traveldiary.stracke.us

We are in the Narita Cathay Pacific lounge, waiting for our flights to Hong Kong and Paris. Here are some of our observations of Japanese ways and customs.
Obsession with hygiene and hair phobia ?
1) Everything is super clean:
In the Japanese baths, the locals soaped and scrubbed their bodies for at least 15 minutes, prior to going in the bath pools. Gabi’s hair was blown by the wind and accidentally brushed against a Japanese. The person almost flipped out and brushed virtual hairs of her shoulder.
I read in the paper that a Japanese businessman became unruly on a Northwest flight to Detroit, because he found a hair on his airplane blanket. He started to pour water on seats and pushed a flight attendant. He was later arrested when the plane arrived.
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No this is not a prejudice post, just a traveler’s observation. Why is it that mankind always seems to want what he, or in this case, she, doesn’t have? Let me clarify. Often in this country of the lotus flower, we have noticed that Japanese women will go to extremes in order to not have the sun touch their face. This of course entails that many wear hats. The second solution is to always have an umbrella handy. The third solution is make-up or skin whitener. Just like we westerners put on suntan lotion, in order to achieve that perfect tan, women here, as well as in southeast Asia and India, put on whitening cream in order to achieve that perfect “light skin”. I am definitely darker than most here.
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Today, after touring the historical part of the city of Kurashiki, the most picturesque city in Japan (according to , as well as Japanese literature and a young man, that we met at the airport, and who was on his way to Banff National Park in order to be a Japanese tour guide there)., a miracle occurred. We figured we couldn’t leave this city off the itinerary. The inner historical part, which was spared the ravages of WWII, was actually very pretty with merchant’s buildings of the Edo Period lining both sides of the willow draped canal of the Takahashi River Basin. Surrounding this historical part were the usual drab Japanese gray city type buildings and lots of signs. Why did they have to take the Bauhaus style so to heart? To worsen the landscape, there are electric poles with hundreds of wires everywhere. I expected that in a third world country, but in a modern industrialized nation? I thought it was supposed to be so high tech. When we ride the rails one city seems to blend into next city. Every once in a while one sees a small area of a town, where I can recognize that I am in Japan. Here the buildings have beautiful curved tile roofs and the houses are constructed with a lot of dark wood. Really pretty, but way too few! Only down on Shikoku Island, whole Japanese architectural villages still existed.
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The Japanese people are really looking out for us. Being the only Caucasian tourists, wherever we have been so far, we usually get all the attention. After our bathing adventure, we were ready to leave the Dogo Onsen Spa in Matsuyama, but were stopped by a Japanese manager, who gave us a private tour of the Royal Bath. It is the oldest hot-spring spa in Japan, built in 1894, and the emperor only used his private bath here 10 times. We saw the imperial bath, the top- floor resting lounge for drinking tea and eating sweets and even the royal toilet ( a hole in the wooden floor ! ). They were very proud to show us everything !
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Everything in Japan is too small for me. I hit my head more than once against door frames. My back is hurting from bending all the time. The bathroom sinks are too low. I have to slouch, sitting at the low tables in the restaurants. My legs don`t fit under the tables. We are staying in a Japanese Toyoko Inn in Kurashiki. This is a business hotel chain and our room can give you claustrophobia. The sign on the bed gives us a hint to place the suitcases under the bed for space saving ! The bathroom is a tiny fiberglass cell with one water pipe. The faucet at the sink has a diverter to the shower hose, so it is either the sink or the shower that has water at any given time. Now I know why some Japanese cars are so small. There is no parking in the narrow streets and homeowners park their cars on the sidewalk in front of their houses.
We have a palace in Clifton Park and I am starting to look forward to live there and to have some space again !

Japanese students seem to be very disciplined. They all wear uniforms, girls usually pleated skirts and blouses or sweaters and the boys, slacks and shirts. They are always of a dark bluish color and often look like sailor suits. The only thing that distinguishes one girls uniform from another is the length of the skirt. Some opt to wear the skirt mini skirt fashion, while others choose the more traditional, to the knee length. All have the same type of school bags and ride the same type of bikes to school.The only difference comes in the shoes. Some choose the sneakers, others the penny loafers, and still others, the traditional flip flops. After school, a lot choose high heels………I think they want to be taller. Most seem to also have a cell phone as standard issued equipment. There are a few that do not fit this image, especially after school hours. They seem to be the trendy kids, with baggy pants, dyed hair or other outrageous get-ups. But their numbers are few.
Japanese men seem to all wear business suits in either dark gray or dark blue. It makes no difference of the age, the garb is the same. Many use either public transportation or ride their bikes to work. We see very little communication between people on their way to work.
The older generation likes to stare at the young girls. They do not even try to hide their gazes. We did not see this occurring in the younger generation, so maybe this will subside with time.
Japanese women—-definitely very few gray suits! Most seem to work in service roles, if they work at all. We seem to only see young women in the workforce. Older women are rarely seen. The only place we saw some were in the supermarket. Still seems to be very traditional. Not that there is anything wrong with that, just an observation.
Japanese think they are smart. When a Japanese woman spoke to me on the subway, she asked how we were getting around without knowing the Japanese language. I explained, we were using signing and gesturing. She said, yes, Japanese can usually figure out what people want and need, they are very smart! No ego problem here! And we thought we were so smart in getting our meanings across.

Here are my first impressions of Japan :
People are very friendly, but shy. They don`t even talk with each other on the trains, but rather read the paper or sleep. It must be very tiring to live here. We have not heard one person shout or raise their voice.
Everybody wears white gloves : bus, taxi, tram drivers, train conductors, policemen and so on. People with these low paying jobs look very professional, wearing suits and ties.
The bodies constantly bent with bows. Last night, we were riding the tram in Matsuyama and the tram driver got out of his seat at every stop to take the fare from all passengers, as they leave the tram, bowing a thank you to each one.
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So, we thought in Japan there would be alot of Hiros type restaurants, with the wonderful food we are used to from there. Wrong! Just like when you go to any other country and expect the Americanized version of the country’s food, it doesn’t exist. That is not to say that the food is bad here, it is just different. They like lots and lots of fish, which right away takes it off of Lothar’s Top Ten List. It is still on mine, until most of that fish is served either raw or whole. That is when it is also taken off my list. The other night, we ordered a non fish set dinner, which included mini shrimp sushi, as an appetizer, baked chicken skin, fried chicken thigh balls, chicken liver, stomach, and heart skewers, and some cabbage type salad on the side. Red meat is really out of the question at $ 40-50 a meal. We were in a supermarket today and the red meat they were selling looked like the poorest grade that I have ever seen, with lots of fat woven throughout, . We have to admit,we have frequented
Mc’Donalds on various occasions. Please don’t spread this news, but hey, sometimes you got to do, what you got to do. Back to our dinner experience. On our way home we saw a 7/11 that had Hagen Daz bars. We　splurged and bought mini size bars at the usual price. But boy were they good. They actually filled us up! Everything here seems to be smaller. Food portions, bathroom sizes, sink sizes, door sizes. You name it!
Breakfast here is definitely also different, soup and fish and cabbage salad and green tea. We usually opt to make our own. Glad I bought that water cooker from Germany with me. We can make coffee, soft boiled eggs and we buy bread to accompany our brought jelly, peanut butter and nutella. We were able to stock up on those supplies in Guam, that good old American “colony”.
Tonight we might try a noodle shop or if it’s too fishy, we’ll have to opt for the Italian cuisine, which has so far been our savior.

So, we made it with our Rail Pass to Matsuyama, even though there was a lack of any signs in English past Okayama. That was 3 hours east of where we are now. We caught a streetcar ( thanks to Frommers Guide Book, we are not totally lost!) to our hotel, which was 20 min from the main station. I also thank the Arabs for giving the Japanese Arabic numerals. At least we can easily figure out anything that has a logical number in it, like prices. Our hotel is across the way from the oldest public bath in Japan, the Dogo Onsen. It is the one that was frequented by several emperors and their families, whenever they were in Matsuyama. Public baths in Japan in olden times were very necessary, since few people had baths in their houses. Besides serving a hygienic function, they also served a social function, as a neighborhood gathering place to catch up with the gossip, politics, etc. They were always segregated by gender. Many, as this one, were fed by hot springs, which are supposed to cure many ailments. This one claimed to be good for muscles and nerves. This bath would definitely be the right medicine for my body and mind!
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Our first trip outside Tokyo started at Narita Airport on May 11th. We took the JR ( Japanese Railways) train to Tokyo Station and managed not to get lost in this multi-level, huge train station. The Shinkansen bullet train took us in 4 hours to Okayama, where we changed trains to Matsuyama, about 6oo miles southwest of Tokyo on the island of Shikoku.
The train conductor came through our car every so often, and each time turned around to take off his cap and bow to all the passengers, before going to the next car. In Matsuyama, streetcar # 5 took us to our hotel Patio Dogo, across the street from Dogo Onsen Spa. We had to use all our gesticulating skills to explain where we wanted to go.
Next, it was time to forage for dinner. We found the ” Dogo Beer ” restaurant plus brewery. We took off our shoes, as always when entering a house, and sat on the tatami mats on the floor. I realized that I was able to sit ” Indian style”
( Schneidersitz) with my knees down on the floor, but Gabi could not. I guess we are built differently ! Otherwise,nothing wrong with her built ! We ended up eating fried chicken skins, chicken stomach, heart and some other stuff the waitress could not explain to us. Where is a TGIF or Outback when we need one.
After dinner it took us a few minutes to get the blood circulation back in our legs and we walked rather stiffly to our hotel.
We desperately needed a hot spa now ( see Gabi`s post ).