19th Birthday in Japan

 June 2nd, 2010, 8:08 p.m.

I must say, my 19^th birthday was pretty unforgettable. Lee and I met Lars (our new Norwegian friend) at the Okazaki train station at 9:00a.m. to leave for Nagoya. Even though Okazaki is pretty small city, there were still tons of people at the train station on this Sunday morning. If Lee and Lars hadn’t been there, I would have had absolutely no idea what to do. There is a little bit of English on the signs at the train station, but not nearly enough to allow a newcomer to understand how to purchase a ticket or even how/when to use a ticket once one has it. However, the boys were more familiar with this sort of traveling than me, and they figured things out pretty quickly. The train ride to Nagoya was only thirty minutes, and it felt like even less. 

There are approximately 2.2 million people who live in Nagoya, and when we stepped out into the Nagoya train station, it seemed like all 2.2 million people had decided to take the train that morning. It was rather overwhelming (but still exciting!) to be surrounded by so many people. Kathleen’s camera charger still hasn’t reached Okazaki, which means that I’m still camera-less; however, both Lars and Lee had cameras, so not to worry, there were still several pictures taken.

We weren’t really sure what we wanted to do or where we wanted to go in Nagoya, so we began just by following the flow of the people. Directly outside of the train station was a huge display of beautiful flowers and plants. There was a Japanese security guard (well, I think he was a security guard, I suppose he could have been a janitor with a really fancy uniform) who stopped me and asked (in English) what country I’m from. I told him that I’m from America, and he started to talk to me rapidly about baseball. I think he was disappointed when I had nothing to contribute to the discussion, but he still seemed nice.

After wandering around some very crowded streets for a bit, we wandered into a less dense area of the city and proceeded to find a Buddhist temple, just hanging out on a street corner. There were trees and statues and lovely, intricate shrines surrounding the temple, lots of artifacts that are clearly worth a lot of money, and they are all just left out in the open, with no worry about thieves. There’s something incredibly reassuring about walking through one of the most populated cities in Japan and realizing that the crime rate is so low, that the Japanese do not even worry about locking up their precious statues and artifacts. Almost immediately after we walked around the temple (where I gotten to practice my cleansing ritual that Collin had taught me last weekend) we got lost. Our map seemed to say that we should be in the middle of a park, but definitely were not. We asked a sweet old woman walking along the street for directions. She was incredibly patient with our speaking abilities and very helpful. I couldn’t help but think back to the three weeks of Japanese class at Jewell that we spent practicing conversations just like this one, asking for directions. I wished that Shinoda sensee could have been there to see me putting her teaching to very practical use.

By the time that we had found our way to where we wanted to go, it was early afternoon and we were all hungry. We stopped at a restaurant that looked nice, but inexpensive. Inside, we realized that we were supposed to order using a vending machine like device, that you paid and then received a ticket from. I had meant to choose the same meal as Lars (curry rice); however, when my food arrived, it became clear that I had chosen the wrong button. I didn’t recognize 80% of the things on my plate. Lee offered to trade me, which was really nice of him because he eats a ton and had order twice as much food as me, but I wanted to stick it out. I at least sampled everything on my plate and ended up eating quite a bit of it, even though the only things that I could recognize were the raw egg, rice, and miso soup. I’ve eaten at least five raw eggs since I’ve been in Japan. We mix them in with our rice almost every morning for breakfast. This shocked me at first, because I’ve grown up hearing that raw eggs can cause salmonella. When I shared this concern with Lee, he told me that he had never heard of salmonella, maybe Japanese people haven’t either. Like I said, I’ve eaten raw eggs several times now, and I seem to be fine, but if it happens that I get deathly ill while in Japan, anyone who reads my blog can assume that it is due to the raw eggs I suppose.

After lunch (which was only 420 yen (about $4.50)), we discovered another temple, only this one was absolutely massive and there were tons and tons of people. I’m not sure that Lee was very interested in it (there are lots of temples in Singapore too) but Lars and I looked around. We didn’t want to be in the way of all of the people who were praying, so we didn’t stay too long, but did take the time to get “omiguji,” a type of Japanese fortune-telling card. I had gotten one at the temple I had visited on the school trip last weekend too. Because he can read Chinese characters, Lee was able to tell us that my fortune was “good luck” and Lars’s was “big good luck;” but that was about all because most of the characters were ancient Japanese.

Can you see my peace sign? Clearly I'm trying to fit in.

Lee and Lars attempting to decode my fortune. 

 

Right outside of the temple, there was a crowded alleyway that led to the most gigantic shopping area that I’ve ever seen. There were streets and streets of shops that were blocked off to cars and crowded with people. We walked around looking at all of the outrageous fashion for a few streets. We stopped at a street vendor and Lee and Lars bought traditional red bean filled fish cakes, and I bought mocha soft cream (green tea powder ice cream). I don’t think that I have adequately explained how popular green tea is here, and I’m not sure how it make it clear yet. But trust me, it’s big.

None of my photos actually do this place justice.

                                                

It looks a lot more green in person.  

Next, we found the park that we had set out for hours earlier, and ended up at the Aichi Center of the Arts, which is an incredible place. The building is very new-age looking, all glass and curvy metal structures. It connects to an underground shopping mall and a giant park. We ended up on the gallery floor of the Center, and realized that we needed tickets (which were pretty expensive) in order to go into the exhibit. But as soon as we started to turn away, an enthusiastic and kind man came up to us and ushered us inside with him. He pulled out enough tickets for all of us, and we entered the painting exhibit. He explained that one of his friends was a photographer with pictures in the show, and told us to have fun and then disappeared.

I wish that I knew how to go about explaining how wonderful the exhibit was. Most of it was paintings (huge paintings, two or three times as tall as me), but there were also sculptures and photographs too. Everything seemed to be pretty modern, but it was definitely not all alike. I could have spent two full days looking around at all of the paintings. I don’t think Lee and Lars were quite as excited as me at the prospect of spending all afternoon in the Art Center exhibit; however, I think they also were impressed by a lot of the paintings too.

Outside of the Arts' Center.

I had worn the wrong shoes for walking around Nagoya all day. By the time we had finished with the Art Center, my feet were killing me. When Lee suggested that we go to a Japanese Onsen, which he explained was a public bath house where people go to relax, I thought it sounded like a great idea. I’d never been to an Onsen before (actually, I had never even heard of them) and was excited to try something new. Here is what I discovered:  Since we didn’t have towels with us, we bought ones that were about the size of a piece of notebook paper from a vending machine inside the Onsen for 200 yen (about $2). There was a small tea shop and a waiting area, both decorated very traditionally. Down the hallway we found the men’s and women’s separate bathing areas and spilt up, agreeing to meet back outside an hour and a half later. I had almost no idea what to expect and was hoping that everything would just be self explanatory. The only advice that Lee had given me was to make sure that I washed myself off very very well before getting into the public pool. I first walked into an area that was very much like a locker room. There were about five or six women (all at least 60 years old) changing out of their clothes. After fumbling to put my things in my locker for an unnaturally long amount of time, I took off all of my clothes. I think that this was about the point when I realized that I haven’t stood completely naked in front of a room of strangers since I was two years old. Being naked clearly did not phase any of the women in the changing room, and I tried to adopt their attitude. I took the elastic band with the key out of the locker and put it around my ankle, which was when I discovered that I didn’t know how to make the locker stay shut. After I had struggled with it for a couple minutes, a woman came up to me, and demonstrated how you had to use a 100yen coin as a deposit in the slot. After I thanked her for her help, I realized that I currently had every single type of coin with me except the 100yen coin, and none of the others would work. I found the locker room assistant, explained in Japanese that I needed change, and then stood and waited while she went to get it (all completely unclothed). As more and more elderly women entered the room, got undressed, and walked into the onsen (as I awkwardly stood waiting for change with nothing to do), I became more and more self conscious. You would think that being at least 40 years younger than all of the naked women around me, I wouldn’t feel too self conscious; however, this wasn’t the case.

After I had finally gotten my stuff put away, I walked into the actual onsen room. The area immediately outside of the changing room was clearly the self-cleaning area. There were dozens of individual stations set up side-by-side, close to the floor. They consisted of a mirror, shampoo, soap, a small bucket, a faucet, a sprayer, and a small stool to sit on.

I found this picture on google, it’s pretty accurate, expect that at the onsen I visited everything seemed closer to the ground and the stations were closer together:

I sat at my station and washed my entire body meticulously, three times. I was terrified that someone would come up to me and inform me that I hadn’t pre-washed myself well enough. By the time I was finished, I don’t think that I had ever been so clean in my entire life.

There were to large pools that made up the onsen, one inside, and a smaller one outside. There were women walking slowly around or sitting on the edges of the inside pool, which was gigantic. I wasn’t sure what I was supposed to do, and I didn’t want to stare at anyone for long enough to figure out what everyone else was doing. I walked unimaginably slowly around the large inside pool once and then went outside. Since the outside pool was pretty small (about twice the size of a normal hot tub) everyone was sitting around the edges, and rather closely together. I found a spot and tried to relax in the water and simultaneously not make eye contact with anyone. After a couple minutes a few of the women across the small pool from me asked me where I was from, and I told them America. I explained that I was a student, and that it was my first time at an onsen. They were incredibly kind to me, which definitely made me more relaxed.  On the whole, it was still an experience that was rather far outside of my comfort zone, however, it was really neat and I wouldn’t be against going to one again, although I think once was enough for this trip.

After the Onsen.

Bus Stop.

Nagoya train station. 

After our adventure at the onsen, we took a bus back to the Nagoya train station and then the train back to Okazaki. By the time Lee and I got home it was about 7:00p.m. and I was pretty exhausted. Not too long after we got back, my host mom and dad and Hibiki (my host brother) arrived at home. They had bought a bunch of sushi and Lee had gotten me a cake to celebrate my sushi. It was incredibly nice. Lee had found out that it was my birthday when our teacher at Yamasa had told everyone in our class last Friday and they had all sung me happy birthday, and he told out host family. It was a really wonderful surprise to have them all want to celebrate it with me. As a present, they gave me an adorable little towel with a teddy-bear-like creature on it (I think it’s some sort of anime character, but seeing as I’m probably the only person here under the age of 25 who doesn’t read or watch anime, I can’t be sure). It was really cute though. I tried to explain how cute I thought it was, and what I should have said was “Totemo kawai desu.” Instead, I said, “Totemo kowai desu,” which means “It is very scary.” They thought that it was pretty funny.   

An absolutely unforgettable day.