A Year in Japan

March 2003

Sunday March 3rd (I discovered later), was Plum Blossom Festival Day. I had offered to walk up Mt Tsukuba with UK Jamie and when we arrived on the slopes, we noticed a lot of Japanese visitors. Following them, we found the first orange/white plum blossoms on the trees. The usual stalls of food had been set up and a formal tea ceremony was going on. Gangs of males photographed young Japanese female models who posed next to the blossoms. Its funny how they all get so excited about blossoms. We had a splendid walk up the long route through the forests to the upper slopes where snow lay in the hollows and on the trail. It was a muddy descent down the steeper route. Another new experience today was being able to see both the tall buildings of Tokyo and snow capped Mt Fuji from Mt Tsukuba.

On my day off, the following Wednesday, I zipped down to Tokyo to visit the Edo Tokyo Museum. Edo was the name for Tokyo during a 260-year period of strict feudalism and national isolation under the Tokugama Shoganate. It was a time of peace, stability and cultural and economic growth that ended with the arrival of the American 'Black Ships' and the Meiji Restoration in 1867, when the city was named Tokyo and began its transformation into a modern, industrialised capital. The museum charts the history of the Edo period, during which time the foundations of the modern city were laid and takes it through to the 1964 Olympics

The futuristic 1993 building itself is supposedly based on an old traditional warehouse, standing on four gigantic legs. It looked like a massive concrete spaceship had landed in downtown Tokyo. I don`t know another city that has a building like this. It is 62.2m high; supposedly the same height as the former ancient castle of Edo. To gain access to the upper floors, you access an escalator encased in bright red plastic. The lightness turns into darkness and you feel as if you are entering a spaceship.

Photo of Edo Tokyo Museum
Photo of Edo Tokyo Museum From The Air
3D 360` Panning Photo of Edo Tokyo Museum

The permanent exhibition is housed on the fifth and sixth floors detailing the history, culture and daily life of Edo Tokyo. The floors are divided into zones. The Edo Zone focuses on the 15th to mid 19th century, while the Tokyo Zone looks at the mid 19th century onwards. There are original and replicated exhibits, as well as large scale models, faithful representations of their originals.

When you start at the 6th floor entrance you are met with the sight of a massive area full of buildings but dominated by Edo`s first wooden bridge which you walk over(over looking the lower floor) to the start of the exhibition. Nishi Hashi Bridge had a length of 51 meters and a width of 8 meters. The replica at the Museum is of the same width as the original but of half the length. It looks spectacular.

I won`t bore you with a comprehensive list (oh yes you will Bob) but there are some excellent photo links to illustrate the sights rather than describe, The Edo Zone contained 1/30 scale models of the magnificent residence of a 17th Century feudal lord and 1/30 scale model of greeting and waiting rooms of Edo Castle, the Shogun`s residence. Both were destroyed by fires.

The original city was divided into `wards` which had gates that were shut at night. A buried wooden aqueduct supplied water to wells in the city which by the 18th Century had reached 1 million people. The 1/60 scale model of a ward was in reality the same size as the 17th Feudal Lord`s residence. The people were packed in like rats into `split houses`. Essentially, these were long buildings divided into single rooms. An entire family would share one small room. Wells and toilets were communal and men took away the `night soil` (Japanese shit shovellers). They were packed so tight, with paper thin walls dividing the households that this was one reason that the Japanese, having to live on top of one another, learnt to act very polite in public and try and maintain harmonious relationships.

There were a couple of huge, very realistic, dioramas with thousands of tiny people going about their daily life. `The West Side of Ryogoku Bridge` was very impressive. A life-size reconstruction of a Kabuki Theatre facade was particularly beautiful. There were also some colourful Kubuki theatre costumes. I had witnessed this traditional Japanese theatre one morning in Tokyo. There was also a miniature working model of a Kabuki theatre demonstrating the hidden secrets of the stage. There were a couple of ornate portable shrines on show (the kind that are carried around during the festivals).

Moving across to the Tokyo Zone, western influences begin to creep in. There was a model of "Itcho Rondon", or in English, "London Town". Built in 1890 by the Mitsubishi Company, the offices were designed to look like those of Lombard Street in London. An entire building which was formerly a newspaper office had been relocated to the museum. "Moral Education for Women" is a title you'll find amongst the many schoolbooks on display. But then in good Tokyo-style, just around the corner, is a large and somewhat enlightening exhibition devoted to Edo's pleasure quarters. The exhibits are truly striking, but tastefully done of course.

There was a 1/25 scale diaorama of Ginza `Brick Town`. The first Japanese skyscraper, Ryounkaku Tower had been reconstructed on a 1/10 scale. This 12 storey tower built in the 1890`s was made of bricks but broke apart during the Great Earthquake of 1923. The section on the Earthquake had footage of the damage and a day by day flickering display of the fires that raged across the wooden city. 57,000 people were fried on the first day alone. The earthquake and fires destroyed most of what I had seen up to that point.

There was an interesting section on the Tokyo air raids during World War Two. This included a resident`s room during wartime. Tokyo air raids started in 1942 and the city was subjected to 120 of them over the following three years. The biggest on March 10th 1945 cost some 100,000 people their lives in just one night! A staggering statistic. Post war Japan, and hi-tech Tokyo emerges. The exhibits include early television sets, washing machines and hoovers and a modern house, with "western style furniture" Moving on, and memorabilia commemorates the 1964 Tokyo Olympics. It was the best presented museum I`ve visited in Japan; for pure scale of the exhibits alone. Every exhibit had comprehensive English information. Upon entering I had been handed a 60 minute tour leaflet. Some hope. I spent 5 hours there and learnt more about Tokyo in one day than I had read about it in a year. Thoroughly recommended.

Nearby I watched an illegally parked Mercedes get towed away. Two policewomen gave instructions to a couple of guys who rushed around inserting a metal bar under the rear wheels, dragging the car around and hitching it to their truck. The policewomen laughed and timed them "Less than 10 minutes. Not bad". After the car had been towed away, one of the policewomen scrawled down some details with chalk where the car had been parked telling the poor sod where he could find his car. Which was nice.

The following Sunday, I made my final excursion in Japan. I caught an early train down to Tokyo and climbed aboard a Shinkansen `bullitt` train to Yokohama. These were nicknamed `bullitt` trains because of their speed and the smooth rounded design of the front locomotive. They have been around since the 1960s and are one of images you have of Japan. The top of the range range trains average 260 kph outside the cities. They are the fastest trains in the world and they are renowned for their punctuality and reliability. But you pay for it. It costs more to catch a Shinkansen to say, Osaka than flying there. My 15 minute ride to Yokohama cost £7. It was the shortest journey I could make on one. They have separate station areas and platforms and dedicated train lines. On the platform I walked past the lengthy sleek white snake to the front for a photo. The train on the next platform had a long protruding aerodynamnic nose that looked very 21st Century. It was just like climbing into an aeroplane and just as smooth. I sat in a virtually empty `non reserved` carriage, with reclining seats and acres of leg room. We pulled out of Tokyo Central station and flew between the endless bland Tokyo concrete jungle with the train reflected in the dark plate office block windows. It was tempting to fall asleep, but I was on the `Hiraki` train to Hiroshima which would only stop 6 times. If I missed Shin Yokohama, the next stop was Nagoya, 300 km west and a fistful of money to pay for the mistake.

Photo of Shinkansen Train
Another Photo of a Shinkansen Train

At Shin Yokohama, I checked out two sights. Firstly the Raumen Museum. This well designed museum cum restaurant is devoted to Japan`s most popular fast food, in its most basic form, a noodle soup garnished with roast pork, bamboo shoots and dried seaweed. The museum`s first floor delved into the roots of raumen, tracing them back to southern China and then chronicled the moment in 1958 when instant raumen (chicken flavoured) was launched on the world followed in 1971 by cup noodles. Dull statistics included the fact that in 1993, the world consumed and estimated 22 billion bowls of raumen. As if we care. In the UK, we call the stuff Pot Noodle, (called `Noodle Cup` in Japan) a popular if derided snackfood. Just add hot water to get an instant bland flavourless cup of crap. I always felt that Pot Noodle was the biggest argument to contradict Charles Darwin`s `theory of evolution`. And noone likes to spend 10 minutes walking past every kind of Pot Noodle ever marketed as I did here. The leaflet said `The collection of over 300 raumen noodle bowls from throughout the country is quite a sight" (Not!).

However, the basement of the museum was a completely different affair. I was transported into the 1950s downtown Japan. It was a careful reproduction of Shitamachi; an old 1958 downtown setting. Below me lay a city square at dusk. Lights were coming on in the shops and vendors called out their wares under grimy film posters. There were gaudy neon signs of pachinko parlours, bars and shabby households, complete with laundry hanging from the clothes lines. I walked around the mezzanine`s dingy alley of wooden buildings, before heading down into the courtyard, where each storefront hid a restaurant from Japan`s most famous raumen regions; Fukuoka and Kumamoto(Kyushu), Sapphoro (Hokkaido) and Tokyo. The leaflet said "Fill your empty stomachs with bowls of scrumptious raumen noodles". I had tried them all on my travels. which was just as well. At 10.30am on a Sunday morning, every restaurant was packed with slurping diners and there were lines outside. I counted 200 people lining up patiently, just to get into one place. Not my idea of a relaxing time. There is a big difference between fresh raumen (which is pretty good) and the instant stuff. But its still all noodles to me. Give me a plate of chips anyday. I felt the whole thing was very well done and I could see it`s appeal. Little Hong Kong at Tokyo`s Bay Area had obviously tried to copy this place but came nowhere close.

Nearby stood the 72,000 capacity International Soccer Stadium, which was built for the 2002 World Cup and hosted the World Cup Final between Brazil and Germany (Noone likes to see Germany taking a beating! ha ha). It is the largest stadium in Japan. There was a large Sunday morning flea market set up around the stadium. Checking out the souvenir shop, I discovered 2 x 1 square inches of the World Cup Final football pitch, housed in a clear plastic moulding and ambitiously priced at about £12 each plastic lump. Perhaps someone can work how much they could potentially sell the entire pitch for if there were enough idiots to buy the stuff. Shin Yokohama lies about 4 miles from Yokohama Central Station and I decided to walk it. On a clear blue windy morning, I climbed up to a temple on a hill and saw a snow capped Mt Fuji dominating the distant horizon.

Down by the bay, I caught sight of the brand new Minato Mirai 21 (MM21) area skyline and went to explore. In a bid to beat Tokyo at its own game, Yokohama now boasts Japan`s tallest building and largest ferris wheel, and is in the process of creating a nonstop, high tech international city of the 21st Century which is rapidly changing the face of the city. A mini city of hotels, apartment blocks, offices and cultural facilities will eventually occupy over two square kilometres of reclaimed land and disused dockyards. Scheduled to be completed by 2005, the bulk of hotels, conference facilities, shopping malls and museums are in place, but there were cranes everywhere erecting new buildings.

A kilometre long covered moving walkway took the Sunday visitors from the nearest train station towards the 296 metre tall Landmark Tower. Inside, the world`s fastest lift takes you up to the Sky Garden on the 69th top floor in an ear popping 40 second ride. But I skipped the £5 charge and checked out the Landmark Plaza next door which consisted of a swanky shopping mall around a 5 storey high atrium.

Next door, the three steeped towers of Queen`s Square was another vast complex containing shops, offices and a concert hall. On the 17th floor were two walkways linking the three buildings. They were off limits but I sneaked up in a lift and walked across both for a great view over the ferris wheel which was stone throw away. The slowly revolving Cosmo Clock 21 is 112 metres tall and claims to be the world`s largest. With a capacity of 480 passengers, it takes 15 minutes to make a circuit. A twisty rollercoaster looped around the bottom of it.

The brand new massive conference centre stood east of Queen`s Square. It was dominated by the Intercontinental Hotel which is supposed to represent a sail, but looked like a gleaming white slice of apple. It was certainly the most revolutionary hotel design I had seen in a long time.

Photo of Intercontinental Hotel
Another Photo of Intercontinental Hotel

I backtracked to the splendid Yokohama Museum of Art. It looked very impressive from the outside; a long white two storey facade with decorative pillars lining the ground floor. The entrance was a tall triangular glass roof supported by two pillars. Inside it got even better with a magnificent expansive central atrium, the Grand Gallery, that spanned most of the length of the building with graded stages and staircases to the art galleries. 18 metres above, it was covered by a huge triangular glass roof, which bathed the cool grey stone in soft natural light. The building was great. The exhibits so-so but the sparten collection was well presented.

Down by the bay, it was very breezy. I walked past the Yokohama Maritime Museum which had various ships moored, including the 1930 `Nippon maru` which, sailing until 1984 covered a distance equivalent to 45 times around the world.

The old harbour area was clobbered during the War, but there are three remaining buildings from its hey day that have European style facades; the 1904 Kanagawa Prefecture Museum, the graceful 1918 Port Opening Memorial Hall which was a red brick Neo Renaissance Building and the biscuit coloured Customs House that was topped by a distinguished copper clad dome. Just up the road stood the ugly pink grey Marine Tower. The 106m high tower built in 1961 to celebrate the port`s centenary, is supposedly the world`s tallest lighthouse and you can catch a lift up to the top. Not that I bothered. It was an ugly spectacle which looked like a poor man`s Blackpool Tower

Several attractive gates marked the entrances to Yokohama`s most popular area; Chinatown. Founded in 1863, it is the largest Chinatown in Japan. Its streets contain about 200 restaurants and 300 shops and about 18m visitors pass through its narrow streets every year. Late on a Sunday afternoon it was teeming with people, but I didn`t bother to sample any of the food available. I`d be in China within 6 weeks where everything would be a third of the price. I did check out its most famous shrine; Kantei Byo which is the focus of community life. The shrine is dedicated to Guan Yi, a former warlord and guardian deity of Chinatown. There was a colourful ornamental gateway and writhing dragons wherever you looked. Inside, a long haired Guan Yi sat on the main altar.

Photos of Chinatown

My final sight was Yamate, the hilltop area where the foreign merchants lived and British army barracks once stood. From Harbour View Bridge, I, not surprisingly, had a panoramic view of the harbour and its graceful Bay Bridge. Foreigners cemetery stood on a hillside. Over 4500 people from more than 40 countries are buried here, the vast majority, British or American. I strolled past Japan`s oldest tennis club (circa 1870s) and the Eristmann Residence, a lovely early 20th Century wooden residence designed and built by one of Frank Lloyd Wright`s students. I think it was relocated here recently because it wasn`t in my guidebook.

After 7 hours of walking my dogs were barking. Leaving Yokohama in the dark, it looked very impressive at night. Overall, I still think that the Tokyo Bay Area is more impressive, but Yokohama is still worth a day trip to see another angle of 21st Century Japan.

I had a fortnight of teaching left, when my successor arrived. Chris was a cheerful 22 year old Brisbane boy who had never left Australia before and had never taught. He arrived with his girlfriend who also signed up to teach. His best mates Ben and Skye had arrived in November to teach and the four of them set themselves up as a social unit. Chris had two weeks `Observation` to get up to speed by the time I left. He came down to my schools every day and watched me do the endless introduction questions to get them warmed up and various exercises to give him a range of teaching ideas. (like picking up kids and hanging them upside down by their ankles). I gave him the low down on the students, the disruptive little bastards, the cuties, the interesting adults, the dull as dogshit adults. Within a couple of days, Chris was firing off introduction questions and joining in on the activities. He ran around the classroom with the kindergarten kids and really got into it, establishing a good rapport with the kids who really took to him. As the final week wore on, I let him take over more and more of the classes and I`d nip outside the classroom and read a book while he took the strain. He was very complimentary about my teaching, saw that I was very popular and could provide him with a wealth of ideas and experience. I felt a bit like a Vietnam Vet who was just finishing his tour and the `rookie` had just arrived. It was the teaching version of the `Platoon` movie. Some kids and adults were sad and gave me presents like flowers, filter coffee, socks, chocolate etc. The kindergarten mothers gave me a huge bouquet of flowers. Really useful when leaving the country!

I attempted to arrange my departure flight and came up against a Japanese paper chasing bureaucracy. Flying to Seoul, South Korea, it was the same price, one way or return. However, if I got a return ticket, Japanese immigration would not let me LEAVE! the country unless I had a re entry visa (since I have foreigner residence status here as opposed to a tourist visa). How can a country stop you from leaving? That was a first. If I wanted a one way, the travel agent would not sell me a ticket unless I had a Korean visa in my passport, even though I know that you automatically get a free 30 day visa when you arrive in Seoul. So I had a choice of going down to Tokyo to get a Korean visa or up to Mito to purchase a re entry visa I`d never use. Doh! I didn`t have time to do Tokyo before teaching so I spent a morning on trains up to Mito, Ibaraki`s capital, and had the rentry visa in my hands within 20 minutes. The excursion cost me £25 just to leave the country! At least I got to keep my Gaigin card as a souvenir.

On top of that I couldn`t get a cheap flight out of the country because of the National Holiday on the 21st. The next available cheap flights were on the 23rd, which meant sitting around 3 more days. I was impatient to get back on the road. Jill had decided to come to Thailand on June 1st for a holiday. It meant I had 10 weeks to cover South Korea, Eastern China and Taiwan. It would be a rush to pack it all in but I couldn`t wait.

According to all travel insurance companies, I was entering a War Zone (yeah right!), and noone would insure me to travel around South Korea. So I guess I`m not covered for the next month. These people should get out a bit more.

My final day`s teaching was the 17th. After my final lesson with Yutaka, (a Director of the Fisheries Division at the Institute of Agriculture) he took me to an izakaya for a Japanese meal of raw fish, sushi, yakatori and warm sake. That night, the sole remnants of my social group stayed up until 5.30am. Everyone was envious that it was all over for me and escape was imminent.

My flat was inspected the following morning, and I moved into Jamie`s. He had so much gear (I`d given him most of my stuff, plus everything that he`d already accumulated) that he felt like Del Boy Trotter (English TV comedy) sitting in a room of dodgy gear looking for someone to buy the stuff. I dropped off the car, and took to my bicycle to get around. On the 19th, Kip and I took a drive into the snowcapped mountains 3 hours north of Tsukuba. On my last morning (20th), I had breakfast with Luke, the teachers` supervisor. Luke had always come through for me when I had had a problem and I was very grateful for his help over the last few months. After collecting my final payment he dropped me at the bus station and I left for Narita airport. I`d been in Japan for 371 days. I`d given the place my best shot and didn`t expect to return. The final update contains my observations and conclusions about my year in Japan.