11 posts tagged “japan”
I am saddened that my t-shirt with a cartoon version of my old Japanese baseball hero, Ikeyama (shortstop, Japan Champion Yakult Swallows, 1993) doesn't fit too well and is about 2 washes from retirement.
But I can always count on Japan to bring me new cartoons, and today they announced a great new one: Sumo Birds!
Apparently, the Japan Sumo Association is finally trying to develop some younger fans (about time, since they were complaining about lack of younger fans back in '93 when I was there) and in order to do that, they've developed some Sumo cartoon characters.
In typical brilliant Japanese pun style, they are Sumo wrestling birds. Why? The Japanese word for Sumo wrestler is "sekitori" and the Japanese word for bird is "tori", so they call these characters "Seki-tori-kun" ("Kun" is like "San", but used as a diminutive for kids). Gotta love that. Unfortunately, I can't read the small print on this poster, but I think they've given names to the different bird-wrestlers, and bios and stuff. And the plan is to have giveaways of stickers and pictures and things of the seki-tori-kun at the tournament (which starts in 2 weeks, by the way).
Now, I just need to figure out how to get an adult size t-shirt with that top middle bird on it (I think his name is Hiyonoyama). Might have to just bootleg one myself...
I thought Japanese Beatles imitators were funny, but this video kills the Cavern Club in Roppongi...
Continuing my Japan trip, even though I've been back a whole week now...
On Tuesday, I started my sightseeing very early. I woke up at 5AM to head to the Tsukiji wholesale fish market, which my travel guide said was a must-see. I had heard about it before but never went, probably because I lived 45 minutes outside of Tokyo before, and would have had to wake up at 4AM to get there from Kunitachi -- not an option.
As it was, I was afraid when I got there (at 6:00) that I was too late and the market was already finished business for the day. All I was seeing was old Japanese guys driving little gas-powered truck/forklifts around packed with styrofoam boxes full of fish that they had just purchased. They were all packing their various vans and heading out with the day's catch. But it turned out I was just in the wrong place. After walking around a little, I discovered a giant mountain of styrofoam.
This pointed me in the direction of the market building, where everyone was selling his wares. Every kind of seafood you could imagine, from eel to squid to lobster to giant 5-foot tunas to microscopic fish one finds shaken on top of one's rice, when one had not known to ask for "no tiny fish on my rice, please". Pretty amazing. There was even an ice guy right there, who had giant blocks of ice and a machine that instantly turned them into styrofoam boxloads of shaved ice for packing the fish you buy. Lots of action -- I nearly got run over several times, but did manage to avoid getting fish guts on myself. Amazingly, right around the corner were many restaurants offering sushi, tempura, etc., at 6 in the morning. I'm sure it tasted great, considering the freshness, but I wasn't quite hungry for sashimi.
From there, I headed to Ueno Park, home of several great museums and also many sakura trees, making it one of the prime hanami (flower-viewing) party locations in Tokyo. I was very lucky with my timing -- I hadn't expected to see any cherry blossoms while in Japan, but the trees were blooming early this year, and I got quite a show by the end of my trip. (One morning show announced the official opening of the season was 6 days earlier than average in Tokyo. I don't know how they decide the blooming has officially begun, but there you have it.) I was still very early at Ueno, walking past a group of elder citizens at the temple there, doing some group calisthenics before a brisk walk. Saw all the set up for a big hanami crowd -- trash cans everywhere, ropes showing where people could put down their blue tarps, and most importantly, the cherry blossom map that also included the "Hanami Code", the rules to follow while at your party.
Before leaving Ueno, I did go to the National Art Museum, which has an amazing permanent collection of Japanese art through the ages, from ancient Buddhist art to modern paintings, including some great woodblock prints by Hiroshige and others. There was also a special exhibition opening that day, which included many National Treasures and Important Cultural Properties from a temple in Nara. More unbelievable art, like huge bronze statues that looked barely a year old, but had been created in 1100 or 1200 or some crazy old year like that. I love the Japanese way of naming specific art objects "National Treasures". (I think there are around 1000 or less that have been named.) It lets you know that you're really looking at something important. I think we should start doing that in America. Maybe we could start with the Liberty Bell and the Empire State Building and stuff like that.
After the National Art Museum, I checked out the Museum of Western Art, which wasn't really that good a collection. You can see better Western art exhibits at various department stores and special exhibits, like the Renoir exhibit I had seen the day before.
After all that, I had some time, so I went to Shinjuku to get some food (at a tiny diner where you paid for your food in a vending machine, got a ticket for it, took a seat at the counter and handed your ticket to the guy, who brought your food. Cheap and fast. I had that Japanese-Indian specialty, "curry rice") and to do some shopping and look around.
Then home to rest before heading to The Big Egg (Tokyo Dome) for Opening Day 2008, Red Sox vs. A's. Turned out to be an awesome game -- more on that later...
Sunday in Tokyo means only one thing -- head to Harajuku to see the looneys in Yoyogi park. I actually got there so early, they weren't there yet, which gave me time to check out Meiji Shrine first. It's a big shrine, found back in the woods, and apparently a very important one. Also seems to be doing a good business in hosting weddings -- I saw several in the few minutes I was there. Here's one of the more formal looking couples I saw:
Next, I still had time, so I headed down the main shopping street of Harajuku. It's the place where all the hip kids shop. Of course, as an American tourist, I always hope to find some crazy authentic Japanese shirt or something -- but am always disappointed to find that what the Japanese seem to like best is authentic American clothing, which is of no use to me. I was also very disappointed to not find the music store I used to always shop in for its great selection of bootleg CD's (I have several live CD's of Dylan, Simon & Garfunkel, Sting, etc., from my year in Japan). All this while fighting ridiculous (but typical) Japanese crowds:
I did make it to the park and see the group of guys in black leather with the Elvis haircuts doing their goofy dances, which made me wonder -- these can't be the same guys who were doing it 15-20 years ago, so, how does one go about becoming one of those guys? Do you just show up in the outfit and start dancing, or is there an initiation? And at what point does the whole group just realize it's really not that cool anymore? (Since it wasn't cool 15 years ago, and they're still doing it, I guess the answer is never.) I also saw some not-so-talented bands and some crazy costumes, but nothing outrageous enough to warrant a picture.
After the park, I headed home to watch the last day of the Sumo tournament. Very big match -- for the 2nd tournament in a row, it came down to the 2 Yokozuna's with equal records for the championship. Every time this has happened in the past, the winner from the previous tournament has lost in the 'revenge' match, and the same happened again, as Asashoryu avenged his loss to Hakuho from January and won his 22nd tournament (which tied him with Takanohana for 4th most ever, I think). Plus, Baruto and Tochiozan won awards and ended up with double digit wins, and all the Ozeki's did finish with winning records, but just barely.
Then I went to Tokyo Dome and saw the Red Sox play the Tokyo Giants in an exhibition match. The Giants crowd was great and the Red Sox won behind J.D. Drew's grand slam (which brought back good memories from the ALCS).
On Monday, it rained, so I thought I would go see museums. Unfortunately, I read that most museums are closed on Mondays, so I waited out the rain in my hotel room, watching the national high school baseball tournament on TV.
Finally, I ventured out, heading across the river to Akihabara, the amazing electronics shopping area. As amazing as ever, but not quite as exciting when you have no intention of buying anything. Saw lots of great and interesting video games, but I know they wouldn't work in American consoles, so I couldn't buy. I was very excited when an ad for one of the games used the one Japanese folk song I know, "Haru ga kita", that I had learned over 20 years ago at St. Paul's. My big triumph in Akihabara came, when, after watching a girl win a very cute little Capybara toy in a claw game at an arcade, I took a chance and on my first try got 3 of them! (I tried for more later and failed miserably.) Here is the site of my victory:
From Akihabara, I took the train to Shibuya for more crowds and shopping. And went to an interesting art exhibit called "Renoir and Renoir". It displayed paintings by Auguste Renoir, paired with scenes from movies by his son, Jean Renoir. It seemed like some of the seeming influences of the son by the father were a little stretched, but some of the descriptions did seem to include quotes from the son referencing the painter's work. It was a little hard to tell since the explanations were only in Japanese. Still, the art was quite good, of course.
Leaving Shibuya, I headed to Roppongi, the big nightclub area favored by expats, to hit my favorite bar in the city, The Cavern Club. It's a Beatles bar and presents live performances of Beatles music by Japanese tribute bands, and it's always fun to hear the close copies of the Beatles sound, followed by introductions and thank yous in Japanese. The drunk salaryman crowd is pretty funny, too. Expensive, but worth it, and the George Harrison guy's solo killed on Gently Weeps.
Before heading to Tokyo for the Red Sox games, I did catch one Japanese baseball game.
It was the Tokyo Yakult Swallows vs. the (Nagoya) Chunichi Dragons, the current Japan League champions in the Nagoya Dome. The Nagoya Dome ranks up there as one of the worst stadiums I've ever seen a game at, but the Japanese fans didn't let me down.
I walked up and bought a ticket (it was just an exhibition game -- there season started the following week), which turned out to be a great seat. But I didn't stay there -- instead, I moved to the left-field bleachers, home of the Yakult cheering section.
The Yakult cheering section consisted of about 30-40 diehards, some of whom, if I read their giant flag correctly, had made the trip from Hiroshima. Nonetheless, they had all the spirit of the bigger Chunichi crowd, singing all the songs, doing the cheers, and even containing multiple drummers and trumpet players and cheerleaders. (Though I was very impressed to find that the cheerleader then grabbed a trumpet and played, and the flag-waver also did a stint as cheerleader.)
Everyone knew the cheers and those that didn't know the songs were reading from printed lyric sheets, that I guess were given out before I got there.
It goes like this. When your team is at bat, one cheerleader (I don't know how they get appointed) will introduce himself to the crowd ("I'm so-and-so, I'm going to be the cheerleader, thanks for cheering...") Then he yells out the beginning of the cheer, whistles, and everyone cheers, right in rhythm. The cheerleaders look like this:
The cheering was impressive and didn't stop from the first batter to the last batter of each half inning (or when a new pitcher came in while the other team was at bat). But the best was when the team scored, and the fans did their usual (and by usual, I mean this is something they have been doing since I went to games during the Japan League Championship 1993 season) -- took out their umbrellas and sang their team song:
How great is it that at the end they actually yell "BANZAI!"? All very impressive, at least spirit-wise. Compared to the entirely packed right field stands full of Chunichi fans, the cheering was not so great. Here is what the bleachers looked like on the Dragons side (notice the unison waving of plastic noisemakers by every single fan):
Retroblogging my Japan trip, now that I'm back near an Internet connection. (I had a tiny hotel room in Tokyo, whose only amenity was a toilet that could wash your butt.)
On Saturday, I left Kyoto for Tokyo, but made a stop in Nagoya, which is about halfway between the two, and a place I'd never been before. There isn't really a whole lot to see in Nagoya (I met a Japanese guy on the bus who asked why I would go there), but I was stopping there because my favorite Japanese baseball team, the Yakult Swallows (now known as the Tokyo Yakult Swallows, for some reason) were playing an exhibition game there.
There is one big thing to see there, though: Nagoya Castle. It is a rebuilt version of the original castle (didn't survive Allied fire-bombing in the war), but very impressive nonetheless. The grounds were beautiful, and the inside of the castle was a museum, where you could climb all the way to the top, where there were amazing views of the whole city. The museum also had a big plastic copy of the famous golden dolphins that adorn the very top corners of the roof, which lots of Japanese kids were sitting on for pictures. And there was even musical entertainment at the base of the castle all day. I just caught the end of a rock band doing a Japanese version of Ballroom Blitz, then managed to get a video of some more appropriate music for the location:
I also got my first glimpse of the freshly opening cherry blossoms, and took lots of great pictures:
After the castle, I went to the Tokugawa art museum, containing items from the collection of the former Shogun's family, which meant lots of really old Chinese (that's what the rich Japanese collected way back when) and Japanese pottery, paintings, etc. The museum's real claim to fame is that it houses one of the 3 remaining original copies of The Tale of Genji, but unfortunately due to its age and delicacy, they almost never display it. Instead they showed replicas.
From there, I headed to the baseball game at the Nagoya Dome...
but not before seeing one of the greatest highway signs ever:
You can tell by the picture what a major earthquake it is, because the fish is so clearly upset and shaking.
my new hotel has no internet. ugh.
so blogging is postponed til after the trip ends.
i did make it to nagoya yesterday. amazing castle. saw the baseball game. the yakult swallows fans were sparse but spirited (movies coming later).
im currently in an internet cafe in Harajuku. just saw the dancing elvises and all the bands. also saw a great Hokusai exhibit at the Ukiyo-e museum.
now i have to head back to the hotel to watch the last day of the tournament. Asashoryu vs. Hakuho for the championship again. Then ill head over to Tokyo Dome and see if i can get a ticket for the Red Sox vs. Tokyo Giants game.
bye from Tokyo - see you in the USA...
Today I had perfect sightseeing weather, warm and sunny, and I did a lot of it.
I started at Nijo castle, a former home for the Japan-ruling shogun Tokugawa. The buildings are amazing on the outside and the gardens are beautiful. And the inside is really amazing. Giant rooms all covered with great painted screens and intricate wood carvings, with brightly painted paneled ceilings. And the "nightingale floor", which squeaks when someone walks on it, to warn the people inside, still works after 400 years. All unbelievable stuff. Couldn't take pictures inside, but I got some good ones from the outside.
Next, I went to the temple of the Golden Pavilion, Kinkakuji, which has to be the most picturesque spot in Kyoto. The golden pavilion surrounded by a wooded hill, sitting beside a beautiful little pond. Makes you want to be a Buddhist monk so you can just sit and look at it all the time (I assume that's what a Buddhist monk would do). I took a picture of an old man in front of it, and he took my picture. Not sure -- either he wasn't Japanese or he was just mentally-challenged, but he was able to communicate with me in grunts.
From there, I headed across town to the Silver Pavilion, Ginkakuji. Not nearly as impressive as the bright gold pavilion, and currently covered by scaffolding as they rebuild its roof, the Silver Pavilion temple still does have impressive grounds with a beautiful garden that incorporates sand along with the usual ponds and trees, etc. Plus, a path up the hill led us to a great view from above.
Which was the perfect warm-up for the climax of the day, way up on the hill at Kiyomizu-dera. You walk uphill for half a mile, on a narrow street lined with souvenir shops, to get to the gates of Kiyomizu-dera. From there you start climbing stairs and when you get to the wooden deck of the temple, high up on the hill, you have an amazing view of Kyoto. Of course, the place was teeming with tourists taking pictures (and requesting that I take their picture) and buying tokens of good luck and things to write wishes on, which were hanging all over everything. At a small shrine on the grounds, there's a pair of rocks of which it's said if you can walk from one to the other without opening your eyes, you will find the love of your life. I didn't try it, but I saw two young women make the attempt. One made it only halfway, but the second (with a little cheating help from her friend) made it successfully.
Then I headed back to the hotel after a lot of walking, a lot of bus rides, and about 100 photos snapped. Just in time to see today's sumo action: Losses for Baruto and Tochiozan seemed to take them out of the running, but then Asashoryu lost for the 2nd straight day (for the first time in 29 matches to Kotomitsuki). Finally, Hakuho won, tying him with Asashoryu at 11-2, with Baruto, Tochiozan, and Kokkai 1 all back at 10-3. Looks like it's going to be another last day championship match between Asashoryu and Hakuho.
Tomorrow, I leave Kyoto, heading to Nagoya for the day, then up to Tokyo for the rest of the trip...
I just woke up after a 12-hour nap. Good timing, since I got to watch Stanford whoop Cornell on the Internets. I came back to the hotel yesterday afternoon to watch the Sumo on TV, laid down on the bed, next thing I knew it was Friday. Too bad -- I missed the most exciting day of Sumo yet -- Both Hakuho and Asashoryu lost. Asashoryu still leads, at 11-1, with Hakuho, Baruto and Tochiozan one back at 10-2.
Well, I was tired, I guess, after a typical day of much walking around the streets, museum hallways, and temple yards of Kyoto.
I woke up, got breakfast down in the tunnels of the subway station, headed to the National Modern Art museum. It was raining, so I headed back in doors. On the way, I bought a magic umbrella -- magic, because it stoppped raining about 15 minutes after I bought it, and didn't rain again the rest of the day (though it stayed cold and gray and windy. Not good for pictures.)
Anyway, the museum had a really great exhibition of German posters from the early 20th century. Very cool stuff.
From there, I headed down to Sanjusangendo, one of the highlights of Kyoto. It's a huge long temple building, built in the 1100's (don't get too impressed. It burned down and was rebuilt... in 1266! :-)
It houses an amazing set of Buddhist sculptures from almost 1000 years ago. One giant sitting 1000-armed Kannon, 28 protector gods of various characters, and 1000 -- yes, literally 1000 -- small 1000-armed Kannon statues. Really amazing. Unfortunately, no pictures inside. But I'm sure everyone who's been there remembers it.
After that, I went across the street to the Kyoto Art Museum, which houses a lot of different ancient Japanese art, from calligraphy to Buddhist sculpture to paintings to an exhibit of Hina-matsuri dolls.
Next, I headed to Gion, the area where the Geisha hang out. I didn't see any Geisha, but I did see a Japanese wedding party that was very impressive, and some more temples, etc. Got lunch/dinner, classic diner food of fried rice and yummy gyoza, and headed back to the hotel.
On the way back, I found that my hotel is on a very happening street -- it has everything from giant karaoke palaces to bowling alleys to arcades. I went in one arcade that had 2 floors (!) of crane games (sadly, no longer called "UFO Catcher") of ingenious variations, and one frightening floor with nothing but photo booths that was teeming with teenage girls. It all seemed so fun, I might have to go back tonight and karaoke by myself.
Today, the weather is better, and I think the sun is even supposed to come out this afternoon, so I'm hitting all the big Kyoto spots -- Nijo castle, Kinkakuji (golden pavilion), Kiyomizu-dera, etc. Pictures tomorrow...
First day in Japan. Of course, had to go straight to the Sumo tournament.
Headed to Osaka early. Got my Japanese sports newspaper for the ride -- so great to have that -- I got my Sumo news and my Red Sox news -- found out Matsuzaka's starting opening day and hopes to win and bring back the game ball for his new son. Got out of the train station with some idea of where the arena was, but I wasn't finding it. Luckily, they were blasting Sumo drums at the tournament:
Seriously, that's how I found the place.
Got my ticket, then headed over to kill a few hours by checking out Osaka castle and the park around it. Unfortunately, it started to rain and, as usual, I was the only guy in Japan without an umbrella. After walking around a little and getting some gray pictures like this:
I headed indoors, to the nearest museum I could find -- the Osaka Museum of History. It was a slightly interesting museum -- most descriptions in Japanese -- about the various eras the city went through (Imperial capital, trading hub, etc.) Had some very old artifacts (8th century) and one cool room that looked like a giant reproduction of the towns found in classic Japanese woodblock prints.
Headed back to the Sumo tournament. Got there very early -- still in Sandanme, the class below the class below the class below the main wrestlers. Saw lots of good Sumo. With only the minor annoyance of the crazy old guy in front of me yelling like crazy for his favorite wrestlers. The guy was a member of the Wakakirin fan club (seriously -- he had pictures from the meeting), which is kind of like being a member of the Julio Lugo fan club.
Asashoryu won again, without too much trouble:
Hakuho won, too, so unfortunately I didn't get to see everyone throw his zabuton. But Asashoryu still leads at 11-0. And by the way, Asashoryu has gone 10-0 12 times since making Yokozuna and he has won the tournament all 12 times.
Tomorrow I tour Kyoto in the rain. Sigh.
