Enjoy the journey.

Category: Out and About (Page 1 of 3)

Welcome Home!

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And we are back!

The last month’s radio silence has covered a frantic period of packing, posting and rushing around, but we’re finally here (albeit homeless) enjoying a sunny Australian winter. At the moment we’re staying with my family in the country, which is nice when it comes to birds and fireplaces, but not so easy for Kin to get to university. So, last week, on a bright sunny day when Kin had classes, we ventured to Newcastle to visit friends, have a proper coffee and take care of a few things like library visits and collecting a few possessions.

It was a lovely day. The breeze was light and scented with eucalypt and Hamilton was sunny and wintry warm. Mid-morning, Kin trekked off to class and I sat in the sun in a friend’s backyard, with a purring cat on my lap and an occasional avocado rocketing down onto the shed from a nearby tree. After lunch, I ran our errands, then headed out to the university to meet Kin. On this carless day, that meant catching a bus. Luckily, the 226 runs straight to the uni, so I flagged one down, hopped aboard and looked around for a seat.

I had a lot of bags, so I decided for a change to sit toward the front, in one of the four person bays. The lopsided gentleman facing toward the back of the bus appeared to be a little too drunk for that time of the afternoon (but who’s judging?) and I didn’t feel like having someone fall on me every time we took a sharp turn, so instead I sat in the opposite seat, next to a pretty lady in a hijab and her two curly-headed baby boys, one toddling, the other perched on his mother’s foot, using her to support wobbly knees that weren’t really ready for standing. I smiled, she smiled, I settled my bags, took out my knitting and felt that it was truly a beautiful world. Knit two, purl two, keep on to the end… and then a sudden gush of warm fluid drenched me from the knees down and splashed the pretty lady (the older child was in the aisle and the younger had
swung to the side, so both were thus far dry).

It took a second to work out what had happened… We looked down at our dripping legs, looked across at the now suspiciously owl-eyed and wet-chinned man sitting opposite, looked at each other… had a simultaneous realisation and both frantically swooped to retrieve bags, bundles and babies from the spreading pool of vomit, not caring which belonged to whom. And then we were trapped, our burdens safely off the ground with only minimal drippage, but so awkwardly gathered and gripped that we were completely unable to relax our clutch on any one item in case another landed in the soup.

Then, while the two of us watched in horror, completely unable to move, the vile, intoxicated beast leaned forward, right over my legs… and vomited again! And again! With each gush, as my stockings soaked, my shoes filled up and the end of my red skirt turned maroon, the pretty lady’s eyes filled with equal parts sympathy and nausea and I began praying to any gods of public transport that she wouldn’t start throwing up as well. I was having enough trouble containing my own stomach. For several minutes, this awful minion of beery darkness threw up on me, my shoes and my ball of wool, then, having wreaked sufficient havoc for one day, blinked a few more times, stood, and as the bus stopped (sending a frothy wave rushing past again and seriously testing my control over my turbulent stomach) he staggered to the door and was gone.

The elderly gentlemen who boarded the bus en route to the RSL were very helpful. The hijab lady and I each passed them a child, then began rearranging our other burdens sorting out what belonged to whom. Both she and they got away from me as quickly as possible, though, and I couldn’t blame them. I smelled awful. My shoes were full of horror. My skirt and stockings dripped. A nightmare-ridden, beery tsunami had washed away my beautiful day and all I wanted to do was cry. And shower. And throw up. Probably while crying some more. While I threw up. In the shower.

Since I could do none of these things, I just sat in silent misery until the bus reached the university, then stood up to disembark…. And it was horrible. My shoes squelched. Trying to hold my bags as far from me as possible, I splashed off the bus, and dripped my way over the crossing then saw Kin, who, expecting the warm, cheerful, bakery-scented wife he’d left in Hamilton, was surprised to open his arms and have a miserable, vomit-sodden wreck fly into them, wailing bitterly about the awful man on the bus.

Kin is a good husband. He just hugged me and didn’t even say “Yuck”.

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I’m laughing (a bit) now that I’m back in the country and my stockings, shoes and wool are soaking in separate buckets by the clothesline. But the experience was surprisingly distressing. I’m no stranger to wearing the odd bodily fluid or two in the line of duty (hospital work is good for that) but to be repeatedly assaulted with the noxious expulsions of a total stranger, in what I had expected to be a fairly hygienic setting, actually resulted in a bit of mild trauma, only slightly dissipated by repeated doses of white vinegar and eucalyptus oil. I don’t mean that my spirit has been blighted and my life is now a ruin. But I feel as though I’ve been doused with a hefty dose of reality, as well as second-hand Toohey’s.

For months now, Kin and I have looked forward to coming home and we’ve been so focused on the wonderful things about Newcastle (our parks, our beaches, the wonderful food and interesting shops) that we’ve been ignoring the fact of our beloved city’s dark side. In particular, we’ve been forgetting that Newcastle definitely has a drinking problem, with all of the social nasties that implies. I’ll admit that actually being vomited on is a new one for me, but any health and hospitality workers, or other denizens of late-night Newcastle have at some point experienced side effects of the city’s struggles with alcohol.

Experiencing them again so soon, and so forcefully, has rubbed a certain amount of bloom off our triumphant return.

There’s good and there’s bad everywhere in the world I suppose, and it’s not as though vomiting drunks are unknown on Japanese public transport either. But I’m already feeling less open and more cautious about moving around my city, even before I’ve officially made it back there. On the other hand, my generally solitary nature is now fired with community-building ambitions; I don’t want anyone to be vomited on again, and the best way to prevent it is to make our neighbourhoods as safe and friendly as possible. Even if that does mean interacting with people more often than my semisocial character would normally choose!

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So, all of you community-minded Australians, I raise my glass to you (cup of tea, actually) and swear to join your ranks in the coming months. I will be active, I will be supportive, I will work until our community is green, helpful and free of antisocial behaviours. And, until that day, I will always wear gumboots on the bus!

In the meantime, soak it all away….

 

Gem

XX

June Was….

Apologies for two gallery posts in a row, but it’s that time! We’ve bid farewell to June and are gearing up for a frankly horrible July… so we’re lucky we have such wonderful things to remember!

June was lovely meals, trips to Kyoto and wanders at wonderful Fushimi Inari; this time with Gem’s older sister and family who came to visit early in the month (our last visitors in Japan!) Nagahama has resumed regular warm-weather routines and we received more visits from our friends, the rat snakes. Kin’s school also had a much more exciting visit from sumo champion Hakuhō Shō and several members of his stable. And, of course, June was Gem’s graduation ceremony to a slightly higher grade of tea ceremony practice.

June was warm, family-filled and very, very busy… but was still nothing compared to the madness that will be July. Wish us luck, everyone!

(Gem will add a more complete gallery to our Facebook and Flickr pages later in the week!)

Gem and Kin

 

 

May Was…

Adventure time!

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Or in other words: Our last chance to run out and about, without any worrying about packing, posting or looking for jobs back home!

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Long walks (at Fushimi Inari in Kyoto)

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The return of outdoor life.

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In more than one environment!

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Happy times for Gem in her pots.

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And for other gardners as well! (Wisteria festival, Shiga)

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A return to green fields.

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And outdoor living. And it’s always time for tea!

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May was also a long, long time ago now! We’re sorry for our longish silence; as you may have guessed, June has thus far been very, very busy! May was outside-the-house time and a sudden jump from “Soon it will be warm enough to wear kimono” weather to “Good God, it’s far too hot to wear kimono” weather. May was also busy-time at work, so our jobs and our running around meant we’re both a bit disgusted with ourselves: not much drawing time for Kin (although he did lots of pottery!) and not much writing or music time for Gem.

Most importantly, May was Kin’s birthday! His brand new birthday-gift travel bag, helped make our May the runaround time it was. May was also time for long train trips, with all the time for thinking, planning and talking things out that they allow. You’ll see some of the results in June and July!

Kin and Gem

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Look Who Came to Visit!

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It’s spring alright! The rice fields are green and full of joy (for frogs) and the nights are dark and full of lurve… also for frogs. As well as having bats to watch, every evening we can also listen to the chorus of croaking from all directions.

Of course, all of this activity means that other creatures are becoming active too, including this fellow:

Snake I, swimming

This is a Japanese rat snake (Elaphe climacophora) that I spotted while watering the beans. It seemed pretty determined to work its way up the canal, so we figured it was heading out to the big rice fields to find frogs like the one above. Being Australian, I immediately yelled for Kin to grab his camera and he raced up the canal in pursuit.

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Unfortunately, his model did NOT feel cooperative. Rat snakes are quite timid (and, apparently, very bitey) so it decided to try and pretend that it wasn’t there and wait for the camera to go away.

Kin was a little disappointed but, as it turns out, he didn’t need to be! When I went for a run along the same canal, I found another friend for him to photograph!

Snake II; full length

Another rat snake! They must be everywhere at the moment! This one seemed a little less timid than the first and allowed Kin and his camera to get quite close. It was proceeding in the same direction as the other fellow, so there must be something attractive (to snakes) in that part of town.

Snake II, head, higher angle

Hello, snake II!

It seems that Japanese people respond to rat snakes much the same way as Australians do to carpet pythons, so our friends should have a safe journey, wherever they’re going. It was lovely to see these beauties and we wish them well on their travels. It’s also fun giving our U.S. friends the screaming heebie-jeebies with these photos!

Is anyone interesting out and about in your area? Have they come to say hello?

We’ve just made a Flickr account, so I’m gradually uploading our photos there (including our Facebook albums). If you want to see more snake pictures or others (soon), please come and visit us!

Gem,

XX

April was…

Sweets

April sweets.

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And an April Fool (we won’t see Shallow again until August).

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Very important preparations being made.

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By Kin as well! He’ll be studying again in August and is making sure that he’s ready.

 

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Hikiyama Matsuri (one of Nagahama’s most famous festivals).


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Time to resume our Lake Biwa adventures!

 

April was short days, long bike rides and genuine joy at being outdoors. It was time for both of us to shake off our winter blues and get back to work on our drawing, studying and just straight making; food, ceramics and music.

We’re looking forward to a period of rest and focus in May, before we really start to get ready for Australia!

Kin and Gem

XX

 

Tokyo: A Youtube Adventure

By Gem

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It seems that all the great cities of the world have been nicknamed. Chicago is the Windy City, Paris is the City of Love and Venice is beautifully known as the Bride of the Sea. Once a city reaches a certain age and size, it seems natural for its people to give it another name, one based on the culture and the character that place has developed.

All except Tokyo.

Tokyo is undoubtedly a great city, boasting the largest metropolitan economy in the world. It is a populous city, with around thirteen million permanent residents and a huge population of commuters from the surrounding countryside. And it is an old city (once called Edo) which has been the de facto capital of Japan for more than four hundred years. Yet for some reason, Tokyo has thus far evaded nicknaming. Is the culture not strong enough? Does the city lack personality?

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Quite, quite the opposite. Tokyo, in fact, has an excess of personality. Multiple personalities, if you will. Outside minds may have given the area one name, but to the residents, it’s never stopped being a collection of small (yet insanely densely populated) villages, each existing as its own mad little world and each certain that the next quake will be The Big One. What can you call a place like that? Bedlam? Godzilla’s Playground?

“Don’t EVER live in Tokyo for more than two years at a time,” insisted my Japanese teacher back in Oz. “You’ll go insane; and you won’t notice.”

This is a man whose racing bike has more than once whizzed by me doing forty km on a downhill run despite being declared LEGALLY BLIND more than a decade ago.

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He lived in Tokyo for six years.

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Japan, overall, can be mad. But even among Japanese people, it’s accepted that Tokyo is much, much madder.

For one thing, the city is constantly changing. In the warmer days of spring, Japanese birds construct nests and Japanese builders hurl down and fling up buildings all over the country. But in Tokyo, they’re busy all year round, making buildings appear and vanish like mushrooms. Stores and advertisements are also constructed or painted on large vehicles (like the flatbed truck bearing massive-breasted, topless, singing battle robots that rolled by during our last visit to Kabukicho) which then move around the city playing deafening music at passers-by. Even without Godzilla or the Next Big Quake, everything is huge, but nothing feels permanent.

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Did I say everything was huge? That’s just the outside of the buildings. In their interiors and on the streets, Tokyo tries to pack as much of itself into the smallest spaces it can. That means low ceilings, narrow paths, tiny furniture and constantly touching at least three other people at once. The scale and density of Tokyo causes a low-grade mental pressure that takes genuine effort to resist.

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The major issue, though, is not really how much genuinely bizarre stuff (like the topless robots) is actually floating around the city, but how quickly you get used to it. The human brain is resilient and will absorb and adapt to any amount of bizarre stimuli, so in a place where so much is abnormal, your sense of normality becomes extremely unreliable.

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When you add the city’s multiple personalities to that mix and the bizarre ways in which they interact, more than anything, walking around in Tokyo is like a real-life version of those nights you find yourself in the weird part of Youtube. You see something, it looks interesting, you click on it, it leads to something else, you click on that, you keep clicking…. and before you know it, it’s three in the morning and you’re watching a man feed his underpants to a goat.

Fortunately, in Tokyo your service provider isn’t gathering any information on you.

What Happens in Tokyo….

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Ours would have had plenty on us before we even left our Akihabara hotel.

Although the manager had rented us tiny rooms with tinier ensuites, most of the hotel’s business actually comes from capsule rentals to drunk and weary salary men. Two thousand yen (about twenty dollars) grants them access to a large shared bathroom with lockers and a small, coffin-like space in the wall with just enough room for one sleeper and a porn magazine.

Does this seem strange? What’s stranger is that it only took about ten minutes before we were totally accustomed to the idea of going to sleep each night and waking up each morning knowing that there were a hundred businessmen sealed into the walls like wasp larvae.

If we leaned out of the window, we could see the local Pachinko Parlour, where an animated (and adorable) adventurer tugged on a jungle princess’ leopard-skin bikini top. Below, the taxi-drivers, neon-lit trucks and scooter daredevils played their terrifying game of dodgems, while sirens screamed all around, yet never arrested anyone. We could also watch tired office workers step onto the balcony for a cigarette and a moment to think, without ever noticing any of the frenzied activity around them.

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In Tokyo, the people are like islands.

Becoming an Island

Despite our inauspicious beginning, we fell into our Tokyo routine (and our island status) fairly quickly.

In the morning, I would wake up, give the wall (and its load of snoring businessmen) an affectionate pat and wander into the corridor to heat water for tea. When it was ready, the three of us would step out onto the tiny “balcony” to watch the dodgem game, the suited abseiler on the opposite building and, one morning, a procession of neon-decorated trucks blaring pop music to advertise the new Idolmaster Game (which will be released in May if you’re into that sort of thing. Please don’t tell me if you are.)

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After that, it was time for us to decide what to do with our day.

We visited Akihabara, of course; our anime-nerd leanings and our hotel’s location by Dentown made this an obvious choice. While we initially had a wonderful time, cramming ourselves between overstacked shelves of figurines, clothing and art books, we gradually started to notice that Akihabara seems to be morphing into something a lot more seedy and a lot less fun. I don’t know if the art has changed, or the current generation of nerds are a creepier breed, but it had a particularly bad effect on the guys, both of whom declared themselves finished with the place and in desperate need of a bath. And, after accidently catching the tail-end of an AKB-48 show, I couldn’t blame them. It makes me cringe to think that our students could potentially attend concerts in the same building as those sweating, tracksuit-wearing otaku waving their glow sticks at fifteen year olds dancing in ruffle skirts.

(Akihabara still has plenty to offer the nerdy traveller, but you might be more likely these days to just get in, buy it and get the hell back out without enjoying your time as much as you used to.)

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Ueno, mixing more of the old Japan with the new was much gentler on the guys’ bruised sensibilities and we spent quite a bit of time recuperating under the cherry blossoms in Ueno Park and in the Ueno markets. Asakasa, though crowded, is also a fairly relaxed place by Tokyo standards and is popular with backpackers and older Japanese tourists. Our objective was Sensou-ji, a holy site devoted to the bodhisattva Kannon, where people have been visiting and buying (actually quite reasonably priced) souvenirs for almost fifteen centuries. (I really love that about Japan; instead of trying to avoid the tourist traps and really connect with the ancient culture of an area, visiting the tourist traps is HOW you connect!)

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We skipped Shinjuku and Roppongi this time and very quickly zipped through Ginza, but Kin and Shallow indulged me and allowed me a lot of time in Shibuya.

I adore Shibuya; I could spend all day there, just watching people and walking around. This area is a bit of an artistic and fashion centre, not just for designers and multinationals, but also for the kids who stitch, paint or hammer together their own looks and styles and, when they get a little older, even open little shops of their own, which are immediately graffitied by their younger colleagues. (They do it so nicely, though that no-one minds.)

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Really, Shibuya is far too cool for me, but it’s generous enough to let me hang out there anyway.

Most of our trekking was done on foot, although we did hop onto the subway sometimes. As we were generally travelling outside rush hours, Kin and Shallow were permitted to travel in purdah with me, in the “Ladies Only” section of the train (set aside to protect women travellers from sexual assault). Only some of our stations had installed suicide-prevention barriers or calming blue lights, but all played a happy jingle as each train approached, which some claim is another preventative measure.

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Personally, I found this ingenious creation much more cheery and engaging than yet another obnoxious noise on the Japanese subway.

Harajuku was so crowded, the tide of people almost washed us away. Shallow’s height became an advantage for the first time since he’d arrived in Tokyo (normally he just bumped his head on things) and he could keep an eye on Kin’s red hat bobbing away on the current. I just became flotsam and grabbed hold of whatever bits I could reach of either Shallow or Kin whenever the flow brought us close together. We saw a few examples of Harajuku fashion on people (and many more in the shops!) but if you really want to see Harajuku girls, visit Jingu Bashi, the Harajuku bridge, on Sunday afternoon. Right over the bridge is a peaceful Meiji Shrine and also Yoyogi Park, where we met with a friend and unexpectedly became part of a cherry-blossom viewing party with the staff of a Shinjuku publishing company.

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The park was so covered in eskies and picnic blankets that parties combined like slime mould, forming one ultra-party whose participants cheerfully shared their food and sake and posed for group photographs with strangers.

Islands can join very quickly, if sake is involved.

Much later, and a little unsteady, our whole cherry-blossom party was carolling about being fireworks in the karaoke booth where we’d had dinner. Our merry trek from Harajuku had gone past decorated trucks (each with a pair of feet pressed on the windscreen), night markets, outdoor raves and a woman quietly walking her meerkats through Shibuya.

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Just another night in Crazytown.

 

Gem

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March was…

 

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Spring! Finally, actual, no-more-wishful-thinking SPRING! 

 

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The return of old friends…

 

 

 

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Including Shallow!

 

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Rediscovering that Tokyo is insane.

 

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Parties! Actual outdoor ones, after dark!

 

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Hanami (cherry-blossom viewing) in Yoyogi Park. There were so many different parties going on that they all sort of made one BIG party!

 

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The Indoor Refugees’ triumphant return to the Great Outdoors.

 

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Gem’s birthday! These are my presents from Kin, including Kyoto courtyard gardening books and a gorgeous new (second hand) goldy-green kimono! My parents have a finger lime waiting for me back in Oz as well, so I have a pretty good haul this year. Thank you everyone! – Gem

 

March began chilly and still, but soon warmed up to be busy, busy, busy, with trips, events and new discoveries popping up every day!  March was new blooms, night buses and near-nudity! Well….

Okay, no-one’s actually naked, but now that we’ve peeled off the layers of yeti-skins we’ve been wearing all winter and are walking around in actual human clothes, we feel a bit that way. It’s so lovely to be able to wear pretty clothes again and to just step outside whenever you feel like it! The ducks are back, the bats are back, insects are busy everywhere you look and we have survived our LAST EVER Northern Hemisphere winter! In four months, we’ll be back where the weather is sane!

February’s promise has definitely been met; the earth has warmed, nature is hard at work and it’s time for things to happen. And our countdown to Australia gets shorter every day…

It’s go-time!

Kin and Gem

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A Week of Willies

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Yes, that is exactly what it looks like. A 2.5 metre, 250 kg, giant, wooden wang.

It’s amazing, isn’t it, that when something’s on your mind, it just seems to keep cropping up? This week, from the new run of “Please do not expose yourself to other commuters,” signs on the train to an unexpected linguistic discussion (that resulted in three people chanting “dickbread dickbread, dickbread” in Portuguese for almost seven minutes), the universe just keeps coming up bellends.

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Today’s post, believe it or not, has a religious theme.  I give you:

Dongs of Praise

Komaki’s spring fertility festival is one of the internet’s favourite spiritual events. I’m guessing you can see why.

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The festival is actually called Hounen-sai or Hounen Matsuri, but people usually just call it the Penis Festival. Again, I’m guessing you can understand.

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Although a lot happens at this festival (like dancing, rice-cake throwing and traditional music) the main event is the rowdy procession bearing a giant carved phallus to its new home in Tagata Jinja, the old home of Tamahime who, along with her children, developed the area during the Yamato period. Tamahime, like many ladies of the time, did not live with her husband, but rather received him as a regular visitor in her home and… I think you’re beginning to perceive the oh-so-subtle symbolism of the festival.

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In the old days, the giant penis was actually attached to the crotch of a straw samurai, borne along by the inebriated procession, which seems a lot more graphic to me. These days, it’s modestly snuggled into a portable shrine, but is much, much bigger, meaning the bearers have to struggle along with around four hundred kilos of weight on their shoulders. And not just calmly hauling the thing either, but actually bouncing, spinning and waving it around to the cheers of the intoxicated crowd. Needless to say, the bearers need to put away even more sake than the spectators to manage this feat.

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At Tagata Jinja, the penis is installed in the place of honour, while last year’s model is auctioned off to local householders and businesses. (And can I just mention that this is the best tradition ever? Just think, in the living rooms and public spaces of literally hundreds of normal-seeming Aichi homes and shops lurk enormous, metres-long, polished, hardwood wangs. Hundreds. Whenever you feel sad, or start believing the world is empty of magic, just remember that.)

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The long history of the shrine is why, I think you sometimes hear painfully sincere foreigners speaking earnestly about the real meaning of the festival, which is not waving genitals around on sticks, but is instead a solemn veneration of the divine generative and restorative properties of the earth and season.

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Uh huh.

I think that modern city dwellers need to understand that olden-day rurals enjoyed a good metaphor as much as anyone; and enjoyed a dirty joke even more! Ensuring the blessedness of the sacred earth is important to a community making its living from the soil, it’s true. But if you can manage your religious observations while drunk and waving a willy on a stick, so much the better. If the shrines wanted to encourage solemnity of worship, they wouldn’t hand out unlimited free sake and dick-whistles. The locals have been enjoying the joke for 1500 years. You can enjoy it too.

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Kin and I were actually pretty sober for this year’s festival, despite the best efforts of the shrine volunteers to fix that state. After a quick wander around the food stalls (selling a variety of phallic snacks) we made our way with Dudebro and Granita to join the throng of spectators waiting for the giant wang to wind by. The three of them found an okay spot by the  road (the best thing about this festival is that, unlike many others, the procession is so long that everyone who wants to see the event gets a chance to) while I wound up on the other side, near the most horrible old lady I’ve ever met.

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Seriously, she was great; she made her way to the front of the crowd by leaving a trail of the most horrible carnage behind her.  I only became aware of her after she inserted one ancient and extremely pointy elbow underneath my floating rib while doing the same to the gentleman on her other side. When both of us yelled and turned slightly away from the injury, the old buzzard had enough room to reach the sake cart, snatch two cups and scurry away.  I was keeping an eye out for her after that, so I got to watch her repeat that action many, many more times.

The procession was the usual wonderful spectacle of graphic banners, men in silly hats, and penises, both large and…. well, still pretty large actually.

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Not to mention people handing out still more cups of sake which, after a while, I just started handing directly to the awful old lady (who received them with the same natural gratitude as a duck accepts breadcrumbs).

We then raced the procession to Tagata Jinja itself, to revisit the food stalls and view the current collection of penis-shaped items accumulated by the shrine.

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Tagata Jinja is worth a visit at any time of year. Anyone in the area who finds anything even remotely penis-shaped trots off with it to the shrine and donates it to the cock-collection. Which sounds like one of the easiest and most entertaining methods of fulfilling your religious obligations that exists in the world to date. There are also a lot of carefully carved or cast penises, (including a penis-shaped shrine bell) and, while the big fellas are auctioned off these days,  there are still a good many Dicks of Christmas Past (as it were) arranged within the shrine.

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The Tell-Tale Dick

In rod-related revelations closer to home, it seems that the build-up to exams has infused the Dick Phantom with a fresh burst of creative energy. Kin tells me that the Phantom’s artistic sensibilities have not greatly matured during this period, but it seems that his productive output has increased significantly… to the point where he’s becoming careless.

His first slip was discovered a few weeks ago, when Kin, stacking desks after a second-year exam overturned one to reveal a lovingly-rendered, extremely veiny illustration, sketched by the master himself.

Kin, himself an accomplished phallic artist, is unwilling to expose a brother to the long arm of the law, so he continued stacking desks without trying to determine who had been sitting at this one. (I wish I were joking, by the way. He once drew an enormous, horribly graphic one on our metre-long whiteboard and I got so used to looking at the damn thing that I forgot to erase it before my grandmother came to visit.)

But then, last week, while marking the papers themselves, Kin turned a page and revealed the final clue to the Phantom’s identity… in the form of a gigantic, hairy knob scratched into the student’s completed and SIGNED examination paper.

The moment was pivotal. “Is this…a cry for help? Is the Phantom weary of life in the shadows? Does he actively seek apprehension and redemption in the light?”

“Or did the dumb little bastard just get bored and draw a dick on his exam paper like he does everything else?”

Figuring it was the second, Kin marked the paper, carefully closed it and returned it to the stack, still determined not to lose a comrade in arms.

“Fight on, Brother. Fight on.”

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They are legion.

Gem

XX

P.S. We’ll be putting up a more complete album on our Facebook page on Sunday.

 

P.P.S. For those who are wondering what sort of linguistic discussion could result in three people gravely intoning “dickbread” at one another for an extended period, it was a phonetics conversation about minimal pairs and meaning contrast on nasal vowels in Portuguese. Pau pão was the only sound set Granita could come up with, and it was only after we’d spent several minutes attempting to accurately reproduce the words that one of us asked about their meaning.

Pau pão : Dick, bread.

Welcome, Spring!

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…or maybe not. That is my school this morning. What the hell, man?

To an East-coast Australian, ice is NOT a substance that occurs in nature. Ice is produced by machinery and found in drinks. There is no good reason for it to just appear all over the place and even less reason for it to hang around for months at a time, getting thicker and meaner-looking every night. And there is absolutely NO possible excuse for it to roar back again NOW, when both the plum blossoms and my spirit were just starting to unfurl some tentative blooms.

Still…

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…plum blossoms are tough and there have been some signs today that I may soon get my spring; like the honest-to-goodness waterfall tumbling off the roof of the gym. This morning, it was just beginning to trickle, but it was cascading by lunchtime and now it resembles alpine thaw in a nature documentary, just before the music turns to woodwinds and a time-lapsed field of edelweiss blooms.

I can only hope.

During the relatively snow-free weekend, though, Kin and I both popped on our coats (and hats and gloves and boots and scarves and mufflers and three layers of thermal underwear) and went to meet Gecko Sensei, my Tea Ceremony teacher in a watery little town to the south of Nagahama, called Gokasho.

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To Grandmother’s House

Gokasho is one of Shiga’s Omi merchant towns from the Edo Period. The Omi merchants’ business took them all over Japan, but their families and their valuables remained safely installed in exquisite (not to mention highly secure) mansions in Shiga. Omihachiman is probably the most famous of these towns, but I find Gokasho with its spectacularly laid-out gardens and population of fat, friendly carp in the canals beside the roads, far, far more charming.

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In theory, we were there to see the town’s Hinamatsuri displays. Sensei is the archetypal Yamato Nadeshiko, so a visit to a girl’s festival is exactly the sort of outing she enjoys. Kin finds Hinamatsuri dolls as creepy as hell, but is fond of Sensei and doesn’t trust her wobbling around unaccompanied when she’s wearing zori (which is pretty much all of the time). I find the displays fairly interesting, but mostly want any excuse to poke around in the magnificent gardens and old family homes (not to mention tickle a carp or two, should the opportunity arise).

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For all of this meticulously planned magnificence, Gokasho isn’t imposing in the way that, say, Kakunodate or Nara can be. For one thing, it’s very obviously a little country village, even if it IS a little country village built and maintained by fabulously wealthy businesspeople. For another, any family home which has lasted for more than two generations develops a really awesome “Nan’s place” vibe ESPECIALLY if that home has since been making an effort to hang onto any item of potential historical value. That means that every old box that every Omi Mum has packed away for the last several hundred years has been unpacked and displayed, including the recent ones, so that next to each other are centuries-old teakettles, exquisitely lacquered furniture, plastic elephants on wheels and shelves of things like combs, old toys and tacky seaside ornaments made from shells, glue and googly eyes.

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It’s an incredibly relaxing place for somewhere so interesting. And just look at this kitchen!

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I’m always drawn to kitchens, but this was a particularly beautiful example of its breed. A person could really work in a kitchen like that.

The Gokasho gardens are surrounded by high walls and each one is different from all of the others.

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I’m certain that the houses and gardens were planned simultaneously, as they complement each other so perfectly and each household seems to have chosen their own aesthetic. One family constructed a fascinatingly erratic landscape with hills, cliffs and a boulder-filled river. Another produced one that was peacefully flat, rambling and flower-filled, except where it rose around the lake (which the house was constructed to showcase).

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My favourite garden looks like a small, dry forest with uneven stone paths winding through it. It’s kind of hard to explain what exactly is so breathtaking about that, but somehow this garden manages to feel completely peaceful and separate from the world outside its walls.

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And any way, any town where the fish follow you around has to be pretty cool.

(A more complete album of Kin’s pictures can be found on our Facebook page.)

Keeping it cool (unfortunately).

Gem

XX

EDIT: Ugh, I’ve just seen some of the photos of Gokasho available online and they give COMPLETELY the wrong idea of the place. It may be time to buy Kin that 32mm Prime lens and let him do it right.

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