Miyako Odori Press Conference

When I woke up this morning at eight, it only had 2 degrees in my bedroom. On such days, I tend to stay in bed until Pumpkin demands his breakfast. But today I had an early meeting: the press conference for this year’s Miyako Odori.

It was similar to last year’s press conference, just a bit smaller because it’s not a milestone anniversary.

After the talks and Q&A by the officials involved in the dance production (just like last year, the dance master and a university professor), the painter of the official portrait that is used for the flyer was introduced. I haven’t looked at my photos from last year, but I’m pretty sure it’s the same woman.

In contrast, the young lady to the left is brand new. Her name is Katsuwaka, she is from Niigata and merely 17 years old. Last year she had her “misedashi” – introduction as a maiko – and this year, she will make her stage debut at the Miyako Odori. She was even interviewed, it must be a big thing for her (and the kagai as a whole).

This year’s theme is “Colorful Seasons of Kyoto” and some of the eight scenes are set in famous places like Kiyomizudera, Heian Jingu, Umenomiya Taisha and Gion of course. While last year was all about the Tale of Genji, this year’s program will stray a little from the formality of the Heian court. At least, that’s what I’m led to believe from looking at some of the costumes. I’m really looking forward to seeing the performance this year!

Again, the look behind the scenes was quite illuminating. It’s fascinating how much work goes into all this; only arranging the promotional photo in front of the large silver doors took about half an hour, not to mention dozens of people behind the camera.

First Snow!

It snowed this afternoon, for the first – no, second – time this winter. I was super happy and went for a short walk that ended at my second-most favourite cafe with chai and brownies.

So far, and I’m writing this at 10 in the evening, it’s not enough snow to cover the ground, but some forecasts promise more in the weekend. We’ll see. Right now, the internet says it’s -1 degrees outside, but thanks to windchill it feels like -8. Looks like I’ll be going to bed soon, Pumpkin snuggles up to me already.

Last week was pretty busy. On top of work, I went to three exhibitions, one shrine, one sake brewery tour (with tasting afterwards), and finally on Sunday: a BATI-HOLIC concert. I was pretty exhausted by then, but it was good.

This week, since I don’t have any appointments, I’m trying to catch up on a few things website and writing-related. And there’s another exhibition I want to see. So much to do in Kyoto!

Busy!

I’ve been very busy since last week, so much to do…

I went to two exhibitions, one with nihonga, Japanese-style paintings, and one with contemporary art. The nihonga exhibition is a biennial exhibition that was established in 1898, and I’ve been there before. This time, there were only two or three paintings that touched me, a pity.

The contemporary art was by Mika Ninagawa (and team) and it was 10 rooms of art installations. Some of them were with projections and films, others with tangible art. My favourite room or “picture” as she called it was 1500 strings with crystals hanging from the ceiling, meant to represent the sparkle of life. I thought it was especially uplifting and cheerful, standing out from the rest of the exhibition, which was very colorful as a whole. As I mentioned on my x account, I got the only black and white postcard…

Besides that, my friend from Tokyo visited me, and we went on a tour through a sake brewery not far from Demachiyanagi. The tour was quite short because the brewery is one of the smallest in Kyoto, but it came with sake tasting afterwards. Sadly, they are not open in the evenings, and I’m not into day drinking at this time, but I’ll keep them in mind if and when I need gifts for friends in the future.

Last weekend I went to one flea market and one handicraft market and I had a blast chatting with the vendors. They would’ve appreciated me buying stuff, but there’s only so much money I have right now.

Next Sunday is Setsubun and while I would love to go to a lucky bean scattering at a shrine, there is also the next BATI-HOLIC concert in the evening… I’ll have to do some careful planning for this one.

Death March on Mt. Hakkoda

Jiro Nitta

In 1902, war with Russia seemed imminent in Japan. In order to prepare and gain necessary data for a winter campaign in Siberia, the Japanese military in Aomori Prefecture conducted a training mission in late January: 210 Japanese soldiers were sent across snowbound Mt. Hakkoda. En route of what was planned to be a short excursion of no more than three days, insufficient preparations and an unclear chain of command met with the worst blizzard of the century, leading to the death of 199 of the men involved.

This “documentary novel” presents a fictionalized account of this tragic incident, which, once word gout out, caused a public outcry that was nonetheless forgotten once the war with Russia started two years later. Equally forgotten was the fact that a much smaller group of soldiers crossed the mountain from the other direction at the same time; however, their planning proved sufficient, so they did not incur any losses.

This book describes both campaigns in great detail, from the planning stages to the soldier’s provisions and outfits, and the aftermath. It also uses survivor’s accounts and military documents (as far as they were available in 1971) that add veracity to the fiction. Yet, the author takes some liberties also. The biggest is certainly the rivalry between the two groups, ostensibly set up by their commanders, but entirely fictional. However, even for the surviving group, the march was harrowing, and Nitta does a great job documenting this.

Jiro Nitta is the pen name of Hiroto Fujiwara, a popular writer of historical novels. Born 1912 in Nagano Prefecture, he became a meteorologist and worked at the Japan Meteorological Agency. After retiring from the JMA, he began writing, many of his books are connected to mountains or mountaineering themes. He received the 1955 Naoki Prize and died in 1980 in Tokyo.

For a touching account of one of Japan’s greatest military losses in peace time, the book is available at amazon.

Cat Apparition

In Japanese folklore, cats occupy a special place. While often depicted as beloved pets and protector of “their” humans, they are also thought to have an affinity for ghosts and the other side. And I’ve just had an eerie encounter of the feline persuasion myself.

Since it’s quite cold in the house at night, Pumpkin sleeps in my bedroom. The other day I had been in bed reading when I needed to go to the toilet. I didn’t want Pumpkin to follow me – it takes him ages to settle down again – so when I closed the fusuma, I made sure the gap was small enough so he couldn’t slip through.

However, just a couple of minutes later, I found him behind me in the bathroom after all, and when I asked “Hey, how did you get out,” he disappeared in the direction of the entrance. So far, so good.

Imagine my surprise when I got back upstairs and Pumpkin sat in the bedroom peering through the narrow gap of the fusuma with a peeved look on his face because I left him behind. But I had seen him downstairs just a minute earlier.

What happened? I have no idea.

Maybe he did get out after all, but as I said, he disappeared in the direction of the genkan and certainly didn’t pass me on the stairs. Maybe it had got too late and my tired mind played tricks on me.

Or maybe, just maybe, my dear Pumpkin knows how to create astral projections. That could come handy, actually. Sadly, I doubt h would tell or even teach me how to do it.

“Little New Year”

Today, January 15, is koshogatsu, the “Little New Year”. Traditionally, koshogatsu coincided with the first full moon of the year, and while this is not the case any more since switching to the solar calendar, there happened to be a full moon yesterday. And I managed to get a semi-decent photo of it, sadly it doesn’t show the lovely pale orange color it had among the clouds.

Anyway, koshogatsu still marks the end of Japan’s New Year period, so people are supposed to remove their New Year decorations. Some people bring them to their shrine in the neighborhood where they are ritually burned in a ceremony.

I’ve never decorated my entrance for the New Year – other than putting up the current zodiac animal – but I had an old ofuda charm from last year. So, I dutifully returned it to the shrine, but there was no ceremony to get rid of such items.

Instead, I walked in on a private ceremony. A couple was sitting in the closed-off part of the main shrine building, where usually only priests may enter, and they received a blessing. Afterwards, they were putting a green branch of a special bush in front of the deities. I am not sure what kind of ceremony it was; both of them were dressed in black, so it might have been related to a funeral, perhaps? Since I didn’t want to intrude, I left after having watched so far.

I always thought that all funeral ceremonies were Buddhist in nature, but I recently learned that this is not the case. Apparently, there are families who practice Buddhism according to one of the many sects, and there are a minority of others who practice Shinto. Obviously, serious believers would not change to the other religion for any occasion, and the ceremonies and rituals for childbirth, coming of age, marriage, death etc. are very different. I have not delved too deeply into this – talking about religion is difficult even in English – but it’s certainly a topic I’d like to learn more about.

Hyakunin Isshu

For you,
I came out to the fields
to pick the first spring greens.
All the while, on my sleeves
a light snow falling.

Emperor Koko, 9th cent.

This is a poem from the Ogura Hyakunin Isshu, probably the most famous of all collections of Japanese poetry. The name can be translated as “One hundred people, one poem each” and this anthology of waka poetry was collected in Kyoto’s Arashiyama district. There, at Mt. Ogura, was the home of Fujiwara no Teika (1162-1241), himself considered one of Japan’s greatest poets.

He selected many poems by his contemporaries, but also by famous older poets whose work had been handed down for many years, among them 20 women. While there are many other anthologies of waka poetry, it is believed that this one became so famous because of the fame of Fujiwara no Teika – and because he had just the right connections to the Imperial court.

Writing waka poetry was one of the courtiers’ favourite pastimes, and to this day, the emperor himself gives out the prize for the best new year’s poetry. Most of the poems contained in the Hyakunin Isshu are love poems, and many of them allude to a time of the year using words like “cherry blossoms”, “full moon”, “crimson mountains” and others.

The poems and their writers have garnered lots of attention over the years; both feature prominently in woodblock prints or are alluded to in other Japanese works of literature. Since the Edo period, they also have a connection to the New Year in the form of the karuta game.

Karuta is a game of memory, where, when hearing the first half of a poem, the players must find the card with the second half as quickly as possible. There are karuta clubs throughout the country, and therefore, the poems of the Hyakunin Isshu are known by practically every Japanese. At home, it’s usually played as a team of three people – one who reads the beginning of the poem, and two who are trying to find the other half of the card as quickly as possible.

Since 1904, there is also competitive karuta, with the main tournament being held at Omi shrine in January, and roughly 50 other tournaments being held throughout the year. In Japan, there are more than 10,000 competitive players, and the game is even considered a sport.

The Hyakunin Isshu has been translated numerous times into a number of languages. Each translation brings a new aspect to the poetry, yet, there are many hidden meanings that are not only hard to translate, but may fly over the head of the unsuspecting foreign reader. For example, would you have guessed that the “first spring greens” in the above poem (translated by Peter MacMillan) are the nanakusa – seven herbs that are gathered and eaten on January 7 for a healthy winter?

I’m back!

Happy New Year again!
I hope you had great holidays and time for some rest.

It’s been a while since I posted, so I have fully recovered from my cold/COVID by now. Unfortunately, I had to deal with other health issues. It seems that I picked up a habit of needing a doctor just before week-long holidays.

This time it wasn’t cat-induced, but instead a tooth that caused pain in half of my lower jaw – never mind that said tooth has been dead for decades… So I had to see my dentist just before he closed for the New Year to get antibiotics, painkillers and a height adjustment of said tooth’s ceramic crown. Everything was fine by New Year’s Eve, thankfully.

The other thing that happened was last Saturday, when I woke up with a shoulder so painful that I couldn’t lift my arm all day. I’m not sure if Pumpkin chose to sleep on it or if it was simply exposed to the cold room all night. It took two nights with hot patches applied to the sore spot to get better. And I’m now sleeping with a (summer) scarf, just in case.

What else happened… A group of my English students bought me a new eto, a little zodiac animal; it already lives in my genkan. It’s super cute, isn’t it?

For hatsumode this year (the first shrine visit of the year) I went to nearby Hachidai Jinja where I bought a lovely goshuin stamp with snake motif and an omikuji fortune slip. Apparently, I will have excellent luck (dai kichi) this year (I’ll need it, trust me.)

The rest of the time I spent sleeping and reading and puttering around in the house. And now real life is back: My accountant paid me a visit on Monday; on Wednesday, BATI-HOLIC had their first concert of the year (with a great crowd this time).

And today, we had hatsuyuki, the first snow of the year. No pictures because I had an early appointment, but there wasn’t much snow anyway. At noon, when my appointment was over, it had all melted away again. Obviously, the house is very cold now; when I got up today at 8:30, it was zero degrees in my bedroom.

Sadly, my plans of spending the afternoon working at some nicely heated cafe were scuppered: The ones in the city were crowded (it seems other people have cold houses too) and the one near my house was closed after it was open during New Year. Oh well. Next time.