Japan trip report 21-23 Sep
Sep. 29th, 2011 11:08 pm![[personal profile]](http://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jinian(Finally back in a place with internet access! I'm mostly doing stuff rather than writing, but here is some writing.)
21 September
Totally incapacitating stomachache. It came with a low fever and muscle cramps, but I'm told that this is actually fairly standard for a Japanese "cold" -- I was a bit scared at the time. So unfortunately I didn't get to go to Nagoya that day, though the shinkansen was delayed some anyway due to Typhoon Roke. I felt a lot better by evening, though still sore and tired.
22 September
Traveled to Nagoya in the morning. The Nara-area bus has a neat semi-metered system in which you get on and take a ticket that has the stop's boarding number on it. Then as the bus travels a display at the front shows each stop number and the cost to get off at the current location if you boarded at that stop. Nice.
So I made my way from NAIST (the science grad school/research institute where I gave the seminar) to Nara Station, took the train from Nara to Kyoto, and got the shinkansen from Kyoto to Nagoya. Luckily (1) I was traveling on university expense money, so I got to ride the super-fast Nozomi shinkansen, and (2) this route back was the same one I'd gone on with Minako to get to NAIST, and I remembered basically how to do it.
At noon, I got picked up at the station by Yoko, who took me to a restaurant in a nearby shopping center to eat some nice mild udon (with special Nagoya-style noodle shape, described to me twice as "thin" but which I would term "flat" -- they're not thin like somen, but flat and wide like fettuccine). I finished about half of mine. Then we drove to Nagoya U and installed my stuff in the guest house, and I tried to fit in as many meetings as I could from my original schedule. (Yoko was very enthusiastic about the Coast Salish art scarf I'd gotten for her, so I hope she liked it as much as I did.)
My seminar was at 3pm, and it went fine. Still too damned short, and I really should have updated the acknowledgements to include my hosts. I said their names, but ugh. Anyway, people seemed interested, though the students were shy of speaking in English.
I met with people from the lab I was visiting, and saw beautiful microscopes, and generally had an interesting scientific afternoon. People appreciated the Theo chocolates and SBC coffee sampler, and basically all was well. (No chance to see the fun little girl again, though her parents left early to get her.)
We had a great dinner at a nearby restaurant, many tiny courses which I mostly couldn't eat due to the tiny stomach of the sickie, but I had fun hanging out and talking with everyone, including former postdocs M and T. Eventually, because I hadn't eaten enough, people ordered me an onigiri. I tried to split it but no, it was for me. I ate it. There was umeboshi in there. Happy!
23 September
A holiday: Autumnal Equinox Day. This meant that no one was in the lab, which actually made me pretty sad because I'd wanted to make up for missing my sick time by playing with microscopes. But most people had plans with their families, so we stuck with the original plan of Nagoya sightseeing. Ken drove, Daisuke was in charge of instructing the newbie, and Keita made some conversation but was a little shy. I'd gotten email from Wim that he'd be later than planned, so I let the boys know that too.
For our first stop, we went to Atsuta Shrine, where I learned how to act right at a shrine. You shouldn't walk through the center of the torii gate, because that's for god; bow first and walk through near the side. Wash your hands and mouth, ideally LRL, mouth, L, and let water run down the handle before replacing the dipper. Give a coin, clap three times, and pray. (In my case, for good travel.) The shrine was a beautiful, quiet place despite all the people, and I felt really reverent toward it. The vast majority of Japanese shrine visitors don't do the full protocol, which was funny, but Daisuke was very earnest about it so I was into it too.
Inside the Atsuta shrine precinct is a treasure hall with swords, paintings, textiles, and other artifacts. I was especially interested in the fabrics, several of which were woven with the same fine brocade pattern (four-petaled flowers in leafy diamond shapes) and one of which was printed with dye (small argument over what the proper English term was from boys who didn't know anything about fabric, hee). No photos allowed, alas. There was also a lovely painting of rice with setting sun, and a fan-paper of doodled-looking chickens. Kibitzing revealed that these were no ordinary chickens. They were... god chickens? the boys offered dubiously. Much barely-subdued laughter. Then we left the treasure house to find a group of very lovely chickens wandering the grounds.
We tried to go to a well-known eel restaurant near the shrine, but despite it not being noon yet there was a wait of an hour and 20 minutes. Too long! Instead we trekked back along the outside of the shrine to get the car, and I discovered what was up with the metal plates in the parking stalls, which had been puzzling me: once the car has been there for some amount of time, the plate flips up, and you can't move the wheels past it without paying the parking meter. Next stop: Ossu shopping street, where we first went to a lesser eel restaurant that was able to seat us immediately. I don't see how the popular one could have been more delicious. I was still a bit sore about the belly and low in capacity, but I was able to eat most of the yummy eel and rice. I noticed once again that Japanese people do not drink enough; really not at all with meals (which I hear is supposed to be healthy for you) but also not that much in general.
From the restaurant we went into the shopping street by way of a "UFO catcher" arcade. UFO catchers are a variant on what most US folk will know as "the Claw" from Toy Story: that game where you control a tiny crane that drops down to grab a toy if you're lucky and bring it to the chute out if you're luckier. The UFO part is a large orb holding the grabbers, and there are only two grabbers, sometimes even just one. Even the boys looked bemused at the first section we went into: all figurines of busty girls and similar porny stuff. "These are abnormal UFO catchers," Ken explained gravely. "For abnormal people."
We found a few with more reasonable toys and tried desultorily to play them, but no one was that interested. Mostly we wandered down the shopping street looking at kimono fabrics and traditional men's dress (for some reason Ken wanted some to do experiments in, I never did understand why) and random strange stuff. We stopped at a tea shop and I had to drink some pretty bitter matcha to be polite. A couple of the boys bought tea. At the end we reached, there was a temple, so I also got a crash course in temple etiquette: wash yourself in the smoke from the incense bowls for protection, coin into coin box, bow, chant a nami amida whatnot (at which I failed), and pray.
Back to the car and a quick trip into Nagoya Castle, about which more tomorrow; suffice it to say that I was cheeky with Oda Nobunaga and got a matchlock pistol pointed at me for it. The castle closed before we were even close to done, and since there was some extra time we went to a dessert cafe, Chez Shibata. I had Berry Enversee, which was stunning. I'd assumed the bright red powder on top was merely decorative, but it must have been freeze-dried raspberry juice or something because the flavor was intense and gorgeous. The layers of cream, jam, and custard underneath it didn't hurt.
Next to Chez Shibata was a marvelous potter's shop where I wished I could have bought more. (The name was only in kanji, alas, but I got one of the boys to copy it down for me.) I did get a little bowl with a woebegone dog on it, but the genius pieces were thin porcelain with a matte finish and elegant, dark line decoration. There's no way I could've dragged them around Japan for another week without stressing out completely. At least the potter had enough English to appreciate my compliments.
Then to the train station. The boys were nice enough to hang out with me almost until Wim's expected arrival at eight, amusing us all by going to Tokyu Hands, an amazing department store that seriously has ALL the things. I was stuck on the fabric area, where I got some floral prints and some print of white chairs on red that is total genius. The boys were bored there but had a good time in the cooking area. Next we all poked around the science area, where they have preserved stained skeletons of fish and such, lab glassware, samples of minerals, all kinds of great stuff. I found "amazing cards," which are basically a single-frame unchangeable Viewmaster, and tried to explain the superior US 1970s technology to Daisuke, who was mostly puzzled.
Then, at 8, I went to wait for Wim. And I waited a really long time. At 9 I decided that if he wasn't there by 9:30 I would try to find a net cafe. 9:30 rolled around with no Wim in sight, so off I went. Okay, katakana knowledge served me well: I saw an internet cafe right by the station and took the elevator up to the lobby. There I was confronted with (1) creepy darkness, (2) non-English-speaking staff, and (3) a price list that had not only different fancinesses of booths to rent (some clearly good sleeping arrangements) but different pricing for men or women clients, which I have still not figured out. Women were cheaper. I really hesitated to speculate on why. "Internet cafe?!" I asked. Yes, yes. So I stumbled through a transaction for the cheapest available computer/booth combo, got led up there, and checked my mail in the dark, private booth with loud snoring from somewhere nearby. Ah. In addition to the missed connection in San Francisco, Wim's luggage had been lost, so he had taken extra time at the airport and then only been able to get the slowest shinkansen, so he was expecting to arrive around 11. Sigh. I called him on the mobile phone he'd sensibly rented to check in and then waited some more.
But wait, there is more fuckery! Shinkansens stopped coming. What. It was getting really late, and I couldn't understand the announcements. All the station staff could tell me was "shinkansen stop" and "no go". They were unwilling to say that it would eventually arrive. Just wait. Okay. After about two extra hours, the trains north started moving, and, after four or so trains arrived coming south, the blessed train of Wim got in. It was too late for subways, as I'd had ample time to check, so we took a taxi. One small problem: taxis can't come past the gates of the university campus at night. So our driver rounded up a student who know someone in the lab I visited, and he called his friend (at 2am, but I conceded that the friend was probably awake) who worked there, and we found the lab building. Mostly I got us back to the guest house from there, though there was a period of confusion. Wim was remarkably lively, but I was dead and wanted to sleep. Past 3am, I finally did.
21 September
Totally incapacitating stomachache. It came with a low fever and muscle cramps, but I'm told that this is actually fairly standard for a Japanese "cold" -- I was a bit scared at the time. So unfortunately I didn't get to go to Nagoya that day, though the shinkansen was delayed some anyway due to Typhoon Roke. I felt a lot better by evening, though still sore and tired.
22 September
Traveled to Nagoya in the morning. The Nara-area bus has a neat semi-metered system in which you get on and take a ticket that has the stop's boarding number on it. Then as the bus travels a display at the front shows each stop number and the cost to get off at the current location if you boarded at that stop. Nice.
So I made my way from NAIST (the science grad school/research institute where I gave the seminar) to Nara Station, took the train from Nara to Kyoto, and got the shinkansen from Kyoto to Nagoya. Luckily (1) I was traveling on university expense money, so I got to ride the super-fast Nozomi shinkansen, and (2) this route back was the same one I'd gone on with Minako to get to NAIST, and I remembered basically how to do it.
At noon, I got picked up at the station by Yoko, who took me to a restaurant in a nearby shopping center to eat some nice mild udon (with special Nagoya-style noodle shape, described to me twice as "thin" but which I would term "flat" -- they're not thin like somen, but flat and wide like fettuccine). I finished about half of mine. Then we drove to Nagoya U and installed my stuff in the guest house, and I tried to fit in as many meetings as I could from my original schedule. (Yoko was very enthusiastic about the Coast Salish art scarf I'd gotten for her, so I hope she liked it as much as I did.)
My seminar was at 3pm, and it went fine. Still too damned short, and I really should have updated the acknowledgements to include my hosts. I said their names, but ugh. Anyway, people seemed interested, though the students were shy of speaking in English.
I met with people from the lab I was visiting, and saw beautiful microscopes, and generally had an interesting scientific afternoon. People appreciated the Theo chocolates and SBC coffee sampler, and basically all was well. (No chance to see the fun little girl again, though her parents left early to get her.)
We had a great dinner at a nearby restaurant, many tiny courses which I mostly couldn't eat due to the tiny stomach of the sickie, but I had fun hanging out and talking with everyone, including former postdocs M and T. Eventually, because I hadn't eaten enough, people ordered me an onigiri. I tried to split it but no, it was for me. I ate it. There was umeboshi in there. Happy!
23 September
A holiday: Autumnal Equinox Day. This meant that no one was in the lab, which actually made me pretty sad because I'd wanted to make up for missing my sick time by playing with microscopes. But most people had plans with their families, so we stuck with the original plan of Nagoya sightseeing. Ken drove, Daisuke was in charge of instructing the newbie, and Keita made some conversation but was a little shy. I'd gotten email from Wim that he'd be later than planned, so I let the boys know that too.
For our first stop, we went to Atsuta Shrine, where I learned how to act right at a shrine. You shouldn't walk through the center of the torii gate, because that's for god; bow first and walk through near the side. Wash your hands and mouth, ideally LRL, mouth, L, and let water run down the handle before replacing the dipper. Give a coin, clap three times, and pray. (In my case, for good travel.) The shrine was a beautiful, quiet place despite all the people, and I felt really reverent toward it. The vast majority of Japanese shrine visitors don't do the full protocol, which was funny, but Daisuke was very earnest about it so I was into it too.
Inside the Atsuta shrine precinct is a treasure hall with swords, paintings, textiles, and other artifacts. I was especially interested in the fabrics, several of which were woven with the same fine brocade pattern (four-petaled flowers in leafy diamond shapes) and one of which was printed with dye (small argument over what the proper English term was from boys who didn't know anything about fabric, hee). No photos allowed, alas. There was also a lovely painting of rice with setting sun, and a fan-paper of doodled-looking chickens. Kibitzing revealed that these were no ordinary chickens. They were... god chickens? the boys offered dubiously. Much barely-subdued laughter. Then we left the treasure house to find a group of very lovely chickens wandering the grounds.
We tried to go to a well-known eel restaurant near the shrine, but despite it not being noon yet there was a wait of an hour and 20 minutes. Too long! Instead we trekked back along the outside of the shrine to get the car, and I discovered what was up with the metal plates in the parking stalls, which had been puzzling me: once the car has been there for some amount of time, the plate flips up, and you can't move the wheels past it without paying the parking meter. Next stop: Ossu shopping street, where we first went to a lesser eel restaurant that was able to seat us immediately. I don't see how the popular one could have been more delicious. I was still a bit sore about the belly and low in capacity, but I was able to eat most of the yummy eel and rice. I noticed once again that Japanese people do not drink enough; really not at all with meals (which I hear is supposed to be healthy for you) but also not that much in general.
From the restaurant we went into the shopping street by way of a "UFO catcher" arcade. UFO catchers are a variant on what most US folk will know as "the Claw" from Toy Story: that game where you control a tiny crane that drops down to grab a toy if you're lucky and bring it to the chute out if you're luckier. The UFO part is a large orb holding the grabbers, and there are only two grabbers, sometimes even just one. Even the boys looked bemused at the first section we went into: all figurines of busty girls and similar porny stuff. "These are abnormal UFO catchers," Ken explained gravely. "For abnormal people."
We found a few with more reasonable toys and tried desultorily to play them, but no one was that interested. Mostly we wandered down the shopping street looking at kimono fabrics and traditional men's dress (for some reason Ken wanted some to do experiments in, I never did understand why) and random strange stuff. We stopped at a tea shop and I had to drink some pretty bitter matcha to be polite. A couple of the boys bought tea. At the end we reached, there was a temple, so I also got a crash course in temple etiquette: wash yourself in the smoke from the incense bowls for protection, coin into coin box, bow, chant a nami amida whatnot (at which I failed), and pray.
Back to the car and a quick trip into Nagoya Castle, about which more tomorrow; suffice it to say that I was cheeky with Oda Nobunaga and got a matchlock pistol pointed at me for it. The castle closed before we were even close to done, and since there was some extra time we went to a dessert cafe, Chez Shibata. I had Berry Enversee, which was stunning. I'd assumed the bright red powder on top was merely decorative, but it must have been freeze-dried raspberry juice or something because the flavor was intense and gorgeous. The layers of cream, jam, and custard underneath it didn't hurt.
Next to Chez Shibata was a marvelous potter's shop where I wished I could have bought more. (The name was only in kanji, alas, but I got one of the boys to copy it down for me.) I did get a little bowl with a woebegone dog on it, but the genius pieces were thin porcelain with a matte finish and elegant, dark line decoration. There's no way I could've dragged them around Japan for another week without stressing out completely. At least the potter had enough English to appreciate my compliments.
Then to the train station. The boys were nice enough to hang out with me almost until Wim's expected arrival at eight, amusing us all by going to Tokyu Hands, an amazing department store that seriously has ALL the things. I was stuck on the fabric area, where I got some floral prints and some print of white chairs on red that is total genius. The boys were bored there but had a good time in the cooking area. Next we all poked around the science area, where they have preserved stained skeletons of fish and such, lab glassware, samples of minerals, all kinds of great stuff. I found "amazing cards," which are basically a single-frame unchangeable Viewmaster, and tried to explain the superior US 1970s technology to Daisuke, who was mostly puzzled.
Then, at 8, I went to wait for Wim. And I waited a really long time. At 9 I decided that if he wasn't there by 9:30 I would try to find a net cafe. 9:30 rolled around with no Wim in sight, so off I went. Okay, katakana knowledge served me well: I saw an internet cafe right by the station and took the elevator up to the lobby. There I was confronted with (1) creepy darkness, (2) non-English-speaking staff, and (3) a price list that had not only different fancinesses of booths to rent (some clearly good sleeping arrangements) but different pricing for men or women clients, which I have still not figured out. Women were cheaper. I really hesitated to speculate on why. "Internet cafe?!" I asked. Yes, yes. So I stumbled through a transaction for the cheapest available computer/booth combo, got led up there, and checked my mail in the dark, private booth with loud snoring from somewhere nearby. Ah. In addition to the missed connection in San Francisco, Wim's luggage had been lost, so he had taken extra time at the airport and then only been able to get the slowest shinkansen, so he was expecting to arrive around 11. Sigh. I called him on the mobile phone he'd sensibly rented to check in and then waited some more.
But wait, there is more fuckery! Shinkansens stopped coming. What. It was getting really late, and I couldn't understand the announcements. All the station staff could tell me was "shinkansen stop" and "no go". They were unwilling to say that it would eventually arrive. Just wait. Okay. After about two extra hours, the trains north started moving, and, after four or so trains arrived coming south, the blessed train of Wim got in. It was too late for subways, as I'd had ample time to check, so we took a taxi. One small problem: taxis can't come past the gates of the university campus at night. So our driver rounded up a student who know someone in the lab I visited, and he called his friend (at 2am, but I conceded that the friend was probably awake) who worked there, and we found the lab building. Mostly I got us back to the guest house from there, though there was a period of confusion. Wim was remarkably lively, but I was dead and wanted to sleep. Past 3am, I finally did.
