"Say Hello to Matsuzaka"
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Last Night in Tokyo
Our last night night in Tokyo the Enomoto family took us out for a fantastic sushi dinner. We can't emphasize enough how delicious it was. It was also amazingly fresh -- every twenty minutes or so the chef would take a fish out of the tank, kill it in front of the customers, and cut it into sashimi or make it into a sushi roll. Once it was made they would ring a bell and call out what it was, and the customers in the restaurant would raised their hands to try to be the first to try it. Benny especially enjoyed the ankimo, or monkfish liver sushi.
That night Harue also helped Alison try on a Kimono. Ali discovered that it is quite a long process to put on a Kimono. It involved special undergarment, two layers of robe, and about four belts tied and adjusted just so. Wearing a kimono certainly helps you have good posture, but it is difficult to take deep breaths and we are sure that eating a big meal and wearing a kimono do not go together since the belts fit quite tightly.
Nikko
After Tokyo, we headed to Nikko, a small town north of Tokyo which houses several world heritage sights. Nikko is a big tourist destination, but it was really quiet during our visit there -- probably since it was a weekday in the winter. It was a cold and wet day, but we still managed to walk all around and see many shrines and temples, including this beautiful bell. The temples and shrines are all set along the mountainside and within a forest so it was very peaceful and beautiful surroundings.
Nagano-ken
March 6th
From Nikko we went to Okaya, a small city in the region of Nagano-ken, where we stayed with Mary, a friend of Ali's aunt Marilyn from upstate New York. Mary has lived in Japan for about 30 years. Staying at her place in Okaya, Nagano-ken (the region of Japan famous for its mountains, and for hosting the 1998 Winter Olympics) provided us with a wonderful base to see some spectacular sights.
The ride to Okaya took us through gorgeous snow capped mountains and away from the warmer weather of Tokyo. Nagano-ken, since it is in the what are known as the Japanese Alps, is much cooler, around 6 degrees Celsius in the day and below zero Celsius at night. Okaya, Mary explained, is called the bellybutton of Japan and is in the middle of Nagano-ken on the edge of a large lake.
During our first day in Okaya Mary took us to see one of the local temples. There are four temples in town, and the temple we saw was called the Fall (as in the season) Temple. Mary told us about a local festival held every six years where men ride rolling logs down a hillside. She said that several people had been crushed by the logs which are basically whole trees!
Mary also took us to her family's cemetery, and we learned about some of the associated traditions. People in Japan are cremated, and while some ashes can be found in the cemetery people do not necessarily put ashes there. Rather there are stones with family names on them (sort of resembling gravestones in the US), and then on a family's 'plot' you will also see several large rocks. Mary told us that when someone dies a rock is placed on the 'plot,' where it will remain for 33 years (after that point the rock is removed). When visitors come to the cemetery they will fill a bucket with water and wash the stone with their family name on it. Upon leaving the cemetery visitors are supposed to wash their hands.
We also learned that within most Japanese homes people have small shrines dedicated to their ancestors. In the one in Mary's home they have a book which has all the names of people who have died in their family from the last 1000+ years. The names are listed on the date that they died and each day Mary will turn a page in the book to show the names of the ancestors who died on that day. Mary also explained that the names in the book are not the names given at birth to those who had passed away. When a person died, she told us, the Shinto priest will give that person a new name which will have one letter in common with the birth-name. Each morning the tradition is to place a fresh glass of water on the shrine, burn incense, ring a bell, and say a little thank-you or prayer to the ancestors. It is also common to place fresh flowers at the shrines, and to place food when eating meals.
March 7th
Our second day in Okaya we visited the home of a friend of Mary's named Matsuko where we had lunch with an English conversation group (Matsuko, Hiromi, and Eriko) that Mary has worked with and become friends with over the years. Matsuko first served us some beautiful and delicious Japanese sweets. They came from a sweet shop that was over 100 years old, and each sweet was symbolic of a flower or poem. Next we made sushi together. Matsuko, Hiromi, and Eriko showed us how to spread the rice properly on the seaweed, where to place the fillings, and how to roll the sushi using a special mat. We did well, except for our rolling was not quite as effortless as the rest in the group. Along with our sushi, Matsuko served a plate of several small edible delicacies -- shumai, a single cherry tomato, a slice of sweetened egg, and two sweet beans which were about an inch and a half in length.
On the way home from lunch we drove around the large lake and took a trip to the grocery store. Seeing grocery stores in other countries is truly one of the best ways to see some of the cultural or at least culinary differences. We saw snacks of dried scallops, a huge variety of mushrooms, all different sizes of squid, many types of dried fish, and several vegetables that we haven't seen before.
March 8th
We took the train to Nagano city, about a two hour ride from Okaya. We wandered around shops and visited the huge temple called Zenko-ji. Zenko-ji was founded in the 7th century and supposedly houses the first Buddhist image in Japan. You can't actually see the image, but the temple complex is still very impressive and beautiful. In one smaller temple we saw 3 monks performing a service which included chanting, drumming, ringing a bell, burning incense, and lighting a small fire. Right outside the temple complex, we passed a shop where they were hand making some fresh soba (buckwheat) noodles, and we were able to get a good video of this -- it is really quite impressive:
After visiting the temple we went to the M-Wave -- the large speed skating rink from the 1998 Winter Olympics. It was a little bit sad to see how quiet the large arena was, and how little it is used. It housed the Olympic museum and we seemed to be the only visitors. We watched a 3-D movie about the games and then walked around the small museum, the highlight of which was a bobsled simulator (a real bobsled placed in front of a video screen that showed a bobsled course from the athlete's point of view). On the way back to to Okaya at the Nagano train station we managed to get some -- uh, great -- footage of Japanese teenagers break dancing:
March 9th
Today we went with Mary to a really lovely town called Matsumoto. We began our day at another fantastic restaurant called Kura where Benny and Mary ate basashi, or raw horse meat (they say it is great). Benny & Mary basically discovered that they are culinary soul mates, enjoying such delicacies as fish cheeks, chicken hearts, and turkey necks. We also had sushi and great tempura.
Then we visited the Matsumoto-Jo castle. Built in 1595 it is one of the oldest castles in Japan that is still standing. Since they are made from wood, many of the other castles in the country have burned down. From outside Matsumoto-Jo appears to be 5 floors, though it actually has 6 floors. One floor has no windows, so it is invisible from the outside. This 'hidden' floor housed samurais who would be on call to fight in an attack.
Outside the castle is a moat where huge carp live. The carp surface to greedily eat bread crumbs fed to them by visitors. A few local Japanese men gave us bread to feed the fish and asked us where we were from. When we told them the US, they told us (in Japanese -- Mary translated) to "Say hello to Matsuzaka" (for those of you who are, sadly, not baseball fans, Daisuke Matsuzaka is the Red Sox newest addition, a 26 year-old pitcher who is considered the best Japanese pitcher).
After the castle we went to a small folklore museum which had small exhibits from the area's history, including traditional dolls, large wooden phalluses (somehow used in a local festival, the details of which are pretty foggy to us), and examples of toys and technology through the years (like crock pots, telephones, and calculators).
We will be sad to say good-bye to Mary tomorrow. It has been a lot of fun to stay with her, and we will miss her awesome home cooked Japanese meals. Thank you for everything Mary. But we are looking forward to our next destination -- Kyoto. Sayonara for now.
