Sayonara sojourns Pt 2. Takarazuka, Trains and transits

Well part two is now upon us. After Ikumi and my hospital appointment I set out on what would be my last major adventure around Japan, as such I wished to make it a biggie. In fact my idea was to go and see all my friends who were further afield so that I could say goodbye. That decision marked the start of a large amount of travelling.

First on my list however was a trip to Takarazuka (宝塚). I'm not entirely sure of the reason but I have totally fallen in love with this area and I just knew I'd regret it if I didn't manage to visit one more time. Now whilst it is a very fancy area, home to the famous Takarazuka revue, an all female theatre troupe, and many fancy buildings and restaurants, my main goal was to go back and visit Osamu Tezuka's museum.

My previous visit had been around two years earlier and I was quite taken by it then, regardless of how little I understood of the displays. I grew up watching a lot of his anime and to be honest he is not called the "Godfather of Manga" for any trivial reasons, his stuff is highly excellent. This time, armed with a much better ability to read and comprehend the Japanese language I was even more impressed with what I saw. Judging by the displays of his primary school work the man was a genius from the very beginning. 

In addition to being able to read more there were also a few extra films on in the small theatre including a very touching piece about a very friendly Ame-furi-kozou (a kind of rain demon that wears an umbrella and looks like a small child) who just wanted some rain boots. He befriends a local boy and helps him out with three requests in exchange for his rain boots. Sadly at the last minute the boy moves away and never returns the Ame-furi-kozou's help. Once he is a fully grown man (now a granddad in fact) he suddenly remembers his promise and goes through hell and high water to get back to his countryside home and present the demon with the rain boots. It had a nice simple line style and the Japanese wasn't too difficult which was great for me.

Afterwards I moved on to Osaka to get on board a night bus bound for Tokyo. I've lost count of how many times I've used that service now, though I am now a gold member so it must have been a lot. It's uncomfortable, it's tiring, but it's just so damned cheap that I can't help myself, I am my Nan's grandson it would seem.

This time, whilst my main purpose was to visit a friend, I was also very excited to be  heading into Tohoku, the northern region of Honshu, for the first time. Since I never like to do things the easiest way I got it into my head that it would be a fantastic idea to go by local train, a journey of a whopping 7 hours. Why would I do something so crazy you ask? Same reason I do everything the way I do. It was cheap. Also I thought the scenery might be nice.

The initial departure from Shinjuku went fine, if a little bleary eyed, and I arrived in Shinigawa in good time, enough time intact to actually buy breakfast. I boarded the first local train, bound for I-can't-remember-where, to begin about two hours of sitting still. I was hoping to read a bit and just spas out from tiredness but alas no such luck. A pair of Ojisans (old japanese men) sat next to me and started nattering away, so much for peace and quiet. It wasn't till I couldn't help but laugh at one of their jokes that they clicked that I understood Japanese. After a bit of a chat we realised we were off to the same place. Well that was that, I was stuck with them for the next four hours.

For the most part they were pretty interesting but once the Sake started flowing I knew I was in trouble as the conversation began to get steadily more and more unintelligible. I'd love to say that I did the right think and stuck it out but alas I am a bad man and ditched them on the third train transfer. I was tired, hungry and in no mood to try and decipher their slurs. I stepped out a little bit before Fukushima, grabbed a bento, played a bit of UFO catcher and just generally chilled for an hour or so before getting back on board for Sendai.

I think even if you know very little about Japan you have at least heard the name Sendai before as it is the capital of Miyagi prefecture, the area that was worst effected by the great Tohoku earthquake of 2011. I have to say I knew pretty soon when I had crossed the border into Tohoku as I was suddenly surrounded by vast seas of green, boundless nature. It is such a contrast to the urban sprawl that dominates central Honshu and I think had it not of been for a combination of the quake and a busy work schedule I think I would have made the journey sooner and more frequently. 

Right that is your lot for today. Next time I'll talk about what I actually got upto in Sendai.

Mata neee

Part 2: A capital time

A short hop, and by short I mean sleepless and gruelling 9 hour trip by night bus, had us arriving in Tokyo bright and early on Wednesday morning. Sadly there was no respite from the heat but the capital, as always, managed to blow me away with its impressive scale and supreme business. I managed to decipher the wonders of the Tokyo underground much faster this time and had us over to our hostel in Asakusa in good time.

Asakusa is a pretty cool place but I’ll come back to that a bit later because we had other places to be. Our first stop for the Tokyo tour was the Miyazaki Hayao Ghibli museum. Huge fan-boy that I am this has been on my to visit list for ages and now I was finally getting the chance.

The museum is way out in a city on the outskirts of Tokyo, Mitaka, and getting there was in itself no small task since we were practically the opposite side of Tokyo. Being  cheapskates money savvy we had purchased day tickets for the Tokyo underground and so plotted a course for Mitaka that allowed us to spend as much time on the subway as possible. This took a bit more time but you know, save the pennies.

Mitaka is itself not really a very attractive location. It’s far enough outside of Tokyo to not be dominated by lines of apartment blocks but it’s slender streets and mundane choice of building colour do give it a bit of a dingy feel. My mate also noted that there was a lot more rubbish on the streets and that it ‘looked like birko’ yeah welcome to Japanese suburbia.

As always there were no signs that were of any use and whilst there is a bus that runs directly to the museum we opted to walk. The websites map is decidedly unhelpful but it did at least indicate the museum was in a park. We headed through some of the winding side streets towards the tree-line in the distance. The heat was starting to pick up again and although we can’t have walked more than a kilometre it felt like forever.

Still arrive we did and I must say that whilst the museum is small it was also very impressive. The museum itself is a 4 storey building of just the sort of quirky design you’d expect from the ghibli team, all round edges, overgrown vines an odd little domes. After being greeted by Totoro at the entrance I knew I was in for a treat.

Inside it’s a little bit chaotic. Firstly it was pretty busy, I get the impression its like this most of the year. Secondly there is no real floor plan as such. There are various rooms and exhibits but they are not laid out so tha you can move from one to the next in a logical order. This is also not helped by the lack of a central staircase, apart from a weird spiral staircase in the middle. The décor however is incredible and you really feel like you’ve just stepped into the world of Ghibli.

The main exhibition room is essentially a history of animation, detailed with bright colours and some incredibly impressive moving exhibits. We once again hit a snag though. Shockingly not a single exhibit in the museum had a translation. Whilst they were in fairly basic Japanese, fine for me, you would miss out on a lot if you couldn’t read, so a bit naff for my friend. This really surprised me given the wide appeal of the films. There was a second exhibit further up that I really didn’t understand. I think it might have been something to do with how Ghibli artists where influenced by European fairy tales maybe? The Japanese was just way beyond me.

The highlights were definitely the wonderful reconstructions of sketches and storyboards of the various films and of course the Saturn theatre. Throughout the day this little theatre screens short films that are only aired within the museum. If I understand correctly they are different each day, I guess as a kind of incentive to go back.

We watched one called, 星をかった日(which could mean the bay I bought, raised or harvested a star depending on how its read.) The story was fairly basic; boy runs away from home, moves in with random older lady, works on her farm, swaps turnips for a weird seed from a mole and a frog, normal stuff really. The visuals and music however where stunning as always. The art direction is based around works by Naohisa Inoue in his Iblard collection, worth a google if you like quirky fantasy art. I think there is a whole other world there just waiting to be explored and I loved the seamless blending of old clapped out technology with a super futuristic city.

This all took a good few hours and by the time my we got back to the hostel my mate was knackered. I decided to have a short wander around the local area since I’d not been to Asakusa before and I’d heard it was home to the oldest Buddhist temple in Tokyo, senso-ji. It apparently used to be the most popular entertainment district in Tokyo before being levelled in WWII. These days it has more of a reputation for being an excellent site of budget accommodation.

Not having any real plan beyond getting to the temple I just went for my usual plan of wander in the general direction and see what I see. Man am I glad I did. As I strolled past a random supermarket I spotted out of the corner of my eye something I’d been searching for since I arrived in Japan. A square watermelon. These badboys will set you back a whopping 10000yen (about £82) and well they just look weird. I’d actually doubted their existence but can now confirm they are a reality, albeit a fairly pointless one.

Marking the entrance to Senso-ji is the equally, if not more, famous Kaminarimon, or thunder gate. The giant red gate, originally built in the 10^th century stands at a whopping 11.7m and is nearly that wide, not your average garden gate. It is home to 4 statues including two very impressive busts of Rajin and Fujin (Gods of Thunder and wind respectively). At the centre of the gate is a giant paper lantern (almost 4m in height), which has an elegant dragon carving on its underside.

Wading through the throngs of tourists I wandered down nakamise-dori, a short street that is jam-packed full of shops selling all kinds of wonderful souvenirs and traditional snacks. I’d have loved to spend a bit more time poking my nose about but I wanted to see the main temple itself. The first thing that caught my eye was the five-storey pagoda on my left. These are common amongst large temples but it was my first time seeing one up close. Actually after the gate the temple ground itself weren’t anything special. I guess I’m a little templed out these days.

The next day saw us heading just one stop over on the metro to Ryogoku home of Japan’s main sumo stadium, Ryogoku Kokugikan, and also the Edo-Tokyo museum. Both buildings are right next to the train station, always handy in the summer heat, and are also massive. We picked up our tickets for the Edo museum but first headed to the Ryogaku to have a look at the Sumo museum.

The ‘museum’ turned out to be a single room that consisted mainly of images of old trainers and Yokozuna. Again almost no English in here so we didn’t take too much away from it, but it was free so I can’t complain too much.

Our next destination on the other hand was absolutely incredible. Firstly it is massive as I stated earlier but to give you an impression I’ll give you some figures. It stands at about 62.2m above the ground and covers an area of 30,000 square metres. Adding to this is the fact it is modelled after an old elevated type warehouse so most of the museum is about 30m above ground level.

 

The inside is where the main event is of course. Whilst the exhibits only take up about two floors there is quite a lot packed in as the museum maps the course of Edo’s progression from being a port town to becoming the modern capital it is today. There are many old artefacts as well as intricate models and reconstructions of various important landmarks within the city. The full size model of a kabukiza and the northern portion of the Nihonbashi bridge definitely stand out amongst them.

What makes the museum all the more fantastic is that a lot of care has gone into translation here. The information is displayed in Japanese, English, Simplified Chinese, Korean and a host of other languages. Further to this there are volunteer guides happy to show you round and providing explanations in several languages. It is easy to lose time in here and we must have spent at least 3 or 4 hours, my mind was sufficiently warped after this information overload.

 

After a bit of a history lesson I took my friend to the Harajuku area to get a good look at the more modern, trendy aspects of Tokyo. We wandered through the boutique-lined streets, taking in some of the more unusual styles as we went. Afterwards we turned back down into central Shibuya just in time for rush hour at scramble crossing. Very few times in my life have I seen so many people in one place. Its worth a look if for nothing more than curiosity. 

We just about managed to squeeze in some nighttime skyscraper viewing in Shinjuku before what was one of the more stressful nights of travelling back to Osaka.

Ja mata kondo ne.

Tokyo day 1

Well the night bus was hell. Not only was I stuck next to an absolute blob but I had unfortunately had a massive allergic reaction to the tomato ramen. I’m pretty sure it had cheese in it, which probably explains why it was so delicious. So after a night of tossing and turning with stomach cramps I emerged onto the streets of Tokyo at 7am.

The obvious choice for me of where to go first was the central station, I needed to figure out where I was and, based on Mum’s dodgy directions, where I would be staying over the next four days. Unfortunately life just isn’t that simple, the JR Tokyo station was on a completely different scale of Huge. I’d say it took me a good 30 minutes to finally get myself orientated.

After picking up and consulting a few maps I was feeling confident I could at least get myself to the area where our hotel was so I headed in the direction of the Imperial Palace (皇居). Well I was in Tokyo after all I had to visit at least once.

The first thing that struck me, or rather nearly struck me, about the palace was the incredible volume of Joggers going around the palace grounds. I don’t know if it was normal or it just happened to be because it was the early morning but there were a helluva lot of them.

I moved a bit closer but was turned away from many of the gates. You can’t actually get very close to the Imperial palace at all. I guess I shouldn’t be too shocked at this. In fact I’m not sure if I actually ever saw it I was that far away. I think the closest point you can really see is the Nijubashi Bridge. Content with that I went off to explore the outer grounds.

The surroundings I have now found out span over 7sqKM. Pretty huge right , which is why I spent the good part of the morning wandering. Many of the outer gardens are open to the public as parks and whilst the southern park （こきょがいえん）is pretty barren many of the other areas are worth a look.

I walked around the perimeter to the northern “きたのまる“ garden. I’d come here as due to my inherent science geekyness I wanted to see the national science museum. Sadly It seemed to be predominantly aimed at children and I was a little dissuaded by this.

I headed a bit further north and began to hear a lot of shouting and saw many people with large sticks and wearing armor, as well a what appeared to be members of the Japanese military. I came to a large circular hall, which Yuko has now informed me is called the “体育館“ (Taikukan) which is the Japan martial arts hall. There seemed to be some kind of kendo tournament on the go. I stayed to watch for a short while as no one stopped me going in but not really understanding what was happening I left pretty quickly.

I skirted round to the eastern gardens which appeared to be th main event of the imperial palace grounds. There were some remains of the original edo palace as well as some exhibitions concerning the renovation of the outer walls. I swung by the information desk for a map, typical considering I'd already been everywhere and also checked out a small art gallery before the heavens opened and I decided it’d be a good time to head to the hotel and check in.

First stop was Ningyocho the district where the hotel was located. Getting there was fairly simple the Tokyo subways where fairly expansive and comprehensive. Sadly that's where the easy part of my journey ended. Getting to the hotel was a bit of a nightmare. This was in no short part due to the double-edged swords that are Japanese maps.

They are everywhere which is really great, but there is a big but. Quite often from map to map the orientation and scale will completely change, meaning that whilst you know where you are you don’t know where you’ve come from or how far you have left to go. Needless to say following said maps I got a bit lost.

I asked quite a few people, including a policeman who are normally pretty helpful, but to no avail. Finally I found someone who could help me and she pointed me in the right direction. I’m not sure if it was my Japanese getting better or just that people in Tokyo are more used to foreigners but I was definitely finding it easier to talk to people.

Finally checking In I dumped my stuff and set off on a hunt for socks and lunch. I got myself a takeout from a nice looking donburi place near the hotel and then set off to a department store the hotel clerk had informed me off. It was unfortunately really posh and about 3000JPY for a pair of socks, not going to happen.

Luckily upon my return I happened upon a cheap clothing shop on one of the high streets and “socked” up (sorry couldn’t resist that pun).  Shortly afterwards I was reunited with the parents. It seemed that they had once again taken the slow Shinkansen so it had taken a lot longer to arrive than they had planned.

Dad expressed his interest in checking out the electronics district in Akihabara so that was where we went next. Akihabara (or Akiba as it’s shortened to) was pretty intense. The streets where pretty crowded and the bright lights of electric town seemed to show no sign of the ‘energy crisis’ Tokyo was currently suffering.

We’d set off with the goal of finding a new XD card for my camera as mine was currently full. First stop was one of the massive, and I mean massive, department stores. These things were about 15 solid floors of electronics and entertainment goods. They were also very expensive however and it did not take us long to realize that the best deals were to be had at ground level.

 

In the end we didn’t find an XD card for my camera but instead I bought a microSD card for my phone. For a mere 350yen my camera could now store over 1000 pictures. Ridiculous.  At this point my parents were getting tire and hungry, they’d been skipping meals again, and so headed back to Ningyocho. My stomach was still a little off so I opted to stay out longer.

I had a quick explore of the Akiba anime centre. This place was an Otaku’s dream. It was about 7 storey’s high and had all manner of Manga and anime related goodies. From comics and DVD’s to soundtracks, figurines and drama CD’s there was quite a lot to look at. Window hopping was all I did however as the prices were pretty unreal.

I descended back on the streets and started a bit more aimless wanderings. One thing that seemed to crop up with incredible frequency where young ladies dressed in rather unusual outfits advertising maid bars. I’m not sure exactly what these entail and whilst not as sinister as the mind conjures I still think they are a bit seedy.

I decided to move away from the side streets pretty quickly and make a move back towards the hotel. This was of course not before stopping in one of the many video arcades for some 2D beat-em-up action. I just can’t help myself. A few rounds of BlzBlue and moonwalker, that's right the Michael Jackson game, I was back on the train to Ningyocho and an early night. Tomorrow held a very early start.