| Submitted by: Evelyn C. Leeper United States |
| Submission Date: 09 February 2005 |
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For some places, a guide book even a year old would be out-of-date, but Japan isn't one of them.)
Along the way we stopped and had a beverage from a vending machine: iced tea flavored with hibiscus, acerola, rosehips, and lemon. There is certainly a bigger variety in the vending machines in Japan than back home.
Next we arrived at Hachiman-gu Shrine. As the books say, this is quite a contrast to the Zen temples. While those are for the most part quiet and contemplative (with the exception of the children's games, of course), the shrine is a bustle of activity and noise.
Japan has two major religions, Buddhism and Shinto, and most Japanese apparently follow both. In particular, birth rituals and marriages are usually Shinto ceremonies, while funerals are usually Buddhist. But in other aspects as well, they co-exist in the same individual.
Shinto shrines are built on sacred sites, while temples (I believe) can be build anywhere. But what confuses everything, at least for the outsider, is that there are things referred to as shrines that are Buddhist. (One sees these in little corners in the city, for example.) Shinto shrines have a giant torii gate of circular uprights supporting one or two curved circular cross-pieces at the entrance (and it is often orange or red), while Buddhist temples have a more traditional carved wooden gate.
Shrines also have zigzag pieces of paper strung on cords hanging from trees, and votive plaques (of the sort I described at the shrine in Ueno Park). People coming up to the shrine clap their hands to attract the attention of the deity, and also throw coins as offerings into a large coin box and may ring a gong. This takes to make shrines a bit noisier, and when they are particularly busy (as this one was), the constant clatter of the coins flung into the box begins to make you understand why the Japanese are not troubled by the noise in a pachinko parlor.
(Since I suspect that Mark will an even more complete description of Shinto, I will omit it here.)
By this point we were pretty hungry, and luckily the shrine was right at the end of one of the main streets of Kamakura. Walking down the street we passed several 'plastic food' restaurants, and eventually settled on a noodle shop, where Mark wrote down the Japanese for the dishes in the window that we wanted. (This does somewhat limit you from ordering dishes with complicated kanji, but it works pretty well otherwise.) Since this was a tourist area, the prices were higher than yesterday-¥650 each for the soup, and ¥400 for six gyoza (dumplings). (I think the bowls may have been slightly bigger as well, though.) If you eat at places like this, food is not expensive in Japan. In fact, you can eat well cheaper in Japan than in Britain.
We also saw a couple of wedding processions. There was a Shinto one at the shrine, with everyone in traditional black and white Shinto garb. There was also one on the street where people were wearing more Western clothing; that one ended up at a Roman Catholic church.
After lunch we had hoped to take a bus to the Daibutsu, or the Giant Buddha. However, I took a look at the buses in front of the railway station and realized that I couldn't even figure out which bus stopped where there (they didn't seem to have numbers on the stops), and it looked like only about a kilometer or two, so I suggested walking. Mark agreed, or at least I thought he did, so we set off.
Following the maps we had was not all that easy, though, because there were no street names on them (or for that matter, any street signs on the streets either). Going by the shape of the streets, we asked in sign language a Japanese couple carrying a Japanese tourist map if the Daibutsu was ahead of us. They indicated yes, but a minute or so later I felt a tap on my shoulder. They had realized that we needed to make a right turn at the light and had run back to tell us!
The walk seemed longer in reality than on paper, but it did at least give us a chance to see a Japanese town out of the center of the tourist section. We passed several shoe stores leading Mark to comment that we must be in the ghetto. (The burakumin, the 'untouchables' of Japan, often deal in leather goods. This is one of the major remnants of the earlier class system-I don't think the Japanese today care about whether you are descended from a samurai or a peasant, but descent from a burakumin does still matter. To most Westerners it appears strange because the burakumin are identical genetically to the other Japanese. They are merely the descendants of people who were in professions such as tanning that were considered as 'dirty.')
We finally got to the Daibutsu. The last couple of blocks was easy to follow because there was such a crowd going towards it. It is within the grounds of Kotokuin-ji Temple (¥150), but sits outside. This is because the building in which it was originally placed was washed away in a tidal wave in 1495 (it was built in 1252), leaving it untouched. It has been repaired and reinforced over the centuries, and you can see evidence of this if you go inside. Yes, the Buddha is hollow, and for an extra ¥20 you can go inside. You used to be able too climb a small staircase to a platform at a window in back, but that is closed now.
There seems to be some disagreement about how tall this Buddha is. One book says over thirty-two feet (ten meters), another says thirty-six feet (eleven meters), and a sign there said forty-four feet (thirteen meters). Well, anyway, it was big.
Our last sight in Kamakura was the Hase Kannon Temple (¥200), also known as the Hase Dera Temple. It is known for its carved wooden statue of the eleven-faced Kannon, or juichimen, but I think may be better known, at least among tourists, as the temple where there are offerings for miscarried and aborted fetuses and stillborn children. Thousands of little statues are erected by their parents, and it's made more poignant by the way some have been dressed by them, with bibs, or pacifiers, or little toys beside them. Some are statues of Jizo, the patron saint of travelers and departed children, while others seem to be little stone statues of children, done in a style reminiscent of South Pacific cultures.
In addition to the prayer plaques, there were also small stones with one of two characters written on them left at the feet of various statues of Kannon, and sometimes there were several flattish ones stacked up. I have no idea what significance this has.
We walked back to the train station. This turned out to be a misunderstanding. I suggested waiting for a bus, and Mark said something which I interpreted to mean it probably wouldn't work, but apparently wasn't that at all. Anyway, we got on the train and dozed a bit from exhaustion on the way back.
We still had one more stop, since we had to change trains at Shengakuji Station. Shengakuji Station is named for Shengakuji Temple, which is dedicated to the Forty-Seven Ronin. Who are the Forty-Seven Ronin? Well, I'm sure Mark will give a long explanation, but let me give a brief one here.
A lord was provoked by an enemy to draw his sword in his enemy's house. This was such a stain on his honor that he was forced to commit ritual suicide. His samurai was now masterless (ronin), but swore to avenge his death. For a long time they planned, many taking on false characters and appearing to become drunkards or other low types. Eventually they all rejoined and killed their lord's enemy, then committed suicide together at the site of this temple. Though this is a major temple to the Japanese (there were even souvenir-type shops around it), it appears to be unlisted in most Western guide books, maybe because it is somewhat remote from the tourist track. We had some difficulty finding it because the one map it was marked on had no street names or much else to help, and indeed we would have missed it altogether except after we had given up and were walking towards the station, we came upon a sign pointing us to it. Unfortunately, we got there after it was closed, but we could still see it clearly from the gate. In the twilight it had a very calm, yet sad, look that is perhaps appropriate to the place.
We returned to the Kimi, picking up sushi boxes at the local convenience store (a different assortment this time, and a larger bottle of soda). It's pretty easy to dehydrate here without realizing it. People are saying it's very humid, but it's only about 70% humidity and in New Jersey that would be low.
After dinner we called a few more places in Kyoto recommended by both the Lonely Planet and Internet people, and found a place for the last six nights at ¥8000 a night. So we were all set for rooms.
October 11, 1996: Even though we woke up at 5:30, we decided not to jump right out of bed and rush off to Tsukiji. Instead we lay around the room until about 10:30, which was good timing since they were just coming around to change the linens then.
Our first stop was at the JR Travel Service Office in Ikebukuro Station to change our vouchers for JapanRail Passes good starting Monday, at which point we will be spending a lot of time on trains for the next seven days. You can do this changing only at certain offices, but there are several in Tokyo. There is also one at Narita, and you can change them before they start (in other words, when you convert the vouchers, you tell them what the starting date should be), but it's just as well we didn't do it when we arrived because we changed our minds on when we wanted them to run. We were going to start them later, but if we have to change hotels in Kyoto one day, we shouldn't plan on any major travel that day.
We went into the local department store (Tobu) to see what their food floors were like. They were not giving out all the free samples that the guidebooks claim, but they did have pre-made sushi by the piece that you could buy. We thought the sushi in the convenience store was cheap, but we were wrong-compared to this it was overpriced. We got an assortment for lunch consisting of two pieces each of flying fish roe, herring, iki (squid), maguro (tuna), tako (octopus), unagi (eel), uni (sea urchin), and something pink that was some sort of fish paste (we think); and one each of clam, something tentacled, herring with scallion, and a long tekka maki (tuna) roll. And what did all this come to? A grand total of ¥1288! That's right, this deluxe assortment cost about US$12.
(It's also true that we saw apples priced at three for ¥1000 and other fruit similarly high-priced. But not everything was like this.)
So we went back to the Kimi and ate our feast, then walked around Ikebukuro. The pedestrian shopping street had posters for all sorts of movies, including such American films as The Rock and Tin Cup (they seem to love golf here, so this should do well), some Hong Kong films, and some Japanese films, including a poster for Mosura (otherwise known as Mothra). Toho is remaking all their old monster movies, but this poster seemed to be announcing that it was coming rather than here, and movies are very expensive anyway (about ¥1500).
This street had more flashy signs than the Ginza area and even though obviously only a small area, seemed more like what we were expecting of Tokyo shopping areas than the Ginza.
We looked in the poster section of Tokyu Hands, hoping to find a Mosura poster, but all their movie posters were of classic non-Japanese films. The toy section had a lot of Disney stuff, which is enormously popular here.
We then went into the Toyota Amlux Salon. Now we are not normally car people (though we like our Toyota), but this was billed as being very interesting, and indeed it was something like going to a Worlds Fair pavilion.
The Toyota Amlux Salon is six floors (everything in Tokyo is vertical). One floor is devoted to urban cars, another to all-terrain vehicles, and so on. There was also a special exhibit (at least I think it was special) of handicapped accessible vehicles (elevator seats, room in back to store a wheelchair, hand-operated, and so on). |
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