Pre-Thanksgiving and Beyond to Kyoto

Part of being a parent is experiencing life through your children’s eyes and ears, and thus we found ourselves transported back in time to the place where we first played musical instruments. Alex is in the Rookie band and has enjoyed the experience quite a bit – he even has remembered his music and percussion sticks without much prompting on the part of his parents. We went to his band performance and were struck by what can be done with a bunch of motivated kids and two months of practice time as well as how much they can improve with a year or more of playing.

Alex celebrated by going on a Boy Scout campout the next day with Japanese Boy Scouts while his sister attended a friend’s birthday party with an Indian motif – saris and Indian food – what a creative event.

Thanksgiving in Tokyo was a bit odd – first of all this is the first year that we have not traveled to DC to see all of Jonathan’s relatives so we did miss our family. We also greatly missed the food. The other oddity was that there was no mention of the holiday outside of ASIJ so it was possible to forget that it was approaching. Our celebration was very tame – we went out to eat at a restaurant with a buffet – plenty of turkey, potatoes, stuffing, salad and veggies and we each had a piece of pie before leaving. One of Jonathan’s colleagues was able to join us which made the evening a bit special.

The next morning we took advantage of the school holiday to travel to Kyoto for a long three-day weekend. We traveled by Shinkansen so the trip only took 2.5 hours and we arrived by lunch to have our choice of eight ramen restaurants on one floor of the train station. A tasty lunch was had by all and then we traveled out to see the most popular of the Kyoto temples before the hordes descended for the weekend. Kyoto was so popular that we had to stay ten minutes away by train at Lake Bifu. Otherwise, trying to get hotel rooms at a reasonable rate was impossible.

Kyoto has 17 world heritage sites and we did not see all of them, but we had a good overview. Kyoto is a very large city and has the traffic to prove it. We visited during one of the prime tourist seasons. The Japanese understandably love to see fall leaves and we agree that the nature show is quite spectacular. I am not sure that I have ever seen such brilliant red and yellow leaves as they have due to the Japanese maple and ginko trees. The children found something to enjoy at most of the sites we saw, whether it was filling cups with water from the overhead spring at the Kiyomizuderu Temple, or making cricket floors creak at Nijoji castle. They observed a priest ring the closing bell for Chion-in Temple and climbed though over 500 vermillion toris, part of a collection of over 10,000 at Fushima Inari. They were even able to see all 15 rocks in a rock garden from one position at Ryoanji Temple - indicating wisdom (or, more likely, sufficient height). They were also questioned in English repeatedly by Japanese school children on class trips. (We decided that the next time we run into a school group with an assignment to question foreigners in English we are going to give very interesting answers and see what reaction we get).

We averaged two shrines a day, which proved enough to be interesting but not overwhelming for the kids. The cold weather was a bit challenging, as were the crowded buses. Kyoto was very well organized for tourism, which was well because the tourists came. Bus routes and streets were well marked and well traveled. The abundance of souvenir shops and sweet stores testified to the importance of the tourist trade. Kyoto train station was an incredible hubbub of action and movement as the huge flow of visitors mingled with the residents going to the architecturally impressive train station to shop and eat. Definitely not an experience for those fearing crowds.

Nikko

NIKKO
The day after Disney our family traveled to Nikko for the weekend. We took an express train from Asakusa and Alex thrilled some older Japanese ladies by showing them how to turn their seats to face each other. When we arrived, we traveled up 20 curves to Lake Chuzen-ji to see the Kegon waterfalls. The falls were quite impressive and we managed to dodge the usual crowds due to the lateness of our arrival. We also saw the sun set over the lake which was stunning.

We were only able to do this trip due to the generosity of a couple with a weekend home in Nikko. They were incredibly kind and not only let us stay but also took us on a tour of the local world heritage site and to an amazing Japanese restaurant that has been in one family for 19 generations. The leaves were at peak and Nikko is one of the few places we have been that has not been ruined by too many people or concrete. Even though the shrines of the heritage site were crowded, the town itself was not built up. The scenery was fantastic with huge trees and a sense of history due to the vegetation that is lacking even in Kyoto. We were also able to observe part of a Shinto wedding and see many fabulous kimonos. Because of the 3-5-7 festival for blessing children, the head priest was very busy but he still took the time to sign Alex and Caroline’s goshuincho – seal books –yet another gift from our host.

We returned to Tokyo just in time to welcome Jonathan’s mom in from Thailand. She arrived very tired but in good spirits. The next couple of days were celebrated with many dinners and food shared with new and old friends. As usual it was difficult to keep up with Esther but we were able to show her some parts of Tokyo that she had not seen before and she left wiser and impressed with the service and cleanliness of this huge city.

Disney Adventure

For Caroline’s birthday the women in the family traveled to Tokyo Disney Sea for an entire day of celebration. I must point out that I have avoided spending vacations with the mouse in the US because an artificial environment that bears no relationship to reality is not my idea of fun and I have no wish to escape to such a place. However, in Japan where much of our life is strange and foreign it was a bit of welcome Americana for our child. Although we were not totally prepared to hear the person portraying Donald Duck to have a high female voice. It was also a bit odd to listen to the familiar songs for the rides in Japanese since all the signs used for decoration are in English.

We were very lucky to be able to go on a weekday which was not a holiday for Japanese children although it was a holiday for Caroline’s school. (In fact we ran into several of her friends at Disney that day.) We took an early morning long subway ride with two changes that included a rush hour experience that Caroline did not like. By the time we arrived at Disney the sun was out and we could tell that we were quite lucky for early November because we did not need jackets for most of the day.

Disney was very nicely landscaped and there were many flowers even though the entire complex was decorated for Christmas. (In Tokyo the Christmas decorations go up right after Halloween.) Caroline went on every thing she wanted two times and she never had more than a 5-10 minute wait. The rides she chose were even tame enough for her mom to enjoy, although I did sit out on one spinning clam shell.

The best part of the experience were the shows – even with a language barrier an extravaganza is still entertaining. The Disney Sea shows made great use of the water and floating boats. Fireworks went off even during the daytime show and there were also many costumed dancers. The evening show included fire as well as colored fountains. Both shows were more enjoyable than I expected even though I did not understand the plots, or maybe because I could not understand the lyrics of the songs. The shows reminded me of a three ring circus because there was entertainment to be had in every direction you looked.

We also caught a Mariachi band performance during our dinner. The group was quite good and reminded Caroline of Texas. Although the songs were all in Spanish the performers did speak a few words of Japanese in their introduction. I must say seeing someone in a Mariachi band speak Japanese adds something to the international tone of Disney. The audience sat emotionless throughout the set although the band finally got them to clap to the beat for one song.