eattravelwrite’s posterous

Okay, I’ll admit it. The Japanese winter is getting to me. Even though the traditionally coldest time of year, Daikan, has officially ended, it is still friggin’ cold. Cold, grey, and quiet.

I’d been warned about this—winter is the hardest time in Japan for us English teachers. It’s bitterly cold, the euphoria of being in a new country—however charming it may be—has worn away, and you’re left with navigating between your apartment and school, and between classrooms and the staff room, in a country that doesn’t have central heating.

It really bites.

The funny thing is, though, that I don’t really miss America, in that I don’t find myself wishing I were there. I just wish I was more comfortable here, in Japan.

I miss people in America. I miss my dogs, I miss my car, and of course I miss being fluent and literate in the local language (also, I could really use an In ’n’ Out Burger one of these days), but America also feels very far away. It’s hard to imagine living there right now—and I don’t mean this in a superior, anti-America way, but in a mental way; I’ve been away for long enough in such a different and, at times, bewildering place that it really is hard for me to picture how my life was like in the United States.

I’ve lived abroad before—a year in Oxford, as a university student. That was different, though. It wasn’t as big of a break from how I lived my life (also, it helps that people speak English in England). It felt like less of a shift, since I knew I’d be returning to California after one tidy year. I wasn’t quite an adult yet, with all the messiness and freedom that comes with adulthood.

This time, the shift is bigger. I left a corporate career in Silicon Valley for travel, exploring, passion—the cynic in me cringes when I use the word “passion,” but that is, yes, the right word. All of this has been a huge change for historically overachieving, straight-and-narrow me (fine, I’m still overachieving, but not, I hope, so straight-and-narrow).

Often, I get frustrated with myself for not feeling 100% adjusted yet. And then I remind myself that I've only been here six months so far, which isn't really that long—although, good god, it feels much longer—and there are so many subtle and not-so-subtle strains to living here as an expat. It all adds up.

Sometimes, I feel like I’m in a self-imposed socio-psychological experiment—how long can I last in a place where I am scrambling to learn the language, where all the people I interact with are new to me, and where I’m not literate enough to read my own mail? Where the general mindset and manners of people I encounter often seem really different from what I’m used to, and silence often seems to be the preferred mode of communication? (Cue the not-so-subtle sense of strain.)

It will get better. Spring will come, and I’ll meet more people, explore more of Japan and the rest of Asia. It still feels right for me to be here, even when I feel cranky or gloomy or dazed about how, exactly, I ended up living in Japan.

And I will head back to America when the time is right, but for now, it feels far, far away.

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In the meantime, I want to do something outrageously fun. Think salsa, hip hop, gangsta rap. Any suggestions?

Below: I have a huge backlog of pictures that I haven’t posted yet. Here are some from Kyoto in December, during a fun day of Christmas shopping with a friend in the charming, winding streets near Kiyomizu-dera temple. The day included a spontaneous stop at a temple, and a delicious lunch at a hole-in-the-wall vegetarian place off of Shijo-dori in downtown Kyoto. It was so hole-in-the-wall that it was located at the very back of an alley, and the place doubles as the restaurant owner’s house, complete with cat figurines and actual sleeping cats.

Note: The geishas we saw were probably fakes.

             

Today is Setsubun, which marks the end of Daikan, or the “Big Cold” period of winter in Japan, and celebrates the coming of spring.

At work today, one of my fellow teachers told me that, on Setsubun, children throw roasted soybeans, or mame, at people dressed up as demons. This is supposed to help ward off evil spirits in the coming year and to bring good luck.

During Setsubun, it is also customary, according to my coworker, to 1) eat a really long maki sushi roll, 2) eat it while facing southwest, and 3) eat the whole roll without talking.  Doing this will bring good luck. I have no problem with any of these requirements, so I stopped by a sushi stand on my way home from work today and bought a special Setsubun sushi roll, which is also the largest sushi roll I have ever eaten.

The sushi vendor had several kinds of Setsubun sushi rolls on sale, each of them the same long size, but with different fillings. I asked him which one he recommended, and he recommended the special, which turned out to have a combination of tofu, marinated vegetables and shitake mushrooms, and bits of unagi—yum.

(Side note: One of the things I love about Japan is that, whenever you ask a cashier/waiter/restaurant owner what is the recommended dish, I’ve generally found that they really do give you their honest recommendation, instead of, for example, the most expensive dish. True to this, the gruff-ish sushi vendor recommended the Setsubun roll that was on sale to me.)

The roll was huge—18 centimeters, or about 7 inches, long (yes, I measured it). It reminded me of a few things, which you can decide for yourself.

The tofu, vegetables, shitake mushrooms, and unagi were sweetly seasoned, the rice fresh. I ate all of it, facing southwest, without talking.

The roll also came with a packet of roasted soybeans, the kind you can throw to ward off bad luck. It is also lucky to eat one soybean for every year of your age. Lucky for me, there were exactly 18 soybeans in the packet.

Below, my Setsubun dinner (with a side of home-cooked udon).

Not a bad view, huh? Because I don't eat enough Japanese food, I ate at this stunning Japanese-Italian fusion restaurant in Hong Kong. (More details on the meal in the picture gallery below.)

This week, I returned to freezing Japan, after two wonderful weeks in Hong Kong, aka the motherland, where I wholeheartedly stimulated the economy through shopping and eating, and spent good, quality time with friends and family.

I go back to Hong Kong every couple years or so to see my relatives (and, frankly, to shop), but now that I'm so close to HK, I will probably go back more often. After five months in Japan as a responsible, super-independent adult far from family and old friends, it was so nice to be babied and taken care of by my very nice relatives. And to be able to eavesdrop on people again! And talk to people, everywhere, in languages that I can speak fluently. Phew.

The minute I boarded the plane to Hong Kong in Kansai International Airport, I could feel the difference. People on the plane were chatty. They were brassy (publicly brassy, that is). They were also speaking…Cantonese.

Here are some of the things I enjoyed about being in Hong Kong (aside from the obvious, like, shopping):
  1. Using my cell phone whenever I damn well wanted to
  2. Not being stared at while reading English books on the trains
  3. There are public trash cans everywhere (Japan is very trash-can deficient)
  4. Eating meat, roasted meats! There’s nothing like Hong Kong’s barbecued pork, roasted pork, and soy sauce chicken.
  5. Dim sum. But I can’t talk too much about dim sum, or I’ll get homesick.

  6. Hong Kong cafes, where I can order Horlicks, milk tea, hot lemon tea, congee, afternoon tea sets, and more goodies.
  7. Salted fish and chicken fried rice, rice noodles in soup with fish balls (not those kinds of balls)
  8. There’s English everywhere!

Here are some things I appreciate about being back in Japan:
  1. The customer service—they really do have the best customer service here of any country I’ve visited
  2. The udon, the sashimi
  3. There’s a vending machine every 2 feet (pardon me, every 2 meters)
  4. Their gorgeous desserts. It's strawberry season, which means I can eat things like this:

  5. The delivery services—I got my 28-kg suitcase delivered to my door from the airport for 1870 yen (less than $21 US).
  6. The quiet on the trains (although I do appreciate the Hong Kong brassiness)
  7. Kyoto
  8. The surprises. I’m still learning.

Below, more pictures from Hong Kong:
  1. View of Hong Kong nightscape from Victoria Peak. This view gave me such an overwhelming sense of pride for my birthplace. Hong Kong really is stunning.
  2. Nighttime on the Peak
  3. Hiking near Victoria Peak on Christmas Day
  4. I think everyone should hike with at least four corgis.
  5. Durian-stuffed rolls for dessert with my friend Lina, the intrepid traveler and blogger. My first taste of durian! It turns out that that smell of garbage I’ve always encountered in Chinatowns was actually the smell of durian. It smells like garbage, but tastes sweet, a bit nutty, and pulpy—weird.
  6. Interior of Aqua, a Japanese-Italian fusion restaurant at the top of One Peking Road, Tsim Tsa Tsui.
  7. I had a gloriously buttery miso-grilled black cod set at Aqua.
  8. For dessert, half-baked chocolate cake with hazelnut ice cream. Yum.
  9.  Prawn curry at Thai Basil restaurant at Pacific Place, Admiralty.
 10. Fish cake and spring roll platter.
 11. For dessert, pumpkin with ice cream and cotton candy!
 12. Dim sum at Lei Garden. They are rated one-star by Michelin, and oh, do they deserve it. The roasted pork there and their “snowy mountain” egg custard buns are the best I've had anywhere.

                       

Last weekend, I went to Kobe to see the Luminarie, a light festival held every December to commemorate the Great Hanshin earthquake, the devastating earthquake that leveled Kobe in 1995. This year’s Luminarie was held from December 3 to 14.

Before the Luminarie began for the night, I explored Kobe a little by foot. It was only my second time in Kobe—the first time was for an errand-type trip for groceries from Kobe’s Chinatown and household goods from Kobe’s Ikea (which, incidentally, is exactly like every other Ikea I’ve visited in the US, down to the layout and meatball sauce—it’s strangely comforting, as if stepping through the doors of Kobe’s Ikea beams you into the Ikea of Anywhere, California).

Kobe is an attractive, walkable port city with mountains on one side and the Inland Sea on the other. It reminds me of San Francisco—something about the grayish shade of light there, its closeness to the water, and the grayness and newness of the buildings (compared to the rest of Japan, which, for the most part, is freaking old).

As I mentioned, there’s even a Chinatown, Nankin-machi, which is one of only about three Chinatowns in Japan (there is also one in Nagasaki, and the biggest one is in Yokohama).

Before the light festival, I walked through Chinatown to Meriken Park, which is on the harbor. It includes Kobe Port Tower, the Kobe Maritime Museum, and a memorial to the Great Hanshin earthquake victims.

I also visited Harborland, which is a shopping and amusement park area, with a picturesque shopping complex called Mosaic. Mosaic has a small park called Mosaic Garden, which overlooks a ferris wheel and amusement park below.

In Mosaic Garden, there is also a special gazebo for the holidays called, “Shakehands.” You step inside the gazebo with that special someone, each put one hand on a metal grip in the middle of the gazebo, and then you use your free hand to shake hands with the other person. When you shake hands, voila! The gazebo lights up blue. What better way to display your affection during the holiday season than by shaking hands?

Trivia: In America, Christmas is a time for families to gather, while New Year’s Eve is for couples. In Japan, New Year’s Eve is when you spend quality time with the family. Christmas is for a different sort of quality time.

And one of my favorite parts of my visit to Mosaic? Snow! Fake snow, that is. At five o’clock, frenetic Christmas music started to play in the mall and fake snow blew overhead. Another one of those sneaky, delightful surprises I often encounter these days.

After I visited Mosaic, it was dusk, and I walked over to the Marutamachi area, where the walking route to the light festival began. The crowds were incredible. It was the last Saturday of the festival, and there were literally thousands of people lined up in the streets, as if it were a New Year’s Eve party.

The city had blocked off several streets for crowd control, and there was a carefully mapped route that the crowds followed to get to the actual streets where the light displays were. It took at least an hour-and-a-half to walk from the start of the route to the light displays, which were really only a few blocks away, near Sannomiya station. It was an orderly crowd, though (yay, Japan!), of mostly couples and families.

The actual light display begins with an arcade of lights that arch over a few blocks of streets. The lights are colorful and gaudy. The Italian government donated the lights, which are each individually hand-painted. Unfortunately, my camera doesn’t do too well with nighttime shots, but you get the general picture (no pun intended).

After walking through the arcade, you walk up into a small park that has a grand, ornate circular set-up of lights that resembles an oversized gazebo of lights.

It was pretty, and yet it also reminded me of a cross between Caesar’s Palace and It’s a Small World—as if the inside of a casino had been transported to downtown Kobe. I prefer something a little more subtle. The onlookers were all delighted by the lights, though, and took plenty of pictures (like me!).

As with any good festival in Japan, one of the best parts of the festival was the street food. There were multiple blocks of food stands, with okonomiyaki (a sort of Japanese “pancake”), taiyaki (a fish-shaped waffle stuffed with red bean paste or chocolate), takoyaki (fried balls of dough with octopus meat inside), and much more.

I had some karaage (deep fried chicken) and these adorable little egg waffles that I didn’t know the name of—no pictures of them this time, though! I was too busy stuffing my face.

As I head off on my holiday travels, I wish you and yours a very happy holiday season, and the best New Year’s yet.

                     

Leaf-peeping season in Japan is, sadly, over. I thought this would be a good time to post some more pictures I took during my leaf-peeping outings that, for one reason or another, were not up to my (admittedly perfectionistic) standards, and so didn’t go into my original posts.

In addition to visiting Takao, Ishiyama-dera, and Arashiyama, I also visited the Hiyoshi Taisha shrine for leaf-peeping.

Hiyoshi Taisha is at the base of Mt. Hiei, north of Kyoto. Unfortunately, the day that I visited, it was raining and bitterly cold, and my photos ended up being all invariably blurry--which makes for interesting moody-type pictures, but not much clarity. Some of them still struck me, though, so here they are.

In spite of the rain and cold that day, the red maple leaf colors were still stunning. Some of the falling red leaves even ended up sticking to the top of my umbrella--I could see their leafy silhouettes from the underside of the umbrella--which I like to think is a lucky sign.

Below: Pictures from Hiyoshi Taisha, Ishiyama-dera, and the bamboo forest in Arashiyama.

             

I recently visited a monkey park for the first time, in the Arashiyama district of western Kyoto. Japan is, apparently, just brimming full of wild monkeys—I have heard many stories about the run-ins that different English teachers have had with monkeys in the mountains or forests, in the countryside, and even (or especially) in an outhouse.

The monkeys at Iwatayama Monkey Park are all wild and freely roam the park, which is on Mount Arashiyama, near the Togetsukyo Bridge (which is famous, incidentally, for its view of the nearby mountains in leaf-peeping season).

The walk up Mount Arashiyama is somewhat steep, with tall trees lining both sides of the trail. Along the way, before you have actually seen any monkeys, are ominous-looking signs, warning you not to show the monkeys any food, give them any food, or look them in the eye (direct eye contact can be seen by the monkeys as a sign of aggression—they’re very sensitive, just like you and I).

Eventually, you get to a bend in the road and take a smaller path up towards an overlook point, which is where the majority of the monkeys are. On the overlook point, which also offers a generous view of Kyoto, the monkeys freely frolic (pardon the alliteration), and caretakers keep the more aggressive monkeys in line with the help of a broom (I don't think PETA would like this very much). You can also go into a small cabin to feed the monkeys (the humans go inside and feed the monkeys outside, through wire-fence windows).

The monkeys are what I expected monkeys to be like: red-faced, red-bottomed, flea-picking, aggressive. Your typical monkey. The ones at Iwatayama are Japanese macaque monkeys. None of them bothered me, but I did see one baring its teeth at an innocent-looking gentleman who just happened to walk by it.

The most interesting monkey I saw was a younger one, a baby, who kept scraping a small rock against a bigger rock. I’m not sure what it was trying to do—make music? Discover fire? Make a weapon?

My most favorite pictures from my visit were of the expressions on the faces of monkeys who were being groomed by their partners. They looked as blissful as I must look when I step into the soaking tub at an onsen.

Shortly after visiting the monkey park, I lunched at one of the best udon places I’ve visited yet in Japan, called Ozuru.

Ozuru is an udon restaurant located on the main street of Arashiyama, close to Tenryu-ji temple and the Bamboo Forest. This was my second visit to Ozuru. Their specialty is tempura udon, which can be ordered a la carte or in a set meal. You can also order the cold tempura udon (i.e. the noodles do not come in a broth) or hot tempura udon (udon with hot broth). I ordered the hot tempura udon set.

Their tempura, especially the shrimp tempura, is the best I have had. Anywhere. The shrimp tempura is huge—really, I don't know where they're getting their shrimp. The tempura batter is so crisp that, when you bite into it, you and the person next to you can both hear the sound of the crunch. This is not an exaggeration.

The shrimp on the inside is tender and fresh, and the batter is so light it makes me want to cry. And the actual udon, oh the udon, has that rare springy quality when you bite into it that is the hallmark of the best kind of noodle. In Cantonese, we call that dahn ngah—which translates into “bounces off your teeth." This means the noodle is so elastic that it slides and bounces off your teeth, as opposed to being a floury mess when you bite into it.

And did I mention that the flavored rice—flavored with shitake mushrooms, pork, and assorted grains--that came with my tempura set was also aromatic and delicious? Perfect for a cold autumn day? I soon forgot about the monkeys.

             

A few weeks ago—on Halloween day, in fact—I went on one of the most beautiful hikes I’ve ever been on, in the Kiso Valley. The Kiso Valley is nestled among the Japanese Alps in Nagano prefecture.

A friend and I hiked from the town of Magome to the town of Tsumago, on the old Nakasendo highway (an ancient road that connected Tokyo to Kyoto—think of the Via Appia in ancient Rome, but substitute udon for whatever it is that Romans ate).

Both Magome and Tsumago are historic, carefully restored post-towns, resting points along the Nakasendo highway for travelers during the Edo era. The hike between them was only about 2.5 hours long (my kind of hike!), on well-maintained trails, and took us through forests and farmland, up and down through a mountain pass, and past waterfalls and small sleepy neighborhoods. The trees were not as red as they were in my last post in Takao, but they were, nevertheless, oh-so-pretty in their lushness and greenness.

Magome is bigger and more bustling than Tsumago. Its main street was full of craft shops, snack shops, restaurants, and tourists.

It was a sunny day, and even the man-sized Hello Kitty rice crackers on display seemed to smile at me (maybe because they were, in fact, smiling. Okay, not the Hello Kitty one, but the Doraemon one most definitely).

Before starting any hike, it's essential to eat right. And what better way to eat before a hike than with soba? (Actually, udon would be better, but soba seems to be much more common in the Nagano area.) The soba we had was delicious, complete with an egg, mushrooms, seaweed, and a pureed mixture of yam that you pour into the soba noodles and makes the soup strangely fizzy.

Shortly after we left Magome, we went up one section of the trail that was paved with red and white stones. It took me a second before realizing that they had paved the path to look like it was covered with cherry blossom petals.

This is the kind of thing that just gets me about Japan—there is so much care taken to make things beautiful in a detailed, thoughtful way. Being lucky enough to come from a gorgeous part of California, I've often seen a lot of natural beauty, but not such meticulous beauty. Did I mention that, at the Ginkaku-ji temple in Kyoto a few weeks ago, I saw a man dusting the rocks in the Zen garden?

Along the hike, we passed by waterfalls and streams and crossed wooden bridges.

Speaking of detail and thoughtfulness, we also passed by a wooden fountain, complete with a set of porcelain cups, where you could stop for water.

Tsumago is a tiny, quaint town, and perhaps because of its size and the smaller number of tourists there--it was almost dusk by the time we arrived--it felt more personal than Magome. We stayed for a night at a historic ryokan, Matsushiro-ya, which first opened in 1804.

Being historic and traditional, the inn had tatami rooms complete with sliding paper doors (note: paper makes for thin walls).

Our stay included dinner and breakfast. Dinner, as expected, was the more elaborate of the two meals—including local specialties such as carp sashimi, river fish with a glazed sauce (as well as miscellaneous fish parts stuffed inside it), and numerous smaller appetizers of tofu and preserved vegetables.

Similar to what I had in Takao, there was also an unhappy-looking grilled, salted river fish pouting at me.

The food was not the best I’ve had in Japan, but decent and filling in a home-style, yet still elaborate sort of way.

After dinner, we went outside to explore Tsumago by night. The main street was deserted, dark, and cold. It was quiet, except for the occasional tourists we passed, some of whom wore yukata and clanking wooden clogs, or geta, from whichever ryokan they were staying at. It felt peaceful, and yet spooky, too. My camera didn't do too well capturing the dark street, but it did capture the street lanterns.

The inn owner also gave us a lantern to light our way.

The next day, I took a morning walk in Tsumago by myself. It was misty and drizzly, and the shop owners were just beginning to start their day. I felt like I had the whole town to myself.

When we left Tsumago, we hiked to the nearby town of Nagiso to take the train home. The trail passed right through the grounds of a Buddhist temple. We stopped there to rest and just to admire the autumn scenery and the mountains nearby.

I've been in Japan for nearly four months now. The weather is changing to an intense cold, and homesickness sometimes feels just around the corner. But having quiet moments in hidden temples--that makes up just one of the unanticipated reasons I came here on this adventure.

Below: Pictures from my morning walk in Tsumago and also more hiking pictures.

                                 

Last weekend, I went to the village of Takao, in the mountains of northwest Kyoto. It’s the start of leaf-peeping season in the Kansai region, so I went with a friend to Takao to visit three temples that are famous for their autumn leaves.

Autumn leaf-peeping, especially of the gorgeous Japanese maple trees—known as momiji in Japanese--is a major past-time in Japan. Temples and parks become crowded at this time of year with hordes of spectators eager to see the vibrant reds and oranges of the momiji. There are even websites with autumn leaf status reports that you can view. My aunt, who is a frequent traveler to Japan, told me that even the local newspapers will feature regular autumn leaf updates. But being currently illiterate, I haven’t checked a newspaper yet to confirm this!

The temples we visited were: Kozan-ji, Jingo-ji, and Saimyo-ji. Kozan-ji is a series of temple buildings spread at multiple levels along a mountainside, with crumbling stone stairways and long stone paths connecting you between the buildings. The trees are so tall and dense there, that it felt more like I was in a forest than that I was visiting a temple in a forest.

The leaves have only just started changing at Kozan-ji, so there was mostly greenery, but what a glorious green they were.

Kozan-ji also happens to feature a set of scrolls that are known as the world’s first manga. (They show happy rabbits, frogs, and monkeys carousing with each other, if you must know. And not carousing in that way.)

The scrolls are housed in a very traditional-looking wooden building (that's my technical term for it) with lovely greenery surrounding it.

Jingo-ji is supposed to be the most famous of the three temples in Takao, but I have to say it was my least favorite in terms of scenery. Its buildings are spread out through a wide, open (i.e. not very tree-filled) area.

The trees around there—at least in the parts that we saw—weren’t dense enough or orange enough for good picture-taking. The climb to Jingo-ji, though, was an excellent way to work off lunch. There are a good few sets of long, steep stone steps that take you up a mountain before you reach the temple.

You do pass by a few udon restaurants on the way, though, which pretty much makes up for everything.

My favorite temple of the three was Saimyo-ji. The scenery there was so beautiful, that I found myself saying over and over again, “This is so beautiful, this is so beautiful” and feeling completely unsatisfied with that word. The greens and oranges and reds there were simply dazzling. And it wasn’t even the height of the fall foliage season yet!

Saimyo-ji also felt the most intimate out of the three temples. All of its temple buildings are close together in a fairly small, park-like area, with a friendly dirt path leading you through the temple grounds.

One of the highlights of the day was our lunch at a traditional restaurant by the river in Takao. We found the restaurant at random on our way to Saimyo-ji—which is really one of my favorite ways to figure out where to eat when traveling, through stumbling. We ate in one of the restaurant’s rustic wooden buildings overlooking the river (the restaurant has a handful of these small buildings by the river; each building is the size of a small room and has one wall of sliding doors that is left open to let in the air). We sat on the tatami floor, by large, open windows, with a view of the maple trees and the rushing water below.

Lunch was a multi-course feast of sweet river trout in a glazed sauce, a small salted fish that kept staring grudgingly at me, small appetizers (preserved veggies, tofu, the usual), and some seasonal small plates, including unagi over rice in a hollowed-out section of bamboo. The food, the river, the tatami, the maple trees—all gave me one of those, “OMFG, I really am in Japan” moments, where I want to laugh and kind of want to weep—in a very joyous way—at the same time.

After lunch, we took pictures around the paths near the restaurant—which was yet another one of my favorite parts of the day.

Below: Pictures from near the restaurant and also more pictures from Saimyo-ji

                           

I’ve been in Japan for three months. This means I’m starting my blog three months late. It also means I’ve been very busy living in the moment, as they say, which is all the rage these days and is, more importantly, something I typically have trouble doing but have become more at ease with this past revolutionary year.

Here are my goals for this blog:
    1. To write, in a not-too-serious manner (I often take writing way too seriously)
    2. To give myself a formal (and informal) place to record assorted memories in Japan. These memories will revolve around my three main priorities in Japan (and in general!): food, traveling, writing.
    3. To have a place to collect and share my pictures—more and more, I’m becoming an avid photographer
    4. To have an informal place to keep in touch with friends, colleagues, and family
    5. To create one more piece to my life in Japan, and a writing piece, no less!

I want to write with heart, and to be as funny as I humbly think I can be. And to have fun. Loads.

Inset: The start of the Magome-Tsumago hiking trail, in Magome, Kiso Valley, Japan.