Return to Japan

The Last Two Days

I woke to a warm, rainy day. It was my birthday. I've always considered one of the fundamental rules of the universe to be that it's sunny on my birthday. I could feel the fates battling throughout the day, with the will of the Japanese weather (it was, after all, the rainy season) vying with my own personal birthday law. After a rainy morning, the weather Gods contented themselves with a slow sporadic drizzle. As a compromise I found this to be barely acceptable.

Traditionally dressed Japanese ladies take a stroll along a rainy Nara street.

I headed down to the station, where I left my bag in a locker. The Tourist Information stand there connected me with a guide. This most excellent system allows students to practice their English by showing tourists around the city.

My Nara city volunteer student guide, Aya.

It being rainy, we started at the Nara National Museum, where a host of statues, many of them more than 1000 years old were on display. My favourite piece, and one of the highlights of the entire trip was a 1200 year old life-sized wooden statue of a monk. The lifelike wrinkles on the face of this old man were enhanced by the cracks in the blotchy old wood. The other great statue was that of the King of Hell, whose angry eyes were made with quartz crystal lenses with gold leaf irises and cloudy quartz whites. Although the statue looked as ancient as it was, the eyes looked like they had been made yesterday.

It is not unusual to see monks begging in busy shopping areas.

From there we went on to Gangoji temple, a mere shadow of its former self. It used to be a 4km long temple complex, but now is a single temple and 'relic museum'. It was still impressive. The temple contained statues and icons of religious significance, in front of which people had left offerings of food. The most interesting thing inside the museum was the small statue of a very clever advisor to the Emperor. Legend has it he could listen to twelve conversations simultaneously, and make sense of all of them. X-rays of this statue have revealed that it contains an object of some kind. No-one knows what it is, but it's made of metal, and it's shaped like a lamp.

During the Tanabata festival bamboo branches are set up in main pedestrian areas, festooned with decorations. People write their wishes on pieces of paper, and hang them in the branches. In Nara, a Japanese girl wishes (left) to be cute , to do well in her tests, and for the world to live in peace. Japanese schoolchildren (right) get involved by making their own decorated branches.

By this point it was lunch time, but I was done with walking around. I bade farewell to my guide then headed into the shopping area of town where I found a seat and rested for a while, reading my book. Following my rest, I cruised one of the shopping arcades, just people watching. What made it particularly special was the decorations for the Tanabata festival. Bamboo branches had been tied to the lamp-posts, on to which people had tied wishes. I even found a table with a pen and pieces of paper. I wrote out a wish and tied it onto a nearby branch. We'll see if it comes true.

A temple to Benzaiten, the goddess of good fortune, is paraded through the streets of Nara. Time is kept with woodblocks, cymbals and shouts of "Sayah Sayah" ( MP3-270KB).

I even got to see a religious procession. I'd actually made the plan to catch it since (with my guide's help) I'd discovered about it that morning. A large group of girls walked a temple through the streets, all the while chanting "Sayah Sayah", which I found out doesn't really mean anything, but if it did, it would mean "Go, Go". They even energetically bounced up and down with it at one point. On questioning, I found out that it was for a goddess called Benzaiten. Later that evening the procession was repeated, this time with the addition of children who pulled their own, somewhat smaller, alter.

Young Japanese girls, dressed for a religious ceremony, kill time by playing a rhythm game ( MP3-138KB).

Having no energy left for random exploring I settled down with my book again, and killed time until I met up with Natsumi and her friends, with whom I was to eat that evening. We went to a chicken restaurant, where I ate chicken salad, chicken wings, fried chicken skin, chicken stomach, chicken soup and even raw chicken. At the next table there was a group of drunk salarymen who really seemed to enjoy the fact that I wasn't from around there. They even bought me a glass of Sake.

Drunken salarymen relax on a Saturday evening at a chicken restaurant.

After the meal I headed into Osaka. I was determined to spend my last night at a capsule hotel, which had been the cultural highlight of the last trip. I had been looking forward to it for almost a year. I managed, however, to get off the train one station early, so I didn't know exactly where I was. It was great that I had got off where I had though because there was a large square just outside the station in which teenagers were practicing their dance moves. I stood and watched for a while, and there was a broad spectrum of styles ranging from the guys in helmets and kneepads who were break dancing to groups of girls who were bopping together to pop music. There was even a couple of guys there who seemed to be doing ballet! The most interesting thing about this group was that there wasn't any music playing.

Train station become a hive of youth activity in the evenings. Young people congregate in the open spaces after rush hour to sing (top MP3-158KB), dance (bottom), practice skateboard tricks or just hang out.

I checked into the capsule hotel and quickly headed out into Osaka to take a few pictures of the night life. The area around the hotel was bustling with people. Neon signs, giant TV screens and computer game arcades abounded. I didn't see too many bars. I am under the (perhaps mistaken) impression that there's more of a restaurant culture here.

A noodle shop in a lively night spot in Osaka.

Returning to the hotel, I had a bath in the communal bath house/sauna, which was just as much an experience as it was last year. Being in a room full of naked Japanese men is somewhat disconcerting, but add to that the presence of fully clothed, middle aged, female attendants, and the experience becomes downright surreal. Following my bath, I sat up for about an hour while I waited for my camera batteries to recharge. I finally got to bed at about 3am, and set the alarm for 8. I wanted to have enough time to have a wander around and eat sushi the next day.

A capsule hotel in Osaka refuses entry to those with tattoos, the traditional mark of membership to the Yakuza, or Japanese Mafia.

The next day I was out and about by 9:30, and wandered around the covered street which seemed a lot quieter than I'd seen them before. Things picked up at 10am, when things started to open. Large lines of people that had formed outside of the pachinko parlors started moving, and the streets filled, even though it was a Sunday.

A cyclist weaves through a busy covered street in Osaka.

And I managed to get a breakfast of sushi. I've decided that sushi is one of my favourite foods. The sushi bar I went to was pretty full despite having been open for only 15 minutes. The hands of the sushi chefs were a blur as they kept the conveyor belt stocked. Despite being noisy and having an undeniably busy atmosphere, I found the experience incredibly restful. The hustle and bustle was so well-ordered that it was relaxing to watch.

A sushi chef works to keep the conveyor belt stocked with a variety of raw seafood.

It was still a little early, but I boarded a train to the airport, and arrived with plenty of time to do a little shopping before my flight, then I sat down and wrote out the postcards that I had bought on my first day in the country and mailed them home. I was one of the only people waiting by the gate for my flight, and had just enough left in my book to take me though the 90 minutes that I had to wait, when it was announced that the flight was delayed by three hours. We did get a free snack and a carton of juice though, so it wasn't all bad.

Gazing wistfully at an airplane that isn't taking them. Flight delayed due to change of aircraft.

Having only carry-on baggage is certainly the way to travel. When we arrived in Korea I dashed ahead of the crowd getting off the aircraft, and managed to be the second in line at immigration, clearing it in record time. Customs eyed me up and down, but waved me through. I guess I have a trustworthy face. I walked to the bus stop and bought a ticket for the Daejon bus that was leaving two minutes later. It was the smoothest, fastest run through an airport I'd ever experienced. No waiting at all. What a great way to end a vacation.

If you enjoyed this report, please leave a comment in the guest book.

Back