temples and some 400 Shinto shrines (as well as countless other historic vistas) ensure that a good deal of Japanese history can be found within the city’s borders. But where to start? The prospect of touring Kyoto can be quite daunting, especially when limited to only a few days. On the one hand, there’s the feeling of obligation to see the city’s most well-known sites; the Kinkaku-ji (“Golden Pavilion”), the Kiyomizu-Dera, the Imperial Palace. But on the other hand, there’s that nagging desire to stray from the herd, to search out the sights less seen.

Further complicating matters for the members of team Gweek was the fact that Kyoto is a large city and by virtue of that fact, offers up any number of delights seldom seen by country bumpkins like us. For example, the curiously-named rock bar ING, run by the friendly and charismatic Hako, who has somehow managed to turn his lifelong obsession with the Rolling Stones into a career. The bar is decked out with Stones memorabilia, Hako’s entire wardrobe seems to consist of Stones tour shirts, the bathroom quite literally looks like the cover of Beggars Banquet and well, I’ll let you guess what kind of music Hako likes to play. Ask him what his favorite Stones record is and he’ll tell you exactly what song strikes his fancy based on his current state of mind (when I asked, it was “Sweet Virginia” from Exile). He’ll then ask you the very same question and will immediately run over to put on your favorite album without you even having to ask. Did I mention that tall bottles of Sapporo are ridiculously cheap and come with the added thrill of seeing Hako open them with whatever implements present themselves (ashtrays, chopsticks, other bottles)? If you’re ever in Kyoto, I highly recommend paying old Hako a visit…if you like the Stones, that is.

Kyoto is quite well known in Japan for its distinctive cuisine but it was a little difficult to keep that in mind when they also have a Wendy's right on the main drag. During our three-night stay in Kyoto, I ate Wendy's at least four times, including the “triple challenge” seen above. Aomori does strange things to men.

As the city of Kyoto was beloved by the late Kansai comic and cartoon artist Tezuka Osamu (and features prominently in many of his creations), it’s fitting that Kyoto station houses a museum in tribute to his life’s work. I was unfortunately too late to visit the museum but was able to pretend that I did by visiting the museum gift shop, seen above. While Osamu is well-known in Japan for his diverse body of work, he is best known internationally for his creation Tetsuwan Atomu (“Mighty Atom”), or Astroboy, as he is known in the English-speaking world.

So what about all those old temples you've heard so much about? Well, I’m getting to those.

Being fairly close to our hostel, Nijo-Jo (“Nijo Castle”) was one of the first sites we visited. Originally built in 1603 as the Kyoto residence of the first Tokugawa Shogun, the castle has long stood as a symbol of power in the ancient capital. Pass through the gate above to enter Ninomaru Palace, undoubtedly Nijo’s greatest treasure.

Built in 1603 and constructed almost entirely from Japanese cypress, the Palace certainly possesses a commanding appearance. Perhaps more impressive though, are the treasures contained inside. The minute you enter the palace, you’ll notice an eerie squeaking sound emanating throughout the building (if you’ve ever heard the song “Teach Me Sweetheart” by the Fiery Furnaces I would tell you that it sounds almost exactly like the backwards-looped notes in the intro to that song). This is the result of the so-called “Nightingale Floor,” a system of clamps and nails underneath every one of the palace’s floorboards from the entrance to the Grand Chambers-designed to alert palace guards to the presence of intruders.

Even more impressive is the vast collection of artwork contained on the walls and sliding doors of the palace-elaborate paintings in the style of the Kano school that date back to the palace’s construction in the 17^th century. Using vibrant colors and generous amounts of gold leaf, these paintings depict everything from scenery to tigers, as well as various types of birds, flowers and trees. Unfortunately, photography is not allowed inside the palace, ostensibly to protect these ancient works from being damaged by flashbulbs. There don’t seem to be any photos easily accessible elsewhere on the internet either, so you’ll just have to use your imagination.

A few rooms inside the palace featured dummies of various court officials, visiting dignitaries, ladies in waiting and the shogun himself-all in full court dress. While I’ll be the first to admit that this sort of thing is usually very corny, I found that in this case, the dummies really helped me imagine what the palace must have looked like when it was actually in use.

Afterwards, we headed to the Kinkaku-Ji, perhaps the best known temple in all of Japan. As you can see above, it’s quite a grandiose structure (not pictured: the thousands of camera toting tourists that mobbed the area-the Golden Pavilion is supposedly the most photographed object in all of Japan and I certainly believe it). The Pavilion itself is simply one building in the Rokuon-Ji temple complex, which was built in 1397 as Shogun Ashikaga Yoshimitsu’s retirement estate. When his son inherited the complex in 1408, he converted it into a Zen Buddhist temple, which it remains to this day. The building you see here dates back to 1955 as the pavilion was burned to the ground in 1950 (this incident was famously fictionalized in Yukio Mishima’s 1956 novel The Temple of the Golden Pavilion). And yes, that's real gold leaf, every inch of it.

After viewing the pavilion, why not try your hand at the Buddha coin toss?

Girls tying omikuji on the Rokuon-Ji grounds.

Here we see a man selling different types of incense for burning on the temple grounds. Descriptions of the incense were given in both Japanese and English. Among the varieties available were “love match accomplishment,” "traffic in safety," "proceed to a higher school" and “be very fine”.

Later in the day, we caught a geisha show. I was unaware that such a thing even existed but apparently, these shows have long been a part of the performing geisha’s repertoire. As you can tell, we were pretty pumped. Well, Matt was, anyway.

The show turned out to be surprisingly good. There were two separate narrative acts, both of which were told primarily through the use of dance and gesture. The sets were elaborate, the colors were vibrant and the show was truly a pleasure to watch, even though I didn’t understand a word of the antiquated, theatrical Japanese that they used.

On our last day in Kyoto, we traveled to Adashina, just northwest of the city. This area was crisscrossed by small rivers and many of the quiet streets were connected to each other by bridges. It was a surprisingly pastoral neighborhood for being so close to such a large city. After a long walk to the top of a hill, we arrived at our destination, the Nembutsu-Ji. If you’ve studied any Japanese Buddhism, you’ll probably recognize the word Nembutsu-a chant performed by Amidists-and as you might expect, the temple’s principle image is that of Amida Buddha.

However, the Nembutsu-Ji’s real claim to fame is the 8000 Buddha stones. Uncovered in a bamboo grove about 100 years ago, very little is known about these small statues, although they are suspected to have served as gravestones of sorts. While most of them have been worn down by the elements beyond the point of recognition (some date back as far as the 8^th century), a few still retain an outline of the Buddha that they once depicted.

The Nembutsu-Ji grounds also contain a well-maintained bamboo grove. I’m not sure what the significance of this grove is but it sure does look pretty.

There's still more Kyoto to come, so stay tuned for tomorrow's installment!

Osaka: A Second City In Name Only

When we last left off, Team Gweek was exiting the island of Shikoku and rocketing towards the Kansai region with reckless abandon. It was well past midnight when we finally arrived in Kobe, essentially Osaka’s twin city. After stopping at a konbeni to obligatorily ask “Where’s the beef?” (nowhere to be found, if that convenience store clerk is to be believed), we pressed on towards our destination. We arrived at our hostel at just after 1:00 am, exhausted and quickly drifted off to sleep in our dorm room-style twin beds. We awoke fairly early the next day and after bidding a tearful (and trunk rattling) goodbye to the Bluebird, we set out to acquire a taste for the city of “great heights”.

No matter how you slice it, Osaka is essentially Japan’s second largest city. Officially, Tokyo isn’t classified as a city (in a delicious nod to Marxist science fiction it’s known as a “metropolis”) but its suburb Yokohama steals the top spot from Osaka with a population of over 3 million. However, if you choose to classify the entire Tokyo area as the largest urban area in Japan (and on earth, for that matter) then the second largest would still be Osaka, with roughly 1/15^th of the Tokyo area’s population. However you choose to look at it, Osaka has a serious case of second-city envy.

But maybe that isn’t such a bad thing. In a lot of ways, Osaka really reminds me of another second city: Chicago. Like the Windy City, Osaka has traditionally been a working class town, a fact that ensured that local citizens were hit hard when the economic bubble burst in 1989. In the years since the recession, Osaka has garnered a reputation as the “homeless capital” of Japan; a standing that the Japanese media tend to obsess over. Homelessness really is quite visible though and certainly adds to the intangible grittiness that the city seems to exude, making it seem, at times, more like a major American city.

Still, this “grittiness” also manifests itself in other, more positive ways and serves to imbue Osaka with a street culture that is unique in all of Japan. Particularly notable is the pervasiveness of youth culture and the way that it reclaims urban space in the city through the use of graffiti and street performance (photographer Andreas Seibert has done some work documenting this rarely publicized scene). In stark contrast to the mostly pristine streets of Tokyo, Osaka looks, feels and even smells like a living, breathing city.

This is Amerikamura (“America Village”), the locus of Osakan youth culture. Not far from here is a busy street whose wide sidewalks and wealth of designer stores reminded me a lot of Chicago’s Magnificent Mile.

Inside a store in Amerikamura that specializes in clothing that defaces prominent character and brand iconography.

Osakans are famous throughout Japan for their love of food and the city is especially renowned for its unique takoyaki and okonomiyaki (the former having originated in Osaka). Although I couldn’t find the legendary oversized Osaka takoyaki, I did try the more diminutive variety. It seemed to have a gooier filling and was served sans toppings.

Here we see a car on a subway train that’s reserved exclusively for women during peak times. In many large Japanese cities, young women have complained about being groped on crowded trains by invisible assailants during rush hour. Reserved seating and women’s only cars are two ways that transit authorities have attempted to combat this problem.

Like in Tokyo, some trains in Osaka house video monitors (attached to the ceiling, on this particular car) that display animated maps, estimated time to various destinations and other travel information. The monitor on the left is dedicated to such functions while the right one displays advertisements.

Osaka has long been famous as a breeding ground for nationally famous comedians and Razor Ramon is certainly no exception to this rule. Having cut his teeth in various Osaka comedy troupes, the man known as HG has become an easily recognizable symbol of the city, as this omiyage (obligatory travel gift given to co-workers), spotted in a train station convenience store, attests. In other HG-related news, I’ve been spotting him on a lot more variety shows as of late; particularly those shows that tend to feature performances by various washed-up, flavor of the week comics in quick succession. Could Razor’s glorious 15 minutes in the limelight finally be up? Say it 'aint so Hard Gay, say it 'aint so.

There just so happened to be a roller coaster on the roof of what was otherwise a shopping mall down the street from our hostel.

Matt and Megan managed to “Have a fun!” in accordance with what is printed on one of the merit patches on Megan’s Gweek shirt.

Along Osaka bay there’s a waterfront amusement area replete with giant Ferris Wheel-almost a mirror image of Chicago’s Navy Pier.

The main attraction here is the Osaka Aquarium Kaiyukan and with good reason-it’s one of the largest and most extravagant aquariums in the world.

Somehow, this performer outside of the aquarium managed to mesmerize Greg. He stopped to watch her act not once but twice. The second time I literally had to pull him away from the assembled crowd.

The Osaka Aquarium attempts to offer visitors a complete view of the wildlife that inhabits the Pacific Ocean’s vast “Ring of Fire”. In order to achieve this, the aquarium is split into 14 different habitats: from the floating ice caps of Antarctica to 8,000 meters below the Sea of Japan; from the Ecuadorian rain forest to the Great Barrier Reef, virtually every major habitat in the Pacific is represented. It’s really an undertaking so large in scope that it must be seen to be believed.

A giant spider crab stands as tall as a human in the “Japan Deeps” tank.

The most commonly overheard exclamation around the crab tank? “Oishisou!” (“looks delicious!”).

A whirlpool of sardines in the Coast of Chile exhibit. Nary a tin box in site.

A porcupine fish swims playfully in the fake Gulf of Panama.
I was treated to a different view of the porcupine fish later that night. The Japanese call it fugu but Matt calls it "the bacon of the sea".

The aquarium’s crowning achievement is their Pacific Ocean exhibit-one of the largest aquarium tanks in the world which serves as a microcosm of the largest ocean in the world. Here you’ll find the majestic whale shark: the largest fish in existence with a maximum length of almost 40 feet. This is one of only a handful of whale sharks in captivity and currently the only adult whale shark on public display in the world. The aquarium’s exhibition halls spiral around the tank, allowing visitors to view the denizens of the Pacific from an almost infinite number of angles.

Towards the end of the aquarium, there was a backlit jellyfish exhibit that seemed almost suspiciously reminiscent of an exhibition that I saw at California’s Monterey Bay Aquarium a few years back.

The final exhibition space was the aquarium’s special exhibition gallery, currently housing a show on sea life as visual art. While most of it was admittedly pretty dumb (a wall of fish tanks with blue lighting, anyone?) there were a few cool pieces like these stacked wineglasses full of bettas.

In all honesty, I really wish we could have spent more time in Osaka. It seemed like a huge, vibrant and stimulating city and we really only saw a fraction of it in the two days that we were there. Let this be a lesson to us all: second place isn’t always such a bad thing.

"Working" For The Weekend

It’s a slow day at the office today, so I thought I might take a brief respite from the non-stop Gweek coverage to tell you a bit about my weekend. Prepare yourself, for what follows is an account of exhilarating events that could only take place in the land of the rising sun.

On Friday night, we headed down to the coolest bar in Hachinohe, a somewhat recent discovery. As much as I would like to take credit for this breakthrough, the truth of the matter is that Charlie Tyack found it and was kind enough to let us in on the secret. The place is called Hanbey and it’s inconspicuously hidden down a flight of stairs on the main drag. The only thing that might clue you into the fact that there’s an awesome bar hiding down there is the old movie posters that line the walls of the staircase.

Step inside and you’re surrounded by old toys, posters and various other paraphernalia, most of it from the 50s and 60s (although I also managed to spot at least one wartime propaganda poster as well). Drink enough here and you can probably convince yourself that you’ve stepped into a time warp.

They’ve also got two black and white TV sets that play old commercials from the 50s and original Astroboy episodes non-stop. At all times, the bar is filled with the vaguely haunting sound of pop music from a bygone era.

Completing this ambience is the menu, which is based heavily around wartime staples and long-forgotten drinks. Like the so-called denki-bran (“electric brandy”) which harkens back to a time when anything could seem modern and exciting if attached to the prefix denki. What’s nice is that the prices induce a sense of nostalgia as well; most drinks go for about half the yen you’d pay anywhere else in town.

Then there’s the food. Hanbey’s extensive menu ranges from standard Japanese snack fare to antiquated oddities to the downright bizarre-and all of it is dirt cheap. I can’t recommend the frog’s legs because even though they do actually taste like chicken, there’s really not enough meat on a frog’s leg to make it worth your while. Although I haven’t seen it yet, the oppai ice cream is supposedly appropriately perky (no, I’m not going to translate that for you). There's also a rule on the books that states that women get a free bowl of ice cream if they ask for it.

Finally, there’s the “table charge”. Many bars in Japan charge a “sitting fee” simply for entering their establishment, which can range from a few bucks to upwards of $20 depending on how nice the joint is. They justify this by giving you a small, “complimentary” dish when you sit down, generally some gross pickled vegetables or something equally unappetizing. Occasionally you’ll happen upon a place that is kind enough to provide you with chocolate, cheese, popcorn or even noodles. Not to be outdone, Hanbey rounds out their eccentric offerings with one of the strangest table foods I’ve seen yet: raw cabbage. They provide two kinds of dipping sauce for the cabbage and if you finish your plate, they’ll bring you another at no charge. Despite what you might think, cabbage with spicy sauce makes for a great pub food. There are a few Hanbey locations in various places throughout the country and you could do worse than to look up this curious anachronism the next time you feel like a night out on the archipelago.

The next day we drove around aimlessly before deciding to go to a barbecue being thrown by someone from Ryan’s office (although he received a personal invitation over the phone, he had no idea who had called him). On the way, we stopped at this playground in Misawa that had a fairly sizeable metal maze. Although we initially wrote the maze off as child’s play, we soon found ourselves ensnared in the belly of the metal beast, wandering around helplessly and bumping our heads repeatedly on the low-hanging bars. That was a scary five minutes there.

At the barbecue, Ryan decided to sport the latest in Japanese headgear technology.

Afterwards, we headed out to the Homac (the Japanese equivalent of Home Depot), for lack of anything better to do. While wandering around in the aisles, I spotted this large display for kabtuomushi (lit “samurai helmet insect”) known outside of Japan as the rhinoceros beetle. Large beetles like this have long been kept as pets in east asia-they’re clean, require relatively little space or maintenance, they’re safe to handle and males can be easily coaxed into fighting each other. You might remember that I mentioned this phenomenon in passing some time ago but what I didn’t tell you then is that an entire industry has blossomed to capitalize on this common childhood obsession. Beetle fighting arcade games, stuffed beetle toys and “Mushi King” branded pajamas are all common sights at any mall or toy store. Ask any elementary school boy to draw a picture and nine times out of ten, it will have a kabutomushi in it somewhere.

Here’s one of the buggers (get it?) in all of his invertebrate glory. While standing around taking these pictures, I observed at least three children begging their mothers for a beetle. The conversation usually went something like this:

Child: “Wow, look, mom! They’re so big!”

Mother: “Yes, they are.”

Child: “I want one. I really want one.”

Mother: “They’re too expensive. Now, come along.”

I find it curious that all of the mothers objected on the grounds of price and not on the grounds that their children wished to bring huge, disgusting bugs into their home.

Leo was just as confused and disgusted as you or I.

Also, I finally broke down and bought one of them newfangled Nintendo DS Lite units. Although they came out here in March, they’ve been consistently sold out nationwide until quite recently. When I dropped by the local Toys R Us and saw that they would be getting a few in stock, I decided to seize the opportunity. Upon I showing up at the counter with my ticket, I was rung up by the cashier who then proceeded to call someone on the phone. A woman came over from the stock room and looked at me before running back whence she came. I ended up standing around at the register without any idea what was going on while various employees scuttled about. Were they making me a Nintendo back there? After about five minutes the pimply-faced checkout guy told me to “Please wait a minute”. Oh, okay. After waiting for about five more minutes, a manager finally emerged from the back room and walked up to the register. She faced me and pointing at the order slip, said to me in English “This...this...this is...”. At this point I told her that she could explain it to me in Japanese and she then simply asked me if I wished to purchase an extended warranty for six dollars. Sheesh.

Although I’ve wanted one of these things for a while now, I knew that this desire was only borne out of an impulsive need to possess whatever the shiny, new gadget of the moment is. I had originally planned on restraining myself from buying something that I would never use until Matt showed me his DS Lite and the kanji dictionary that he had purchased for it. I’ve wanted to buy a denshi jisho (electronic kanji dictionary) for a while now but two things were keeping me at bay: their prohibitive price and the fact that you usually have to know a kanji’s phonetic reading in order to look it up (which doesn’t help at all in the commonly frustrating situation of being confronted with a character on the page that you’ve never seen before). Actually that’s a lie, you can count the number of strokes in a character and look it up that way on almost any electronic dictionary but that always seemed like way too much work to me. Anyway, the DS dictionary alleviates this problem by using the unit’s touch screen and stylus to allow you to enter characters that the software then attempts to match. What’s more, the DS unit and a copy of the game still cost considerably less than a denshi jisho with similar functionality.

Plus, it plays Tetris. And Tetris is awesome.

Memo To Shikoku: Ride Wit Gweek

The smallest and least populated of Japan’s four main islands, Shikoku has little to offer aside from farms, small towns and mountains. So basically, it’s just like Aomori but warmer. Until the Honshu-Shikoku Bridge Project was completed in 1988, the island was only accessible by ferry and plane making it a somewhat isolated, insular region. This network of bridges, including the world’s longest suspension bridge, the Akashi-Kaikyo Bridge, was built to encourage both economic and cultural trade between Shikoku and Honshu.

Just about the only thing that Shikoku is internationally famous for is the 88-temple pilgrimage, commonly known as “the Shikoku Pilgrimage”. The island of Shikoku is home to almost 300 temples and it is said that the Buddhist monk Kukai visited 88 of these temples by foot, most likely in the late 8^th century. As a result, pilgrims, known as Henro, can be seen walking around the island to this day, their trademark white robes flapping in the wind as they attempt to retrace Kukai’s steps. While the pilgrimage is traditionally done on foot (usually taking between one and two months to complete), the modern pilgrim sometimes makes use of alternate forms of transport as a means for saving time. While most Henro embark on this journey with the hope of achieving some form of spiritual clarity, tourists are sometimes known to take the 88-temple challenge just for the thrill of the trip.

Speaking of trips, a relatively small, sparsely populated and generally quiet island like Shikoku just screamed road trip to the members of team Gweek. At about 10:00 am we rented this beauty in Hiroshima; the official vehicle of Gweek, the trusty Nissan Bluebird.

Now, all of the members of team Gweek had been charged with certain duties that were carried out in preparation for the sacred journey and I am proud to say that none of us took these obligations lightly. Among my responsibilities was compiling an official Gweek road trip mix, to be played non-stop during our jaunt through Shikoku. Being that I could think of no more appropriate soundtrack for such an epic journey, I did what had to be done: twelve non-stop tracks of Nelly’s “Ride Wit Me”. I don’t have to tell you that we listened to the song 144 consecutive times during the course of the trip, I also don’t have to tell you that the final time, blasting it at full-volume while parked in an alley in Osaka, we most likely had the cops called on us and I certainly don’t have to tell you that while we may have gritted our teeth at times, we secretly enjoyed every minute of it.

In addition to the moral support provided by St. Louis’ finest bandage-wearing, pretty boy rapper, there was another secret weapon in our arsenal: the navigation system that you see above. You would be hard pressed to find a car on the road anywhere in Japan that’s not armed with one of these GPS systems and rental cars are no exception. Once we had figured out how to actually use the thing it became an invaluable ally.

With the sun beating down on the pavement, Nelly blaring on the stereo and a full tank of coffee in our stomachs the stage was set for an epic journey. As we headed out of the city, the scattered houses on the landscape slowly receded into the rolling hills that would soon come to dominate the landscape. It really was a beautiful sight and while I’m sure many of the small towns outside of Hiroshima are just as boring as Oirase, it looked nothing short of idyllic to us after a long winter of hibernation. Children played along the rivers, traditional fish-shaped kites flapped in the wind anticipating the arrival of Kodomo no hi and five foreigners rolled along, doing their best to disturb the peace.

Eventually, the solid ground of Honshu gave way to a scattering of islands and the network of bridges that connect them. If you look at our approximate route (marked in blue in the map at the top of this post), you can see these islands, nestled between Shikoku’s western border with the mainland. It really is a cool feeling, leap-frogging from island to island as if driving through the sea.

Eventually, we reached the mainland of Shikoku, without a clue as to what we wanted to see before driving across to Osaka. A quick glance at the Lonely Planet seemed to suggest that Matsuyama, the island’s biggest city and home to an ancient castle and what might be Japan’s oldest bath house, might be our best bet. So we swung around and headed for the Eastern coast.

When we arrived at Matsuyama, we decided to first head straight for the castle. What greeted us was a long walk up a steep mountain path, to the castle at the top. When we arrived, exhausted and sweat-drenched, we were dismayed to find that the castle was being restored and could not be viewed. What. The. Fuck.

Greg decided that he could not let stand such an affront to team Gweek and attempted to stage a one-man invasion of the castle. He was largely unsuccessful.

After failing at this, he decided that it was his sacred duty to defend the castle against barbarian invaders.

Despite our disappointment at not being able to view the castle, the surrounding area was really nice and provided an incomparable view of the city below.

Next stop: Dogo Onsen. Possibly the oldest hot spring bath house in all of Japan, the onsen is mentioned in writings dating back to 759 and is rumored to have existed as early as the sixth century. Dogo Onsen was also a favorite hangout of one of my favorite writers: the early modernist, Natsume Soseki. At any rate, the onsen is well known all over Japan for its supposedly medicinal waters. As you can tell from the picture, Greg just couldn’t wait to get in to the bath.

While I was drying off after bathing, an old, naked Japanese man approached me. “Are you from Sri Lanka?” he asked without hesitation. “Uh, yes, my parents are,” I replied, completely at a loss as to how he ever could have guessed that. “Oh, well, you must be here with your friend then.” “What friend?” I asked, only to have him point across the room to a middle-aged South Asian man standing nearby. Well, Greg and I eventually went over and talked to the guy and as it turns out, he actually was Sri Lankan and has been living in Japan for some time as a Catholic missionary. He was traveling on business but said that he always makes it a point to visit Dogo when it’s on the way. Amazingly enough, he actually hailed from the same town that my mother grew up in. It’s a small world after all.

After the onsen, we headed to a nearby brewpub for dinner, famous for its micro-brewed beer which is made on site. While the staff was less than courteous, the food was good and the beer even better. After feeding the bluebird, all members of Gweek were ready to roll on a full tank. We left Matsuyama at around 7:00 pm, having no idea when we would reach Osaka.

Well, just before midnight, we finally crossed the the Akashi-Kaikyo Bridge, bringing our Shikoku adventure to a close. As it was night time, I took a few long-exposure shots that pretty accurately capture how the bridge looked to me in my sleep-induced haze. With yet another stage of the trip clear, team Gweek pressed on in the night towards the bright lights of Osaka. “Hey, must be the money!”

Miyajima: Wherein Team Gweek Cavorts With Fellow Members Of The Mammalian Persuasion

Miyajima is a small town on the sacred island of Itsukushima, a small oval-shaped dot of land that lies southwest of the city in Hiroshima bay. The island has long been considered sacred in the Shinto faith and until recently, births and deaths were not allowed on the island lest the site’s purity become compromised (accordingly, women and the elderly were sometimes barred from entering). While the island features a number of tourist attractions including shrines and temples, an Edo-style promenade and an aquarium, the main draw continues to be Itsukushima Shrine’s magestic otorii (gate). The entire shrine complex has been designated a Word Heritage Site by UNESCO.
Here we see the Miyajima side of Itsukushima Island from a distance; the prominent, red torii can be seen on the left.
Since Itsukushima is an island, it must be accessed by ferry. The ferry station is less than an hour from the city by either streetcar or train.
Here we see the shrine’s iconic gate, which dates back to 1168. Of course, the gate has been ravaged throughout the centuries by typhoons and various other natural calamities and has been rebuilt eight times in total (the current gate dates back to 1875). The gate, considered one of Japan’s “three views,” is sometimes referred to as the “floating torii” for creating the illusion that it is floating in the sea when it actually rests on the sand below. Now, you’re probably looking at the photo above and scratching your head in confusion, wondering how anyone could think that the gate is floating. That’s what I thought at first too. It turns out that we had the misfortune of showing up during low tide, when the gate’s secret is revealed for all to see. If you’d like to see what it looks like during high tide, I believe that Charlie Tyack has a few photos up from his trip last year.
Low tide on Itsukushima may represent less than ideal conditions for tourists but it provides a field day for clam diggers. The beach surrounding the gate was jam-packed with clam enthusiasts, most of whom walked away with at least a bucket full of the shelled creatures.

Despite the fact that the gate looks somewhat less impressive, low tide offers tourists a few interesting opportunities. For one, you can see if you’ve got what it takes to land a pebble on one of the gate’s flat surfaces. This is actually a lot harder than it sounds and took Greg about a hundred tries to get right.
The gate itself serves as the gateway to Itsukushima Shrine, a massive complex that sits on stilts and which also appears to float during high tide. While the first temples and shrines were probably built on Itsukushima Island around the 6th century, most of the current buildings probably date back to the 13th century. Pictured above is the five-storied pagoda, erected in 1407, that sits outside of the Senjokaku, a library of Buddhist sutras.
Much like Nara, Itsukushima is well known for its abundance of wild deer. Of course, with all the tourists that pass through the area, these deer have become quite accustomed to the presence of humans. However, the tourist brochure makes sure to warn visitors of the following, in both English and Japanese:

ATTENTION: The deer on Miyajima are wild. They may eat paper and cloth. Please pay attention and keep an eye on your personal belongings-especially tickets and souvenirs as the deer might eat them.

As you will shortly see, this is no idle warning.
Please note that I decided to wear proper attire for the occasion.
While wondering around the beach, Matt and I noticed that one enterprising deer had found his way into a tourist’s bag. I decided to go in for a closer look.

What’s he got there?

Oh, looks like it’s a map or brochure or something.

Through his unusual interest in reading, the deer had soon amassed a small audience of children and foreigners.

Wait, he’s not reading that brochure at all! Is he…eating it?

That's a yes.

After scarfing down the entire brochure, the deer dove back inside the bag to find a cigarette, which he quickly sucked up in one slurp. He then discovered the rest of the pack, which he trotted off with, shaking it up and down as he ran until the cigarettes fell out. However, before he could enjoy the fruit of his labors, the old man who owned the cigarettes chased him down and forced him to drop the pack. Sounds like someone could use a Nicorette patch.
Well, after witnessing that display of gastrointestinal fortitude, I decided that a deer would probably make a suitable repository for what was left of my Subway turkey sandwich.

I was correct in my assumption.

After all of our time spent bonding with the local deer population, it was decided that a suitable representative would have to be chosen as an honorary member of team Gweek. Greg initially tried to court this baby deer who seemed a bit put off by the uniform.
After a long and exhausting search, we finally found a suitable candidate in one of the local community’s elder statesmen. Here we see Greg, presenting the deer with his honorary Gweek shirt.

With Miyajima crossed off of the list, team Gweek had successfully conquered Hiroshima and its surrounding areas. Like five deer in a paper factory, the team hungrily set out to survey what remained of Japan’s east coast. Onward!

Okonomiyaki: Whatever You Like...Grilled!™

Imagine, if you would, a random assortment of American foods. Let’s say a cheeseburger, a thanksgiving turkey, a short stack of pancakes, a club sandwich and a deep-dish pizza. Okay, now imagine that I stack all of those foods up on a grill, somehow flatten them into an easily edible disc shape and then cook it up. What would you say to that? Why, you’d probably say, “Wow Mehan, that sounds awesome, too bad such a thing doesn’t exist!” Well my patriotic brother or sister, I hate to be the bearer of bad news but I must inform you of yet another way that Japan lords her technological superiority over us: okonomiyaki.

With a name that literally translates into something that sounds more like a slogan than a food (“Things that you like, grilled”), okonomiyaki just might be that mythical food that has something for everyone. Or, in the eternal words of old Ludwig van:

You know, I was completely unaware that they even had okonomiyaki in 18th century Vienna but since I generally don’t question the veracity of information that I see written on random signs posted on the street, you’ll have to accept the above quote as authentic. Anyhow, okonomiyaki, sometimes referred to as “Japanese pizza” or “Japanese pancake” is essentially a flat, omelet-style dish, cooked on an open grill. The base of the dish is a pancake-like batter which is topped with any number of ingredients spanning the gamut of Japanese cuisine; noodles, vegetables (cabbage, bean sprouts, various kinds of onions), seafood (squid, shrimp, octopus), meat (bacon, pork), cheese, eggs, kimchee and mochi are all common. After it has been cooked, the 'yaki is generally topped with takoyaki sauce, mayonnaise, ginger, katsuobushi (fish flakes) and nori (dried seaweed). Okonomiyaki recipes vary greatly from region to region and some restaurants will now provide you with base ingredients and allow you to make your own okonomiyaki at your table (Japan has somewhat recently adopted Korea’s infatuation with cooking at restaurants).

Well, no trip to Hiroshima is complete without sampling the local variety of okonomiyaki, sometimes called “Hiroshima-yaki”. Okonomiyaki was supposedly invented in the city and just about any Hiroshiman will tell you that the local method of making the dish (layering the ingredients instead of mixing them, using yakisoba noodles) is the only way. While okonomiyaki is available all over Hiroshima, there’s one location generally agreed upon as the place to go: Okonomimura. Spanning three floors and featuring over 25 different okonomiyaki restaurants, Okonomimura is Hiroshima’s proudest gastronomical showcase.

Having no idea what differentiated the various booths, we simply walked into the first one that we were ushered into (by a lady who confidently assured us that the food contained within was oishii). While the menu allowed you to choose your own ingredients (most okonomiyaki shops do), we all opted for a pre-set variety featuring squid, octopus, pork, sprouts, cabbage, cheese, a fried egg, spicy soba noodles and about a million other things that I can’t remember.
Here’s what it looks like when it’s almost done. All that’s left is to melt the cheese on top.
Voila! When the okonomiyaki is finished, it’s simply pushed to the edge of the grill where the customer cuts slices with the provided metal spatula and serves them on to his or her plate. As you can see, we all ordered the same thing except for Megan, who was trying to prove that she’s not a conformist or something, I guess. By the way, okonomiyaki, especially the Hiroshima variant, is all kinds of delicious.

The Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park

Sitting in the southwestern quadrant of the city, the Genbaku-Domu (lit. “Atomic Bomb Dome,” known officially in English as the Hiroshima Peace Monument) quietly looks out over the city of Hiroshima; a tangible reminder of that morning in August of 1945 when it was one of only a handful of buildings left standing within a one-mile radius. The Peace Monument has gained a certain currency within the popular imagination as a timelessly iconic representation of mankind’s most terrible weapon, second perhaps only to the image of the mushroom cloud itself.

Originally the Hiroshima Prefectural Industrial Promotion Hall, the building’s structure survived as a result of being mere meters from the hypocenter where the bomb’s force was almost entirely downward. Despite resistance from some residents of Hiroshima following the war (who criticized the preservation of the dome on the grounds that it was an unwanted reminder of the city’s destruction), the dome was preserved as a testament to the destructive power of nuclear weapons. In 1996, the dome was named a UNESCO World Heritage Site, despite objections from the United States and China.

To me, the dome looked almost exactly as I had always expected it would. The only surprise was seeing that the building had been painstakingly preserved down to the rubble that fell within its boundaries. Reactions to the memorial are varied; while most stood and stared in quiet reverence, a few families clamored to have their photo taken in front of the site, flashing peace signs as if being photographed at Disneyland. While I fail to understand the desire motivating the latter group, I suppose that risking such trivialization is simply one of the compromises involved with transforming something like the Genbaku-Domu into a historical site.
While the dome may serve as the most prominent memorial to victims of the atomic bomb, it also merely marks the northern entranceway to the greater Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park. Situated at the fork between the Honkawa and Motoyasu Rivers, the expansive park features a number of memorials and a large museum set against large swaths of open grass.
Just across the river from the dome is the Children’s Peace Monument. Standing atop the monument, holding a golden crane is Sadako Sasaki, whom many of you may have read about in grade school. For those unfamiliar with the story, she was a young girl who developed leukemia as a result of being exposed to radiation from the bomb. While hospitalized, she decided to fold 1000 origami cranes, inspired by a Japanese folk legend that claims that a person who folds one thousand paper cranes will be granted a wish. Although she died at the age of 12, her story has transformed the paper crane into an internationally recognized symbol of hope.
Here we see just a few of the myriad paper cranes sent to Hiroshima from children all over the world. Many of these are displayed in glass cases adjacent to the Children’s Peace Monument.
Heading towards the eastern edge of the park, we find the National Peace Memorial Hall. The largest memorial inside is the so-called Hall of Remembrance. The hall represents a 360º panorama of the ruined city, with the bomb’s hypocenter at the center of the room. The walls are made up of 140,000 tiles, based on the number of victims believed to have died by the end of 1945. The names of the city’s neighborhoods are given on the wall as well, the ones closer to the floor representing those closer to the bomb's hypocenter.
The Memorial Hall also features a section with information on all known bomb victims. You can search through the database for individual victims or families.
Directly in front of the Peace Museum, you’ll find the Cenotaph for the A-Bomb Victims. A stone chest in the center of the monument holds the registry containing the names of all deceased bomb victims. The cenotaph is inscribed with the following words: “Let all souls here rest in peace, for we shall not repeat this evil”.
Just across the pond from the museum sits the Flame of Peace. It has burned continuously since 1964 and will only be extinguished once all of the nuclear weapons on earth have been dismantled. Every time a nuclear weapon is tested, the mayor of Hiroshima sends a letter of protest to a dignitary in the responsible nation. Many of these countless letters can be seen inside the Peace Museum.
The Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum itself is a massive structure; you could literally spend an entire day trying to tour it in earnest. Admission costs only ¥50 (just under $0.50 as of this writing) and the museum is full of fascinating artifacts-from a watch forever frozen at 8:15 am to flyers dropped over Hiroshima by American bombers warning of possible air raids. The discourse of the atomic bomb is, of course, a delicate and complex issue but to the credit of the curators, the museum does an excellent job of providing the visitor with a variety of viewpoints. America’s political motivations for dropping the bomb are acknowledged as well as Japan’s wartime aggression (in the case of the contentious issue of the rape of Nanking, both sides of the argument are presented). Even the rarely broached topic of domestic discrimination against hibakusha (bomb victims) is covered. The museum is quite refreshing in its impartiality and apparent refusal to serve any political agenda through historical revisionism.
This is a uniform that was worn by a mobilized junior high school student at the time of the bombing.
This tricycle and helmet belonged to a young boy who died in the bombing. They were buried with the boy by his father and later unearthed when the child’s remains were moved to a proper cemetery.
The museum also features this display that attempts to recreate what victims might have looked like at the time of the bombing. In all honesty, when compared to archival footage and photographs of victims or first-person written accounts, this display seems comparatively mild.
Well, that’s the Hiroshima Peace Park, in a nutshell. In all honesty, it can be a very exhausting and depressing place to visit (not unlike the Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington D.C., if you’ve ever been). Still, I feel that travelers passing through Hiroshima, especially those who have not read about or formally studied the discourse of the atomic bomb, should feel some level of responsibility to visit the site and learn about what history will surely remember as one of mankind’s most horrific creations.

A Snake In The Hand Is Worth Two In The Bush

Good news for Aomori ophiophiliacs! Hot on the heels of my declaring the prefecture void of all wildlife comes my foot, which, as of this afternoon, seems to have taken up residence in my mouth. I was sitting around in the teacher’s office of Momoishi Middle School today after lunch when I noticed a circle of second grade boys crowding around the front entrance. The principle stood in front of the window observing them and shaking his head in disapproval. When I walked over, I noticed that a boy standing in the center of the circle seemed to be prodding an object on the ground with a stick. I opened the window and stuck my head out just in time to see the brazen lad seize the object by