Japan

Ice cream
Before writing this entry, I thought I might go and get some icecream (I am in a manga cafe, with free soft serve icecream). The machine appeared broken, but that wasn`t going to stop me! I ingeniously engineered a method of opening the ice-cream valve without using the proper lever. My coffee cup filled with ice-cream, and everything was going to plan...until I wanted to stop it. Stopping was more difficult than it seemed, and so now I have a ridiculously oversized cup of soft serve to keep me entertained while I write this story.

Geisha
The story begins with a handsome young man (me, in case you didnt guess) in Arashiyama, which is altogether a very nice area of Kyoto, surrounded by towering mountains and rivers and all that lovely nature. However, having blisters the size of pancakes, I had had quite enough of temple hopping for one day, and was ready to go home early. I waited at the bus stop...and waited...and waited...for 15 minutes did I wait.

Rickshaws are a very traditional form of transport in Japan, where a big tough guy basically plays the part of a horse, and drags you around town in your little carriage. They are an integral part of samurai-era Japan, and very culturally important. As I stand there waiting for the bus, a rickshaw drives past...carrying two Geisha!
Geisha are much rarer than most people think (there are only around 1000 left in all of Japan), and the Rickshaw driver seems very chuffed at the opoprtunity to take them. Geisha...on a Rickshaw...on a bridge over a river overlooking mountains in the cultural heart of Japan...could this be the best photo opportunity ever?

I abandon my post at the bus stop and chase after them, trying to get my camera out of my bag. After a few hundred metres however, I realize that the Rickshaw man is actually in quite good shape, and is perfectly capable of outrunning me even with his 100kg carriage. And just as I am on the point of returning to the bus stop, the Gods of Irony send down another ironic thunderbolt.

Of course the bus comes now. Of course it does.

Yakuza
Another saturday night means another night to go out and wander the streets. Me and Nick (the guy who works at the hostel...yes, his nickname is Nick, I`m not talking in 3rd person), an English teacher from Melbourne and a volunteer hospital worker from Britain decide to go out for dinner. Then of course, to a bar. Nick ends up in a long, deep, involved conversation with one of the men at the bar, a man dressed in a suit with a gold necklace, carrying a briefcase. No alarm bells ring in my head just yet though.

Some hours later, I have a conversation with this man about his sons, who are overseas in Australia at the moment, and also about the philosophical connotations of `Emptiness` in Japanese language...the second topic required skilled use of the subtle art of head nodding. Then he gets out his mobile phone and shows us some pictures of him when he was younger - covered, from head-to-toe, in a set of intricate red tattoos. Amazingly, still no alarm bells go off in my head. In the end, Nick explains to me in English that this man is Yakuza, and a very high-ranking one at that. The next set of photos he shows us serve to clarify that - Here is a photo of his collection of sports cars, here is a photo of him, muscle bound and tattoo covered, sitting on a white yacht in Hawaii in the classic pose of those who have made a lot of money from underworldly activities. He gives his phone number to Nick, and it too reeks of status and power - a special number, something like 080000003. His presence allows us to stay in the bar until well after closing time, and predictably, as soon as he leaves they kick the rest of us out.

A Monkey
The pub may be finished for the night, but we are certainly not. I want to prove to Robbie (the Australian) that there is more to Kyoto nightlife than his impression - monks sitting around in a club saying `cmon guys, lets meditate another hour...I don`t have work in the morning!`. We visit a nightclub first, but it is far too black for my tastes...I am not black, and neither are any of the people in here, but they don`t seem to understand that. The most interesting thing there was two girls dancing on top of the Bar, whom my friend assured me were Russian. To me they look just like any other girls, and I assume he was just having a wild guess, so I call his bluff and ask where they are from. `Moscow, Russia`, is the reply, in a thick accent. Damn him!

At the end of the night we end up in Nick`s favourite bar. So...warm! Nick knows everyone, everyone knows Nick, and I have never been in a more warm or friendly place. Only about 15 people, everyone singing songs together and sharing drinks around the table. Tonight is a special celebration, the bar has a new manager. His face is printed on the bottles we drink from, but he looks a fair bit different stumbling around the bar...a fair bit drunker to be precise.

The alcohol is both expensive and terrible, $40 for what is essentially Passion Pop, but what they are really selling is the atmosphere. I love the place, I love talking to everyone, its so warm and noisy and warm and warm. I end up talking to two Japanese girls, one of whom speaks English quite well. No matter how many times I tell them that I can speak Japanese, they insist on translating everything through her...I suppose it is something of a novelty when talking to foreigners, so I go along with it. Eventually I come to the conclusion that they perhaps are just forgetting that I can speak Japanese, as they seem quite drunk. To prove my point, I convince them that I am French, and can only speak French (`Parlez vous Fromage?`), not English or Japanese. Despite the fact that we have been talking for half an hour in English, and Japanese, they believe me, and try to communicate with me in English that they cannot speak french...I laugh and laugh.

The girl who speaks English turns to me at one point and says `I am a monkey!` with a very straight face.
`You are?`
`Ya! I am!`
Then she pulls the most hilarious face, and I am sad to say she did look awfully like a monkey. She seems to consider it a compliment rather than an insult, and pulls the same face at least 100 times that night, each time making me laugh at loud. Nick has work the next morning (at 7 30), so we decide to head home early at 3 30. I went to see him at work this morning, but he is not there...oh dear!

That was the key thought floating through my mind as I lay on my bed in the dormitory at 11pm last night. Two people from denmark, one from French Canada, and two from France, and all having very lively conversations. At one point, the danish people tell the french people that they can speak French, and everybody is happy! Except me, sitting in the corner grumbling in my own strange language...

The highlight of that day was a tour/meditation in a zen temple. Finding it was a challenge, as I attempted to hop from one temple to the other on foot...big mistake. Kyoto has a habit of switching North with West, and West with East, and I spend a lot of time retracing my steps after walking in the wrong direction for several kilometres. And I don't think I'll ever be able to navigate the maps of Kyoto. Still, I do eventually find my way to the temple after an hour or so.

My companion from the tour is a very nice guy from Berlin. It is nothing like I had in mind; I thought it would be fat Americans yelling their way around a temple "Look hun, they've got them paper door things!". But instead, me and Christoph (That's what I call him, he looked very artistic) spend hours chatting in English with one of the monks. Christoph is a artist/musician from Berlin, and his enthusiasm for every painting and picture is contagious. Check out his website http://www.chrisgertges.de/ and his myspace http://www.myspace.com/chrisgertges

Being shown a temple in depth is an amazing experience; we are allowed into all the room that would usually be marked NO ENTRY, and are pointed out every detail and secret. There are quite a few of these, and what seemed like an ordinary gold screen painting turns out to be fascinating. One of them is 250 years old without a single restoration, yet still amazingly vibrant since the pigments are made from rubies, ivory, emerald and gold. One painting contains a visual illusion based on which side of the room you sit on, where walking from one side of the room to the other the perspective changes.

Another contains secret Christian symbols, dating back from the time when Christianity was persecuted in Japan, and this Zen temple harboured secret practicitioners. A rose in winter symbolized the birth of Jesus, a white Lily symbolized Mary, and even the holy trinity found a place as three birds, one of which was white (the holy spirit). We also see the bell hidden within the temple for over 400 years, which the Japanese army attempted to recquisition for its iron, but the head priest intervened to protect it. A committee is currently deciding whether to designate it a "National Treasure", and members of the Vatican are soon travelling in Japan to see the bell. But for now, its just me, Christoph, and the bell, which the monk rings several times for us. A sound of rebellion that has echoed through the ages...Having always seen Christianity as orthodox, the idea of Christianity as an underground, secret religion opens up a whole new perspective for me.

We go into the tea room and talk for hours more, about anything that comes to mind: Zen, Mayan spirituality, Japanese art, and so forth. The monk who shows us around is a bit of a jet setter, having just arrived back from Seattle, and holds a degree in Psychology. He has been all around the world, and much of the conversation between the two focuses on European places I have never heard of. And if I ever go to Berlin, I have a place at Christoph's house :D.

After walking around for about a million more hours (lost of course), I find my way to a beautiful park in time for sunset. I talk to a Japanese woman who uses a very thick Kyoto dialect, making most of what she says incomprehensible, but it still sounds nice. After my day of wandering, I soak my feet in a nearby onsen, reputed to be the best in Kyoto. In addition to the usual array of baths, there is a herbal bath and a "Takaon" bath, Japanese for "hotter than the sun". I spent a good amount of time in both, and my cares of the day are forgotten.

Budget is looking much better now - despite the $20 temple tour, I have kept my budget to $45 a day (much less than $75 a day). I came down hard on food, and now spend only $10 a day - $3 on a big delicious breakfast of miso soup, grilled salmon, rice and orange juice, $4 on various snacks which now constitute lunch (mainly onigiri, rice balls with various fillings), and $3 on dinner, beef curry (the cheapest dinner meal in Japan that I can find). The only thing I am waiting to see is how my nutrition ends up - I spent a while trying to figure out whether I was getting enough Vitamin A, B, C, D, E, K, R, and Q, but then I looked at my water and noticed that it advertised its high "Vanadium" content. WHAT THE HELL IS VANADIUM?! Giving up on balancing all these complex micro-nutrients, I took a multi-vitamin instead. I'll give my new diet a week or so - if I develop scurvy, I'll come up with a new idea

Tis a day of reflection, a day of lying around not doing particularly much at all.
I begun this day at 12pm...that's right, I slept for 13 hours straight, a record even for me. I was very exhausted last night! It's cloudly outside, and already mid-afternoon, so I figure I'd be better just to hang around here. However, staying still for more than an hour allows that spectre of thought to catch up with me...where is all my money going?

Losing my wallet meant I had to go to an ATM, which marks my first $1000 spent in Japan. $1000? That's right. How could you possibly spend that much, you say? Well, Here's my current list of excuses

- Some was spent on one off things, which I needed to buy at the start of my trip. $100 went on the first day, on items like iPod cases, headphones, battery chargers and so forth.

- Some was spent on the hectic period of travel, where I traversed between the airport, Osaka, Kyoto, Nagoya, and everywhere inbetween. Even trying to use the cheapest, most time consuming forms of transport, this still totalled about $100.

- Accomodation is predictably expensive. I have kept to the cheapest forms of accomodation, dormitory rooms that seem a lot like living in a college, except very very compressed. It very much shatters the whole notion of early to bed, early to rise, as the lights stay on until at least 11pm, and people come and go at all hours of the night and day. Still, it ends up at about $30 a night, and the only way I can go cheaper is to spend a 7 hour night (e.g. midnight to 7am) at the internet cafe, sleeping in a recliner chair. I pre-booked my accomodation for the next three nights, which is roughly another $100 accounted for.

- Food is sneaky. An area of particular weakness for me, since I love Japanese food and want to eat all the delicious sushi, tempura and miso soup I can get my hands on. Having spent at least $7 per meal (I usually skip one meal a day though), and a lot on snacks and so forth, I am putting my foot down on my hobby of eating, and went to the supermarket instead today. I followed the boarders' advice of buying whatever is on special, and I have enough Japanese curry and rice to last me for days. Hopefully I'll be spending a lot more time in the common room with my miso soup and grilled salmon, and less time in those damn sneakily expensive restaurants.

- Water costs money here. As someone who drinks several small lakes worth of water per day, this is very annoying. In Japan, tap water is not something that most people drink. Therefore, there are very few water coolers, fountains and so forth where one could get a drink of fill up a water bottle. I have been filling up my drink bottle with terrible tasting water from hotels, but I drew the line at the last guesthouse when it came out brown. Actually, come to think of it, I did end up drinking it after it went clean...In the summer, when its humid and sweaty and your walking around 15km a day (I did the maths for how much walking I do on a typical day of touring), you end up buying a lot of drinks at the very conveniently located, very enticing vending machines. Luckily, the hotel I'm at now has reasonable tasting water, so I think I'll stick to that. Otherwise, I can always buy one the 2L bottles I found in the supermarket, and just fill up my bottle with that.

- $100 vanished along with my wallet

- Going to internet cafes does cost money. But you don't want me to stop that, now do you?

- Being a tourist costs money. Buses are $2.20 one way, and temples charge about $5 each for entry. Having skipped only one temple due to the expense, I already regret not doing it. You just can't say no to temples!

I have therefore spent about $600 on living costs (food, drinks, accomodation, entry fees, transport around the city) over 8 days in Japan, working out at roughly $75 a day. However, I believe this figure most likely reflects the cost of inexperience. It takes time to adjust to things, to figure out what's cheap and what's not. Hopefully I'll be able to manage my cash better as my trip goes on. Luckily, my trip is very very flexible, and I can always change my plans to suit my budget.

Evil roads
The roads here are evil, especially in the district I was staying at last night. Built in the days before cars and fat people, they are very historic, or very frustrating, depending on whether you actually want to get to a specific place or not.
Let me illustrate: yesterday I wanted to get to the main office of the guesthouse to extend my stay by one night.
It is about 300m away. On the way there, I get lost. Then, having forgot my wallet, I go back to get it. On the way back, I get lost. Once I am reunited with my wallet, I just have to go back to the office again and pay the bill. I get lost.
Finally, exhausted from all this getting lost in streets I now wanted to demolish with a bulldozer, I attempt to make my way back to the hotel to get some sleep. I get lost. This time, I just give up and go down the street, and do not return for another 12 hours, hoping that by then the streets will magicalyl become easier to navigate. They do not.

Pain
By the time I return you will notice two different things about me. Firstly, I will have legs the size of tree trunks. Secondly, the skin on my feet will be thicker than leather, and twice as tough. I spend at least 3 hours a day walking, and the kilometres certainly do add up. Sometimes by plan, other times by spontaneity, I end up walking large distances to get somewhere, occasionally carrying my gigantic pack up and down temple staircases because I walked past the entrance and just HAD to check it out. My feet are still blistered from walking in the rain, but I think I heard somewhere that walking excessive distances cures blisters.

Freedom
Having finally become truly independent, truly free to do whatever I want, I became rather depressed last night on a train leading out of the city. It is about 9 30pm, and having had a very long day, I am seeking a hot spring to soak myself in. Unfortunately, the directions I am given lead to a highly authentic, mountain onsen a million miles away. As I watch Kyoto Tower fade into the distance, and the dark mountains loom aheadm I am suddenly gripped with something between fear and sadness. I don`t want to leave, I can`t leave, I want to be in my hotel, I want to be at the pub with my new friends...I want to be home again. After soaking my feet in what turns out to be a warm puddle (producing much frustration toward the directions-giver), I go back towards the city, and instantly feel relieved.

I realize that my freedom has finally caught up with me. For the last week I have moved to a different location just about every night, zooming away from any friends I make, and any familiar places. I have no attachments whatsoever, nothing to hold onto at all. I have never had a situation like this before, I have always stayed at least in the same place, or with the same people. I feel lonely.

I know it is all part of the experience however. As the moon is replaced by the sun in the morning, so too is the loneliness is replaced by the familiar thrill of adventure.

On the road again...

I packed up and left the youth hostel again this morning, I`m getting quicker and less frustrated when it comes to packing (thankfully). While packing, I suddenly realized - I`m not a tourist at all...I`m a Ronin!

Ok so a Ronin is technically a Japanese Samurai with no master, and I am clearly not a samurai. But I have many other features that qualify Ronin status:
- I wander around from place to place, with no specific destination in mind
- My only possessions are those I carry
- I love sushi
- I smell strange, and need to shave
- I have a habit of spending time in the mountains, looking wistfully into the distance.

As a Ronin, I spent last night wandering the streets. The manager (turns out the title is somewhat honorific, everyone is a manager so long as they can manage the broom closet) took me to a highly recommended yakuniku place, which I will in turn highly recommend to others. Our company was a mob of drunken Japanese businessmen, and the food was distinctively Korean rather than Japanese. Aside from the Yakuniku (beef that you cook over flames on your own table), I once again found that almost every dish on the table was completely new to me. I thought I had explored most of Japanese cuisine, but I`m only just starting to realize how deep the rabbit hole goes. And the conversation was as memorable as the food - the topics here included Japanese business heirarchy, Basho vs Shakespeare (Basho is a Japanese poet of similiar standing to shakespeare), the deeper philosophy of manga and the underlying patterns behind the world economy. At only 28 years old, he has quite a history behind him; having studied Economics/Accounting at university, he then joined a generic Japanese company, but quit after a few years when he realized it wasn`t for him. He now works in several Youth Hostels, getting plenty of practice with his English (which is fantastic, as he spent a year in Canada). I felt very cultured when our conversation would flip from Japanese, to English, then back again...my smug grin was no doubt visible from the moon.
Unfortunately, a planet sized ego is a common side effect of speaking the local language. I`m keeping it in check though, by doing stupid things regularly. Just now, I had the staff come in to fix the computer...it turned out I needed to press the button labelled `POWER`.

After the Yakiniku we went out to a local Izakaya. It was very local. We drank warm sake (sometimes even hot sake when we were being adventurous) and ate Edomame (salted snow peas - the Japanese version of peanuts, probably much healthier). As the atmosphere became warmier, and the sake bottle emptier, our conversation turned from matters of practicality (like how I can get a job and replace some of the money I`m spending) to far more presing matters, such as `what is the sound of one hand clapping?`. By the time we had finished musing over whether a tree falling in the woods makes a sound with no one around to hear it, it was time to head home...

By home of course, I mean the hostel dorimitory. Me and 7 other people, but at 1 30am most of the beds were still empty. Compared with the place I stayed at last time, where mothers and children congretated with adults of varying ages, this place felt more like a college. For example, photos on the wall, and pictures of cats telling me not to forget to switch of the air conditioner and so forth.

The plan for today (not to mention tonight) is hazy. Every hostel in town appears to be fully booked, and for a while it seemed I would be testing my samurai skills by building a shelter in the mountains. At the moment however, it seems I may be able to stay the night at the owner`s house, a huge, traditional style Japanese house with room for guests when the hostel is full. I`m very tempted to stay in this manga cafe though, its only $15 for a 7 hour stopover (more sleep than anyone needs, plus I can blog when I wake up in the night and get bored!).

Whatever happens, I`m sure it will be something amazing, judging by my record so far. I am finally comprehending the city of Kyoto, a city as old as Japan itself. It`s a funny thing that on my way between the 7-11 and the manga cafe, I walk on streets that pre-date the samurai, streets where huge battles have been fought (at one time an army of 100 000 troops and another of 90 000 troops fought in the city of Kyoto), streets that contain so much history you practically trip over it when you walk around. Now if only I had a sword and a robe...