I was pretty exhausted, having carted myself all around Tokyo, then Kanazawa, and then spending the whole day yesterday on trains, trains, and trains, I was ready for a break. I did a bunch of laundry, wrote some blog entries, and watched the Japanese coverage of the Olympics.
This was a pretty interesting thing. The NHK (which is like the Japanese CBC) has exclusive rights to the Olympics here in Japan. What that means is, they control all the stories of Olympic success. In Canada, we tend to focus on lifestyle stories. If someone had to overcome some great adversity, or had to defeat a long-time friend in order to advance, had help from their mom or was mentored by a former olympic great - it doesn't matter which country the athlete comes from. We'll cover it. In the states, the coverage is about heroes. If there's someone who's going to become a legend, break an unreal record, or someone who keeps going undefeated, they'll cover it. Regardless of where they're from. In Japan, they focus on...Japanese athletes. That's it.
We watched a swimming race, and it was just an early qualifier. The Japanese girl who was competing came in dead last, and was eliminated from contention. Immediately, the NHK was there to interview her. Now, you're not allowed to cry in Japan. It's not permitted really...it's too great a show of emotion, which is only allowed if you've completed an enormous accomplishment. Win the gold, you can cry in front of your country, and you will be celebrated. Come in last, and you'd better not shed a tear, because that would not be proper. This poor, poor swimmer is trying desperately to hold back her tears, meanwhile she's being put these absolutely brutal questions. "Why do you think you failed?"
Merciless.
The time difference doesn't help either. All that means is that highlights such as the 8th place swimming loss will be replayed all throughout the day. It's not a success, or really something to celebrate, but because it's the home team, it will be watched. Granted, Michael Phelps was the exception to this rule, and he received some coverage as well. But he's the only one.
I didn't really know where to go from there...I did my laundry, hung it up all over the apartment, burnt some toast in the fish-cooker, and drank a cold Yebisu beer. It was a nice day off from all the heavy vacationing. I didn't even really go outside until much later in the day...I sort of wanted Lindsay to colour my first impression of the town. I'd heard so much about it through her, and I didn't want to start off my experience by coming to my own conclusions...which is slightly odd, because normally that's all I want to do. I waited.
My clothes dried in the humid air at a snail's pace, and the olympics moved from swimming, to badminton, to judo. Eventually I heard a bit of a commotion, and Lindsay came home from work. She of course had designs on me experiencing her town in Kochi.
So Lindsay's town is called Tsuno-cho (cho meaning town) and it's about 3500 people. She'd seen some of the locals out fishing in the river, so we hurried out to see if we could catch some photos of them in action with their waders on and their 30 foot poles. Sadly, we arrived just as they were packing up, but we caught one or two quick shots.
On the walk back to Lindsay's place, we ran into some of the littlest kids in town - she teaches at middle school, high school, and also kindergarten. The kindergarten is right next to her apartment...literally within fifteen feet...and so sometimes she's ambushed by the babies on her way home. This time, we got to do the ambushing, having spotted them from across the road.
They all were quite happy to wave to us from afar, but much more shy and reserved when we went and approached them. They loosened up after a few words from Lindsay, and let us take a few photos.
Lindsday and I piled in the car so she could show me what it was that really tied her heart to this town. First we stopped at a little viewing spot by the roadside, where she'd told me was her favourite spot in the whole village.
Reminds her of the "Great Valley" from The Land Before Time. I could see that. We cruised around the "downtown" of Tsuno a little bit, before heading up the side of a mountain in order to see some of the windmills up at the top.
After close to an hour of twists and turns, and an exciting tanuki sighting, we arrived...in the clouds.
Digression: A Tanuki is a real thing...I thought they were a Japanese myth for most of my life, because they figure strongly in Japanese mythology and culture, but I learned this year that they are a real thing! Anyone who's played the original Mario game for NES remembers the Tanuki suit, a bear-looking suit with a raccoon tail. These animals are native to Japan, and the name Tanuki essentially means "Raccoon-Dog", and that's what they are. They just look like odd Raccoons. I didn't get to see it very well as it scurried across the road, but it was pretty neat. They're very funny and odd elements of mythology too...they have hats to protect against bad weather, a sake bottle that represents virtue, oversized testicles that for some reason represent financial luck, and a promissory note that represents trust, or confidence. There are statues of them in lots of places, the same way you see that lucky cat with the coin everywhere you go.
Anyway: The sky. It was an amazing place to visit. I couldn't believe it was even possible, but looking up, and seeing the clouds crash into the side of the mountaintop like so many waves, was surreal enough...but actually arriving at the top, and stepping out into the clouds.....I didn't even know what to say.
It was like something out of a fantasy novel, but I assure you...this is a real place that actually exists in real life.
There was even a small shrine at the mountaintop where people go to take small offerings in order to wish for success, good luck, prosperity, and a good future. They might toss a five yen, or fifty yen coin (they're lucky, after all) next to this small marker in the sky, and let their wish fly. There was quite a stack, and it was quite an effort to surmount this goliath of the earth, and further effort still to get to the shrine itself. Otherwise it's left to a lucky toss to get the coin where it needs to be...and I suppose that's sort of in the spirit of the wishing after all.
The big windmills paid us no mind, and went on turning at their own pace, as the clouds pushed past in a hurry to make the sunset. They really filled out the mountaintop, and looked like they were having a conference of their own...I felt like a bug must feel, landing on a human leg at some important meeting.
We headed to a nearby Onsen, which for those who don't know, is a Japanese hot spring. This was another dream realized, because there's nothing romanticized more in Japanese media than the meditative value of the hot spring. The feudal lord visits the onsen to ruminate on going to war. The samurai visits the onsen to prepare his mind for battle, or for suicide. The martial arts master takes his hotheaded student to the onsen to cool his nerves, and the young adolescent goes to the onsen to determine just how he's going to ask out that girl he likes.
Onsen are divided by gender of course, and everything's public so there's no modesty and no secrets. You check your bathing suit at the door, wash in the public bath, and then you can sit outdoors in the hotspring, and look at the stars. They're highly popular in the winter, because there can be snow on the ground, and you can sit in naturally ground-fed water and watch the flakes sizzle into vapour on the top of the water in front of you.
Even in the summer, I was highly relaxed. I mostly had the place to myself, and the two guys that were there kept their distance from the strange westerner. It was just great, out in the mountains there's very little light pollution and so there's a plethora of stars. There's also silence. Silence is precious, and anyone who lives in the city or in the suburbs will know how hard the quiet hits you whenever you're up at the cottage, or out of town. It's so sudden, and so strong...to quote a favourite film of mine...it wakes you up in the middle of the night, it's so quiet. It's just amazing, and that compounded with the heat, and the feeling of weightlessness in the water...it was highly, highly rejuvenating after a long stretch of extensive travel.
• • •
After the Onsen, we were heavily relaxed. We were also late. So we meandered at top speed across the parking lot into the car, to hurry off to Lindsay's friends place to watch a well-heralded bad film: Bird-demic!
In Yusuhara, the neighbouring town, we met up with Lindsay's friend and fellow JET Kavita who settled us into her living room, with a giant electric frying pan so we could watch footage and make stir fry at the same time. We put together a good spread, as we watched a movie that is easily the worst film ever made...on par with "Alien Apocalypse" and well worse than "The Room". It was a lot of fun, as all of us were expecting the terribleness and we were laughing heartily as we tore the film apart. Dinner was delicious, the company was awesome, and the film was just excellent-ly bad.
It had gotten quite late by the end of the film, and Kavita had things to do early, just as Lindsay had to get up to work, so we headed back to Tsuno-cho and after a brief Olympic update, headed off to bed.
It was an excellent introduction to a very different Japan. I'd seen two small towns, living conditions at home, some of the local scenery and a wee glimpse at the locals. I was excited to get into the heads of some of the kids, some of the teachers, and have a look inside one of the local schools in rural Japan. I'd imagined myself attending one of these all my life...and I couldn't wait to finally step inside, exhale my preconceptions and inhale the summer air.
-Jeff
No comments:
Post a Comment