All Things Japanese – Page 41

Koyo

Few things draw the Japanese masses as easily as nature viewing. I have written about this phenomenon in my article on moon viewing in September, and it is well known even outside of Japan that the Japanese are crazy about cherry blossoms in spring.

Now is another time of nature viewing – the time of koyo, viewing the autumn colours – not just any colours, but those of the maple. The momiji or Japanese maple has small, almost dainty leaves of about 4 cm length, which are induced – by a drop in temperature below a certain threshold – to turn from green to yellow to orange and finally to a blazing red. This change can occur quickly and it is a rather short lived beauty. Right now the red momiji are on their peak, and Kyoto is packed with (mainly Japanese) tourists who go around exclaiming kireii – pretty at every step and seem to take pictures of each individual leaf.

Well, when in Japan… here are a couple of my own pictures

The Castle of Crossed Destinies

Imagine the following: It’s Japan, at the end of the 17th century. You are the shogun, the most powerful person in the country. Everything runs well, you have a lovely spouse, an attractive concubine, and a countless number of admiring – and admirable – courtiers. But then, your one and only heir dies unexpectedly from a disease – and suddenly securing succession for your family by producing another heir becomes paramount. The usual courtly intrigues are reaching a new peak when the only solution is to ramp up your sex life, but…

…what if you’re a woman?

This film, based on a manga, turns history upside down by assuming matriarchy throughout 17th century Japan. The 5th shogun, Tsunayoshi, is a woman who desperately endeavours to conceive a daughter to secure her family’s succession on the throne. Interwoven with her story is that of Emonnosuke, a court noble from Kyoto who enters Tsunayoshi’s services as potential mate and remains at her side throughout her difficult task.

The Castle of Crossed Destinies (Ooku Eien Emonnosuke), 2012, 124 min
Director: Fuminori Kaneko
Cast: Miho Kanno (Tokugawa Tsunayoshi), Masato Sakai (Emonnosuke), Toshiyuki Nishida (Keishoin)

The old problem of succession seen from a completely new point of view. Even in matriarchy, taking a different man to bed each night is frowned upon, and it does pose quite some difficulties for Tsunayoshi. Some true historical facts are hinted at, like the ban on killing dogs, but the film lives mainly from the reversal of the sexes and the elaborate costumes and stage designs. There is a lovely happy ending, though…

This film is available in Japanese from amazon, but I have not found a version with subtitles.

Court Music

Last Saturday I was invited to a performance of Gagaku – traditional Japanese Court Music. Gagaku is an ancient form of music; it was imported – together with instruments – from Korea and China around the 8th century, i.e., at the start of the Heian period.

A Gakagu orchestra consists of wind instruments (different types of flutes), string instruments (zither, lute, and harp) and different types and sizes of drums. There are often three parts to a concert: one where the whole orchestra plays together, another one containing songs and actual singing, and a third one where only the drums and wind instruments accompany classical dance.

I went to the performance not really knowing what to expect. When everybody had settled down (the place was sold out), a young girl came on stage and made a short introduction before the curtain lifted. There was an orchestra of maybe 30 people, sitting on tatami in a stage that was fenced off with red wood like in a shrine. The percussion instruments were in front, the strings behind them, and the wind instruments in the very back on red steps. They started with the kangen, concert music, and the effect was … striking. It was similar to the music I had heard before at shinto shrines; I would call it rather a sequence of tones that were more or less attuned to each other than a melody that you could follow to help you along. The second part was a short introduction to a song that was contained in the brochure, in the end the whole audience was expected to sing along with the teacher on stage. It was fun, even without understanding Japanese (or being able to sing…) During the break, the stage had been rearranged for the third part, the bugaku, or dance music. The string instruments were gone, and the musicians now sitting to the left and right of the tatami stage in the middle, where the dancing took place. The dancers, clad in elaborate costumes, performed slow dances fitting the music, almost like the stylised movements in Noh theatre, or, as a friend of mine observed, resembling the slow movements in tai chi.

The whole concert took only 90 minutes, and to be honest, I was rather happy about this. It was interesting and worth a try, but nothing I really need to do again. The music could not move me at all, as I said there was no melody at all to help you along or make you understand the intention of the song. I liked the songs in the middle, but that was only a 10 minute intermezzo. The dancing would have been more interesting had I known what the movements meant. That was similar enough to Noh to expect that with some deeper understanding you could get something out of it though.

Maybe there is something more to it, I have to confess complete and utter ignorance here I’m afraid. I know, however, that I’m not the only one: the lady sitting next to me, after taking off her shoes, fell sound asleep within the first five minutes of the concert. Or, maybe, she just had had a hard day?

Gosho

When the capital of Japan was transferred to Kyoto in 794 (then known as Heian-kyo), the emperor’s living quarters were called the Dairi imperial residence. When the Dairi was destroyed by fire, the emperor moved his private residence to the palaces of other noble families in the city. Clearly, it must have been a great honour for those families, and the number of imperial (ex-) residences (or Sato-dairi) in Kyoto makes it easy to believe that the emperor was rather forthcoming with this kind of favour. From the latter half of the Heian period (794 – 1185), the original imperial residence fell into disuse, and the emperor moved for good into the Sato-dairi. In 1331, emperor Kogen was crowned in a Sato-dairi called Tsuchi-Mikado-Higashi-no-Toin-Dono, and subsequently, it became the new imperial palace, the starting point of today’s imperial palace or gosho. It remained the residence of the emperor until 1869, when the imperial household left Kyoto and moved to Tokyo after the Meiji restoration.

The imperial palace, like many parts of Kyoto, was destroyed by fire several times in its 500 year history, it was often reconstructed, but also new buildings were added throughout. So, when you visit the palace, there are many different architectural styles to be seen, starting from the bright red buildings with endless corridors of the Heian time to the Otsunegoten, the emperor’s private residence in the Shoin-style of 1590. The latest addition to the palace, however, is the Shinmikurumayose – a new entrance for carriages that was built for the 1915 enthronement ceremony of emperor Taisho.

When you enter the palace grounds through the Gishumon gate, you first pass the Okurumayose entrance for dignitaries and then you see the Shodaibu-no-ma, a waiting room, or, rather, three adjacent waiting rooms, decorated according to the rank of the people who would have to wait there for their audience.

Other than those visitors of old, you have to take a more roundabout way: You pass the Shinmikuru-mayose and the red Heian-style corridors to get to the Nikkamon Gate leading to the Shishinden, the most important building of the palace. It was used for enthronement ceremonies for example, and there is the Chrysanthemum throne in the centre and the smaller empress’s throne to the right of it. Sitting on the throne (no, you’re not allowed to enter any of the buildings), you behold to the South a large Japanese Zen-style “garden” of raked white gravel, the only living things in there are a cherry and a mandarin tree.

You then move past the Shishinden to the Seiryoden, a reconstruction of the emperor’s residence built in the 8th century, where the emperor would receive visitors. Opposite the Kogosho and Ogakumonjo-buildings (for meetings with lower ranking people and lesser ceremonies in general), there is a beautiful Japanese garden called the Oikeniwa.

Its pond is meant to resemble the sea, pebble beach included, but the red koi do not quite fit that image. Finally, you get a glimpse at the Otsunegoten, the private residence of the emperor. It is the largest structure of the palace grounds with 15 rooms and faces the Gonatei, the emperor’s private garden. This is the end of the tour and you exit through the Seishomon gate.

The Imperial Palace covers an area of about 110.000 square metres. It is enclosed by a wall, and lies inside the Kyoto National Gardens, which covers more than 900.000 square metres and is enclosed by another wall. To visit the palace, you must first register with the Imperial Household Agency. You can do this either online or in person in their office in the garden. You can go as late as 20 minutes before a tour, but it’s better to be early. There are currently two free tours in English from Monday to Friday. Don’t forget your passport! Check out the homepage of the Imperial Household Agency for more details.

Capsules

As you know, I went to Tokyo last weekend. As I had to go on relatively short notice, the hotel chain I usually stay in was booked solid down until Yokohama. Not willing to pay 12.000 YEN and more for a single night – the Shinkansen ticket was expensive enough – I decided to go the other way and booked – for 2.200 YEN – a place in one of those (in-) famous capsule hotels!

A capsule hotel, if you want so, is like a dormitory but with a bit more privacy. You get your own capsule, which is a hole in the wall of about the size of a bunk bed. There are usually two stacked on top of each other and you have to enter at the head or pillow side. A capsule is very basic: Besides a futon or mattress and sheets for it; a TV may be there as well. Facilities are shared, and that’s why many capsule hotels only cater to male guests, although some have own floors reserved for women. Besides towels, yukata, and slippers, no further service is offered, meaning you will not get breakfast there. Usually however, there is a communal room somewhere with vending machines, microwaves, and even computers.

So much for the theory, this is what I knew beforehand. Here is my personalized version of the adventure…

Upon arrival at the Hotel Asakusa and Capsule and after some struggling with the reservation name, I first had to buy a ticket from a vending machine opposite the front desk for the price of the accommodation. After filling in my name on the ticket, I had to put my shoes in one of the small lockers near the elevator and put on slippers. In exchange for the shoe locker key I received the key to my capsule, or so I thought. Equipped with keywords for the electronic locks and pointers to the women’s bathroom, I went up to the 6th floor and found my capsule to be one of 34 in a rather dark corridor to the left of the elevator. Right of the elevator were housed the toilets and a washroom.

Each one of the capsules was just as I expected, they had a sort of curtain instead of an entrance door (I guess it would have been too claustrophobia inducing inside otherwise, as only some of the capsules had little windows, but not mine); they key turned out to be for the closet inside the capsule, which had space only to hang two shirts. It was certainly the smallest closet I had ever seen, although I have to admit that some of the Japanese business hotels I’ve stayed in did without them altogether.

Anyway, besides the closet, the concrete capsule was equipped with a futon, pillow, and blanket, and on a shelf on the foot end stood a tiny pay TV (100 YEN/hour), with earphones discretely but in plain view located beside it. There was a light, a telephone to call the front desk, and a small ventilator which I actually did use later on because the space became stuffy rather quickly. Also provided were towels and a yukata – after all, the hotel did have one floor dedicated to a sento. I found the capsule rather spacious, it had a size 1.2 x 1.2 x 2 metres, which was enough (for me at least) to sit without bumping my head. When I lay on the futon, I could not touch the ceiling with my hands, so I did not feel claustrophobic after all, but maybe – as the hotel was a bit older – newer ones are smaller?

Looking at the picture, you will notice that there is certainly not enough space for any type of luggage, regardless of its size. Clearly, it is not a good idea to leave anything in the capsule while you’re out and about, so different sized lockers were available in the basement – for an extra charge, of course. Other add-ons were a “dining” room equipped with water cookers, microwaves, vending machines, several computers providing free internet and a TV. An interesting bit of information – provided via a notice in the elevator – was that you had to do the vending-machine check-in every day again, even if you had booked for several nights.

All in all, I found the experience very interesting – a bit dorm-like with more privacy. It was very clean everywhere and warm and quiet. Everybody was very considerate also, I only heard the other guests as they were leaving in the morning, and the place was also fully booked. I think this is certainly something to do again – provided I don’t have to get dressed decently and put on makeup again, the washrooms had terrible light…

Jidai Matsuri

Yesterday was the last of the three big festivals in Kyoto, Jidai matsuri (the other two are Aoi and Gion matsuri). Literally the name translates as Period Festival, but it is better known in English as the Festival of the Ages, and that although it has a history of rather short 120 years only.The first Jidai matsuri took place in 1895, 1100 years after Kyoto had become the capital of Japan, and only a few years after it had lost that place to Tokyo when the emperor moved his household there. Jidai matsuri is – like most of the festivals in Japan – connected to a shrine, and in this case it is Heian shrine (named after the old name of Kyoto: Heian-kyo) , which is a 2/3 scale replica of the former imperial palace, was built also in 1895, and enshrines the first (Kanmu) and the last emperor (Komei) that had Kyoto as residence.The idea behind Jidai matsuri is to showcase not only Kyoto’s history, but that of all Japan, and this is done with a long costume procession “back in time” from the Meiji era through the long Edo period of peace until the famous Heian era. About 2000 people form the procession, wearing traditional clothing, not only the well known ones of famous samurai going to war or court ladies of leisure, no, also normal people in their work clothing and straw sandals, are walking the streets of Kyoto from the imperial palace to Heian shrine.Of course, there are additional props that can’t be missing: samurai on horses accompanied by stable boys and soldiers on foot with weapons ranging from the long rifles of the Meiji era to the swords of the earlier periods. Court ladies in lavish kimono comprised of several layers were carried along on platforms or walk underneath large umbrellas. People carrying flowers or offerings for the shrine followed two mikoshi that held the spirits of the two emperors mentioned above, and a large wagon with undetermined contents was drawn by a black ox. And in between, large groups of people were playing music – on seemingly modern flutes and drums at first, then on instruments that I have only seen during religious ceremonies, and finally there was a lone soldier blowing on a horn made from a large shell.There is an enormous amount of attention paid to every detail of every costume: from the appropriate hairstyle (sometimes accomplished using wigs) to the clothing itself (some of the samurai wore loudly clanging heavy armour) and all the accessories (helmets, jewelry, war fans and weapons, ladles and buckets to water the horses) down to the footwear – boots and sandals made from rice straw. It is a real joy to watch, and it takes – nomen est omen – ages until the procession passes by any one point – more than two hours altogether.What I found most exciting though was that the participants of the procession gathered on the pathways of the imperial gardens before the start, so you can watch the participants getting dressed, having lunch, or posing for pictures – some of them even selfies 😉 This was different from the Aoi festival in May where the procession started from within the palace and the participants were not seen before. Somehow the fact that they were just gathering “in the open” so to speak, gave me the feeling of a rather relaxed, fun thing – as opposed to Aoi – but maybe that’s because Aoi is more of a religious ritual than Jidai matsuri?

Nijo Castle

One of my favourite places in Kyoto is Nijo-jo, the state residence of the Tokugawa shoguns of the Edo period. It is situated pretty much in the centre of Kyoto, southeast of the emperor’s palace, on Nijo-oji dori. It has been started on orders of the first shogun, Tokugawa Ieyasu, in 1601, but was completed only in 1626, under Ieyasu’s grandson, the third shogun.

The whole complex of Nijo-jo comprises 275.000 square metres inside a wide moat, but only 8000 square metres are built upon. There are actually two castles on the ground, the inner citadel called Honmaru is surrounded by a moat, and on the grounds outside of it, in the eastern gardens lies the actual residence of the shogun, Ninomaru, the second citadel. The Tokugawa shoguns actually resided in Edo, today’s Tokyo (hence the name Edo-period), but still they needed to show their wealth and influence in Kyoto where the emperor resided as well, lest the people would forget who’s actually ruling the country. All of Nijo castle is built from wood, and despite it having burnt down and been rebuilt just to be damaged by typhoons, it is still a highly impressive site.

When the first moat is crossed, you enter Ninomaru palace through the Kara-mon gate. Ninomaru was designated as the residence of the shoguns (should they ever want to stay in Kyoto) and it is comprised of five buildings, all connected with corridors. As a visitor to the shogun, your entrance would be closely watched, and how far you would get inside the buildings would be determined by your rank – in Japan even then hierarchy was everything. You would start out by entering the retainer’s waiting rooms tozamurai-no-ma, go further to the formal reception room shikidai-no-ma and from there move on to the grand rooms ohiro-ma. Only very important people, for example messengers from the emperor would be allowed further into the inner audience chambers kuro-shoin.The total floor space of Ninomaru palace measures 3300 square metres, divided into corridors and 33 rooms covered by more than 800 tatami mats. Each of the large rooms are divided into smaller rooms by sliding doors, and the rooms are named after the paintings on those doors. All of them are lavishly decorated with gold and exquisite paintings of plants, trees, or animals, and on top of the doors there are intricate wood carvings, often looking different depending from which side of the doors you look at them. At the end of all the long corridors there are the shogun’s living quarters, the shiro-shoin. They are relatively modest in size, compared to the rest of the palace, and only female servants were allowed to enter there, obviously for safety reasons.

Many more measures were taken to ensure the safety of Japan’s ruler. For example, in some of the rooms where the shogun would be present himself, there are doors behind which armed men would wait for the faintest sign of distress to enter and protect their master. Many castles have these, and the doors are usually well disguised. Not so in Ninomaru though – the shogun did obviously not buy into the idea of discreet hinting – here those doors are well visible, and even decorated with big red tassels. The most interesting protective features of Ninomaru palace however, are its corridors. They are made of plain wood, but the boards are placed on nails in a special way such that each person walking on them causes the construction to chirp like birds – hence the name uguisubari – nightingale floors. Walking on them is quite some fun, not only for school kids, and the idea was to prevent intruders from sneaking up the corridors and launching a surprise attack.Crossing the second moat leads you to Honmaru palace. This part of Nijo castle measures 16800 square metres, and it was once the home of a palace similar to Ninomaru and also sported a large five-story castle. However, both buildings were destroyed by fire in the 18th century already, and there has been no attempt to rebuild them. The present Honmaru building once stood on the grounds of the imperial gardens and was moved here at the end of the 19th century. It is not generally accessible, so I cannot say anything about its interior.

The buildings are surrounded by beautiful Japanese gardens, three different ones stemming from three different periods: Ninomaru garden is the oldest, as it was constructed during the Edo period. Honmaru garden is the middle one, built in the Meiji period at the end of the 19th century, and the so called Seiryu-en garden is the youngest, having been constructed only in 1965.

As I said, Nijo castle is beautiful, if you come to Kyoto, it is one of the places you must not miss! Nijo-jo is now a property of Kyoto city and has been open to the public since 1940; in 1994 it has been designated by the UNESCO as World Heritage Site. Unfortunately, because the paintings in Ninomaru are 400 years old, it is not allowed to take any pictures there. A few photos can be found on the official Kyoto city website for Nijo castle though.

Classes

I had a rather busy weekend. On Saturday there was my soroban class (I learned division), and on Sunday I took my first Japanese cooking lesson.

We were about 25 people, both Japanese and foreigners, and we made a variety of Japanese dishes: Chestnut rice, clear soup with mushrooms and tofu, grated radish with cucumber and chrysanthemums, a stir fry with Okinawan bitter gourd and bean curd, yakitori – skewered chicken – as main dish, and the almost obligatory anko rice balls as dessert.

The class lasted three hours and started off with a short introduction by the teacher, an old lady who had lived in many places in Japan, including Okinawa. In the quickest Japanese I have ever heard, she explained how each dish was to be made, and then we were sent off to three tables and were left on our own. English recipes had been provided though, and the groups were mixed so there were always Japanese people to help.

I chose to prepare the dish from Okinawa (I had eaten it in a restaurant a long time ago) which consisted only of bitter gourd goya, pre-fried tofu, miso paste and sugar, fried in a pan. I was in the team with a Japanese man and as we both did not seem to be the chatty type – although he was very friendly – our dish was the first one ready. I then had time to help with other dishes, clean a little, and take photos.

When everything was ready, we set the table for everyone – in a cleary prescribed way of course: rice and soup at the bottom, just above the chopsticks, the meat in the centre, the two side dishes to the top left and right of the meat, and the dessert yet a bit further on top. With an additional cup of green tea we were ready to eat – and it was delicious! (Note: In the photo above, there is no desert because we only prepared eight, but the teacher was invited to our table… as I’m not a fan of anko, I gave my desert to her – and was rewarded with my own green tea pudding a bit later on ;-))

I greatly enjoyed the class, I am planning to go there again. Almost everybody spoke both English and Japanese, and the atmosphere was nice and relaxed. The only thing that is not optimal is the limited space for cooking, and that it is difficult to keep dishes that are finished warm until it is time to eat. But then again, my own dish was supposed to be eaten cold anyway, who’d have thought…

Shiroi Koibito

Last week, a friend of mine from Hokkaido (that’s the northernmost of the four main islands of Japan) sent me a little present. It is quite common in Japan to give consumable presents of sake, green tea, even fruit; and when people go on vacation or business trips they often return with local specialities as omiyage – souvenirs. Hence, I received what is considered as the classic present from Hokkaido – a large box of Shiroi Koibito.

Those are very thin cookies – cat tongues the French call them I believe – with a layer of white chocolate in between. The name translates as White Lover and the cookies are delicious!

Interestingly, except for the name which is written in Kanji, all other text on the box is in French – not that I speak that language any better than Japanese. Only when you open the box, does the writing indicate the provenance of the gift… I’m so glad my chocolate-free month is over 😉

White Night

Kyoto has 10 sister cities, and one of them is Paris. The idea behind sister cities is to foster cultural exchange, so, last Saturday there was La Nuit Blanche, the white night in Kyoto. For the third year already, there were exhibitions, performances and meetings of French and Japanese artists throughout the city of Kyoto – and Paris as well. The opening ceremony, starting at 7 pm. with the French minister of culture, took place at the Kyoto Manga Museum (of all places), then there was a projection of art onto Kyoto City Hall, and then there were many small events in art galleries and other places around the city.

I have to admit that I’m not very big on modern or performing arts – although I like photography and sculpture and make the occasional trip to see opera. Anyway, I decided to check out the white night regardless, and there happened to be an interesting performance in a house near Ebisu’s.

I arrived at the house – old Japanese style with a beautiful garden – shortly before one show, and as we were led through the house in a roundabout way to the stage, we had to pass through white woollen threads hanging from the ceiling or having been woven into something resembling spider’s webs. We took seats at the edge of a darkened room furnished only with tatami; there were more threads hanging from the ceiling, and in the middle of the room something lay, covered with a black cloth.

All of a sudden, music started, spotlights came on, and the “thing” began to move. There turned out to be a woman underneath the black sheet, dressed in white, with straight black hair and white makeup (like the one geisha wear) on face and arms, who was “chained” to the ceiling with the wool. She began to move more vigorously, finally broke her chains and disappeared though a side door. The whole performance took less than 10 minutes. As I said I am not very big on modern art, and this one made me shiver… All the time I had the feeling the creature was evil and rightfully in chains, and when she had escaped, that something very dangerous was now at large.

My housemate later explained that this was a special type of Japanese performing art, that it originated some time after the war and that it is centred on depicting primeval forces and on evoking feelings of fear in the spectators. It certainly did that for me, and probably for the Japanese spectators as well, as they were leaving very quietly, nobody clapped or gave any sign of appreciation of the actress. It was interesting, but more interesting it would be to find out why the Japanese are all so fond of ghost stories…