Christmas in SEA aka. a quick plunge to South East Asia.

Christmas and New Years in Japan is quite opposite to the ones in the West. Christmas in Poland is always a family thing, and though only I am Christian in my family, we still celebrate the Christmas Eve because:

1. We live in Poland so we like to follow this big Polish tradition

2. It's my Bday.

In Warsaw, on Christmas Eve, everything (and I really do mean everything) closes after 5pm and does not reopen until the 27th. If you haven't stock yourself with food beforehand, be ready to starve.

Well, for the Japanese youth though, Christmas is a lover's day – it's a day to go out to restaurants on a romantic dinner date or take your cute-obsessed girlfriend to Dinseyland. For the rest of them, 24^th and 25^th are just plain working days.

New Year's Eve is a party time in the West. It's when you either try to crash a drunken party of your close friend somewhere far away in the suburbs of the city or buy super expensive ticket to a club's event in the city's downtown, awaiting the countdown and fireworks and champagne. In Japan though, 31^st is the time to go to shrines with your family. When in the West, people go home around before the 24^th, in Japan trains don't start getting crazy packed until right before the 31^st.

As for me, I skipped on the date time in Tokyo and decided that since the past 21 Christmases I have spent with family, so will I this time. But Tokyo is a bit further from Warsaw than was Boston, so I decided to fly to Vietnam, and spend some time with extended part of family, in Hanoi. Not quite the same, but at least somehow similar.

I also took the chance to do a bit of South-East Asia travel and from Hanoi, went down to Saigon, then a small trip to Bangkok, after which I ended the journey in Singapore.

Hanoi.

As always, even in December Hanoi is surprisingly humid. And so warm, I walked around in a short sleeves all the time. But for Hanoians, 15C counts as cold already, and everybody walks in very thick jackets and winter coats, so the mere sight of me screamed “she's back from the West”. Seeing my aunties, uncles and lovely cousins was extremely wonderful and it was my first time since 1993, when I left Vietnam, that I got to go home during winter's time. I definitely liked it much better than boiling hot and humid summers.

Food that I enjoyed:

- Mango, mango and once again mango.

- Traditional Pho and porridge (chao xuon)

- and a huge but quite random Korean dinner (my uncle happened to be friends with a Korean restaurant owner so he got us a VIP room in that fancy place).

In the VIP room at a Korean restaurant. With cousin, Huyen aka. De.

Saigon.

Very red isn't it? The slogan says: "Everything because of the building and protecting the nation of Socialist Republic of Vietnam"

It is my real first time playing in Saigon. Since a Harvard friend happened to be visiting home this Christmas in Saigon, of course the pragmatic me couldn't let such a chance go and so I turned my lovely eternal “senior” Quang into my personal tour and play guide and motorbike driver in Saigon for 2 days.

Quang and me.

Saigon is definitely much more developed than Hanoi and I was incredibly surprised to see it (for some reason I never held high opinions about Saigon, probably because I really dislike southern accent, a totally personal thing). I saw much more foreigners and cars in Saigon and the past-presence of Americans is somehow noticeable as well. And it was much warmer than Hanoi, by around 10 additional Celcius degree. 25-27C was enough to make me wane, sweat and complain. And here I still saw people in sweaters and long-sleeves. “Superhumans” is what I thought.

Crazy busy streets of Saigon.

One interesting observation I noticed during my little trip: when we went with Quang for a night drink on Sheraton's top floor bar, I could not help noticing many of hookers hanging around in their tight mini skirts and a fair amount of sketchy foreign men either Chinese or Western, picking them up, very obnoxiously and openly. “Waaaaait a minute” I thought “this is a 5-star hotel right?”. Me and Quang came to a conclusion that it is just sad, how in a developing country as Vietnam, an exclusive and high class place as Sheraton can still be a scene to something that should be reserved to a red-light district.

The food I enjoyed:

- Banh xeo, some sort of savory omlette-like food.

- Tre – assorted dessert

Bangkok

Bangkok was 10 times bigger than any of the above-mentioned 2 cities. Such a huge metropolis, my mouth dropped and stayed open for the whole ride from the airport to the Vietnamese Embassy, where my uncle and auntie worked and where I was to stay over.

I will be honest and confess, that I had thought Bangkok's level of development to be around that of Saigon's. But I was hugely mistaken – it was much more advanced, bigger, with well-functioning underground (metro) system and much nicer people. Oh, and though it was hot, it was not humid but dry, so totally enjoyable.

I was like a storm to my quiet uncle and auntie, demanding to be driven around to as many Bangkok attractions as possible. So they did as I requested, drove me to many many shopping places and the world famous, mesmerizing Emerald Temple. On the day that I left for Singapore, my auntie gave a long long relief sigh, but also said : “It's good to have some big loud disruptions once in a while”.

One interesting thing that is impossible to ignore in Bangkok and very eye-catching for the first-time visitor is the ubiquitous presence of the Thai King(Emperor?). The first time I saw his picture on a highway, in his golden robes, he reminded me of the Pope. And indeed, it seems that Thai people just adore their King, and so decorate every second street intersection, every shopping mall or bridge with his picture in an ornate gold frame that looks like an altar. And they love him so much, that whatever good has happened, they say it's thanks to the Emperor.

People once believed that the King is almighty and good because he's descended from God, a notion originated in Ancient Egypt and especially persistent in the Middle Ages. If that belief survived modernization, I think it's newest form will be something like Thai King's cult in Bangkok.

Here's one of the many examples of King's pictures displayed randomly on the street.

And the food, oh dear. Everywhere I looked I could enjoy most famous Padthai, Tom Yoon Gong soup and even the simplest meat on sticks sold by street cart vendors was delicious (the Thai know how to flavor their stuff). And fruits! All Thai fruits were incredibly fresh and sweet, much better tasting than in Vietnam!

Singapore.

I didn't have much hesitations about going to Singapore by myself – the country was hailed for safety and convenience. I was very eager to see this richest country in the South East Asia region as well. I imagined it to be equally modern as Tokyo but for some reason I also expected Tokyo's or Western level of civility and sophistication from its inhabitants.

Crazy busy Orchard Road on Christmas Eve. It was impossible to walk!

Certainly Singapore lived up to its safety and convenience fame. Trains were clean and worked without problems. Bus drivers were very nice and answered all destination-related questions to the ignorant me.

One surprising thing to me though was that Singapore was so very very Chinese. I imagined a highly diversified place with lots os Malay and Indians mixing around everywhere, but the first thing I saw was a street full of banners written in Traditional Chinese characters. Well, it might have been due to the fact that the hotel I stayed at was located in Geylang, a pre-dominantly Chinese neighbourhood. However, even when riding the train, on some trips, everywhere I went I heard a lot of Mandarin. Soon I learn that even if Singapore has tons of ethnic variety around, has up to 60-70% ethnic Chinese. Duuh. なるほどね。

Another surprise was the Singaporean English dialect. Yes, I did hear rumours how Singaporean English was really terrible, but I expected that it couldn't be worse than Japanese accent of English (which is indeed awful). But no, Singaporean English was actually really bad – I never understood anyone on the first try. The shopkeepers, the train station service people, the locals – I always had to ask them to repeat themselves twice or three times. It wasn't just the accent issue, it was also the grammar, completely mixed up and changed. Yet, I did enjoy it, I found it really amusing.

On Sentosa Island, the closest thing to Disneyland. Riding a very high, scary adrenaline rope.

Night Show "Songs of the Sea" at Sentosa.

Singaporeans, as proud as they are of Singapore being the richest place in the geographical vicinity, had a trait that I found very characteristic of 3^rd World country's people – a very pragmatic mind, devoid of romanticism. According to Shilin, another Harvard friend I managed to pester while in Singapore, the people there are too materialistic for her taste and that is the reason they let themselves easily be ruled in almost autocratic way – they don't really care about principal freedom, just as long as they're well-off.

A country of such contrasts, (“Disneyland with death penalty”, “the only shopping mall with seat in UN”), Singapore really is a fascinating social experiment to observe. Perfect place for visit, eat and shop, not so sure about living.

An interesting story. I didn't really know where my hotel was when I booked it; since it was a well-known fact that Singapore is such a safe place, I did not spare the location a second thought and booked myself in the first place my search engine threw out. But the moment I got to my hotel, I noticed that the neighbourhood was a bit dirty and not as glamorous and clean as other districts. And predominantly male-dominated. And somehow all of them stared at me, some whistling, some waving. Queer, I thought.

The sign reads: "Baby can swim contest"

The funniest thing I ever saw in Singapore!

Well, turns out, even if it's safe everywhere, one can still end up in an undesirable place. I soon learned from a taxi driver that the district was badly notorious for being the prostitutes area (but not yet the red-light district). Oh, that explains the number of men on the streets; and as soon as it got dark, the objects of their desires just appeared out of nowhere, standing on the streets in their high hills and mini skirts. “You careful, you walk alone and you get people think you prostitute. No, no, you'll be safe, nobody will do anything, they only come and ask you how much.” (Taxi driver)

The food I enjoyed:

Maybe because I have eaten so much for the past week of travel, eating in Singapore, the most enjoyable activity to do there (next only to shopping) wasn't as mind-blowing as I imagined. Of course the Laksa soup, the Penang rice and curry chicken were all delicious, but not a novelty anymore.

Back to Japan.

Being in Japan this year gave me a good opportunity to travel around SEA. As much as enjoyed all the sights, all the food and cheap prices, it made me also realize, I miss my cold white Christmas! Being in the SEA was the first time for me to see gigantic Christmas trees, santa-clauses and reindeer decorations without a single trait of snow but in full sun blaze and boiling hotness, something so terribly off, I could not feel Christmas atmosphere at all. After all, spending twenty-something Christmases in a snowy cold country as Poland does leave an imprint and a prejudice in one's mind, like it or not.

Luckily, Japan is as cold and snowy as it should be for New Years. I don't think I could stand celebrating even New Years in mini skirts.

Living in Komaba International Lodge.

Through the relationship Harvard has with Tokyo University (Tokyo Daigaku – in short, Todai) I was luckily placed in a dorm/apartment, called Komaba International Lodge, located on one of Todai's two main campuses.

Some great things about my apartment, starting from the best one:

1. It's impossibly cheap. Have you heard about prices in Tokyo? Especially renting prices ? Even higher than NYC supposedly. For a similar-sized, single apartment in an equally convenient location, the market-priced rent would be around ¥100,000 (roughly $1100). For me though, the rent is ¥5900 (around $65). Even if you add all the utilities fees and Internet, it comes down to ¥13,000 ($143) which is 7-8 times cheaper than the market. Todai's subsidy is truly mind-blowing.

2. It's 20 min by walk and 2 subway stops away from Shibuya, one of Tokyo's biggest and craziest downtowns and shopping centers.

3. It's free to go to Shibuya by subway if you have a commuter pass, and I do.

4. It's 15 minutes walk and 2 train stops away from Shimokitazawa, a truly lovely market-like place with lots of cheap stores and small restaurants and bars that serve brilliant food and drinks.

5. It's 5 minutes away from Todai's second main campus, Komaba. So 5 minutes away from very cheap and quite good cafeteria food. Mind you, Japanese food, even cafeteria food, is comparatively delicious after 3 years of American dining hall food. (Though Harvard's still pretty decent compared to other colleges I have eaten at.)

6. It's 5 minutes away from Todai's second main campus, Komaba. So 5 minutes away from classes and lecture halls and thus 5 minutes away from hundreds of potential Japanese friends.

7. It's a single. After 3 years of room-sharing at Harvard (excluding last spring), that's quite refreshing.

8. Lots of international friends. It's the easiest place to practice some French or German or Chinese (though I don't hang out with the Chinese too often, as they are a bit of geeks and just stay in their rooms all the time) and British English. Easy place to get a drinking buddy as well.
   

Of course, to be fair, I will also lists some annoying points about my room. Most of these is something you might expect from such a cheap place...:

1. The whole building is old and dirty. To illustrate it, here's a bit of a quote from my dormmate Ben.

Me: “What was the password for the main gate again? I forgot... Was it 1890?”

Ben: “Yeah, probably the year this whole mess of a building was built in.”

2. I don't mind the former (old), as I love Harvard for its old colonial look that is more historic than US itself. But the former and the latter (dirt) and a third factor (ugly) combined is nothing nice. I was appalled, with my expectations high after my super clean experience at a homestay this summer, to see Japanese management letting a building become so dilapidated.

3. My room was dirty. If you can imagine a place where the dust has laid for so long it got sticky, that's how I was greeted the day I arrived. The walls are supposed to be white, but they are just yellowish. So massive dorm cleaning was in place, as opposed to room-warming party. And cleaning is one thing I hate with passion (second only to dish-washing).

4. There are bugs. As a hysterical bug-phobic, seeing anything small with more than 4 legs sends me screaming and crying. So getting a stinky killing bleach was also a must.

5. It's too small. Probably because they tried to fit both a bathroom and a kitchen in a room of 15m2.

6. The kitchen is an absolutely unnecessary space eater. It looks unused and I intend to leave it that way. I hate the cooking fuss and economically it's not worth it for one person. Not with all the Japanese (and not only) goodies all around me.

And some really queer things:

1. Everything folds and unfolds in my room. The bed a huge folding door, and so is my desk. So if you unfold these two together and the chair stays in-between then there is no more room for anything.

Before.

And after.

1. Even the bathroom folds and unfolds. The sink is slidable to reveal the toilet. So if you need to take the shower, you need to slide the sink back over the toilet. In some way it should be termed 'ingenious' for space utilization in the crowded Tokyo, but sometimes it's just purely annoying to keep sliding and un-sliding when physiological needs call you...

Before
And after.

1. The very funny English you get to see. Here's an example of a notification letter:

   “To Residents,

   I am very sorry, but cannot present toilet paper and trash bags, because there is not the budget. Please buy it by yourself.

Staff.”

First 30 days of Tokyo.

My first month in Tokyo was like the city itself – fun, busy and crazy.

One of the many corners of Shibuya, Tokyo crazy downtown.

Getting settled in Japan is a mess. In order to be able to do anything, one needs:

1. Alien Registration

2. National Health Insurance

Only after receiving these two, one can get to:

3. Open a bank account

4. Get a cell phone

5. Pay the bills

To make it "easier", all of these in very many different places.

Size.

As for my first city impressions, first thing I want to say is that Tokyo is huge. Having spent my whole life in Warsaw and in the last 3 years in Boston, I realize I was still quite sheltered. Both cities are relatively quiet and small. Tokyo is immense and loud. I get reminded of New York and Shanghai very often, but even in those cities, I have never seen rivers and rivers of people, who surprisingly still move in a coherent manner. The streets of Shibuya, one of Tokyo's biggest city shopping downtowns, are always crowded, to the point that the flows of people naturally divide the pathwalk into two directions. Doesn't help when it rains and everyone opens their umbrellas. I swear I could have had my eyes pocked out multiple times.

Another aspect of Tokyo's hugeness I found worth mentioning is Tokyo's subway system. Since there are so ridiculously many lines (as opposed to Warsaw's one and only one ;)), the stations can get humongous, so that when one tries to scheme their travel route, one always has to calculate the transit time. My longest walk between the lines was 20 minutes, up, down, up, left and right.

Efficiency.

The subway system is worth all its praise and acclaim. Tokyo trains are clean and always on time. So an excuse of getting somewhere late because of the train delay is almost impossible. To emphasize this point, here's an illustrative example: if a train really gets delayed, the subway staff hands out official certified/stamped/signed slips explaining the circumstances.

The riding etiquette is also quite mesmerizing. One is not allowed to drink or to put on make up in the public train. The trains are exceptionally quiet, even when it's packed. There are also some “women-only” carts for the rush hours.

Food.

Tokyo is fun and the food is amazing. Having suffered through American dining hall diet for the past 3 years, I feel like in heaven. Everything here tastes the way I want it and it is easy to be frugal, even if it's one of the most expensive cities in the world, all thanks to the many small family-owned restaurants or wonderful chains.

Eating delicious tempura soba. $11 for the dinner set.

Fun. Constantly.

This is the first time I am living entirely on University's money. Even at Harvard, my scholarship covers only my tuition and other fees. Personal expenses remain truly personal. Here, all my scholarship is practically one big personal expense, a deal sweeter than I could dream of. So not surprisingly with so many new acquaintances and friends made, and not so much class responsibilities (yet), it's been a very very long weekend for me for the past 30 days, with nights in karaoke bars, restaurants and many izakaya (居酒屋、Japanese type bars) with a lot (and I do mean a lot) of very tasty drinks.

Out in a all-you-can-drink izakaya, Japanese-style bar (飲み放題、居酒屋). From left: Reda (Swiss), me, Ben (Brit) and Fengphu (Brit).

Singing Abba - oh, us the Europeans know the old school music!

But all has its price.

Unfortunately the upside of this blessed state is that it breeds very bad habits – my scholarship breeds the awful spending habits. Especially with Tokyo prices, it incredibly easy to see your money disappearing. Of course the biggest budget-consumer is the food. But the travel expense is equally mental here. Unlike in most of Europe ,where you can get a monthly pass for unlimited travel with all public communication, in Japan you can't really save. Commuter passes are for specified route only (and you would have to travel every day back and forth to make the worth of its price) and any diversion is additional costs.

Getting to Tokyo was a disaster.

Here's the story of yet another failed long-distance flight, because nowadays, it is actually rare not to run into some sort of an airline problem. In my case I was bitterly disappointed with my favourite carrier Lufthansa, and had a nightmare of a flight. Instead of smoothly going straight to Tokyo, I bumped around in Munich airport for a day to fly to Shanghai and then barely missed my flight to Tokyo. In Shanghai they also lost my luggage and stole my beloved iTouch. Well, the airlines are just not reliable anymore, what with their fledging businesses and economics slump – one big mess.

Princeton in Ishikawa - 世界で一番いい夏友達。

I miss PII so much. One of the greatest language programs out there, where one learns just about as much as one plays and laughs (and eats).

The Princeton kids are as normal as any Harvard one, some of them very pretty with angel's voice (Jordan-san =)), or very cool half-Jewish-half-Asians (Nikki-san =)).

The Yale kids are rock-awesome. And again, for the second time in my life, I made a wonderful Yale friend during a summer program - Haiyan is, as they called her, the natural comedian, and so cute in her innocence. A great walking buddy (this girl is incredible, she can walk whole day and not feel anything, till the next day ;)), invincible tofu lover, intense diet-obeying eater and finally non-stop-asking speaker with a very very sexy accent (double wink). She is a great match to the other Yale student - Katheryn, who is calm, composed and very very sharp :).

The Georgetown kid is a beer-lover. With his random erratic knowledge of German and a bit of Chinese, this Caucasian Tim-san always gets the conversation rolling. Tim, I hope you are enjoying yourself, wherever you are now!

And of course, never forget the UPenn kid - the most hilarious male in PII, a male version of Haiyan. Of course if I didn't know him (and I didn't for the first few weeks), I would think he is the biggest sketcher out there (and so I did ;P). But nah, Wen-san is just way too cool. And how many Taiwanese-Brazilians do you know out there? I know only Wen-san.

But the Harvard kids are still the best.
Yizi for being the prettiest yet so cool.
Yu for being the most knowledgable and refined.
Vivian for being the most fashionable flower-thief out there, and probably the only PII who knows how to put on a yukata.
Romeo, for being the most handsome African-American student in the program (and the only one conveniently), who sent Japanese girls's heart throbbing every time he flashed his Obama smiles.


And finally Brandon, for being simply himself. There are no words to describe Brandon, but there are a few of his quotes that sent me laughing hysterically:
"I generally don't trust people. I think they LIE." (on the last day of classes, eating okonomiyaki)
"My host mother is freaky. She told me to be careful of Japanese girls, because they want to attack me."
"I went to onsen and there this guy took a picture of me showering."

PIIが大好き、ずっと　大好き！

Japanese Grandparents

The Japanese are well-known for their highest life-expectancy in the world. It goes 83 average for men and 86 average for women. My host family was no exception. I had a great host family who really cared to make me feel at home, so my host mother made sure I met all of her family members, starting with her younger brother (who astonishingly looked very much like young Ishikawa Ryo, the Japanese number 1 golf-player) and sister, her parents all the way to the aunties and grandparents. Before I realized it, I became very emotionally attached to almost all of them.

The grandfather is a retired soldier and a 93-year old baseball enthusiast. Although he can no longer walk, he is surprisingly energetic and talkative with a rather curious train of thought. Every time we visit their house, I get to watch some Japanese baseball with him. He of course knows all the Japanese players in the American league, Matsuzaka or Okajima in the Red Soxs or Ichiro in the Marines. He knew probably more than I did (which isn't that difficult though).He also has a very cute habit of falling asleep at the dinner table as soon as he's done with eating. He claims he needs to go on a diet, because he has gained a bit too much weight in the past few months.

Me: So, ojii-chan (granpa), how about your friends? Do you see them often?

Ojii-chan: There are only 2 left.

Me: Oh... . So what did you do in your youth?

Ojii-chan: I fought in the war for Japan in Machuria. I got shot in my arm but survived. … Do they eat rice in your country?

Me: Depends on which country we are talking about (smile)

The granny is even more astonishing. For a 86-year old who is so bent and hunched, which makes her effectively shorter than her own 7-year old great-grand-daughter Momo, she is freakishly healthy. She goes shopping frequently, can carry really heavy things and converses lively like no other.

Obaa-chan (Granny): You have to come back and visit us during the New Year's. We will prepare lots of good food for you.

Me: Thank you! Obaa-chan, you should come to Poland too.

Obaa-chan: You be careful, because I might really come!

My host siblings absolutely adore their great-grandparents, mostly because they get spoilt all the time, especially with sweets. The grandparents obviously never get mad at them and buy them whatever they want. This big Japanese family is one of the most welcoming experiences of my summer and something truly worth cherishing.

Japanese Family – lots and lots of sashimi.

My host family is called Inami. It’s a family of 4, a father who is a fireman (how cool is that! Didn’t every boy at some point in his childhood desire to be a fireman?), a house-wife and two kids: a 4-year old boy Koushyou and a 7-year old girl Momo. Both of them terribly loud, quite spoilt and amazingly stubborn. The girl is nothing like a cutie, delicate Japanese I once desired. She screams most of the time, hits me and shouts at me occasionally, which just reminds me of a mini yakuza boss. I, a 21-year old am being most of the time terrorized by this 7-year old devil. I do not recall my sister ever being half as mean as this one, when she was 7. The boy is equally loud, although opposite to his sister, he does not talk to me. Whenever I try to approach Koushyou, he makes a barking-like sound and goes away. And every time he is not given what he wants, he cries very loudly. What’s wrong with these kids I kept wondering? Well, soon I learn in class that there is a wide social phenomenon of Japanese kids being 甘ったれ (amattare – an overly spoilt and dependent kid). These two begin screaming at around 6:30-7am every day, and the mother to quiet them down, shouts over them, thus only amplifying the overall sound effects. I really need no alarm to wake me up every morning. Apparently, my other program classmates have very similar ear-deafening experiences if their host family also tend to include kids.

Since the mother is home most of the time, she cleans the house every day and that includes vacuum cleaning, floor swiping and laundry (which works great for someone like me who has experienced Harvard dorm-living habits). On top of their fixation on cleanness, Japanese people have crazy but how admirable recycling habits. Each house has 5-6 trash boxes, one for different type of trash – combustible, bottles, plastic, paper, perishables etc. etc. It is really incredible how a Japanese on an individual level give so much effort to segregate the trash. And for that reason there are no public trashcans – as one cannot segregate the public trashes, one just takes the trashes with himself until he reaches a) home b) convenient store (where there are huge segregated trash containers). I wonder when US/Poland can ever reach that level of eco-awareness (I shall omit Vietnam, as it is pretty lightning years from being eco-conscious).

The breakfasts served to me was the biggest disappointment – was all western bread, butter and yoghurt. Thank god they didn't force me to eat cereal. And here I was hoping to eat the traditional meal of rice with miso soup and fish, but no, apparently too much of a bother for a typical family. To compensate for it, I get a very Japanese meal for dinner. I think I have tried everything I wanted to try – sashimi (Kanazawa’s fish is the freshest in Japan, so goes the word), tonkatsu, okonomiyaki, takoyaki, yaki soba, cold udon, unagi, ramen… . I could go on and on given all my love for food, so I guess it will suffice to say I am very more than happy with the culinary part of my experience. On the expense of my weight of course.


There is no wireless. The only one I use is a stolen one from (what I assume is) a neighboring house, which for obvious reasons is very, very slow (another reason for my blog silence). The family has wired Internet connected to their household computer, which I refused to use, mostly because it is quite inconvenient and I cannot understand the Japanese menu bar very well. For a very middle-class Japanese family, their use of Internet is surprisingly limited. Most of their free time is spent shopping or watching TV. As the father is a firefighter, his shifts are usually 24 hours long, after which he gets one or 3 days off (a very interesting working schedule), and during his days off he just spend the day around the house, playing with the kids.

The Kindergarten Matsuri.

I have told you about the city festival. They are incredibly big and a wonderful spectacle. But I only grasped the significance of matsuris to the Japanese culture and how deeply it is rooted, when my host parents took me to the kindergarten matsuri held for their kids. So even the 4-year-olds have their own minature festivals.

It was one of the cutest and heart-melting sights I have ever experienced. Little tiny girls dressed in the Japanese pink and blue yukatas, running around from one attraction to the other. The festival was held at the kindergarten, which itself was placed in a shrine. According to my host-mother, the kindergartens in Japan tend to be placed near shrines to ensure quietness and safety.

There were many very cute games I saw and lots of food stands, but my favourite one was called Soba Nagashi (そば流し), literally meaning “flowing soba”. Soba is one of the Japanese kind of noodles, and the game, that cost 150yen (app $1.6) was the following: there were two bamboo half-open pipes/gutters, raised on one end, through which water was poured constantly. At the higher end of these, stood a man who kept throwing in the noodles, and the kids, standing along the bamboo gutter, had to pick the noodles up, as they flowed, into their little bowls with sauces and eat them up. It was quite a thrilling and endearing look and if not for my human size and age that socially barred me from participation, I would have happily joined in.

And as with all the matsuris, there were performances and finally the dance. This was the climax of the cuteness as I stood and witnessed the 3 and 4-year olds attempting to dance. Americans have their own idea of family bonding – probably BBQ or a road trip, the Poles tend to hang out on their dzialki (summer ledges), but to the Japanese, kindergarten events are these moments where the family gets together, the mums to exchange the latest gossips, the kids to play with their peers and the dads to play the games :). Well, what do the international students do then? Take pictures and boast about it to their friends, sometimes through the blog.

And here's the little video that I took:

Kyoto from a very very primitive point-of-view.

It is no surprise to people with slightest knowledge about/interest in Japan, that Kyoto, the previous capital of Japan, is one of the most historically rich and architecturally riveting cities in the world (a UNESCO treasure as well, of course). Here with the astonishing old Royal Palace, hundreds of temples and pagodas (and I keep forgetting which belong to which religion), a week would still not be enough to pay full due respect to all these marvelous buildings. And yet, here I am, an ignorant tourist, who can barely appreciate anything on her 3-day-trip in the middle of the PII program (we had a "semester break").

Well, a couple of factors. One, 3 days is way too short. But also, summer's generally a bad time - hot, humid and crowded. And finally, but probably most terribly, we had way too many people. It is impossible to do or see anything with more than 3 heads thinking. We had a total of 10 (!). Which means, it took forever to decide where to go or what to eat (or rather where to drink in our American case). My first lesson was that, if independently of a tour, always travel in pairs. This over-crowdedness of PII students resulted in me seeing less than I wanted, less than I definitely should have. A scorching, humid sun and temperature of more than 32C did NOT aid me in my quest to discover more of this interesting city.


Well we did hit the main attractions though - the Golden Pavillon （金閣寺 Kinkaku-Ji）and the Nijou Castle (二条所 Nijo-jo) etc. And although far from my plans, we had excursions of our own, rather unplanned, but equally interesting I must say, of which I devote the next posting. Golden Pavillon, as the name indicates is covered all in gold - something really worth seeing. According to Wikipedia (my Harvard TFs would probably chide me viciously for referencing this kind of source), it was built as retirement lodge for a famous shogun (chief samurai) within his big private estate. Man, people used to be rich right?


As for Nijou Castle, that belonged to yet another shogun (again not an emperor, just the highest samurai) where I finally saw the all-famous nightingale floor, of which I read so much from this once very bestseller book, "Across the Nightingale Floor" by Lian Hearn (I read it when I was still in middle school, which is some ages ago, but I do remember I was quite crazy about it). This famous wooden floor makes sounds like nightingale everytime it is being stepped on - back in the day it was supposed to help reveal ninjas and assassins if they entered the castle at night. Well, now with the hundreds of tourist passing every day, it's just incredibly noisy.

During the tour of the castle's insides (camreas not allowed :() we sneakily followed an American high school tour group that was lead by a Japanese guide who spoke very fluent English. Thanks to that bit of stealing, I learned a good deal about the rooms and floor plans of the castle - in those, where shogun made his public appearances, he was always seated next to a sort of built-in door, behind which many samurai stayed hidden, ready to burst out and defend their master in case of a sudden attack. Yet, my favourite room was the shogun's bedroom. Apparently that was the only area no males were allowed in - whether they were shogun's male servants or his advisers or ministers. And therefore, shogun who was all alone with his many ladies, had no males to protect him. For that reason, these beautiful ladies in service, with long hair and long, complicated robes, who entertained him graciously with music and dance, were also out of necessity masterful at martial arts, concealing their deadly knives and swords just under their gracious kimono. Dead cool and sexy as far as I see it :).

Geisha of the past and the present (even male!).

Another term that is distinctly and uniquely Japanese, among other such as sushi, sakura, onsen etc. is definitely geisha. In the shortest way of defining them, they were Japanese female entertainers and hostesses of the past. And here again, I allow myself to refer to another western-written book about Japan, again once a bestseller, "The Memoirs of a Geisha". I read it as a high-schooler, so obviously I was over-captivated with this Japanese version of Cinderella hidden behind a culturally rich novel. (On a sidenote, the author, Arthur Golden, was a Harvard grad too, History concentrator, and he took the very classes of Japanese Ba and Bb that those at Harvard learning Japanese know so well! ;).


Going back to the main point, the Geisha are supposed to still exist, though they became extreme rarities. Gion in Kyoto, the most famous Geisha district in whole Japan, once an exuberant and lively entertainment district of tea houses, is now much more subdued and it is only with some luck that one can get to see a real Geisha on the streets (and yet it is one of the few places where any Geisha can spotted at all). I was hoping to catch a glimpse of the wonderful scenery from the "Memoirs of Geisha" Hollywood-made movie, but I think we got lost on the way, as I never really saw what I saw on the screen (or maybe because nothing in reality ever looks like what's on the movies? -- a philosophical question for one to ponder ;) ). On the other hand though, we did walk into a real Geisha and I rudely, like a crude tourist, took a sneaky picture. She was indeed breathtaking.

In our wanderings to find Gion, we walked into a dark sketchy-looking alley, with many locales of seemingly incomprehensible purposes. It was only after we picked up a colorful catalog lying on the street that we learned the true nature of that alley - it was the hostess district, a modern version of Gion (and how conveniently close-by). Looking at the catalog full of profile pics of Michikos, Minakos and Amis, we started noticing that the only wanderers in that dark street were white-collar salary men, carrying their business bags and glasses. So this is the famous Japanese hostess club!


But that's not all of it yet. What we found at the end of the catalog, was a massive ad of male host clubs. Here we had profiles of all Hirokis, Mamorus and Kens. So what should 5 ladies on a lonely night, finding themselves in one of these streets, do? Of course, we couldn't be more eager to get in. The district was a bit sketchy though, many of the clubs located in unattractive, dark and even dilapidated buildings, so we had no other choice but go for the brightest but also the most expensive club with a flashy (and oh dear, how lame) name "Club French Kiss" (here's the link). The interior was loud and rather dark, but at least they served some drinks. The male hosts were quite distinct. They were supposed to be handsome, but I'm not sure to whose standards. Because to me, they looked like long skinny cats with plugged eyebrows, who ever so often looked into their mirrors to check out their hair. To American standards, they were pure-blood gay.

The policy in the club was easy to pick - although drinks were free, all they could serve was Sex on the Beach. As for champaigne, you had to pay yourself, on toe of the entrance fee ($45 per person per 1,5 hours), and the more champaigne you bought the more male hosts you had. Here's an illustrating example: there was this salary-earning, rather loaded-looking woman sitting next to us, in her thirties, completely wasted. She had a row of 20 Chmapaigne bottles piling and 5 loud hosts (one half-naked) attending her. On the opposite site, there was us, the 5 American students, with their broken Japanese and empty purses, who ordered no champaigne. We were served by 2 hosts only, sometimes even dwindling down to 1.


What surprised me was that the lady was quite good-looking, definitely very chic, and with her salary, I bet she would be receiving quite a bit of attention in her everyday life. So why was it that she even went to and spent a fortune in that host club? As my friend Brandon assessed, he would be so depressed knowing that the only way to receive attention is to pay others to do so. Yet, escort is such a widespread phenomenon in Japan! Of course male hosts are definitely less numerous the female hosting, which is available in every city (even in this little Kanazawa city, where I stayed, the PII guys managed to go to one of them). And the root of this phenomenon is so irresistibly linked to the Geisha tradition (which in itself seems to be a bit over-glorified in the modern times).

And here's the little (illegally snatched) video from the club.

The Noto trip - when you become royalty.

The Japanese are famous for the exceptionally high level of politeness. It is noticeable everywhere – in smallest shops and convenience stores, post offices, everywhere one goes the service is simply superb. My favourite part is when handling the money, they receive and return cash with both hands a slight bow, using the very formal speech. Can be a princess anywhere I go, as long as I pay :).

As a part of PII, I was lucky enough to be stay overnight at a place that offered the best personal service in whole Japan. Kagaya Ryokan of Ishikawa Prefecture is Japan’s most famous 旅館 (ryokan – literally, a travel house, which is a traditional Japanese hotel, also tends to be much more expensive than typical western hotels). Since PII has America’s (supposedly) best and brightest students, the Ishikawa Prefecture Government has not begrudged a single yen and has kindly sponsored our stay in that ryokan, where a room per night costs around $500. To describe the whole experience in one sentence, I will say that for once in my I really felt like a queen.

Upon our arrival, we were greeted by two lines of maids dressed in pretty kimonos, bowing their heads. I felt like I was walking on a red carpet. Our luggage were taken to our rooms ahead of us, while we attended the opening speech with the tea ceremony in an extravagant hall whose roof opened automatically. I hardly understood anything of the welcoming speech, but I sporadically noted some absolutely polite vocab spoken only in absolutely formal occasions.


After the ceremony we had a little bit of time to enjoy our rooms, stunningly Japanese and pretty. We were served green tea the 2nd time during the day, this time in our suites. Before we had managed to get enough of a look of the room, we were soon dressed into the Japanese yukata, after which we were headed towards the welcoming reception (that was organized according to Japanese festivals, with food stands and games) which then was followed by a feast worthy of a king. While eating the superb quality food, we enjoyed performances and small chit chat. And my legs ached all along, as we all sat in a traditional Japanese way, on the floor.

However the real point of the trip, apart from really appreciating Japanese bests, was to soak in the Japan's always famous onsen (hot springs). The Japanese have thousands and thousands of hot springs, which are baths with above 40 degree Celcius water, full of minerals and medications, that are supposed to ease your pains and tiredness. The very unique thing about these hot springs is that you go into them completely naked, no towel allowed. Lucky, we were lodged at an onsen with separate baths, although co-ed baths also exist.

The kids in my program did not forget they were American, so after the dinner and the baths, we engaged in a drinking party in one of the rooms. Some managed to stay all night and get another soaking bath at the dawn, thus catching a view of beautiful sun-rise from the bath. I unfortunately crashed at around 4am. But it was experience like none before, something that would make every single person fall utterly and impossibly in love with Japan.