Japan travelblogue 02
Thursday, August 30th, 2007 at 7:43 amASAKUSA
Our apartment is just across the river, but despite our having a map its location eludes the taxi driver, who turns his meter off and drives around asking directions. Two phone calls to Liina don’t seem to bring us any closer to the elusive apartment, until she rings us and says she’s just across the road - and so she is, six feet tall if she’s an inch, and gorgeous. Trying to banish the tidal wave of inferior feeling that crashes over me is useless; I surrender, letting myself get good and soaked. We press some extra yen on the white-haired driver, who is reluctant to take it but eventually accepts with a bow; then Stu, Liina and I walk the short distance to the apartment, which is on the fourth floor of a small building and every bit as tiny as its advertisement promised. But it does have two rooms, and it’s much cheaper than a hotel. Liina, or Galadriel as I am starting to think of her, tells us that the bedding will be brought around in an hour and the washing machine, microwave and TV will arrive on Monday, then departs in a shower of twinkling stars, leaving us mortals to decipher the Japanese aircon remotes and hot water controls.
We wait for the bedding to come, then sleep, then go and buy groceries. Having rested and fed, we check out what’s on in Asakusa. The Asakusa Samba Carnival is on, it turns out; but in the afternoon, and it’s already 6pm, so we think we’ve probably missed it, and we have. But never mind; we do see a couple of eye-popping sequinned costumes swishing by in the crowd near Sensoji, the famous temple west of the river, where the carnival was held (because Buddhist temples and samba go together like…um, Buddhist temples and Samba?). And of course we saw the temple itself, and the Nakamise shopping arcade (specialities were rice crackers and souvenirs) leading up to it from the Kaminarimon (Thunder Gate). I have a thing for paper lanterns, so the giant one hanging over the gate appealed to me very much:
The next gate:
The temple - there’s supposed to be a statue of Kannon (Kuan Yin) in here, but you can’t go inside, so no one knows if it’s there, making it a sort of Schrodinger’s goddess:
A restaurant sign in a street near the temple:
Closing time - decorated doors in the Nakamise arcade:
Walking back across the bridge we heard music on the other side and wondered if we hadn’t missed the carnival after all. The music was coming from the direction of this building, whose decoration might or might not actually be a giant golden sperm (Jizzilla!) - Stu took these pictures catching the effects of car lights on the bridge:
The music turned out to be coming from an open air stage which was occupied not by samba dancers but by middle-aged women in kimono leading a crowd of ordinary people, of all ages, in both traditional and modern dress (we saw quite a few young women, not geisha, out and about in kimono, and a handful of men in old-style clothing) in a circular dance, accompanied by musicians in skimpy white costumes, with kids taking turns to beat the drum.
(As I write this, the peace of this quiet neighbourhood is being disturbed by wankers in a black van broadcasting ultra right-wing propaganda out of a loudspeaker. They drive around here every day. Why they do it here, where there’s no one about, I have no idea. Maybe they’ve been lost in Asakusa for years and just keep driving in circles, dutifully making noise, too embarrassed to ask for directions. In any case, I hope the Chinese find them, kill them and eat them.)
Anyway, back to the other night… pictures of the dancing and some more pretty lanterns that were strung along the river and the plaza where the stage was set up:
August 30th, 2007 at 11:43 am
Jizzilla! Jizzilla could take Godzilla any day.
I remember one of my friends who was in Japan through the Jet program blogging about being on the way to work and one of those trucks driving by broadcasting anti-gaijin propaganda. Seems like a pointless crusade to me…
“Schrodinger’s Goddess” - that sounds like the title to something. Something awesome! And very cheeky.
August 30th, 2007 at 3:37 pm
The paper lanterns are lovely. Now I’m going to have to mention paper lanterns in my novella somewhere. So what if it’s not really relevant! (I think the city that the character doesn’t actually go to in the book will have paper lanterns. I’ll slip it in somehow!)
The decorated door over the third arcade window is really really stunning. I want to know what/who those dancing bird-people are now. Maybe they got trapped in the labyrinth too, and decided to live on the door. (Why hallo thar, plot bunny.)
And the idea of a Schrodinger’s Goddess ties quite neatly into the faith a religious person is meant to have. It must be trusted that the Goddess is there; look, and she’ll either not be there and your faith will come crashing down, or she will be there and she’ll do something to punsh you for not trusting in her existence. (I’m sure there are stories in the Bible along these lines. The guy who got his wife turned into salt? I think I remember something like that. Daaamn it’s been a long time since hearing those stories.)
August 31st, 2007 at 3:15 pm
ASAKUSA
I seen it once but was all full of demons.
I love Video games
August 31st, 2007 at 6:49 pm
From a tourist brochure:
“Asahi Breweries, Ltd. The landmark is a building pretending to be a beer glass with an adjacent big golden object. Inside the premises, good restaurants can be found.”
Little do they know what *really* lurks on the roof of the Asahi Building =8-O
Nani?… Are! Do Itta! Ano Jizrirra!
September 1st, 2007 at 3:10 am
Laurie - it seems a dismal sort of hobby. Sad, really…
Alankria - I’ve made gratuitous mention of paper lanterns in at least one story! I wondered if the winged people
were tengu, but I don’t think tengu wear pointy hats like that(?). Maybe someone will find a way to rescue them from the door.
Colin - unless an awful lot of demons masquerade as quiet Japanese people riding bicycles, I have to admit I haven’t seen any here.
Stub - Someone yesterday told me how to ask in Japanese if the thing is a sperm. Now I just have to find the right person to address the question to.
September 2nd, 2007 at 4:12 pm
But do they want to be rescued from the door? (A short story is already brewing.)
Also, ignore any emails you got from me inviting you to some Quechup service. The moment you join up, they spam your ENTIRE contacts list. And when I actually poked around, it looks like they’re a dating service, so I cancelled my account. Didn’t stop the unwanted spam being sent out though. *enraged face*
September 3rd, 2007 at 6:02 am
Yay, Alankria fiction!
Thanks for that - I nearly signed up but got your message in time!