Sorry for the late update. This past weekend was absolutely beautiful, and I spent much of my time outdoors enjoying it. Yesterday (Sunday) was also Commencement Day at Ithaca, and I was busy finishing some e-mails to my friends who were graduating yesterday.
I have decided to take a break from the Wednesday updates for two or three weeks. This is due to the combination of a) running out of material, b) needing to free up more time for class work, and c) my parents' visit to Japan next week, which still needs some planning on my end. I will let you know when I will be resuming my twice-weekly update schedule. I will try my hardest to have another update next Sunday, but I can't promise anything as that is when my parents will be arriving in Akita.
As for today's post, I decided I would do something a little different. In order to get into the greater Akita City area, students take a short trip on the local train from nearby Wada-eki (Wada Train Station) to Akita-eki. There is an infrequent bus from the AIU campus to Wada-eki, but it is also possible to walk there on foot - a thirty to forty minute endeavor. Because the weather was perfect, I decided I would bring my camera and photograph for you the Akita landscape, featuring the many rice paddies, a local shrine, and local Akita homes. Today's entry will be more like a "travelogue." I will be combining text with a just a few pictures. You will find a link to the full album of pictures at the end of the entry, as well as on the right sidebar. Be sure to check it out as I am only sharing about half of the photos here and there are many more to enjoy. You should be able to read my entry and follow the album step by step. My objective is to help paint you a more elaborate picture of the Northern Japanese landscape that surrounds AIU.
With that said, off we go!
A Walk Through Akita
It is Sunday, May 18. The weather is, in a word, perfect: ~70F, slightly breezy, clear skies with a few puffy cumulus clouds on the outskirts of the sky, scudding along at a leisurely pace. I make my way to the back end of the AIU campus, near the large garden (or tiny park, depending on your view) at the edge of the school property whose existence is still unknown to many students on campus, especially the ichinensei (first years) and ryuugakusei (international students). I know from previous explorations that at the very back of this small slice of nature is a steep footpath that opens up right in front of the major road that leads to the town of Wada, cutting my walking time by about five minutes (and I walk pretty briskly). Plus, I much prefer beginning my journey surrounded by the still blooming flowers, bushes, and trees to paved roads, cars and buildings. I walk carefully down the precariously steep path on the hill face, glad it has not rained for a while. I reach the bottom of the staircase and am deposited at the mouth of a green tunnel of trees that line the main road into town. After checking the roads, I cross the street and begin my trek into town.
I remember a month ago (has it been that long already?) this lane of trees which are now so full of green foliage were once full of enormous white cherry blossoms. It really is remarkable how soon that joy passed, leaving only the calm tranquility of green, beautiful in its own way. To my right I looked down to see a bicycle track far below me that wound its way through the green of mature Spring. This track would run parallel to my own track for much of the journey into Wada town.
After the lane of cherry trees was stretch of road that passed a small tree farm on the right where cedar saplings grew in neat little rows, no taller than my knees, Japans attempts at reforesting their landscape after harvesting the wood for buildings like AIU's new library. The road moved sharply down hill, curving right, and soon opened onto the wide, flat rice paddies that Akita is known for. In the far distance, tall rolling hills were covered in cedar trees, reminding me of the hills that I drive through on my way to Ithaca every semester. Farther in the horizon, the tall ridge of Taihei-zan could be seen through a haze of mist and cloud that lent it a dream-like quality. For kilometers, though, no the land was flat and bare of trees. The only green that could be seen were some patches of wild grass and the small shoots of rice that were just beginning to peek above the placid waters of the many rice paddies. The paddies were flooded with water, and the landscape before me looked like it was filled with small ponds whose still waters reflected the blue sky and green trees in the distance. Houses dotted the landscape as well, and I could see farmers hunched over some of the rice fields. It is a seen unlike anything I have seen in my modest travels of the US. The landscape is infused with a peaceful quality that is occasionally broken by the sounds of cars passing at high speed on the road to my left.
As I continue my walk, I come closer to a small development of houses and a large gas station. I can hear children laughing and running, and beyond the gas station I can make out a community baseball field, the source of the laughter and fun. I am still surprised by how popular baseball is in Japan. Latin America, is the only other place in the world where I have seen baseball so popular. In Europe, football (i.e. soccer) is still supremely popular, and I recall explaining the basic rules and mechanics of baseball to my Norwegian friend Hans Petter who had seen a few baseball games but had no idea how it was played. I smile at the sound of the kids playing; while I do find children in general to be cute and fun, for whatever reason I find East Asian children to be exceptionally adorable. These kids looked like they were eight or nine years old, and watching them run around the mostly dirt field reminded me of my own days playing T-ball and baseball, and how much I disliked the sport.
To my right I can make out, beyond some rice paddies, two large wooden torii (gates) which mark the location of a Shinto shrine. The first is very large and left unpainted, gray in color due to age and weather, and wearing a thick yellow rope across its arch that denotes it as the entrance to holy ground. Just beyond I can make out the smaller torii painted in vermilion, and beyond that a small wooded hill which undoubtedly housed the shrine. I remember seeing these torii on my first trip by taxi to the AIU campus, and excitedly hoping to make a visit. I decided to make a small detour today and explore the shrine grounds.
As I walked through the first torii I saw that there was a copper plaque, rusted green with weather, on the left pillar with writing in Japanese that undoubtedly described the nature of this particular shrine. Once again I was slightly frustrated that it would be many years of intense study before I would be able to read the plaque. I made my way past the second torii whose yellow rope was hung so low that I had to actually sidestep the center pommel as I walked past. The shape and vermilion color of these torii almost always excite me in a way that no other religious building or monument does back at home; while I generally do enjoy exploring "places of worship" from a variety of religious backgrounds, there is something about the torii that stirs me in a unique way. Beyond, I can see steps up the small wooded hill that lead up to the main shrine compound.
The shrine covers a much larger area than I initially realized. The top of the steps opened onto a path lined with stone statues and stone lanterns leading to the large wooden building that was the main shrine. I could see some of the cedar trees, noteably the largest of them, had a ring of yellow rope with faded white strips (gohei, symbolizing purity) that designated those trees as holy in some way. To the left on a small rise I could see two or three large wooden and stone monuments with Japanese written on them. In the left hand corner of the courtyard was another set of two small vermilion torii in front of two or three small accessory shrines. To the right was a small shed.
I made my way past the two stone Shi-Shi, guardian lion-dogs, one with his mouth open and the other with his mouth closed. They are there to ward off evil spirits. They reminded me of the stone guardians outside of many Buddhist shrines, who are also intended to scare off evil spirits, and who always feature one statue with his mouth open, the other with his mouth closed. The parallel is not surprising. Japanese Shinto and Buddhism have been closely intermingled for hundreds, perhaps a thousand years, making it hard at times to separate one from the other. The forcible separation of Shinto from its Buddhist connections (with mixed results) happened fairly recent, at the dawn of the Meiji Era (1868-1912), mainly as a way to re-legitimize the Emperor's rule and to form a sense of national unity that rejected foreign influences, including imported Buddhism. I mused a bit about the often ridiculous and always serious exploitation of religion for political means, and then continued on my way to examine the small accessory shrines to the left of the main shrine building.
The shrines resembled small sheds or huts, with a sliding door and just enough room to step inside. They featured either a small wooden house that reminded me of a tabernacle, or wooden plaques with people carved into them. They all had a large candle stand, as well as offerings of food. I was surprised when I entered the last of the accessory shrines, which housed an almost life-sized, white wooden horse, complete with offerings of rice cakes. Of all the shrines I have visited, this was by far the strangest thing I have ever seen. I was mildly disturbed, to be honest, and quickly shut the sliding doors behind me in favor of exploring the main shrine building.
I noticed that the roof had a marvelous carving of a dragon on it, with Shi-Shi heads acting as bookends. I walked around the building first and noticed that there was a small building in the back connected to the main building. I opened the sliding door and immediately beheld a large rope with bells attached used for announcing your intention to offer a prayer or wish. The inside was carpeted with tatami, a kind of straw mat that is common in traditional Japanese buildings. You are not supposed to wear shoes or sandals on the tatami, so I deposited my shoes on the front step before bowing my way into the main room.
Inside there were many wooden plaques hung on the walls with Japanese writing on it. There were also a couple of paintings, some of them old, but one of them featuring the white horse that I had met just a couple of minutes ago. I am pretty sure the paintings and signs said something about the nature of the shrine and the kami (spirit or god) that was worshiped here, but I had no clue. In the center of the room was a very large candle stand in the same shape as the previous, smaller candle stand, the frame resembling a large water drop. In front of the stand was a collection box for coins (I tossed in a 5 yen coin, considered to be lucky), and behind the stand was an altar with various trinkets. Behind the altar there was a glass sliding door that revealed another room, and at the end of that room a large gilded door. This undoubtedly led to the smaller building in the back that I had seen on the outside, and was also probably reserved for more holy persons. After getting a general feel for the place I made my way outside and closed the door behind me.
After putting my shoes back on, I explored the building that was annexed to the right of the main shrine. There were large windows throughout, which revealed what was obviously a living space for the local Shinto priest(s). It was covered in tatami, had a small altar of its own covered in purple silk, and pictures of what I presumed were past priests. There was also a sink and cabinets in the corner, as well as a couple of stoves for warming the place when it got cold outside. It was hard to take pictures with the sun reflecting the background so heavily on the windows. After a while, I decided to make my way back to the main road and continue my walk to town. All in all, I found the shrine to be quite charming.
As I stepped back into the sunlight, I was again surprised by how beautiful it was outside. I watched as the rice paddies steadily gave way to more and more houses, which resembled those back at home but which also had a distinctly Japanese flair. Often, Japan feels very much like home and simultaneously very much Japanese, lending the landscape a Twilight-Zone feeling to it; am I in the US, Japan, both, or neither? I saw on my left, across the main road, a small plot of shiny black marble, graves for some family living nearby. I had seen another similar plot up the road, which I planned on exploring on the return trip.
The large government building and Max Value (a shopping center) told me I had finally made it into the main Wada proper. There were no rice paddies here, just some roads and many houses. The overall feel of the buildings reminded me very much of suburban Puerto-Rico, if about fifteen degrees cooler (and not nearly as humid!). I decided to explore the little side streets a bit and get a better feel for the Japanese homes. I was once again amazed at how efficiently they packed they homes and garages. This was not suburbia, and therefore there were no yards to speak of, but it was all quite quaint and comfortable all the same. I passed by a group of older Japanese enjoying company on their porch and cooking food on a grill, though they became a bit hushed as I passed.
I was surprised to pass a small shed-like building that, upon inspection, I discovered was a trash pick up site for appliances and other electronics which needed to be disposed of in a special manner. I could see bags filled with discharged batteries of all shapes and sizing hanging from the inside. As always, I was a bit impressed with the ease of correctly disposing of your garbage in Japan. Now if they could only cut down on all the wrapping paper they use for everything...
I made my way back to the Max Value to take a break and buy myself a snack, which included a Tropicana Juice box and trail mix. I rested on the bench for ten or fifteen minutes, giving my legs a break and reading as much as I could of the labels. Now that I know all the katakana, I can finally understand many words that were originally imported from English and other foreign languages. For example, I could read in Japanese the label indicating this was a Tropicana product, and that specifically it was "Citurusu Juusu" or "Citrus Juice." On the health information panel, I could make out "Enerugii" (Energy or Calories). One particular ingredient always tickels my chemistry self, "natoriumu" which is supposed to be "Natrium," the true word for sodium (that's why sodium's chemical symbol is Na: natrium). After amusing myself with my growing reading skills, I threw out my trash and began my walk back to AIU campus.
The sun was getting lower in the sky, it being around 5:00pm, and sunset scheduled for about 6:45. The angle of the sun made the waters of the rice paddies look even more beautiful than before. As I made my way back I stopped occasionally to take pictures, as I had been for much of my journey. As the cars passed me on the road, I wondered what the natives must think of this strange gaijin (foreigner) snapping photographs of rice paddies and houses. I felt a bit like a voyeur, but my overwhelming desire to remember the sights of this beautiful place overrode most of my discomfort. As I began trudging up the large hill just before the final leg of my return trip, I passed by the tombstones which I had intended to check out on my trip down to Wada.
I carefully crossed the street and quickly realized that what I had assumed were just a handful of tombstones were actually the very edge of a medium sized graveyard, with maybe a hundred family tombs. Similar to the way that torii fascinate me in an inexplicable way, Japanese head stones also draw me in a way that traditional Western head stones don't. These monuments were mainly made of a black stone that was, in most cases, polished to a glassy finish. They were carved with writing in Japanese and symbols of family clans. There were offerings of flowers and food at some of them. It is impossible to adequately describe what they look like, so I will let the pictures speak for themselves. The glossy black stone evokes in me a somber attitude as well as minor awe at the dark beauty in their craftsmanship. The color and design naturally instill in you the kind of reverent respect that all cultures reserve for the departed.
After taking my pictures and paying my respects, I finally made the last leg of my return journey. As I re-entered that long green tunnel of cherry trees, I reflected on the ways that my new home in Japan constantly melds the familiar with the new. It was, all in all, a beautiful walk through Akita.
I remember a month ago (has it been that long already?) this lane of trees which are now so full of green foliage were once full of enormous white cherry blossoms. It really is remarkable how soon that joy passed, leaving only the calm tranquility of green, beautiful in its own way. To my right I looked down to see a bicycle track far below me that wound its way through the green of mature Spring. This track would run parallel to my own track for much of the journey into Wada town.
After the lane of cherry trees was stretch of road that passed a small tree farm on the right where cedar saplings grew in neat little rows, no taller than my knees, Japans attempts at reforesting their landscape after harvesting the wood for buildings like AIU's new library. The road moved sharply down hill, curving right, and soon opened onto the wide, flat rice paddies that Akita is known for. In the far distance, tall rolling hills were covered in cedar trees, reminding me of the hills that I drive through on my way to Ithaca every semester. Farther in the horizon, the tall ridge of Taihei-zan could be seen through a haze of mist and cloud that lent it a dream-like quality. For kilometers, though, no the land was flat and bare of trees. The only green that could be seen were some patches of wild grass and the small shoots of rice that were just beginning to peek above the placid waters of the many rice paddies. The paddies were flooded with water, and the landscape before me looked like it was filled with small ponds whose still waters reflected the blue sky and green trees in the distance. Houses dotted the landscape as well, and I could see farmers hunched over some of the rice fields. It is a seen unlike anything I have seen in my modest travels of the US. The landscape is infused with a peaceful quality that is occasionally broken by the sounds of cars passing at high speed on the road to my left.
As I continue my walk, I come closer to a small development of houses and a large gas station. I can hear children laughing and running, and beyond the gas station I can make out a community baseball field, the source of the laughter and fun. I am still surprised by how popular baseball is in Japan. Latin America, is the only other place in the world where I have seen baseball so popular. In Europe, football (i.e. soccer) is still supremely popular, and I recall explaining the basic rules and mechanics of baseball to my Norwegian friend Hans Petter who had seen a few baseball games but had no idea how it was played. I smile at the sound of the kids playing; while I do find children in general to be cute and fun, for whatever reason I find East Asian children to be exceptionally adorable. These kids looked like they were eight or nine years old, and watching them run around the mostly dirt field reminded me of my own days playing T-ball and baseball, and how much I disliked the sport.
To my right I can make out, beyond some rice paddies, two large wooden torii (gates) which mark the location of a Shinto shrine. The first is very large and left unpainted, gray in color due to age and weather, and wearing a thick yellow rope across its arch that denotes it as the entrance to holy ground. Just beyond I can make out the smaller torii painted in vermilion, and beyond that a small wooded hill which undoubtedly housed the shrine. I remember seeing these torii on my first trip by taxi to the AIU campus, and excitedly hoping to make a visit. I decided to make a small detour today and explore the shrine grounds.
As I walked through the first torii I saw that there was a copper plaque, rusted green with weather, on the left pillar with writing in Japanese that undoubtedly described the nature of this particular shrine. Once again I was slightly frustrated that it would be many years of intense study before I would be able to read the plaque. I made my way past the second torii whose yellow rope was hung so low that I had to actually sidestep the center pommel as I walked past. The shape and vermilion color of these torii almost always excite me in a way that no other religious building or monument does back at home; while I generally do enjoy exploring "places of worship" from a variety of religious backgrounds, there is something about the torii that stirs me in a unique way. Beyond, I can see steps up the small wooded hill that lead up to the main shrine compound.
The shrine covers a much larger area than I initially realized. The top of the steps opened onto a path lined with stone statues and stone lanterns leading to the large wooden building that was the main shrine. I could see some of the cedar trees, noteably the largest of them, had a ring of yellow rope with faded white strips (gohei, symbolizing purity) that designated those trees as holy in some way. To the left on a small rise I could see two or three large wooden and stone monuments with Japanese written on them. In the left hand corner of the courtyard was another set of two small vermilion torii in front of two or three small accessory shrines. To the right was a small shed.
I made my way past the two stone Shi-Shi, guardian lion-dogs, one with his mouth open and the other with his mouth closed. They are there to ward off evil spirits. They reminded me of the stone guardians outside of many Buddhist shrines, who are also intended to scare off evil spirits, and who always feature one statue with his mouth open, the other with his mouth closed. The parallel is not surprising. Japanese Shinto and Buddhism have been closely intermingled for hundreds, perhaps a thousand years, making it hard at times to separate one from the other. The forcible separation of Shinto from its Buddhist connections (with mixed results) happened fairly recent, at the dawn of the Meiji Era (1868-1912), mainly as a way to re-legitimize the Emperor's rule and to form a sense of national unity that rejected foreign influences, including imported Buddhism. I mused a bit about the often ridiculous and always serious exploitation of religion for political means, and then continued on my way to examine the small accessory shrines to the left of the main shrine building.
The shrines resembled small sheds or huts, with a sliding door and just enough room to step inside. They featured either a small wooden house that reminded me of a tabernacle, or wooden plaques with people carved into them. They all had a large candle stand, as well as offerings of food. I was surprised when I entered the last of the accessory shrines, which housed an almost life-sized, white wooden horse, complete with offerings of rice cakes. Of all the shrines I have visited, this was by far the strangest thing I have ever seen. I was mildly disturbed, to be honest, and quickly shut the sliding doors behind me in favor of exploring the main shrine building.
I noticed that the roof had a marvelous carving of a dragon on it, with Shi-Shi heads acting as bookends. I walked around the building first and noticed that there was a small building in the back connected to the main building. I opened the sliding door and immediately beheld a large rope with bells attached used for announcing your intention to offer a prayer or wish. The inside was carpeted with tatami, a kind of straw mat that is common in traditional Japanese buildings. You are not supposed to wear shoes or sandals on the tatami, so I deposited my shoes on the front step before bowing my way into the main room.
Inside there were many wooden plaques hung on the walls with Japanese writing on it. There were also a couple of paintings, some of them old, but one of them featuring the white horse that I had met just a couple of minutes ago. I am pretty sure the paintings and signs said something about the nature of the shrine and the kami (spirit or god) that was worshiped here, but I had no clue. In the center of the room was a very large candle stand in the same shape as the previous, smaller candle stand, the frame resembling a large water drop. In front of the stand was a collection box for coins (I tossed in a 5 yen coin, considered to be lucky), and behind the stand was an altar with various trinkets. Behind the altar there was a glass sliding door that revealed another room, and at the end of that room a large gilded door. This undoubtedly led to the smaller building in the back that I had seen on the outside, and was also probably reserved for more holy persons. After getting a general feel for the place I made my way outside and closed the door behind me.
After putting my shoes back on, I explored the building that was annexed to the right of the main shrine. There were large windows throughout, which revealed what was obviously a living space for the local Shinto priest(s). It was covered in tatami, had a small altar of its own covered in purple silk, and pictures of what I presumed were past priests. There was also a sink and cabinets in the corner, as well as a couple of stoves for warming the place when it got cold outside. It was hard to take pictures with the sun reflecting the background so heavily on the windows. After a while, I decided to make my way back to the main road and continue my walk to town. All in all, I found the shrine to be quite charming.
As I stepped back into the sunlight, I was again surprised by how beautiful it was outside. I watched as the rice paddies steadily gave way to more and more houses, which resembled those back at home but which also had a distinctly Japanese flair. Often, Japan feels very much like home and simultaneously very much Japanese, lending the landscape a Twilight-Zone feeling to it; am I in the US, Japan, both, or neither? I saw on my left, across the main road, a small plot of shiny black marble, graves for some family living nearby. I had seen another similar plot up the road, which I planned on exploring on the return trip.
The large government building and Max Value (a shopping center) told me I had finally made it into the main Wada proper. There were no rice paddies here, just some roads and many houses. The overall feel of the buildings reminded me very much of suburban Puerto-Rico, if about fifteen degrees cooler (and not nearly as humid!). I decided to explore the little side streets a bit and get a better feel for the Japanese homes. I was once again amazed at how efficiently they packed they homes and garages. This was not suburbia, and therefore there were no yards to speak of, but it was all quite quaint and comfortable all the same. I passed by a group of older Japanese enjoying company on their porch and cooking food on a grill, though they became a bit hushed as I passed.
I was surprised to pass a small shed-like building that, upon inspection, I discovered was a trash pick up site for appliances and other electronics which needed to be disposed of in a special manner. I could see bags filled with discharged batteries of all shapes and sizing hanging from the inside. As always, I was a bit impressed with the ease of correctly disposing of your garbage in Japan. Now if they could only cut down on all the wrapping paper they use for everything...
I made my way back to the Max Value to take a break and buy myself a snack, which included a Tropicana Juice box and trail mix. I rested on the bench for ten or fifteen minutes, giving my legs a break and reading as much as I could of the labels. Now that I know all the katakana, I can finally understand many words that were originally imported from English and other foreign languages. For example, I could read in Japanese the label indicating this was a Tropicana product, and that specifically it was "Citurusu Juusu" or "Citrus Juice." On the health information panel, I could make out "Enerugii" (Energy or Calories). One particular ingredient always tickels my chemistry self, "natoriumu" which is supposed to be "Natrium," the true word for sodium (that's why sodium's chemical symbol is Na: natrium). After amusing myself with my growing reading skills, I threw out my trash and began my walk back to AIU campus.
The sun was getting lower in the sky, it being around 5:00pm, and sunset scheduled for about 6:45. The angle of the sun made the waters of the rice paddies look even more beautiful than before. As I made my way back I stopped occasionally to take pictures, as I had been for much of my journey. As the cars passed me on the road, I wondered what the natives must think of this strange gaijin (foreigner) snapping photographs of rice paddies and houses. I felt a bit like a voyeur, but my overwhelming desire to remember the sights of this beautiful place overrode most of my discomfort. As I began trudging up the large hill just before the final leg of my return trip, I passed by the tombstones which I had intended to check out on my trip down to Wada.
I carefully crossed the street and quickly realized that what I had assumed were just a handful of tombstones were actually the very edge of a medium sized graveyard, with maybe a hundred family tombs. Similar to the way that torii fascinate me in an inexplicable way, Japanese head stones also draw me in a way that traditional Western head stones don't. These monuments were mainly made of a black stone that was, in most cases, polished to a glassy finish. They were carved with writing in Japanese and symbols of family clans. There were offerings of flowers and food at some of them. It is impossible to adequately describe what they look like, so I will let the pictures speak for themselves. The glossy black stone evokes in me a somber attitude as well as minor awe at the dark beauty in their craftsmanship. The color and design naturally instill in you the kind of reverent respect that all cultures reserve for the departed.
After taking my pictures and paying my respects, I finally made the last leg of my return journey. As I re-entered that long green tunnel of cherry trees, I reflected on the ways that my new home in Japan constantly melds the familiar with the new. It was, all in all, a beautiful walk through Akita.
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