Japanory

Asakusa & Tree Bondage

January 2008

Mum wanted to go on a quick trip back to Asakusa as she remembered there were lots of fabric shops in the alleys around the temple. At home, she has an entire room full of pretty materials and uses them to make all kinds of appliqué things such as pictures and cushion covers. She also makes three dimensional creatures – she once made a dainty white dragon that ended up on the Christmas tree in Buckingham Palace. Not entirely sure how that happened, but she is very good at whatever art or craft she turns her hand to. So she wanted to try and find some off cuts of Japanese kimono fabric. She did and was very happy.

Whilst there, we discovered a rather fabulous stationery shop: not your standard stationery, this contained lots of Japanese woodblock prints, reams of washi paper and some pre-framed blank paper ready for calligraphy. Mum spent ages in there and bought some of the latter to experiment with her botanical watercolours.

It was a bit too busy for me so I came outside to snap a couple of photos while I waited for her.

Then I spotted this incredibly intricately roped tree.

What on earth was that all about? It certainly wasn't anything to do with Bonsai. Yes, they do manipulate large trees into stylised shapes too, as you can see through the ropes. But this rope wasn't moving the branches anywhere. The branches were trapped in a kind of roped cage. Tree bondage? Very strange. It took me a very long time to find out the answer.But what an incredible work of art!

Can you work out what it is for? (the answer is below)

 

 

Further below...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Keep scrolling!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is called yukitsuri. Yuki means snow and tsuri means suspension. It's to protect the branches of the tree from breaking off under the weight of snow. Something we don't get much of in Tokyo (so far!)

One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish...

While we were buying new goldfish...Tim decided that he really wanted to keep tropical fish!

So we ended up coming home with yet another fish tank, complete with heater and everything. This is now getting out of hand. Luckily my upbringing means I am not fazed by this at all - Dad kept fish so I know what to do with them.

A few guppies, a pair of Honey Gouramis, a couple of Corydoras and, of course, the compulsory Neon Tetras.

I think that was it at this particular time. There were more to come... especially as the guppies had babies within a day or two of getting them in the tank!

 

And Then There Were None – Goldfish, that is.

January 2008

Over a period of a week the little goldfish died, one by one. I found a revolting parasite on the first dead one and identified it through the power of Google as a Branchiura Argulus – fish louse.

I won't inflict a picture of this monstrous thing on you but I took the picture to our local fish shop (found accidentally after our trip to D2 last week) and they gave me medicine for the water but it proved too little too late.

Poor Rhiannon was distraught. So I gave in, sterilised the tank and a week later she chose a couple of fresh, new goldfish from a proper shop. These were the ugliest looking things I'd ever seen in my life, but according to Rhiannon they had "cute eyes".

To me they looked like they'd swallowed a golf ball, they were that spherical. They are called Ping and Pong…

I have researched until my eyes have crossed, but I cannot discover what breed they are at all.

 

These are not the actual goldfish - just a picture to illustrate this post...

Scooping for Goldfish

December 2007 / January 2008

Oh I dunno! Sometime then.

While Mum was here we went to a strange shopping mall over in Odaiba where one floor was set out like an old Chinese market. Yes, I know we're in Japan, but hey! Anything goes here!!

While Mum and I wandered around the stalls, Rhiannon stayed with Tim. She always does this because she knows that if she wants anything, he will buy it for her. I say no – and mean it. He says no for a while, and then gives in. They found a quaint game where you can scoop for goldfish… by the time Mum and I had found them, Rhiannon had already got going. <Insert expletives here as required> Just what we need - fish - and nowhere to put them.

This is the game: hundreds of small goldfish swim around in a shallow bath. The game is to scoop as many as possible out using a flat scoop made from rice paper. Rice paper, as I'm sure you are aware, dissolves very quickly.

However, Rhiannon was soon the extremely proud owner of 5 tiny goldfish in a plastic bag.

That rather cut short our day-out as we now had to rush home and find them somewhere to live.

In the car on the way home the bag started to leak. Of course.

Back home the only thing I could do was bung the poor things into a basin of ordinary tap water and hope for the best. Then we shot off to a place called D2 which is like a garden centre. And on our last visit we noticed they had fish tanks. 

We got a small fish tank, some food and all the gubbins to go with it and returned home to find one of the fish had already gone belly up.

Oh joy.

 

(and no, they didn't look as good as this!)

 

Mount Takao & Fuji - photos

6th January 2008

Still backtracking. Found some more photos which I'd like to share with you.

We took another trip to Mount Takao. The weather was stunning. It was very busy as many people make a sort of pilgrimage to this sacred shrine. They buy new charms for the coming year which get replaced next New Year.

Some shrine details:

 

From the top of Mount Takao we could see Mount Fuji in the far distance. It was a stunning view. Everyone else thought so too as you can see from the crowds of photographers.

 

This is my favourite picture of Fuji-san

Yet More Visitors…And I'm Not a Happy Bunny

See, this is the problem with writing a blog so far in the past – I get dates confused. Anyway. Having checked various diaries, bits of paper and so on, I've got this post to put in, out of sync again.

18^th January 2008 – 23^rd January 2008

Tim invited his friend, and friend's girlfriend to visit. It's all timed so that they return to the UK just before Mum comes back here from Borneo.

A week or so before they are due to arrive, Tim casually dropped into conversation that a couple of other extra friends will also be joining them… "oh, I thought I'd mentioned it". Errrr NO! But I guess I should not have been surprised as this lot always do everything together.

I'll call them D1 and D2 (or Thing 1 and Thing 2 as we've recently been re-reading The Cat in the Hat). So that's four people coming to stay, when I was only expecting two. I am not happy about this at all. But what can I do but deal with it?

I won't be going on any day trips with them as there is no way we can all fit into the car and I will, of course, need to be on hand for the school run.

Thing 1 and Thing 2 share the twin bedroom next to ours. You have never heard snoring like it in your life, I can promise you. One of them always ends up going downstairs in the middle of the night with no regard to the rest of us by trying to be silent. I am greeted by the sight first thing in the morning.

None of them eat anything other than "safe", semi-vegetarian British food. Therefore, I refuse to cook: besides, with the prices here, I can't afford to buy expensive British food for all of them. They eat McDonalds all the time.

While here, they barely spoke directly to me, although the volume at which they speak is decibels above normal volume. And the conversations are beyond inane. I just kept out the way because with all of them sitting in the living room, there was no room for me.

Talk about being excluded in my own home. Humph.

When they returned to the UK only one of them said thank you to me for "putting up with them"...

A Gratuitous Photo of my Daft Cat

This is Raymi.

Asleep on the dining table with his face in a bowl of tangerines.

Daft creature.

That cannot be comfortable!

 

And I've just noticed he's lying on an antique obi I'd just bought and hadn't got around to hanging!

The Adventurer Returns!

Friday 25^th January 2008

Tim went to collect Mum from the airport after her jungle adventure. Because I had the school run to do, he had to take the increasingly decrepit Landrover mentioned here. Not a stylish way to collect his mother-in-law! But better than nothing.

As he pulled into the driveway of our house, we heard – from inside the house – an ear-splitting screech followed by a massive clunk. At first, I thought he'd hit the other car, but no – a piston had sheared off completely and shattered a path right down through the engine (or something like that - I can't be bothered to check now). The Landrover was no more. It had ceased to be, expired, was bereft of life and a now very ex-Landrover. Oh dear. But what incredibly lucky timing! If that had happened at any other time today, goodness knows what would have happened – I may have had to drive on a motorway! The horror!!

Mum asked Tim to put her suitcase into the kitchen. What an odd request, I thought. Then I remembered where she'd been – and having lived in the jungle myself, know how migrants can sneak into bags and cases. When I returned from my South American travels, I was so shocked by something gruesome I found in my camera case I lobbed it right out of the third floor window and collected it several days later when thankfully the gigantic grub had disappeared.

Sure enough, "things" escaped from the case – we sprayed them all with insect killer and hoped for the best. Then shook the empty case outside and left it there for a few hours to de-louse itself.

Mum had had a fabulous time and stated that this was one of her best ever trips. Which, considering all the places and things she's seen and done, was high praise indeed. She regaled us with hilarious stories of her travel companions, food and discoveries. She had found a potentially unknown-to-science orchid. Which meant the very eminent botanist hosting the exploration didn't know it, so she painted it – she's a botanical artist – and sent the details away to Kew for identification in due course. It turned out to be known-to-science, but incredibly rare. Shame, we'd been working out Latin names for it.

She stayed with us until 31^st January and we fitted short shopping trips in between the school run. We spent a lot of time laughing at the little dogs here, in their pushchairs and outfits. Hardly any dog is seen outside without clothes on and it's rare to see anything larger than a poodle. She was in fits of laughter after seeing a group of four dachshunds, fully clothed and wearing sunglasses. yes, you read that correctly - there are cool shades for dogs! Leads that flash in the dark. And one event she still talks about today is seeing a group of primped fluffballs wearing frilly dresses prancing along the street; a dachsund - unfettered by clothing for once - passed them by, turned and barked at them as if to say "honestly, have you seen that state of yourselves? Have you no doggy pride?!"

Then, one day while we were walking and talking about these creatures she said "now, that's what I call a real dog". I turned to see what she meant and was absolutely smitten by a beautiful medium-sized red foxy-looking dog with a curly tail. It was gorgeous, and yes, it looked like a REAL dog. I had to find out what breed it was but my Japanese isn't up to asking that sort of question... I will have to search through Google. And so an obsession began...

Anyway, Mum's getting to grips with Tokyo now, so is able to get around on her own, leaving me to work and deal with Rhiannon.

However, she did give me a bit of a scare one evening when she didn't return home when expected. I had no idea where to go to look for her, she had no mobile phone (and wouldn't use it even if she had one) and I wasn't entirely sure how she would get back if she really was lost. It was dark and well past dinner time when she sauntered in.

I was able to say "Do you know what time it is???!!! Where on earth have you been? I was worried sick!" Oh, how the tables have turned!

She'd returned up a different road and found herself an artist's department store. About six floors of pure heaven to her and therefore had lost track of time.

Too many "what if" scenarios this week!

On the morning she returned to the UK, I went for a relaxing facial – I think I definitely deserved it this month!

Tattoo in Japan – part 3 (I think)

January 10^th 2008

So it's time to get my cover-up mentioned here finished once and for all. The ground work was done with some colouring in of the main arm piece and now it's time to finish it all off in one go.

I've decided to add a bit to it so that it runs over my shoulder and across my back. I like the curlicues the tattoo artist has put into to the design so this will be continued to include a name…

Oh no! The first rule of getting a tattoo is not to ink a name into your skin. After all, who knows the future? Obviously someone should never have the name of their partner, favourite rock band or celebrity tattooed on them – how crass.

But this is to be my daughter's name. Whatever happens in the future, she will always be my darling daughter. The text is somewhat disguised, too.

Another 4 or 5 hours under the needle passes in a flash – the conversation, as ever is stimulating and completely fascinating. He chooses music he knows I like too, so we discuss bands, history, politics… everything, you name it, we've probably chatted about it.

Because it's a cover-up he doesn't photograph it to include in his album but sent me the photos anyway.

Time to Start 2008

With a couple of free weeks…

On Monday 7^th January we all went to take Mum to the airport to catch her plane for her Borneo adventure. It was a fairly early flight to we parked and went into the airport for a rather nice breakfast. There's not a lot to do in Narita airport – you certainly can't spend hours browsing the shops like Heathrow and most other airports. It's quite dull and disappointing really.

Rhiannon started back at school the next day and I went for my Tuesday coffee morning and a much needed catch-up and relaxing chat with The Girls. After school was a Japanese New Year Festival, complete with warm sake (which was alcohol free – what was the point of that? It's vile, anyway!). Rhiannon doesn't like the dragon – it terrified the life out of her on her first day of school last year and she hasn't fully recovered. So we didn't stay long.

Then it was back to work for me – juggling everything with school runs, after-school clubs and so on as usual.

It was lovely to have some time to myself, even though I was putting myself under a heap of pressure to get all my articles written before Mum returned.

But there was another trip to the tattooist in the middle of those two weeks – more about that in the next post!

Frantic Speeding up of Blogging Commences…

January 2011

I'm horribly and acutely aware that I am so far behind with this blog that it is very unlikely to be finished before we leave Japan – which is actually in April… YIKES! Yup, not long now! (I'll keep you guessing as to what happens in April for as long as I can…)

However, I have so much I want to record that I am going to continue as best and as fast as I can. I may publish two posts a day, so please check back at the previous posts in case you missed something!

Do I need to mention that the amount of packing and organisation I am also trying to fit in is astronomical? I am reserving my nervous breakdown until about June – I think that will be a good time to come down from it all, don't you think?

 

When people came to visit us, we mostly did the same site-seeing trips with them, so I'll ignore those rather than repeat myself. I'll put links to previous posts instead - if I remember. At some point I will incorporate all the published Tokyo Tales articles into the posts too – some are already in here, but most are not. This is what I plan to do, but life does have a wayof interfering...

Sometimes I do wonder if what I'm doing here is worthwhile though – a slight confidence crisis arises in me from time to time - not often, it's true - but obviously while I'm writing this post at a ridiculous hour in the night/morning. I see people visiting Japanory, but very few make any comments. But I am aware that this is not a "normal" blog so doesn't really invite comment and discussion.

Japanory is more like a "travelblog", which suits me fine and what I intended. I don't particularly feel a need to comment on every facet of my life and thoughts.

As far as I can tell, the commenting crowd tend to discuss posts on more day-to-day commentaries, or deliberately controversial or business-type blogs. And the ever growing mass of "Mummy Blogs". I don't consider myself to be a Mummy blogger - I just happen to be a Mum who blogs - it's not my raison d'être. Perhaps I've missed a trick, but I don't think so in my case.

Actually, "worthwhile" isn't the right word – I'm not doing this for fame, recognition or money (although the latter would be very nice!). I'm not competing with anyone to compare how many readers I have or how well I have "pimped" my blog.

I believe I am over-thinking things right now - and it probably doesn't help that I tend write these posts between midnight and 2am...! Which is the only time I get to myself.

I'm really doing this for my own benefit as a record of a very special time in my and my family's life. Rhiannon in particular loves to see herself on the internet (diva in the making!) and I think in years to come, when she's older and our 4 ½ years in Tokyo is a distant memory, she will appreciate the details and information I've put here.

Also, I know that people planning trips to Japan and/or Tokyo find this blog useful. I know I had a lot of interest from readers of the Tokyo Tales articles who planned trips here. These people tend to email me, which is great.

So I hope that you will continue to read Japanory and I'd love it if you could click the "Become a Fan" and / or "Like" button over there on the left (pretty please!). I don't know why there are two Facebook buttons - I have no idea if they do the same thing or no. I can't test them out myself!

I'm having a needy moment - I need to feel that it's not just me and a few friends reading this - I would quite like a little motivation in the midst of the chaos that surrounds my life at the moment.

And if you do want to get in touch with me please either leave a comment or feel free to email me at [email protected]

Thanks for reading and I'll get cracking on the rest of the posts now.

Welcome to Yesterday

1^st January 2008

As well as setting foot on Fuji-san, we wandered around Lake Kawaguchi for a few moments – it was bitterly cold, so we didn't stay outside for very long.

To be honest, there wasn't much to see so we pulled over at a large car park by an information centre and spotted this fabulously named hotel!

I was in stitches – where on earth did they get the idea for that name from? And even funnier was a sign saying "Hotel Yesterday is closed today".

 

In the information centre were a few vending machines and lots of leaflets about things to do in the area, but sadly they were all in Japanese so, although we collected a number, we have no idea what they mean. The pictures were pretty though.

We got tins of hot coffee and hot chocolate from the vending machines and for the first time, tried a food vending machine - there were no other options as "Yesterday" was closed.

It was rather good, although none of us fancied anything with chicken in it – after all, we have no idea how these things work (possible microwaves, but I'm not sure). So better safe than sorry. We had chips and a shared a big box of noodles which warmed us up beautifully.

And then it was time to head home, with a couple of stops en route to photograph the scenery. A lovely change from concrete.

Mount Fuji

1^st January 2008

Yes! I've finally made it to another year – I really don't know if I will get Japanory up to date, but I will continue to try...

What a way to spend New Year's Day – a trip to the magnificent Fuji-san.

As Japan's highest mountain at 3776 metres, Mount Fuji dwarfs every other mountain in the country. It is the iconic symbol of Japan and a sacred and beloved landmark with its almost symmetrical cone looming so high that on a clear day it can be seen from many miles away including Tokyo.

Although Fuji has been dormant for over 300 years, the mountain is a potentially dangerous volcano which, if it erupts, would cause an enormous amount of damage to the surrounding area and Japan as a whole. For now though, it seems calm. The last eruption started on 16^th December 1707 and continued until January 1708. Until this eruption the symmetrical shape of Fuji was about as perfect as a volcano could be, but this eruption created a new crater with a second peak half way down one side.

Due to the altitude, the climate near the top of Fuji-san is very cold and the peak is covered with snow and several months of the year.

Most cultures since time immemorial have worshipped spectacular mountains as sacred places and the homes of gods and Fuji-san is no exception. For many years the only people allowed to climb the sacrosanct mountain were monks, and women were completely forbidden to set foot on a mountain at all. This changed in 1860 when the first British diplomat in Japan, Sir Rutherford Alcock, was reluctantly given permission to climb Fuji. The ban on women climbing was lifted in 1872 after the wife of a British diplomat climbed a mountain in 1867. However she was not the first female to make the ascent. In 1832 a 24 year-old Japanese woman was given unprecedented permission to climb by a sect who worshipped Fujisan as a divinity in itself. She had to disguise herself as a man to show deference to the taboo.

Nowadays anyone can climb Fuji if they so wish although it is not an ascent to be made lightly. The official climbing season is in July and August and during these two months the mountain is usually snow free and the mountain huts are open and stocked with oxygen cylinders. There is a saying that "you are wise to climb Fuji once, but a fool to climb it twice". Approximately a quarter of a million people climb the mountain each year, which when you consider they all climb it during just two months, makes it rather a busy place. Apparently the favoured time to climb is around the O'bon festival in August when some of the passes actually have long queues of people patiently waiting their chance to move on. There is a Torii gate near the summit showing you that apart from nearing your goal, you are on sacred ground.

I have absolutely no intention of climbing it. I don't do "uphill" walking if I can possibly avoid it.

Once you see the shape of Fuji you can understand why it has been depicted so many times in so many forms, and you also gain an insight into why much of the art in Japan is stylised. Fuji-san is the perfect real-life example of a stylised mountain. If you ask a child to draw a volcano or mountain the shape corresponds perfectly to Mount Fuji.

We were delighted to see some substantial snow there – it made it all very picturesque. Shame about the clouds covering the top. Mum hadn't come prepared for a snowy trip so wore all her clothes and borrowed a hat, gloves and scarf from me.

On the drive up, we found a place to stop and go for a walk through some woodlands. Snow dappled the ground, icicles in a tiny cave and intriguing ice crystals that had formed in the fallen leaves and soil. Rhiannon hasn't had much experience of snow, so had a marvellous time although we had to put a dampener on her enthusiastic snowball throwing. It hurt!

 

The views were amazing. I don't know what lake this was but five lakes surround the area - Lake Kawaguchi, Lake Motosu, Saiko, Lake Shoji, Lake Yamanaka, so I guess it was one of those… The feathery plants are my latest love – Japanese Pampas Grass, aka Susuki. It's considered a weed, but I adore its grace and delicacy.

We drove up the winding road for as far as we could before the road was closed at 2020 metres.

According to the car's thermometer the temperature was -10C. A small car park was full and people milled around. There was a terrible stench in the air which turned out to be a mixture of this sweetcorn seller's wares and the most dreadful toilet in Japan. It was literally a hole in the ground and rather overused – I nearly dropped my camera down there, ugh.

 

And here's the standard photo to prove we were there - and cold - Tim is wearing his summer trousers! Then it was back into the snug warmth of the car to head back down the mountain to find some less stinky food.