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Vocabulary and Grammar
しつれい - shitsurei, meaning rude. Elder men often use in place of sumimasen. すみません - sumimasen, meaning excuse me. When bumping into someone on the street, "ああ、すみません" おかわり - okawari, used when asking for seconds. Idiomatic expression, meaning to refill. "すみません、おかわり" なんでもいい - anything, useable when asked what you'd like to eat "何を食べたいですか" "なんでもいい" さむい - cold "とても寒い" いくら - how much "すみませn、このぼうしはいくらですか" つぎ - next "つぎは東京です" おいし - delicious "このにくはおいしです" どいたしまして - you're welcome "ありがとうございました" "どいたしまして"
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We've finally reached our last day in Japan, and I've got to say, I'm pretty distraught to be leaving. It's not Japan itself that made this trip so great, but the people I took this adventure with. My group really influenced my feelings towards this trip and made this one of the best months of my life. Spending a month with a group of 20 people really is a difficult challenge but I'm glad I did it. And so begins our last day. Out of all the places we could have gone for our last day in Tokyo, we decided on Akihabara because yes, we are a group of nerds. We went in a few figurine shops but I didn't really have any intention of buying anything from these places. After going in and out of a couple and not being particularly interested in anything, I moved onto my main goal; retro games. Tyler and I separated from the group and found a retro game store along the main street, which I easily spent half an hour in, but only left with one purchase. The difficulty of finding what I really wanted around the end of the tour was that my suitcase was already pretty full, so I settled on a copy of Pokèmon Gold for the Gameboy Colour I bought a few days before. Tyler and I went to a few card game and hobby stores before going to Yoshinoya. For lunch I had gyudon, but instead of beef, I got pork. Yoshinoya will definitely be something I'll miss from Japan. Although it's Japan's version of fast food, it's still considerably better than western fast food. After lunch, we went to a few more card store, and then on to Yodobashi, a large chain of 6 floor department stores, with each floor being similar size to that of Kmart or Big W. Akihabara holds Japan's biggest Yodobashi, and also somehow the first one I'd been to on the entire trip. We spent some time in there before going to the train station to meet up with Raya and Danica, and one of their Japanese friends. All of us then went back to Yodobashi and headed upstairs to the restaurants. Although I already had lunch, I ordered a mini curry so I wouldn't be kicked out for not ordering, and it was delicious and I have no regrets. After what was their first lunch and mine and Tyler's second lunch, we headed back to the train station and returned to the hotel to retrieve our luggage and make a sad return home.
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Sapporo This was ultimately what I was looking forward to, the most exciting part of my trip. I’d never been to Hokkaido before, so finally having this opportunity got me excited. It was the perfect combination of my favourite two things; snow, and cities. The night we got to Sapporo, we checked out some of the ice sculptures lining the streets, and made our way to the infamous ramen alley. A whole alley full of ramen. Amazing, right? I tried some of Sapporo’s famous corn butter ramen, which was fantastic, although for some reason, despite loving corn, I wasn’t that okay with putting it in ramen. The next day we checked out the Odori park, the central hub for yuki matsuri, meaning snow festival. The snow sculptures were massive, and a lot of them were really good. Some of them were funny, such as the Donald Trump one who appeared to be yelling. This was a good example of how much Western culture and events have spread to and are prominent in Japan. In the afternoon, we went to the Sapporo Beer Museum, which to be honest, I wasn’t that excited for as a person who doesn’t drink beer. It was, however, interesting to see how Japan had made their way into a popular phenomenon that was dominated by the West. That evening, we had a massive all you can eat meal full of BBQ meats and crab, as well as all you can drink beverages. It was the last meal that we would have as a complete group, and was a great way to summarise the trip.
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Tokyo Tokyo, the capital of Japan, is what I would consider the pinnacle of modernisation. The city is so advanced that it makes Australia look old. There’s something about the hustle and bustle of the city that excites me. I feel like everyone has a purpose, and I want to be a part of that. Except catching the trains there. It can get pretty packed, and you could be touched in some uncomfortable places. The night we got there, we took off to Shibuya, the clothes shopping capital of Tokyo. Half of us divided for karaoke, which I unfortunately couldn’t do because I had just begun to lose my voice and was unable to sing. Instead, I decided to take the leftover people to find some ramen. And I my quest was complete. I had found the best ramen in Japan, at a small restaurant in Shibuya. Our first day in Tokyo was a busy one. First, we head off to Shinjuku, a large business district, home to the Tokyo Metropolitan Government building. At the top of this building was an observatory free to the public, which held far views across Tokyo. Next, we moved to Ginza, a shopping district. Here we had lunch and visited an extremely expensive department store. Some of the prices were so high you didn’t even want to touch anything. After that, we visited Asakusa to walk through the Nakamise shopping street leading up to Sensoji temple. Nakamise was probably one of the busiest streets I’d walked through in Japan. It was sprawled with small food vendors and shops filled with some traditional Japanese souvenirs. My first idea, of course, was so buy some black sesame ice cream. For some absurd reason, however, they wouldn’t let us leave the small stand until we had finished eating the ice cream, so I’d spent some time in there giving myself a brain freeze so I could continue pushing my way through the crowds of people up to Sensoji temple. This temple is distinguishable by the large red balloon hung up through the tori gate. Walking up towards the temple was a tall covered fire pit, and it’s believed that by getting the smoke in your hair, you would have good luck. People surrounded it trying to pat smoke into their hair and left whilst having a coughing fit. In the afternoon, we visited Akihabara, the pop culture and technology hub of Tokyo, and everyone’s most awaited place in this city. Most people took off to hunt for some figurines, whereas I decided I wanted some retro games. I took off to find my favourite store, Super Potato, a retro gaming paradise. The only thing I picked up however was a Gameboy colour. After that, I decided I’d head back to the hotel.
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Kyoto and Nara I previously spoke about traditional Japanese culture and history, but nothing truly compares to Kyoto, the ancient capital of Japan. Temples and shrines flooded the streets of Kyoto everywhere you turned. Geishas walked the streets in their colourful kimonos and white painted faces. While everyone else was sick, I was probably one of the few who weren’t, at least not yet. Kyoto is home to two of the most popular tourist places in Japan; Kinkakuji, also known as Golden Pavilion, and Kiyomizu dera, or pure water temple. They’re popular for a reason. These places are marvels of traditional Japanese culture. We first visited Kinkakuji, the golden pavilion. Having lightly snowed beforehand, a little bit of snow sat on top of the tiled roof of the pavilion. This is my second time having visited here, and I’m thankful I’m taller than I was before, because it’s difficult to be able to see past the crowd full of people. Moving through the area are more souvenir and food stands, which seem to be an essential here. We were even stopped by a group of students who asked us some questions about where we’re from. Unfortunately, like many other old structures in Japan, this was only a reconstructed pavilion. Despite the Japanese’s best effort to preserve their history, many castles and shrines have suffered incidents such as fires and earthquakes. Despite this, it was still very cool to see. That afternoon, we headed to Nara to see some of the Buddhist temples, and of course, deer! I was surprised at how willing they were to let you pat them, and just how many there actually were just casually wandering through the streets. The next day at Kiyomizu temple, there was a large, croweded, market filled street leading up to the temple itself, where I bought some amazing black sesame ice cream. I don’t care what you say, ice cream in winter is great. Standing under the veranda of the temple lead to a fantastic view of the nature surrounding which leads to different views through the year depending on the season. Just downstairs by the temple was the famous pure waterfall, which is believed to have wish-granting powers. Of course, there was a massive line up next to it. In the afternoon, we decided we would endeavour to find some ramen, which took a while, but we eventually found it. Ramen is my favourite food, and so being in Japan is essentially a quest for me to find the best ramen. Although this ramen was great, I unfortunately can’t say it was the best, and so the quest continues.
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Boarding the plane, I could say that I’m probably not as excited for Okinawa as everyone else is, or as much as I should be. I can’t really tell why, but I’m just not that interested in it. I’d previously researched Okinawa to learn more about the merging of Taiwanese and Japanese culture which is represented in the architectural style of the buildings and the sort of food they eat, but unfortunately it didn’t interest me as much as the rest of Japan does. That’s not to say I’m not happy about exploring new parts of Japan, because I really am. Okinawa isn’t a place I would have considered travelling to with my family or by myself, so I’m happy to have had the opportunity to do this.
3 and a half hours later, we landed in Naha, collected our luggage, and jumped on the monorail bound for Asahibashi for our stay at Toyoko Inn. The name is a fusion of the cities Tokyo and Yokohama, where the hotel chain originated from. Toyoko is a common hotel chain for business men and woman due to how affordable it is while still offering a comfortable stay. Despite this, the hotel is very accommodation to everyone, and best of all, has an all you can eat breakfast.
The next morning after waking up at a much more reasonable due to not having to rush to the bathroom (the joys of sharing a room with just one person), I headed downstairs to consume my all you can eat breakfast befitting of a Viking. The Japanese term for buffet is ‘baikin’, which is how the Japanese would say Viking. The term originated from a hotel chef who had seen a movie called ‘The Viking’, and enjoyed it so much he decided to name his new smörgåsbords style of cooking after it. The hotel chain he worked at expanded across Japan, and these baikins became more popular. Because of this, the term began to spread across Japan.
After what was actually a pretty good breakfast, we caught the monorail to Shuri Jō, which was once home to the ryukyu kings. Leaving Shuri Castle, we headed to Daichi Makishi Kōsetsu Ichiban, a fish and produce market with restaurants immediately upstairs, where we ate lunch. I ordered a beef and rice dish that I unfortunately didn’t like due to the intense amount of onion they’d poured into it. The chefs were kind enough to give us some plates of squid ink noodles which I wasn’t brace enough to try. Although those who did try it were left with a nice black smile.
Next we set off to the arcade downtown (though not before a quick kanji lesson surround some garbage bins) to go shopping and have some fantastic ice cream, only to be stopped by a strange man dressed as a goat, and a camera crew asking us to try some goat soup. After smelling the soup, I decided I wasn’t up for that, and so I left to do more shopping, and then returned to the hotel for the evening.
The next day, we left Naha and headed towards Moon Beach on a very long bus trip. About half way through, we stopped at Ryūkyū-mura, a traditional village preserving Okinawan history and culture. I had a fun time exploring the little village and for lunch had Okinawan udon and some amazingly good purple sweet potato.
We jumped back on the bus and finished the trip to Moon Beach, which is a town surrounded by, yep you guessed it, beaches! I’m not particularly a fan of beaches or tropical areas so I can’t say I believed this was going to be the highlight of the trip.
When we arrived at Onna Marine View Palace, we quickly checked in and headed upstairs to check out our rooms, which were actually cooler than I imagined. The room was huge, contained a kitchen with a functioning stove that I doubt I’d use, a seating area, two beds, and a tatami mat area with a table and two futons, which is much more than I expected.
Most of the group quickly headed off to the beach while I, being my beach disliking self, decided I’d stay behind with a few others. We decided instead of heading to the beach, we’d explore the town. Stopping at a conbini, we bought some ice cream, and then somehowc ended up at the beach with everyone else, and so sat on a chair under the shade waiting for everyone. Leaving the beach we moved onto some rocky areas which I actually had fun playing around, making me glad I came along. Although thinking back, it was with the help of the group that I enjoyed my day.
Our last full day in Okinawa, we were headed even deeper into Okinawa towards Churaumi Aquarium. I’ve gotta say, seeing the fish inside the aquarium didn’t excite me very much, but I did enjoy learning about the marine life. On the outside of the Aquarium we saw a whole lot of turtles which really excited me because I love turtles. They were just refilling the enclosure and we watched for a lot longer than was probably necessary as the turtles basked in the flow of running water.
Once we finished at the aquarium, we got into a taxi, and ours specifically got confused and took us to the wrong hotel. But with our good Japanese skill (and by ours I mean Raya’s), we managed to get back on track and somehow only just arrived with everyone else. We spent our last night in Okinawa having essentially what was a second party.
Although I’m happy to be moving onto what I think would be the more exiting parts of the trip for me, I can say that I enjoyed Okinawa more than I thought I would, especially Naha. It had such a unique vibe to it, really not feeling like Japan at all. There’s so much history here to be explored in more than a couple of days, and I may just come back to Okinawa.
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Japan and Foreigners
I’d often heard stories about some forms of racism in Japan, for example, Japanese people refusing to speak with foreigners, or Japanese-only bars and restaurants. But I’d been yet to come across any of that.
The term for foreigner in Japan is gaigokujin, meaning outside-country person. This word is often shortened to simply gaijin, which just means outsider. We’re pretty okay with this word, often calling ourselves ‘stupid gaijin’ when we do something out of place.
While I was watching television with my host mother, the news had a segment on foreigners in Japan, and I’d noticed that they only used the full form of gaigokujin. I knew that gaijin isn’t exactly a positive word, however I never felt like it was a particularly rude word, or that I should ever take offence to it. My host mother, Lilly, told me that the word gaijin was described by ‘shitsurei’, meaning rude. Because of this, they can only ever use the full version of gaigokukin on television.
The word shitsurei stuck in my mind, mostly because my host mother didn’t really know how to describe it in English. In fact, Google translate didn’t exactly give me the meaning rude. When I was walking on the street and an elder man accidentally bumped into me, he said ‘shitsurei’ rather than ‘sumimasen’, and I assumed he was calling me rude because I was a gaijin. However, after looking into it, I found that some elder Japanese men use the word shitsurei rather than sumimasen, as if to say “this current situation is an inconvenience.” It made me think about how Japanese people often have words which all generally mean the same thing, but should be used in a certain context. For example, the words gomennsasai, meaning sorry, and sumimasen, meaning excuse me, would be considered interchangeable to us. However, that is not the case in Japan, and is another think we have to consider while learning Japanese.
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Snow in Japan
Our first bit of snow we saw in Japan was in Nagano. We’d gotten to the train station, and there was a whole lot of it to the side that everyone started playing in. Since coming from Australia, a place with barely any snow, it’s understandable that everyone would get super excited. Because snow is extremely fun. But I don’t think Japanese people really agree. So far, I’ve not seen many people playing in the snow, not even kids. Could this be due to their feelings of not wanting to draw much attention to themselves? As foreigners, we don’t really care about attention being drawn to us, because we have that attention regardless of what we’re doing. Because of that, we tend to do a lot of this that Japanese people wouldn’t necessarily do in public. Comparatively, in Australia, people don’t have this sort of reserved personality, and often do what they please.
But you know who really does love playing in snow here? Snow monkeys. Surprisingly, I saw more foreigners at Jigokudani monkey park than I saw Japanese people. I’m not sure if that’s because it is just that popular of a tourist spot, or Japanese people just aren’t that fussed about it. Either way, the monkeys were great and I love them. This place was better than a zoo because they monkeys were free to roam around and pass by people, so you really got involved in the monkeys, leading for good photo opportunities. There is some small worry at the beginning, but that worry goes away rather quickly. In fact, I think the monkeys are more scared of the people than the people are scared of them.
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English in Japan
Today we headed to Aeon, a massive shopping mall, as big as the Westfield in Australia. For lunch, I headed to a very traditional Japanese restaurant called KFC, and ordered a classic chicken burger with chips. Ordering in Japanese isn’t very difficult at all, however I wasn’t really given a chance as the cashier immediately spoke in English to me. Of course it makes it significantly easier that many people across Japan speak English very well, however they seem to be presumptuous in believing that the foreigner isn’t able to speak English, though this could have been influenced by the fact that a lot of foreigners really don’t attempt to speak Japanese. This makes it disappointing for me when I’m not given the chance to practice what I’ve learnt.
I’ve noticed on a few occasions, some of the elderly people around Japan either can’t or are reluctant to speak any English, and often speak pretty full on Japanese to me. What makes it difficult is that they don’t slow down, which makes it difficult to understand with my limited Japanese skills. Comparatively, the younger people will either assume you can’t speak Japanese and speak to you in English, or be helpful in their speech by slowing down and giving me a chance to comprehend what I’ve just heard.
While Western culture and people are becoming more prevalent in Japan, Japanese people are adjusting to the presence of foreigners in Japan. This is especially evident in places such as train stations, which have an abundance of English signs and directories, making the country more easily accessible. This could also show reason as to why tourism is becoming a lot more popular in Japan.
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Religion and History in Japan
During our stay in Narita, our host and tour guide Katsumata-San took us through some shrines, temples, and even a kanji exhibition. Being able to see Japanese history and art amazing because Japan went through so many distinguishable transitional phases as emperors changed, and yet this part of their culture managed to stand strong and almost unchanged throughout time. There’s also such a large collection of temples and shrines of different religions such as Shinto and Buddhism.
We went inside Shinshoji temple, otherwise known as the Peace temple, which was home to a massive Buddha statue, Fudō-myōō, who was represented one eye wide open, and one partially small. These eyes see two different things; the large one, everything far and wide and massive in scale, and them smaller eye saw closer and more minuscule things. The statue really did loom over you as if to intimidate, creating a clear distinction between people and gods.
After the peace temple, we visited an area that had both Shinto and Buddhist shrines and temples. This is unique because both Shinto and Buddhist temples are legally not allowed to be built in the same place. However, given that these specific ones are so old, they’re given an exemption.
It’s clear to see how important religion really is in Japan. Despite the decreasing number of people who practice religion in Japan, there was still an amazing amount of people who regularly visited shrines and temples, and the they were all very well preserved, despite many being hundreds of years old.
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First Day, First Impressions - Narita
I woke up significantly earlier than usually this morning and get up much easier than I ordinarily would at the ungodly hour of 5 am. I can’t lie, I was extremely excited. Today was the day of the big 9 hour flight bound for Narita, Japan. To be honest, I was very nervous to meet everyone. I already knew two people going on the tour, but the remaining 18 I wasn’t so excited to meet. Although I thought having previously spoken to them online would have help break the ice, it apparently did not.
We landed at Narita at a painstakingly long time, and then spent what felt like the same amount of time waiting to go through customs. At this point, it still hadn’t dawned onto me that I was in Japan. I expected a certain indescribable feeling which would have confirmed that I was overseas, but I never felt it. Having been my 4th time in Japan, I didn’t really expect too much just being in the airport.
Once arriving in Narita, we met Katsumata-San just outside the station ready to take our luggage for us. I had a moment to take in the collection of being neon lights around me; a familiarity in almost any Japanese city. Strangely, I take a sort of comfort in bright city lights. After giving away all our luggage to Katsumata-San, we began our walk to the ryokan, only to stop moments later for our first kanji lesson. Here we learnt 成田山ー Narita-San.
On the first morning I woke up surprisingly comfortably after my first sleep on a futon. I’d always expected them to be uncomfortable and wondered why Japanese people would prefer to sleep on the ground rather than a western style bed. I realised a lot of effort went into making sleeping on a futon comfortable, for instance the tatami mat underneath. Sleeping on a futon is just one of the many traditions Japan still holds. In comparison, Western societies often drop many traditions as technology advances and it becomes obsolete or unnecessary. As a result, many countries appear to have a lack of tradition, which helps to make Japan stand out more. Many were still evident in this ryokan, such as the removal of shoes in the genkan area, and while it becomes difficult to make sure you’re following what seems like Japan’s abundance of rules, it’s really just a way to properly adapt and experience Japanese culture.
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