Tobu-Kamikita Picnic For Differently-Abled Students

Every summer, the Tobu-Kamikita board of education (which oversees schools in Oirase as well as in the neighboring town of Rokunohe) organizes a special day out for differently-abled students. Taking place in late June, this picnic of sorts allows the students time outside of the classroom to bond with their teachers—as well as with each other. While some of you may recall my critique of the way these students are normally handled in the Japanese school system, this event provides an example of something positive and inclusive that one school board does to make differently-abled students feel more integrated in their schools.
The day started out in front of the local gymnasium where the students were asked to give brief self-introductions. While these introductions were quite simple (name, school, grade level, likes and dislikes), the pressure of speaking in front of a crowd stressed-out at least a few of the students. I’m happy to say, however, that all of my students did quite well. Here we see two of my elementary schoolers with Tsutsumi-San, who organized the event.
The day began in front of the area’s (and allegedly, Japan’s) oldest ginko tree. I was carrying a heavy box full of sketchbooks at the time, so I was lamentably unable to take any photos. After spending a few minutes answering ginko-related trivia questions, we traveled to Icho Sports Park to view my adopted hometown’s most prominent landmark. Remember when I visited Oirase’s Statue of Liberty replica, over a year ago and reported that it sported decidedly manly features? Well, now you can judge for yourself.

Here’s the obligatory group photo. Not pictured: me.

One of my greatest teaching-related triumphs is the story of my relationship with Gou-Kun. Gou was a first grader when I first started teaching at Momoishi Elementary School and no matter what I did, he never seemed to be able to remember who I was. Considering that I’m about a foot taller and at least five shades darker than anyone else in the town, I was always a bit surprised that he couldn’t seem to recall any memory of me. Well, after almost a year of teaching, Gou eventually started to remember me and even got excited (instead of scared) when he encountered me in the hallway or in class. He’s in the second grade now and poses here with his portrait of yours truly (he was supposed to be drawing the Statue of Liberty but you can be sure he wasn’t reprimanded by me). The text reads “Mehan Sensei”.
Here’s Gou-Kun again, this time posing with a drawing of my cat, which is surprisingly accurate considering that my cat lives in Baltimore.
Meanwhile, one of my other students (the one who screams a lot) decided that he couldn’t be bothered with drawing and went off in search of bugs instead. Two of his teachers and even his principal assisted him in the hunt.
Finally, it was lunchtime. The picnic’s organizers had really gone all out to ensure that the meal was a memorable one (my longtime fans will notice the presence of the hunter in the background—he was actually quite indispensable in the planning of the event and obtained most of the foods used). First off, they constructed a long track out of bamboo through which they piped cold water.
They then dumped noodles into the track while the students waited, chopsticks at the ready, to catch them as they raced down the miniature waterslide.
After catching a bundle of noodles, the lucky contestant simply dunked it in a bowl of cold broth and proceeded to slurp. This is actually in keeping with the Japanese dish zarusoba, which is quite popular during the hot summer months.
This smart old dude from the school board, however, figured out the secret: most of the noodles inevitably end up in the basket at the end of the line.
Even though there were more than enough noodles to go around, I soon found that they were only an appetizer. The main meal consisted of yakiniku, with a plethora of meats, fish and vegetables available for grilling, as well as tofu and unadon (barbecued eel served over rice).
After lunch, we all gathered around for a rousing game of smash-the-watermelon-while-wearing-a-blindfold. Ah yes, of course.
Luckily, when watermelons are smashed, everyone wins! All in all, 2006’s Tobu-Kamikita picnic seems to have been a great success.

Tokyo Drifter

Seeing how I’m wrapping up coverage of what essentially turned out to be my last substantive trip to Tokyo, I figured that this might be an appropriate time to belatedly tend to a little spring-cleaning. So here they are, the odds and sods: random photographs shot in Tokyo over the course of the last year that never seemed to fit in anywhere else.
After visiting the city a few times, I stumbled upon a hostel in Ueno that quickly became my venue of choice when holding court in the eastern capital. Ueno station is located rather conveniently on the east end of the Yamanote’s loop and this particular hostel happens to be clean, cheap and free of the annoying American anime nerd crowd that seems to congregate at similar establishments.

Upon emerging from Ueno station, the wide-eyed visitor is greeted by a series of serpentine footbridges that snake through the humble Ueno skyline, above the endless torrents of traffic below. As you walk along these bridges, you’re treated to little snapshots of Tokyo street life like the one seen above. Of course, bridges like this exist in more exciting parts of the city as well-the footpath leading out of Shibuya station in particular sticks out in my mind as one of the more impressive ones.

Anyway, while walking over the footbridge to my hostel in early June, I spotted something that I had somehow failed to notice during all of my previous visits. If you look closely at the photo above you’ll spot a pizzeria called Nicola’s, on the second floor of an otherwise nondescript building. Why is this important? Well, if you heeded my earlier recommendation to seek out Robert Whiting’s Tokyo Underground, you’ll know that the original Nicola’s location in Roppongi was many things: the first pizza parlor in Japan (supposedly), perhaps the only parlor offering authentically American-style pizza in Tokyo, the first restaurant in what later blossomed into the bustling nightlife district of Roppongi and a den of seedy yakuza activity. The first time I ever visited Roppongi, I wandered around in the cold, fruitlessly searching for the restaurant that started it all. Much to my dismay, no one seemed to have even heard of Nicola’s pizza parlor, cabbies included. I was forced to conclude that the restaurant had probably served its final pie years before I arrived.

So you can imagine how excited I was to discover that at least one Nicola’s franchise still existed in Tokyo. Upon setting foot in the tiny restaurant, however, I discovered that the Nicola’s of today bears little resemblance to the original joint. As Whiting notes in the Epilogue of Tokyo Underworld, the Japanese investors who acquired the restaurant from American Nick Zapetti kept only the name. Gone are the checkered tablecloths and American-size pies, replaced by a stylish, minimalist décor and the Japanese standard-tiny pizzas covered in mayonnaise and corn. My fantasies dashed, I despondently walked across the street and ordered a cheeseburger.

Here we have a shot of Shinjuku’s main drag by night, the most densely packed nightlife district in the city.
Leo cranes his neck in search of a suitable venue at which to serenade me with his brilliant karaoke renditions of Eminem songs.
Roppongi’s famous Tokyo Tower, which any Japanese kid can tell you is exactly 333 meters tall. As you can see, the tower is designed to resemble the Eiffel Tower.
Shibuya crossing, allegedly the busiest pedestrian intersection in the world. I once showed up here at about 5 pm on a weekday and the mass of people crossing at the intersection seemed virtually endless. That Starbucks Coffee you see is also supposedly the busiest Starbucks in the world.

Greg and Jason bravely traipse through the whirlwind of humanity.

Akihabara, known to natives as “electric town,” is the place to be if you’re an electronics enthusiast.
Originally, Akihabara was where Tokyoites went to find deals on exciting new technology like televisions, vacuum cleaners and washing machines. As Japan started to emerge as a leader in consumer electronics, Akiba (as the locals call it) started to shift its focus more towards cameras, computers and video games. Nowadays, Akihabara is known not only for electronics but also for anime, manga and other related nerdy pursuits. I’ve heard whispers that the area is transforming yet again and that within the next decade it will be known primarily for cosplay items. Wonderful.
Yodobashi Camera, the stuff geek dreams are made of. Yodobashi is essentially the Japanese equivalent of Best Buy albeit much, much larger. They sell everything from computers to vacuum cleaners and traveling between the building’s seemingly endless floors feels like excavating layers of Akiba history. Although the company’s core business is selling cameras, most of that is done in Shinjuku, which has emerged in recent years as Tokyo’s camera district. While the newly opened Akiba branch does sell some camera equipment, photography enthusiasts are advised to visit the Shinjuku branch, which boasts four floors dedicated to cameras.
In case you’ve never seen a Tokyo railway map, here it is, in all its glory. Pretty intimidating, huh? While I felt the same way the first time I visited Tokyo, I pretty quickly learned that the Yamanote line (the lime green loop in the center) circumscribes the city center (much like the Chicago “loop”) and everything basically branches off of that. Keep in mind though that this is just the Tokyo JR map, there’s also the metropolitan subway line as well as a number of independently owned, specialized transit lines.
Living as we did, in Aomori, many of us soon came to miss good old, greasy American food. Outside of the globalist arches, there are few places in Aomori where one can eat something that approximates American cuisine. Tokyo, however, offers a wealth of options; I’m willing to wager, in fact, that literally any type of food can be found somewhere in the city. After a few months of delicious research, we were able to determine that the Outback Steakhouse offered the most “American” food that we could find (ironic in that it’s an Australian-themed restaurant) and was therefore the best restaurant in the world. However, steaks aren’t the only thing that Tokyo offers the hungry Westerner.
There’s also Freshness Burger, Japan’s best burger chain and the only place in Japan where I ever spotted a double cheeseburger in the wild. Of course, they operate almost everywhere in Japan-except Aomori.
And real beer! If it wasn’t for Tokyo’s numerous brewpubs, I would have forgotten that beer isn’t supposed to taste like fizzy water.
After a year in Aomori, you can’t blame us for having such a ravenous appetite for burgers and steaks. Of course, that isn’t all there is to Tokyo cuisine. From 24-hour sushi in Tsukiji to the world’s most famous ramenya, Tokyo knows how to please those with a more native appetite just as well. When stepping on to the pavement outside of Tokyo Station at 7 am, bleary-eyed from a 14-hour bus ride, the only thing on my mind is fresh sushi and fast.
Here’s the shinkansen (high-speed bullet train) that takes me home to Aomori. I always let out an exasperated sigh as it pulls up to the platform, knowing that I have no choice but to board.

Fair and Balanced: The Chimpan News Channel

One fateful night during my Tokyo trip in early June, I retired to my hotel room in Ueno, exhausted after a long day of sightseeing. I had resigned myself to munching on a convenience store sandwich and watching a little TV before bed, nothing all too exciting to be sure. By rights my night should have ended on an uneventful note, if only I hadn’t been in Tokyo where one never knows quite what to expect.

Anyway, after briefly watching a special on new technological advancements in the field of plant growing (seriously), I changed the channel to discover what is perhaps the most incredible thing that I have ever seen on Japanese television: The Chimpan News Channel. It’s worth noting that it’s not actually a channel but rather, a show, which only slightly detracts from its virtues. At any rate, rather than trying to somehow explain the show to you (trust me, this is one situation where words prove truly inadequate), I’ve decided to simply direct you to the video clip below (Shockwave required). Enjoy.

Passing the Dog, Panda and Shoebill Days of Summer at the Ueno Zoo

First opened in 1882, Tokyo’s Ueno Zoo is Japan’s oldest and most famous zoo. Situated in the west end of expansive Ueno Park, the zoo is only one of the many museums, temples and other public institutions located in the park. Since the park borders Ueno station (one of Tokyo’s largest Japan Rail stations, through which both the central Yamanote line and the high-speed Shinkansen pass) the park has become one of the city’s most popular and easily accessible tourist attractions.
The Ueno Park of today sits on what once were the grounds of the Kaneiji, a temple built by the Tokugawa Shogun and destroyed during the Boshin War of the late 19th century. In 1924, the Emperor Taisho granted the land to the city so that a park might be built as a gift to the people of Tokyo. A number of shrines exist in the park today, including a small shrine hidden behind a pathway of red torii (above).
Here’s the zoo’s front gate; as I recall, the entrance fee is about ¥600. Fun fact: during the Second World War, the Japanese military purposefully poisoned some of the zoo animals to prevent them from escaping in the event of a bombing. Wait, I guess that fact isn’t quite so fun after all. At any rate, this historical episode may have served as the inspiration for the brutal zoo killings in Murakami Haruki’s popular novel The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle.
Just inside the main gate is a five-story pagoda, which dates back to the 19th century as well.
One of the first exhibits that visitors are greeted by is the panda pavilion. The Japanese love their pandas, so much, in fact, that even animals decorated to look like pandas receive media attention. If you visit the zoo during a weekday, like I did, you’ll find that the passageways of the panda area are absolutely clogged by large masses of schoolchildren on field trips. Dressed in matching uniforms and bright red caps, these pint-sized gawkers form an insurmountable, if adorable, obstacle to panda enthusiasts. Pictured above is the red panda, obviously basking in the attention of two hundred sets of eyes.
The giant panda, the zoo’s prime attraction and trademark animal, seemed even more hung over than a JET the morning after a charity event. Regardless, the assembled crowd delighted at the skills this magnificent animal displayed: sleeping, lying around and scratching.

Oh, Japan.

Here we see some schoolboys examining a shoebill (or “whalehead,” if you prefer), one of Africa’s strangest-looking birds.
Just look at dude lording it over those comparatively boring flamingos. That bird is king of the jungle in my book.
I suspect that someone was having a bit of fun in the zoo’s translation department that day. Anyone know how I can apply for that job?