citizen of the planet

Just another lazy Sunday today.  Back on Thursday, at the end of the work day I emailed a document I was working on to myself in hopes that I’d work on it some point between Friday and today.  Well…at least I had good intentions.  Thing is, I know very well that I was unlikely to spend time at home working on it.  It would have been a different story if I was far from being finished, but no, the document has decent progress on it.  There are also some open questions against the project that need to be answered before I write about them, so I would have been stalled anyway

Funny how I seem to be attempting to justify it.

Anyway, since I’ve got nothing much I figure I’d pick a picture that showed up in the “Random from Viewport” widget on the right and give a few words on it.  I ended up choosing a picture from my trip to Japan in June 2006.  On one of my first days in Tokyo, me and a couple of travel companions headed over to the beautiful Meiji Shrine complex on the west side of the city.  If I recall, it’s pretty much adjacent to Harajuku station and a short walk to Takeshita-dōri which is that fashion forward place that Gwen was going on about in her pop albums. It’s accessible from the JR Yamanote line via Harajuku station, or the Tokyo Metro Chiyoda line from Meiji-Jingūmae station, which can be translated as “in front of Meiji Shrine.”  How descriptive.

Anyway, Meiji Shrine is a Shinto shrine.  This is where you would go to pay respects to Emperor Meiji and Empress Shōken.  What’s pictured here is a part of the complex where there are a huge number of these wooden plaques.  These are called ema.  You would buy these ema prayer boards and then write a prayer or a wish or some form of thanks on them.  You then hang these boards on a designated rack.  Now, what’s pictured here is just one rack, but at the Shrine there are many more racks right next to this one.  These are meant to communicate with the spirits.  Now, when you consider the fact that these boards hold what amount to the hopes, dreams, and wishes of thousands of people, it’s an extremely powerful symbol.

I’m not planning on heading back to Tokyo anytime soon.  However, if I somehow found myself there again at the big Meiji Shrine I would buy an ema.  What would I write on it?  I would pray for peace.  I would wish for someone to come into my life to change my life for the better.  Most of all, I would give thanks for all of the blessings I have in my life: family, a place of my own, a job, and nice things.  I wonder if that’d all fit.  Guess I’d just have to write smaller.

Hey, so what would you write on an ema prayer board?

On that second last day in Japan, I headed back to the apartment with all of my purchases and chilled out for a bit before being convinced to head out for a long walk to Akasaka, near Roppongi. He wanted to go to a ninja restaurant in the area. If you recall, I made an attempt to wander around the city from Roppongi back to the apartment back before the rail tour. That walk took 4 hours. Of course, I wasn’t taking a direct route, but still. Knowing that, I was skeptical about the walk. He promised a 2-2.5 hour walk. I balked at first but he retorted: “what are you going to do on your second to last night here, just sit around the apartment?” True. As such, I just decided to go along. God, that was a rough walk. I mean, after walking around the city all morning, I really just wanted some rest. Instead, I was hiking cross-city again. Sure, he took me around to see some interesting sights: Kanda Myōjin, the Imperial Palace, Hikawa Jinja in Akasaka. Of course, it was all in the dark, but still. We eventually made it to where we needed to go after 2.5 hours. I was hot and sweaty and rather unamused.

As it turned out, the ninja restaurant was called…Ninja Akasaka. Figures, doesn’t it? We waited around for a third person to join us. When we arrived, we headed in. Oh man, what a trip that place was. The reception area looked all boxed off and dark. There was a single greeter there taking names. After taking our names the greeter went from smiley to secretive and spooky all at once. She announced that a ninja was going to come in and guide us to our table so we had to pay attention. All of a sudden one of the walls opened up and in came the seater, dressed up ninja garb guiding us to follow her. She took us through some tight passages with low ceilings. The whole time she was bending her knees and looking around because, after all, we were in a ninja hideout and someone might attack at any time. We had to go up some uneven stairs and such. At one point the pathway looked destroyed–the path was broken and there was flowing water below. The guide put on a good show in decent English. “Oh no! The bridge is destroyed! What should we do?” I think we were all just in a state of WTF is going on @__@ to respond. She said, “wait…NINJA MAGIC!” She then yelled out and did a chant “rin pyou tou sha kai jin retsu zai zen….” All of a sudden, a drawbridge came down allowing us to cross. God, that was awesome. When we crossed, we finally got to the dining area. There were different rooms with tatami mats full of people enjoying themselves. When we got to our own room, we took of our shoes and sat down at the low tables.

The waitress, naturally in ninja garb, came by and greeted us. She started prefacing things saying that she wasn’t too great with English but that she will try her best. My friend then spoke up that it’s OK to speak Japanese if she has to because he’ll translate. The waitress was shocked and let out a very happy “arigatou gozaimasu!!!.” So funny!

After we ordered drinks, ehe pulled out what looked like a tube, and with great dramatic flair, she yanked on it and revealed that it was actually a scroll with the menu on it. She said that a few of the courses involved “ninja surprises.” Naturally that was a draw. Two of us ordered the “Surprise Course.” My friend ordered a steak course. Well the first course that came for us was a bunch of ninja star crackers with some foie gras. No kidding. The juxtaposition between an oddball theme the sophistication of foie gras was amusing. When the waitress came in with the second course, she announced: “first appetizer…now…dessert! Ninja surprise!” She set down two chocolate truffles in front of the two of us that ordered the surprise course. All I could think was, “umm..OK…” After a pause, she told us though that the chocolates were actually a potato type appetizer and a meat ball of sorts. Well that was neat. Heh. At some point we got this escargot type course. She came with a plate with shells on it. She did a chant and…well…probably better if you see this:

Get the Flash Player to see this player.

Awesome! For another course, she brought out these veggies and started cutting them up in a small wooden bucket. She poured in a “secret soup” which was a mixture of soy milk, shellfish soup, and vegetable soup. She then took this rock and told me to say “nin nin.” I did, and then she stuffed the stone into the bucket. The contents started sizzling. Turns out the rock was 400 degrees. That heated up the whole thing. Quite awesome. She added pork, and that completed the soup. See the following vid:

Get the Flash Player to see this player.

The soup itself was pretty nice. It had a very Thai feel to it. At some point someone (also in ninja garb, of course) came in to perform a funny magic show for us. He was also able to speak in broken but understandable English which makes me think they must get a lot of foreigners around the restaurant. By the end of the meal, the waitress brought in what looked like a bonsai tree. Turns out the bonsai was made of a fried wonton-like wrapper. The soil was made of chocolate cake. The green moss was dusted matcha powder. Underneath is all was ice cream and fruit. That was damn awesome.

As our guide was taking us to the front, I was expecting another crazy trip so I had my camera ready to capture it all. Unfortunately, the way out was a little for straightforward. She opened a door and there we were back at the reception area. God, that was amazing. As we headed out, someone called out to us. It was the guide. She jumped out, pulled out a scroll with a big smile: “Please come again.” Hahah. So cute! Well yes, if I find myself back in Tokyo that will be a place I’ll want to visit again. I was totally happy to have eaten in such a place. I had so much fun! It was a memorable way to slowly close out my vacation there. Of course, I still had one day to do stuff, but wow, how do you top something like that?

On my second last day in Japan I headed back to Akihabara to check out what I considered to be a super-geek store. Now, the area is already known for having a lot of the geek shops–video games, manga (adult and otherwise), anime, hobby figures, etc. This one particular store though seems to consolidate it all into one shop. Back in 2006, we’d gone to a branch of the store out in the far west of the city. Being that they opened a store closer to where I was located, I thought I’d check it out.

I wandered around looking for the building being unsure what to expect, but when I saw a tall black tower I knew that I’d found it. I was a little unsure about walking in. Why? Hmm…maybe I was suddenly hit by a little bit of self-consciousness. Did I want to be seen walking into such the place? Then it occurred to me that no one would ever see me again. Point! So, I started wandering around. Eight floors of geek-wares. Second floor had costumes and anime cels. The third floor had all sorts of manga and artbooks. I made a feeble attempt to look for a particular title, but I got lost amid all the kanji. I found two artbooks that I wanted though so I purchased them. In the other location, they put the contents in these heavy black bags which were designed to hide the contents. Now, that’s dead useful if you purchased something pervy, or mildly embarrassing. Thing is, in carrying a black bag, you’re sort of giving away the fact that you’re carrying something that you don’t want broadcast. This time, they put my purchase in a paper bag and taped it shut with three pieces of tape. Still opaque, but branded with the company’s name. I think such a bag still induces curiosity if you recognize the company, right?

So, again, why is an opaque bag important? Well, the fourth floor of the building was purely hentai. There were so many illustrated boobies and flying fluids. It was fascinating. This floor was actually the most popular floor in the building from what I remembered. There were a lot of guys perusing thing, pawing at the good, collecting piles and piles of…whatever. It all caught me off guard. As I walked up to the fifth floor, I saw a sign describing floor contents. I couldn’t make out all of the details, but I noticed that the fourth floor (the floor I was just at) had kanji for “men” on it. The fifth floor had kanji for “women” on it. Well, I wasn’t in the mood to face a full floor of men loving men, so I headed for floor 6. I don’t recall exactly what was on the floor. I think it was a full floor of doujinshi. Floors 7 and 8 had video games and hobby figures. Once again though, they didn’t have much in the way of figures from [that one show] that I would have been interested in. Feh.

Well, walking around with a bag from that store was interesting. I could have sworn that people were looking at the bag wondering what was in it. Or furthermore they were wondering what the foreigner was doing carrying something from the store. Maybe it was all imagined. Actually, I don’t think it was. I did some more general shopping before heading to Sensōji and the Nakamise shopping street. The street is full of souvenir type stuff all leading up to the big Buddhist temple. I’d been there in 2006, so I knew that it was a great place to get stuff. I went into one store to shop for a yukata for myself. I set my bags down as I was trying things on. One of the store clerks had to set them aside to access a storage drawer. As she picked up my bags, the paper bag sort of popped open a little bit possibly exposing the contents. The clerk started apologizing–genuinely sounding like she was sorry that I was possibly ‘exposed’. Oh, she knew. Of course, its not like I was carrying illustrated porn, so I didn’t care too much. In any case, I thought that sort of reaction was interesting.

That store, by the way, forgot to give me a free belt for my yukata. Boo!

Today, as we were travelling around before and after dinner we experienced a lot of delays all along several of the train lines. The trains had layovers of several minutes at each stop and each time we waited the trains became more and more packed. When we looked up at the screens on the train, it gave a list of delays. There were four delays on four different lines. Each one listed “信号トラブル Accident.” That seems innocuous enough. However, “accident” is sort of a euphemism. It’s well known that “accident” generally means that someone jumped in front of a train. So, people committed suicide in front of four trains slowing down the systems, delaying thousands of commuters.

It’s kind of odd when I think about it. I don’t think anyone really pays attention to the individual in the sense that anyone really feels sorry for them. More of the focus is on how that person was rather inconsiderate in delaying others from getting home. Is that a bad thing? I dunno, it’s just what’s done around here, I guess. It’s kind of sad to know that these events are sort of regular occurrences. With 8 million people here, I guess it can’t be helped. Just part of life in the big city.