The results on are in. With 99 percent of precincts reporting, my beautiful, streamlined, $85, three-geared bicycle, complete with bell, basket and light has a name.

Henceforth, my bicycle will be named 'Newton.' Both the name of the town where I was raised and a serviceable surname of some great men of past and present. Thanks for all those that helped out with the vote.

Check back for more exploits, particularly those involving Newton and me.

Be well,
Christopher

Posted by Christopher at 02:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Ever heard of Kabuki? Maybe so.

Early in the seventeenth century, a woman named Okuni devised a new form of dramatic dance and presented it to the people of Kyoto. Called Kabuki, the dance became and remains wildly popular. Even attempts to squash it have just enhanced its fame. Known for flamboyant costumes, Kabuki became associated with prostitution. When the Japanese government banned women, the resulting all-male casts produced “onnagata”, or men playing female roles.

Still today, the scratchy, high-pitched voices of onnagata are a favorite part of Kabuki, along with its tradition of gaudy dress, brilliant sets and excessive special effects. The idea that only men participate in Kabuki is no longer a reminder of a male-dominated society but rather a fundamental portion of the Japanese aesthetic, a people with respect for obedience that aren’t afraid to look past traditional promiscuities.

This I had to see. It should be no surprise that I was determined to do it right. To me, this meant seeing a Kabuki show in the Kabuki-za Theater, which first opened its doors in 1889. A lofty, heralded building, showing a mash of modern and traditional Japanese architecture, Kabuki-za sits in a long row of tall office buildings near the enormous intersection of Showa and Harumi-dori in bustling and overcrowded Ginza (See Photo Album.

Kabuki shows can last more than three hours and reserved tickets, especially in Kabuki-za, cost well over $100 USD. As someone who loves nothing more than getting an experience at a fraction of the cost, I stood on line just before extra tickets went on sale for the final portion of a performance one cloudy Sunday afternoon.

Sure enough, for 1,000 yen ($8.50 USD) I got a seat in the last row of the fourth level for the final portion of the day’s performance. For 400 yen ($3.50 USD) I rented a radio with an English translation and prepared for one of the great Japanese experiences.

See, Kabuki has legendary stature within Japan and has affected theatre throughout the world. Costume designers and choreographers in every major style know Japan’s most famous stage performance. The idea of a revolving stage first came from the world of Kabuki, when nearly 250 years ago Namiki Shozo thought of the stage mechanism while watching a spinning top.

Perhaps what first attracts so many to Kabuki are the actors. It has been said that Western theatre is meant to be representational and thus the stories have reality-based themes. Kabuki is referred to as presentational, meant to be extraordinary and beyond the limits of life. While most Western actors are meant to give a story, Kabuki shows are meant to highlight the actor. The world “Kabuki” literally means song, dance and technique, referring to the varying abilities required of all actors.

I was given the opportunity to see Kumagai Jinya, Kumagai’s Battle Camp, one of Kabuki’s better-known productions. It portrays a clash between two samurai warriors, and as the curtains were drawn, exposing the dazzling sets for which Kabuki is known, I soon saw the production’s masculine aesthetic.

It is a story of honor: how there is no greater source than death in battle. As a chanting narrator, dressed vividly but set aside of the action, said with the entry of Genji general Kumagai, “Even a fierce warrior knows the sadness of things.”

Such is Kabuki. So much of what it once meant, and perhaps still means, to be Japanese comes through. Hidden musicians and seated choruses help heighten every step, every flutter of the oversized, overly elaborate costumes.

The shamisen music and the echoing stage of cypress all serve purposes, perfected through some three centuries of development. The white-based kumadori, facial makeup, of which there are 50 varieties today, further exemplify the exaggeration of each story’s theme. The reds that form the next level of face paint offer a striking highlight of each actor, which is as strong a player in creating a supernatural dynamic to the story.

The theater was full and the applause was robust as the curtains closed ninety minutes after I first sat down. The actors didn’t return to the stage for personal thanks – there’s certainly no individualism like that in Japan -- but I left fully recognizing Kabuki’s role in promoting the actor, as the story drifts in the background as a tool.

I creaked down the steep stairway, the type that old buildings seem to always have. I walked outside and returned to the crowds of Ginza, smilingly accepting another Japanese experience accomplished.

Jaa ne,
Christopher

Posted by Christopher at 06:10 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

There is nothing more encouraging than finding emails or blog posts from readers and viewers. Better still is when questions and comments are hurled in my direction. So, I’d like to answer some questions that I think might interest many of you. As always, send me more mail or posts! Suggest something or ask a question, please!

I was recently asked about the influence of Major League Baseball in Japan. Having just watched, or to be more accurate, having followed pitch-by-pitch online accounts of my New York Mets losing in the seventh game of the National League Championship Series to the St. Louis Cardinals, this is a sore subject of sorts, but who could say no to cultural diplomacy?

Baseball is growing. Or so it appears to me. This should mean something because the sport was brought to Japan in the nineteenth century. In 1920, the first paid league began; Puro Yakyū, professional baseball, was born in Japan. American baseball officials actively promoted this growth, sending some of the league’s greatest stars over the Pacific. Babe Ruth played in a handful of exhibition games here, trying to encourage the sport’s nascent popularity.

I regularly see children playing baseball at schools or catch in the streets. Sumo is dying, basketball is lingering, soccer is strong, and baseball is growing. Any Japanese players who play in the MLB are covered in major newspapers and television. I was at a hostel in Kyoto reading the country's leading English language newspaper when I read that the New York Yankees were out of the playoffs. In the corner of the sports section was a review of the performances of every Japanese player in any playoff series.

Still, excluding an occasional Los Angeles Dodgers baseball cap or San Diego Padres sweatshirt I see, I haven’t gotten a sense that there is a determined interest in American baseball. Certainly there is interest in Ichiro Suzuki of the Seattle Mariners and Hideki Matsui of the Yankees, but it doesn’t appear there is a youth contingent obsessed with American baseball.

Japanese professional baseball is followed closely enough, though the league is regularly assumed to be financially subsidized. The Yomiuri Giants, the oldest and most successful Japanese baseball team (the former team of Matsui), play in the Tokyo Dome, the very city in which I live. Yes, I would have liked to make it to a game, but by the time I got my act together, the season had entered the playoffs. Tickets were more expensive and rare, if available at all. I didn’t make it.

Keep those questions coming!

Jaa ne,
Christopher

Posted by Christopher at 01:55 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

Well, as people like to say, I have loved to hear from all of those who have had the misfortune of stumbling upon my portion of JYA. My response to some of your comments, questions and suggestions are long overdue. I have gotten advice from a Philadelphian who had lived in Japan, notes from internet-surfing college students and plenty of posts from people finding JYA in their own way. Some call for more interaction. Shall I respond to some now?

Someone wanted to hear a bit more about Japanese, the language. Is it hard to learn? Well, it is, of course, a non-western language, with its own alphabet, so, in a word, yes. Of course, I am hardly much of a Japanese speaker, but I find the subject interesting anyway. Interestingly, my experience is that Japanese people love to gloat that their language is difficult to learn. And, while some argue the Japanese tend to overstate their language’s complexities, they are largely correct. See, yes, there are the alphabets of Hiragana, used primarily, and Katakana, which is only for words that came from other languages, like ‘computer,’ and, some 3,300 kanji symbols that are in daily-use. But, many clamor about the strict grammar of the language. While, new English speakers can throw out verbs and nouns and meaning can be found, this kind of comprehension is harder to be had in Japanese. All that being said, it is important to once again remind you that I cannot speak the language, so this is all second hand information. What I can tell you is that I know a few useful phrases and a few words that I am regularly called. Those titles I have been given that I thought would be fun to share with you now.

Daigakusei – (die-GOCK-say) university student
Gakusei – (GOCK-say) student
Gaijin – (guy-JIN) foreigner/outsider
Hakujin – (HOCK-jin) white person

Someone told me to get to know the people. Oh, the fun that this has been. This is generally my strongest asset in travel: I am not afraid to talk to strangers. The very reality that I managed to survive getting lost on Fuji (my third episode), throughout Tokyo (my second episode) and, well, almost daily is in complete thanks to those Japanese with whom I have been forced to communicate. Moreover, I do this regularly, without need. In fact, last night I met a young man and was drawn into a conversation about North Korea and its nuclear weapons program. Suddenly, he was escorting me to his friend’s home, where a party was in full swing. I was there until 3am, all of us discussing politics, religion and the global mission of my American home. There is no more important part of travel than involvement in the locals, whether it is a neighboring town or a faraway continent. Thanks for the advice.

Someone wanted to see more Temples. Well, my next episode will have a splash of traditional Japanese images, but a later segment that focuses on my trip to Kyoto will show almost nothing but temples, stay posted! In the meantime, check out the photos in my Kyoto Album.

Someone recommended that I see Akihabara. Well, I most certainly followed this piece of advice. For those of you who don’t know, Akihabara might be the technological capital of the world, if Japan is to be considered the world’s leading country in electronic goods. The place to be is Denki Gai, Electric Town, and the sight is an amazing one (See Akihabara Photo Album). The crowds are puzzling and I had never seen more gaijin in Japan than in Deki Gai. The place is like a wet dream for every computer nerd and video gamer that comes to Japan and, looking around, there are plenty. There is no place on this planet with more electronics of every order, all in tall buildings competing for sunlight with signs that read Sega, Sony, Casio and so many more. While, Shinagawa-ku is home to the headquarters of Sony, Seio, Toshiba and many others, Akihabara is chock full of stores, making it more interesting to consumers. Thanks for the suggestion!

I’d love to hear more from all of you. Either post on my blog or send an email, I want to hear from you!

Jaa mata,
Christopher

Posted by Christopher at 04:03 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

Well, as you might have noticed, my fourth episode has debuted. I have gotten some emails and blog posts about the episode, both kind-worded comments and some questions. So, I thought it might be fruitful to supplement the segment with a bit more about why Donald Richie was my focus and offer a venue for any questions about the man, his work or his philosophy. For me, it was a great pleasure to interview Richie, truly a legend of academia and cinema.

As was clearly displayed in the episode, Richie has authored more than 40 books on Japanese culture and thousands of articles and reviews through his weekly columns and inclusion in anthologies and other publications. He is a legend of academia and the man responsible for introducing Japanese film to the world. Moreover, he is an authority on cinema worldwide, with a short tenure as the Curator of Film at the New York Museum of Modern Art being the only interuption of his six decades living in Tokyo.

Our interview was in the storeroom of a tiny Japanese club where he was hosting a night of 1960s era Japanese avant-garde film. The club was packed with internationals and Japanese alike, all there for Mr. Donald Richie. (For more on the night, see the previous blog, 'Donald Richie').

Among students here in the city, he is universally known and revered and even the professors I know at my university hold a deep and unquestioned respect for the man. Knowing of him and then finding the level of adoration offered for him here in Japan, there was no questioning that I wanted to interview him.

Born in Ohio, he was an American, but one who had come as close to entering Japanese society as possible. Understand, outsiders do not ever become Japanese, a nationality that is as coterminous with an ethnicity as any. (Think, what is an American? Lots of shapes and sizes and colors. Think, what is a Japanese? Not an 82-year-old American-born scholar with black rimmed glasses and stylish suits).

His is a perspective valuable to anyone traveling, most certainly for those interested in the Japanese world.

After a few phone calls and emails, there was little resistance to an interview, showing a graciousness that few exude, especially those with national, indeed international, celebrity. The man is active in academic circles, so I simply pushed and proded professors, asking anyone I knew to find me a phone number or business card that might help me in my quest. Determined and lucky: there is no more efficient means of accomplishing anything.

The night of our interview he arrived late and encircled in whispers. As he came through the door, ushered in by beautiful Japanese women organizing the event, the awaiting crowd immediately began noting to their friend that there, that was Donald Richie.

We had to abandon our interview spot, with a beautiful antique movie reel in the background, as the club had become crowded and noisy. He grabbed a drink as I hastily located and cleaned a spot in the club's storeroom. He casually and calmly followed me in the back, as I awkwardly apologized.

"We shouldn't apologize for learning," Richie said to me in passing. Using the collective pronoun he sweepingly and simply assuaged my apprehension about his disinterest in a twenty-something fledgling interviewer. The interview went well and I was met with Richie's signature, a flurry of powerful and valuable thoughts, neatly packacked and given with the rough delivery of age and wisdom.

Please feel free to post any comments or questions. I hope you enjoyed the episode.

Posted by Christopher at 02:48 AM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

I let myself sleep in, not rising until nearly 9am. I got all of my things together quickly and without any goodbyes to be said, I wasted no time checking out of the hostel that had housed me for two nights of my young life, turned my back on its door and walked away, probably never to see it again.

My bus headed home to Tokyo was leaving at 11:20am, so I thought I should use my time. I walked immediately west of the Kyoto Station for the first time and found a quiet, dreary, open-doored restaurant. I was surprisingly satisfied by the breakfast of rice, raw egg, seaweed, sausage and miso soup for 420 yen ($3.50 USD).

I wandered a bit more before finding my way onto another highway bus, destined for Shinjuku Station in Central Tokyo. On our way out of Kyoto, I spotted a particularly beautiful graveyard, but it went by too quickly for me to grab my camera. Instead, I was left trying to remember it, large and hill crested, with stone columns left to help those still here remember those who aren’t. The grave columns were cleaned and shiny and well-maintained, as so many things are in Japan. Perhaps it is a way of fighting time, trying to forget that we forget. Sanitizing death and its memory to quell the terror death often inspires, fighting that terror with brooms and brushes.

The rest of my trip was another eight hours of war, watching Japan fight its environment.

Our bus cradled rock walls that had been cemented over, ladders remaining a final declaration of Japanese triumph over the wild. Two hours into our trip, we drove over the Ibi River with cement banks and the wide and meandering Kiso River, dumped-in and concrete filled. The Ochigawa River was dry, surely from over-damming.

There were fronts that made me believe that nature had won some battles. The town of Iida, nestled at the feet of great peaks, and scarecrows in fields, old Japanese bodies hunched over crops. We passed some older people playing croquet, protected in the forgiving arm of a mountain range, before my bus plunged into the lengthy Enasen Tunnel

There were the fruit trees of Matsukawa and the sun playing peek-a-boo over crooked teeth of green, green mountains. I stuffed my face in another book and soon the coming night was brushed back by the office lights of Shinjuku buildings, tall and straight.

I trudged, bag in hand, out of my bus and to a subway, finding my way to Jiyugaoka again. Unlocking the door of my apartment after a few days away suddenly made it feel more welcoming, kinder and gentler, like feuding friends that greet each other with warmth after having been away from each other for too long.

I vomited my bags on the floor, showered, ate, and fell asleep, exhausted and satisfied.

Jaa mata,
Christopher

Posted by Christopher at 02:17 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)