| Submitted by: Mark Leeper United States |
| Submission Date: 09 February 2005 |
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I wonder what is involved in moving a whole castle? I guess this is an island of scarce resources. When you want a castle in a location you don't think of just building it, you ask yourself from what that is already standing do I get the materials. In this case the materials came from another castle. In any case the castle was completed in the new location in 1622.
We took the walk slowly, since the castle is on a steep hill. We went into a small museum room with models of the castle and artifacts like round tiles with family emblems. Somehow they have not maintained the feel of a castle inside. They have a place that says please come inside and join us for green tea and a sweetcake. 500 yen. The main tower is indeed under renovation with scaffolding all around. It is a pity because it would have had a beautiful view of the lake. Actually though the real loss is not being able to see the castle from the outside without all the scaffolding. Inside there is really not that much to see. At least there is a cliff lookout with a railing.
There is a building that has photos of all the major feudal castles. There are a couple of nice ones I would not mind seeing. However the labels are in Japanese. I ask a man 'doko?' pointing to one of the castles. 'Fukuyama.' Well perhaps we can get there.
Somehow this castle is short on period feel on the inside. None of the rooms are in the original form.
We walk the grounds, which takes a little longer than it usually would with the race track set up. I do get some pictures of racers. The ticket includes admission to the garden on the side. Unfortunately we end up taking the garden route in reverse order. Normally it would not matter but there is a natural progression here. We pass a monument to a novel. THE LIFE OF A CHERRY BLOSSOM is the story of Tairo Naosuke Ii who opened Japan to the world when the American first arrived. The novel was popular and done on their public television. It seems that Ii was born here. The Americans showed up and demanded the right to trade with Japan. (Now that in itself is interesting. Trade is an agreement between consenting parties. This was an expression of seclusionism, the term given to Japan's desire to shut out the outside world. The Tokugawas were fat and happy ruling the country, the samurai were like lords with little to do in time of peace. Along come the Americans saying you must let us sell to your people who consent and the ruling class was afraid this would rock the boat. Of course the US was also demanding access to ports to make this trade possible.) Ii was a high official and he signed a treaty without the consent of his government saying that the new ideas could come in. Noasuke signed the treaty with Perry in June 1858. He was assassinated by seclusionists in 1860 at age of 46. But by then new ideas had entered the country. These days the Japanese cannot get ideas from other countries fast enough. Yamamoto said after Pearl Harbor that he feared that Japan had awakened a sleeping giant and filled him with terrible resolve. The US did much the same thing almost a century earlier.
For the most part it is a pleasant garden walk. There are carp that come begging for food, mouths open. Supposedly you can buy food for them. But they are much nicer than the deer, they don't mug the tourists.
When we were done we walked back to the station looking for a place to have lunch. We found one and had soba noodles and ramen. We had a little trouble finding Hikone, we had no such problems with Nagoya. Nagoya is a big city almost with a Tokyo feel and it is easy to get to.
Our JapanRail pass ends today. It certainly was worth getting. We wanted to see a lot of Japan and at $524 for the two of us. We would have spent much more than twice that had we bought individual tickets. We saved on the order of $800. Of course even so over the same week we must have spent $200 for food and $524 for transport.
We got to Nagoya and instead of being able to see the castle from the train station we had to take a subway. The castle area has a sort of park atmosphere. There are a lot of school children. There is a man dressed up in a samurai armor. They are playing this castle up as Samurailand. We get into the castle and what do we find? Inside is an elevator to the top floor, marble walls, and fluorescent lighting. Outside it looked like a real castle, but that was not the interior they had. They have gummed up their own national history with a kitsch castle. Of course a little of the fault goes to Americans who totally destroyed the castle bombing the city in W.W.II. I guess if they were going to rebuild it they would do it with modern materials and modern conveniences. Himeji Castle had black screen put over the walls to hide the castle from the bombers. It sounds like the bombers were intentionally trying to destroy the castles the Japanese. What a loss. It also sounds rather stupid. If anything it would fill the Japanese with the determination to fight on.
Inside of the castle they had a little museum of medieval life with portraits of Japan's feudal castles with Fujicolor, the usual samurai armor, tiles with family crests, a samurai sword, a matchlock, and mostly things we had seen in other castles. One thing that was interesting to see was portraits of Oda Nobunaga, Toyatomi Hideyoshi, and Tokugawa Ieyasu. On the top floor there was an observatory. It is amazing what a great view a five story castle gives from the top of a hill.
On the way out I stopped at the gentlemen's convenience and discovered that the whole inside could be conveniently observed by someone going into the ladies' convenience. In some ways this is a very laid back society.
We decided to walk back to the train and perhaps see a little of downtown Nagoya, perhaps find a place to eat. Think again. This is a fancy neighborhood. As we pass by hotels the doormen look at us like walking fungus.
We pass City Hall with its tile roof that looks out of place on a modern office building. It is sort of a traditional roof. As we walk I think about why Japan works so well. Part of it is that you don't see the pessimism of the US. At home we know that the big cities have failed, that we have serious crime problems, that our problems are impossible and it will all fail. The Japanese see the future as a place of endless possibility. The Japanese have decided that the future works, we have decided that it doesn't. And perhaps for that very reason it will work for them and fail for us. The belief that things cannot work is a convenient excuse for not making them work. There may not be much I agree with Newt Gingrich about, but I think we are both sick of pessimism.
We pass a store called American Drug Store, but it mostly sells souvenirs.
Eventually we decide that this long walk is pointless and take a subway to return to the train station. Before we take the Shinkansen we decide to get dinner. We go out on the street and look for a restaurant. Here are plenty, but their menus are in Japanese. Finally I decide that this is silly. I have yet to get any Japanese food I have not liked. So I just copy two specials off a menu and decide this is what we are getting. The meal turns out to be beef and bean sprouts, fish, eggplant, Japanese veggies, tea, and pickles. That is the union of two meals. Evelyn and I share. When we are done there is not much left but fishbones. When we first entered the owner was trying to show us what we were getting because we might not like it. Guess again.
With the ride back to Kyoto we saw the end of our JR pass. Now we are mostly stuck in Kyoto. When we get back to Kyoto we were going to take the bus back because we were both bushed. But it would have been a 15-minute wait. We decide to walk. We go back for our last night at the River Side Takase. The winds blow cold. Winter is certainly coming on.
At the room we wrote and tried to listen to the radio. The music stations are somewhat frustrating to listen to. Nothing is done in English and talk to music ratio is a lot higher than in the US. You feel like telling these guys to shut up and get on with the records. I guess in Japan there is a lot more emphasis on personality on the radio.
One thing I find interesting is that official things are in often in English, less formal in Japanese. The news will come on and it will say 'The National News from the Asahi Shinbun.' Then the news reader will come on and speak entirely in Japanese. Then they will come back and say 'Traffic Watch' and then lapse back into Japanese. They seem to have accepted English as the proper language to use in conjunction with ideas they got from abroad. Maybe it is not so strange. I call wasabi 'wasabi' and not 'mustard.'
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10/21/96 Kyoto: Variants on Buddhism
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We were in no great hurry to leave in the morning. We worked on logs and packed, leaving at 8:45.
It took us a little while to find the Ryokan we were moving to. The River Side Takase could put us up only for five nights so we had to get another hotel, Ryokan Seiki, just a few blocks away. We found it with an entrance in a small alley. It did not look all that clean on the outside. Compared to the last place, however, this one looks a little cleaner, but the room is also the smallest so far. It has room for two little futons and a strip beside that much smaller than a futon. The cupboard is over this space and is only half-length with a space underneath it with a TV. Free TV in this room, I think. But we will have to roll the futons in the morning.
Because we leave our shoes we get to see what tourists wear. My recommendation to potential tourists: don't make the mistake I made. Wear a running shoe, not a loafer. Loafers are easier if you are visiting temples, but you really need foot support for all the walking.
Evelyn wanted to go back to the tourist information center so that was the first stop. Along the way we decided to pick up breakfast. There was a bakery across the street from the Lawson's where I had been buying buns in the morning. Evelyn got two pieces at the bakery and I got one. We then crossed the street to get steamed buns, but there were none left. What I got from the bakery turned out to be a bread roll with a thin sweet coating. Evelyn got what turned out to be a banana muffin and what looked like a fruit pastry, but turned out to be meat-filled, probably liver. This she shared because I did not get buns and I think the concept of liver in the morning bothered her. I have a cast-iron constitution. I was a picky eater when I was growing up, but that is all out of my system now. Variety is much more important to me than familiarity in food. If someone else likes it, I at least want to give it a try.
A lot of stores seem to have automatic sliding doors. This might not be a problem, but some are very slow. You get so that you forget to look and stand in front of a glass door you are supposed to push. Or you push on a door and it starts sliding to the side. It is strange in the train station where in any crowd there are a few Japanese running. This is a people often in a big hurry.
We got some maps and tourist information at the info center. One thing we found out is about a film festival for non-Japanese nationals who wanted to try subtitled Japanese films. I think for once we qualify. The only real drawback is that it runs from 2 PM to 4 PM, prime sightseeing time.
We crossed the street to the train and bus station. Like just about every other form of transport, the bus has electric displays to tell passengers what stop is coming up in Japanese and English. We could do the same, but the Americans are slow to change in their ways. We believe in big jumps in style, the Japanese in continuous small improvements. |
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