experiences – Page 18 – goinggaijin.com

Eruption

When people hear about a natural disaster happening in Japan, they most often assume that it’s another earthquake. And with an earthquake happening almost every day, they are mostly guessing correctly. What is often forgotten however, is that Japan is also the home of many volcanoes, and most of them are just dormant and can erupt again at any time.

This is just what happened late yesterday night, when Mt. Asama erupted and sent a pillar of smoke some 1800 metres into the sky. Mt. Asama is 2568 metres high and one of the most active volcanoes in Japan; the last eruption was 10 years ago. Since the volcano is on the borders of Gunma and Nagano prefecture, it is a popular hiking spot, but the region is not very densely populated.

Still, the government has forbidden access to the volcano as a whole, and is trying to evacuate all hikers that are in the area. Judging from the youtube video below, taken today, the situation has cooled down a little.

See also this interesting article at Kyodo News, which is relatively level-headed and includes a great map of the many other (and so far quiet) volcanoes in the area and a link to the Japan Meteorological Agency and their volcanic warning page just below the map.

Inspirational

I’m back from my “holiday” that I spent at home – and at a number of cafes just to get out of my apartment for a few hours in the hottest part of the afternoons at least. I was relatively lazy last week (up to 38 degrees didn’t help) but I read a few books, did some apartment maintenance (aka ironing and cleaning), and spent too much time on youtube.

I also got busy looking at color schemes for future website improvement and I now have a new list of “things I’d like to do for What’s up in Kyoto“. As if I needed a new and improved – and significantly longer – list there…

An interesting highlight was meeting a friend of mine and catching up with her. The last time we met was several weeks ago at a small cafe where neither of us had been before, and where they happened to look for part-time staff. Now my friend is working there! She spends maybe half the year abroad, so she needed something flexible, job-wise. Interestingly, she was considering another, more corporate job as a translator as well at the time, but chose the cafe after all. She said she had never worked in a restaurant before and wanted to make that experience and try it out.

We had talked before how I came to Japan and how I left everything behind, and that if it didn’t work out, I could always do something else. So, she knew about my journey to Kyoto. And then she suddenly said: “You inspired me to try something completely new as well!”

I am amazed and humbled and a bit embarrassed to inspire people to do anything. Probably because there are many days when I don’t feel particularly inspired myself.

Week Off

Yesterday morning, when checking my schedule for this week, I noticed that I don’t have a single work-related appointment this week. Even my Japanese teacher has called a holiday. This hasn’t happened since New Year! So, I decided to take the week off. I’m not going anywhere, and there are still a few things I need to do (because it’s the end of the month), but I have decided to take it extremely slowly this week.

It helps that it’s very hot as well right now. Summer has arrived with about 36 degrees for the rest of the week, so it’s not as if this is a good time to work anyway. I have a few personal projects I’d like to push forward and I’d like to go out with friends. Today I already visited one of my favourite cafes where I did some serious flirting with the cute waiter (who casully asked me to show him on google maps where in Austria I was from, and even more casually mentioned that he was married to the owner of the cafe. Talk about sending mixed signals?) And on Thursday I will be visiting the Tamayuran again to see off Kyoichiro. I’m curious how much he’s grown.

I’m not sure if I’ll be posting the rest of the week (it’s nice to have a break from posting too every now and then), but you can definitely expect a new post next Tuesday. Have a great week too!

Summer!

It’s much later than usual, but finally today we had the first day of summer! It was sufficiently hot (36 degrees), humid (75%) and sunny (I even got a sunburn on my way to the city) to be called a decent summer day. And there was a nice shower in the late afternoon to cool everything down before the evening – I’m calling this a perfect day!

And it started off well too. I went to one of the museums I’d like to feature as a What’s up in Kyoto monthly highlight soon, and everything went incredibly smoothly. I had my own tour guide even before I had explained why I was coming, everything went easily in English, and when I asked for an interview with the museum’s director I got an immediate “consider it done”. All I need now is to come up with a time and date. Perfect!

Afterwards, I went to a local gallery that has a large rack full of flyers and event advertisements. I only recently discovered the place because it’s a bit out of the way of my usual haunts, but these are the places where I can leave my own postcards for my website. So I went there, scoured the flyers for new ones, and then went to the office to ask if I could leave my own. “Sure,” the man in charge said. Usually, these places have a limit on the number of flyers or postcards they take, but when I pulled out my pack of about 50 cards, he said “oh, just give me all of them, it’s fine.” Perfect!

In the afternoon, I went with a friend of mine to Shimogamo Shrine where the yearly Mitarashi Festival is ongoing. You have to wade through the cold stream, light a candle on the way and place it before the shrine at the end of the pond. It was very nice and refreshing, just as planned. Perfect!

And afterwards, we went to my favourite chocolate place to buy just before they are closing down for their summer holidays in August. We even got 20% off because there are only a few days left and they want to get rid of as many chocolates as possible, obviously. Perfect!

So you see, my first day of summer this year couldn’t have been better. Let’s hope it’ll stay this way!

Ofunehoko

Yesterday, for the second year, I was working as a volunteer at the Ofunehoko, the last big float of the second Gion Matsuri Parade that is taking place on July 24th in the morning.

I felt a bit more confident this year, being there before and most of the things we had to do were the same. This year, the visitors to the second floor of the Ofunehoko house and the Ofunehoko itself had to take care of their own shoes, which was a great relief since this was a very stressful job last year. Also, every one of us could spend some time inside the Ofunehoko house, which meant: sitting down for a while! Even if it’s just sitting in seiza, taking the weight off the wooden geta and not having to stand for 6 hours straight is quite a relief.

Even though there were much fewer people this year (probably because of the bad weather), it was still fun to sell the chimaki and the upstairs tickets and the tenugui… Interestingly, most of the foreigners dropping by yesterday were Italians. Unfortunately, only a single one of my friends visited me, but it was the one who introduced me to the Miyakogusa group and made the whole thing possible in the first place. I felt quite honored that he would come and see me.

As a reward for our work, we all received a free chimaki upon leaving – the paper bag that goes with it is almost more interesting. A chimaki is a charm that is usually put up at the entrance door or in the genkan of a Japanese house to prevent evil from entering. Interestingly, there were even young Japanese people who asked about the meaning of the chimaki, which I found a bit odd – it seems such a fundamental thing here in Kyoto that I can’t believe this is not done everywhere else in Japan. I will investigate…

Gion Matsuri

Gion Matsuri, probably the biggest party in Japan, is going on right now. Today is yoiyama, the night before the big parade with food stalls and music and fun throughout the inner city – and I didn’t go. I guess I’m getting old…

Or maybe it’s because I’m involved in the second half of the Gion Matsuri now myself, or because it really is so traditional that things don’t change anymore, or because I’d like to see a few things I didn’t so far and have to be careful with my work and free time…

However, I am planning to go to town tomorrow evening, when the shinko-sai is taking place and the gods of Yasaka Shrine will be moved to their temporary resting place in the Otabisho. I have an appointment nearby just before and if it is not raining, it will be fun to watch the people of the neighborhoods walking with the mikoshi and yelling “washoi” to spur each other on.

Tamayuran

This afternoon I had my weekly English class, and we usually meet in the shopping mall next door. As I mentioned before, the mall is being extended, and many shops are closed, even at parts of the mall that have nothing to do with the extension. They want to have the big “renewal open” in December, and I’m looking forward to it! At the moment the place looks like a ghost town with large parts dark and closed off. It’s not a nice place to have English classes …

Additionally, today it was very noisy, so we decided to go elsewhere. My student/friend suggested to visit the Tamayuran, a small cafe near Kyoto University. The owner rescues cats of all ages, and my friend picked up a 10 year old cat there a couple of months ago, which is how she got to know the Tamayuran in the first place.

So, we went to see cats. And: I’m in love! It is the season for baby cats, and there were six or seven in the cafe, from youngsters who are a couple of months old and very playful to a tiny little one that’s probably less than four weeks at the moment. Here is little “Kyoichiro Yoshida”:

https://www.instagram.com/p/ByuPa6spJ50/

He’s a bit bigger now, some two handfuls of kitten, but sooo cute and lovely and he was first sleeping and then crawling around in the big box he was in and when I picked him up he started crying but then he liked being stroked and got cuddly and he’s so tiny still with blue eyes and …

*cough* Sorry.

So yes, he’s very cute, but already spoken for! Somebody from Tokyo will come down next month and get him. Personally, I like cats of all sizes, but I think grown-ups are easier to care for, especially if they are potty-trained already. But since I’m not allowed to have cats here anyway, the point is rather moot.

Even without the cats, the cafe is definitely worth visiting. I had a wonderful milk tea and my friend and I shared a enormous peach parfait. It was delicious! The Tamayuran is open from 12:00 – 18:00, closed on Wednesdays. They serve a daily lunch, toast and sandwiches, and the seasonal parfaits are to die for (says my friend). I will definitely visit again, I think what the owner is doing is commendable and I’m happy to support her.

Find lots of pictures of the Tamayuran – with a certain focus on cats and food – on their instagram page above.

KimOhNo!

As you probably know, a certain self-absorbed woman (whom I shall not name) from the US has recently announced a new line of underwear that she wanted to name “kimono”, of all things. I’m definitely not one who’s waving flags on the “cultural appropriation” bandwagon, but even I would say that was a bad idea to begin with. And as if it couldn’t get worse, said self-absorbed woman from the US had plans to get the name trademarked. Don’t even get me started on that one…

Anyway, the idea caused a veritable shitstorm on the internet, and many of the people involved were Japanese, who otherwise let foreigners get away with murder. But not with naming stuff “kimono”, apparently. The outcry was bad and loud enough that even Daisaku Kadokawa, the current mayor of Kyoto got involved in the issue. Even though modern Japanese don’t wear kimono in their daily life anymore, and many of the cheap summer kimono are now made in China, Kyoto is still the main producer of high-end kimono in Japan. As in former days, the Nishijin district where kimono are painted and obi are woven is still a major part of Kyoto’s industry.

So, it is only natural that the mayor of Kyoto got involved, I think. Especially since he is one of the few men who are still wearing a traditional kimono every singe day. And in the end, he – and all the other Japanese who complained – won an earned victory. Of course, part of the appeal of modern society is that you do things publicly, and therefore, he posted a number of letters pertaining to the affair on his facebook page. Here are four letters, in English, and in chronological order, the last one a letter to the League of Historical Cities, which is interesting in itself.

https://www.facebook.com/kadokawadaisaku/photos/a.722619441108370/2318978978139067/

https://www.facebook.com/kadokawadaisaku/photos/a.722619441108370/2325711274132504/

https://www.facebook.com/kadokawadaisaku/photos/a.722619441108370/2325713274132304/

https://www.facebook.com/kadokawadaisaku/photos/a.722619441108370/2327444103959221/

Impulse

Last Saturday, I took a trip down to Takeda, south of Kyoto station. It takes quite a while to get there from my place, and it’s not really the nicest part of town to visit, so I waited for the perfect timing to go to three events and not just one.

First, I visited Jonan-gu Shrine. It has a beautiful garden in two parts, and last weekend was the Nagoshi-no-Harae summer purification. Usually, this ancient event takes place only on June 30th, but Jonan-gu is one of the few shrines where they have a hitogata ceremony the week before. The ceremony is easy and DIY: you take one piece of paper in human shape, touch your body with it (left shoulder, right shoulder, then blow on it) and then you set it afloat in the shrine’s stream. The idea is that all your illnesses of the previous six months will be taken down to the sea together with the paper.

So I went there for the purification ceremony and it was easy and fun to watch the paper dolls float down the stream. They would never make it to the ocean though since they were fished out at the end of the garden. The paper will then be dried again and ritually burned, so there is some ceremony involved in their disposal. Unfortunately, I don’t have pictures of this. Although I brought my camera, I had a scatterbrained moment and didn’t load the SD card…

At the next stop, photos were not allowed anyway. I went to the Kyocera gallery were they had an exhibition of their Picasso collection. In summer 1968, Picasso made 347 prints featuring women and sex, and the Kyocera gallery owns a full set (the second printing out of 50). Even though at this time there was only the second half on display (Japanese museums often change their exhibits midway through an exhibition), I found the images very interesting. They were numbered chronologically and you could see the shifting interest of Picasso throughout these months.

In the second floor of the Kyocera building there is the Kyocera Museum of Fine Ceramics, but you will not find many vases and tea bowls there. Fine ceramics are industrial type ceramics used for example in cars, rockets, solar panels etc. Making them requires high precision and more knowledge of chemistry than the regular potter will ever need. Since I am a science nerd, I loved the exhibition. There was so much to see – including a full-time line of Kyocera – that I was overwhelmed quickly and had to leave. I will come back though, promised!

My last stop was at the Kyoto Antique Fair. I love browsing through the many different stalls and looking at (if not for) things. I have been there several times, and it seems that there are some sort of waves as to what is for sale there. This time, I found a huge number of cloisonné items, something I only now recognise after I did the piece on the Namikawa Cloisonné Museum for What’s Up in Kyoto. And, wouldn’t you believe it, there was even one booth selling pieces made by Namikawa Yasuyuki!

Seeing them up close in all their glory was mind-boggling! How did he manage so much fine detail 100 years ago? The seller said that they didn’t really know, and that even nowadays, his art is unmatched. Of couse, since Namikawa Yasuyuki was the Japanese cloisonné artist, his pieces were completely out of my price range. Just to give you an idea: the smallest vase they had, about 5 cm in height, went for 1.6 million yen. Not just pocket money, is it…

Well, I did not come home empty-handed after all. There were a few things that tempted me and that were still within my price range. And I went for something unusual. For me, at least. But, I mentioned it before somewhere, I am fascinated by shakuhachi, traditional Japanese bamboo flutes. And, so I bought a very cheap second-hand one for just 7000 yen.

I have heard that playing the shakuhachi is extremely difficult, and indeed, I am trying to get a sound of this thing since last Saturday. Sometimes it works, and then I try to cover a single hole and then I have to start again. Fun fact: I am not a very musical person, the only thing I am good at playing is CDs. Also, one of my friends once called me tone-deaf. Which is not going to make things easier. But hey, what is life without a good challenge every now and then. So, let’s try this and see what happens!

Encounters With Kyoto

I have reason to celebrate: I can now call myself a “published author”. Yay!

As I mentioned before, since last November, I am a member of the group Writers in Kyoto, as the name suggests, a small group of writers who live in (or around) Kyoto or have some other connection to Kyoto and who write in English.

This year, for the third time altogether, the group has put out an anthology to which the members of the group were invited to contribute. There was also a writing competition that was free for everybody to join. About half of the Writers in Kyoto members have sent in short stories or poems or non-fiction essays – and I’m one of them!

And, our book “Encounters With Kyoto – Writers in Kyoto Anthology 3” is now available on amazon in paperback! An e-book version is in preparation and there’s lots of fun stories to read. For example, there is a very interesting non-fiction piece on ropes made with human hair that were used to lift the wooden beams of Higashi Honganji Temple – some of the ropes are still on display there. Or the lovely poems full of childhood memories by a local Kyoto lady. And then there’s my essay about a Japanese garden I was not supposed to enter… My personal favourite is a fun piece on an encounter with yakuza – in the sento to boot!

Last Saturday the group met for the official book launch in Umekoji park near Kyoto station. We had sake and local and international snacks and then some of the authors went on to read their pieces from the anthology. It was my first time at a group meeting, so I decided to read my piece by way of introduction. People seemed to like it, or at least the liked my reading, so we had something to talk about afterwards, thank goodness.

It was fun to meet other English speakers in Kyoto, some of whom have lived here for decades, some of whom have just arrived; some of whom I have heard about from friends, others I would have never known otherwise. And it was fun to meet so many different people – and to find out interesting things we have in common regardless.

I realise that this self-promotion is a bit of an unusual book post for a Sunday, but I really enjoyed working on my essay and reading the other contributions. If you’d like to check it out – and I promise there are better writers in it than me – as I said, it’s available internationally on amazon.