Going Down the Country (Pt.1: Kumano)

I'm down in Kii Katsuura, a town having far too many vowels. I'm on a boat going across a bay ringed by islands resembling karst. Beyond these, is the village of Taiji, being for one, the pinyin romanization for the Chinese concept of Grand Ultimate, referred to by us yogis in the sound of "Om." In this country, however, Taiji is know as the place where whales are brought to die. I look away, toward the north. Dark clouds loom ominously above the high peaks that I'll attempt to go over the next day.

I'd been in town for less than a half hour. After dropping my bags, I wandered a little, trying to get the bearings of the place. To call this town sleepy is an exaggeration. It's only 4 pm, but nothing was moving. It had been a relatively fine day for this season, but the weather is growing bolder, making it seem later than it is. Through my headphones, John Prine tells me that "the night comes early on rainy days." So, I got on this boat.

I'm headed to Urashima Onsen, a name that lends itself to the sleepy atmosphere. In the legend, a fisherman named Urashima Taro goes to a kingdom at the bottom of the seas for what appears to be a few days, but turns out to have been 300 years. Hot Springs do have a way of making time seem slower. The hotel lobby itself seems dated, glittery and brashy like in a 60's Bond film. Beyond is a series of rocky passageways and steaming hot pools reeking of sulphur. It's all made more surreal by everyone wandering around in long robes. I find a pool in a cave which overlooks the sea. It's getting on dinnertime so I have the place to myself, except for a few crabs and those weird armored bugs climbing the wall over my shoulder. The sea crashes a few meters below me. There's a fence now, but I doubt it's been there long. Some drunken folks acting like children have led to means which treat us all likewise. Bath over, I wander the long corridors of maroon carpet. There are quite a few Chinese here, many greeting me with smiles which I at first think is shared camaraderie at being an "honorable guest," until I look down to notice I'm wearing my Bruce Lee t shirt. My face suddenly goes redder than those of the drunks going off to their next bath.

The boat brings me back to town. It's full dark now, and I'm looking over the view from the garden of a small temple. Though there's not much here, I'm bemoaning my late start today. Being a creature of habit, I frittered away the morning reading blogs, when I could've instead spent the afternoon walking the low hills ringing the bay. Growing hungry, I walk out the temple gate, passing a sign which tells how a 14 meter tsunami sent water up to this height. Down at the level of the sea itself, I look for a place for dinner. Prine's voice on my iPod really fits the scene, both with his lonely man on the road vibe, and the whole stranger in town thing, my form drawing looks with every passing step. I look at the menus outside the few shops open on a weeknight, bristling every time I misread ikura (salmon roe) as iruka (dolphin). One spot looks especially friendly, and I duck inside. The place is warm and friendly, the owner's wife flirtatious to a point just short of bawdy. She gives me a couple complimentary mackerel that she'd caught herself. And the maguro sashimi is so fresh it's like butter.

The TV in the room below mine wakes me at 6. With time to kill before the first bus, fuelled on sugary bread and canned coffee, I make my way over to the fish market. The fishermen are already back with the days catch, literally hundreds of tuna now lying on the warehouse floor in various stages of decapitation. The men with hoses wash the red back into the sea. Not long after, I leave the bay behind and head up into the hills.

This is my fifth trip to the Kumano area. After I learned that the region was going to get UNESCO's special status, I began to walk the parts that weren't protected, figuring that the World Heritage area would remain unchanged, but the surroundings would get ruined by the new hotels, restaurants, and roads made friendly to tourist buses. Cannon fodder for the Construction industry. It didn't take long to see my predictions had come true. In the three years since I'd last come here, they'd built a new highway and a whole section of forest had been converted to a parking lot. Most bizarre was a new handicapped toilet, complete with a ramp built midway up a set of ancient stone steps. (Here was Japanese political kata in action, obeying the letter of the law yet all but neutering the spirit.) I walk these steps to the temple at the top. There are are surprising number of tourists at this early hour, Koreans lingering in front of the unopened souvenir stands, Chinese taking photos with Buddhas. I find the old trail at the back of the complex and begin my walk up the Ogumotorigoe, (romanized menacingly as "Big Cloud-Catcher Pass").

The Kumano Kodo here is a stone trail with the earth pushing through. The rocks are slick with lichen, due to all the moisture trapped below the high sugi. I reckon I'm the first to have walked it in a few days, due to the spiderwebs I keep breaking with my chest. It's a beautiful day, the trail dappled with sunshine. I frequently see snakes warming themselves in these spots, looking for the same feeling I got from last night's baths. It's a nice trail, with markers every half kilometer. These markers are small and made of stone, nicely unobtrusive against the bushes and trees. (Many trail markers have the subtlety of vending machines.) Heading for the first pass, I scare up some quail. At the top, I reward myself with some rice balls and the view . Dropping down the other side, I'm startled by the yelp of a young fox. This descent is spooky, a place notorious as the haunt of the spirits of deceased pilgrims, whose souls are looking for new bodies to inhabit. The valley at the bottom is beautiful yet forlorn. In front of one large tree is a makeshift shrine, with a small sword lying across the stones and moss. It seems to have been there for centuries. Rushing streams overflow onto the trail at many places and the finding footing is a challenge. Atop the next ridge I find a road which follows the trail, both leading down to a small shrine and hut. I climb out onto a large stone in the river, soaking my feet as I eat lunch. The final ascent is quick, and there are many man made signs at the pass, pride in achieving the tough climb from the other side. I'm simply descending, but before long I find this the hardest part of the day; literally a long, slippery 2 hour, 4 km drop to the next valley. Climbing this must be like the Stairmaster from Hell. Ruins of old teashops and stone walls tell me I'm coming close to Oguchi. Near the 500 meter mark, I begin to relax and a minute later I fall on my ass. Not quite there, buddy.

Finally at the bottom, I grab a canned coffee and chat awhile with the manager of the camping hut here. Three years ago I camped in the grass out front after having come over the Kogumotorigoe (Small Cloud-Catcher). That day, a night-long conversation with my left hip scuttled any thoughts of going over the hills I have now just came over. Making that first ascent on that hip with a full pack would've been seriously grievous.

I walk upsteam, out of sight of any houses. Stripping down, I join the cold river, washing the day off my body. Later, it takes me 2 buses and a train to get back to where I started. The sea looks inviting, so I swim awhile. Then I walk in the shadows of abandoned, crumbling hotels until I find a good place for dinner. It's a Chinese joint, and they're quite creative with the local catch. I have maguro spring rolls, maguro gyoza, maguro with chili sauce. I've loaded myself with enough mercury to fill a thermometer. The oolong ice cream helps ease my pain...

On the turntable: John Coltrane, Meditations"

On the nighttable: Jan Morris, "Pleasures of a Tangled Life"

On the reel table: "Two Days in Paris," (Delpy, 2007)

Going Up the Country

Late May saw Miki's birthday, and my present to her was a weekend away. She chose the Tango Peninsula, a beautiful area of gorgeous ocean, high mountains, and a feeling that is very very old. We spent a few days driving around, walking the beaches, checking out tombs and shrines named for myths, and eating way too much seafood.

Taiza is a small village squeezed between large rock formations that are carved into bizarre shapes by waves whipped huge by frequent storms. Men fish in the shadows of shrines built into rock overhanging the sea. The gods within are the deified ancestors lost further out on these same waters. The shrines are weathered both by the salt air and their extreme age. The sheer number of these sacred places attests to the local folk trying to make sense of extreme natural phenomena brought by harsh weather. Primitive science as formulated by religious ritual. And the men--presumably men--who held these ceremonies are buried in the hilly tombs further inland.

Further south still the high mountains begin. Among them is Oe yama. Besides its fine views of Amanohasidate, it is well know as a source for various Oni myths. Trails lead through high scrub to bizarre rock formations that were once these demons' fortresses, but are probably now the lair of bears, who move through this dense cover, out of sight just off trail.

The human realm lies closer to the sea. Ine is a small, one lane village stretching between the hills and the waters of the enclosed bay. An island at the bay's narrow mouth protects the village from the storms, and as such it is considered sacred, the grounds off limits to all but a few fishermen. The catch here must be plentiful, for the houses here are all large and sprawling. Swallows flit above the front doors, bringing food to their newly hatched young. Across the road from the houses are small structures like garages, with large openings facing the sea, to take in the fishing boats when typhoons come. On the second floor are small, simple rooms, where the younger generations sleeps when they return home from the new lives in the cities.

Like a koi that takes on the size proportional to the body of water containing it, the bigger communities lie where the mountains stop. In Miyazu, there is an old church, built of wood and tile, a perfect hybrid of Japanese and European architectural styles. Inside there is tatami rather than pews. Miki says that she wants to use the toilet before we go, and begins to step inside a confessional. The twain still haven't met.

Where religion goes, commerce follows, and the moneyed class now fill the old sabbath days with leisure. Kotobiki Beach is packed with surfers. Around the cove is a small beach, where weekend warriors up from Osaka carve the waters with their jet skis. One of these drivers sits astride one of the bigger machines, his belly resting heavily on the seat. A small child of four or five sits behind him. The man, either through drink or inexperience or simple stupidity seems unable to handle this machine. He tries to pass through the surf break diagonally, and one large wave tips him and the boy and the machine sideways and over. The boy, without a grotesque belly of his own, is able to keep afloat with his life vest, through just barely. He's struggling, eyes huge with fear. But his elder, his protector, swims to the overturned jet ski rather than to him. The boy's mom shrieks at the man from the beach. I nearly join her.

This lack of perspective, the loss of priorities is apparent all across the countryside here. Unlike the koi, money grew to a point of overflowing during the Bubble years. When the money receded, it had washed away the things held dear for generations. Left behind is the detritus: abandoned Swiss Villages, decaying karaoke and pachinko joints, rusting ski lifts, massive empty parking lots. Like in the Arthurian legends, the sickness of the King brings ruin to the land.

Slowly, life is beginning to return. There's a large number of people who have grow hollow in the cities, and are looking to return to a life of meaning. This is not only the retirees seeking out their simpler roots, but young couples look for sustainability. The King is dead. Long live the King.

On the turntable: Sonny Clark, "Cool Struttin'"

On the nighttable: Herbert Ashbury, "The Gangs of New York"

Fed up

Food acting as catalyst for a search for better balance.  Party season is revving up, meaning far too many heavy rich meals.  My usual delight in such delicacies has been replaced by the feeling that my usual rhythm has sped up to the point that I can no longer dance.  New patterns in eating mean new patterns in energy,  resulting in lost sleep and daytime lethargy.  This all culminated in a night dining with the Swiss Consul.  It was an unbelievable meal: a series of courses building up to the butter-like texture of Kobe beef, washed down by a escalation of wines, each one more expensive and exquisite than the last, and poured into a far larger glass each time.  To refuse anything led to some playful gastronomical bullying.  This meal was accompanied by talk of Eastern culture and Western art.  The topic would frequently turn to music, then our host would jump up and play said musician on his stereo.   Roger, who was responsible to our being here, was quite astute in his observation that the Counsel was like a 19th Century patron of the arts.  His contribution to art and culture was massive and done with a deft signing of his checkbook.  The night was rich in many ways, but as it went on, I got a sense that I was going under. The waves just wouldn't stop coming.

It took not a little effort to extract ourselves, and when we finally did, we'd missed our train.   This turned out to be lucky, since a half hour later, some poor disenfrancised soul would use its progress to end his life.  As it was, we sat idle in the train behind it, langoring in Shin Osaka for 2 hours.  I looked out the window and fumed, furious at the sight of an ineffectual platform barrier that prevented nothing.  Rather than apply this costly bandaid, it seems far better to use those allocated funds to seek out the social reasons why this seems to happen week after week.    The sight of four (four!) heavily armed cops patrolling a quiet 1 am Kyoto Station further set me off, though not as much as those three JR workers tying up the taxi queue by attending to a handful of folks who'd missed their bus, delaying the far larger majority of us who just wanted to end an already long night.  I raged in the taxi about an inept society as the skies tore open above us.  My own torrent outdone, I quietly biked with an equally sodden Miki, talking about how a rich social life can be uplifting, but such uplift has a way of pulling one away from roots.  While I'm happy to have reclaimed some free time after quitting my course, I've not yet driven deeply the peg to which my current phase of life will be anchored.  Even the lightest of winds has a way of blowing me this way and that.   

On the turntable:  Mingus Big Band, "Gunslinging Bird"

On the reel table:  "8 1/2 Women" (Greenaway, 1999)

Two things learned in June...

Never bring a 1500 yen bottle of wine to a diplomat's dinner invite.

One yen coins stick to your fingers during rainy season.

On the turntable: Diana Krall, "All for You"

On the nighttable: Jay Rubin, et al.,   "A Wild Haruki Chase"

Yama bushed

Ascending the stairs,

Still carrying Omine-san,

In my weary legs.

On the turntable: Wayne Shorter, "Native Dancer"

On the nighttable: David Liss, "The Coffee Trader"

On the reel table: "The Balled of Narayama" (Imamura, 1983)

Thru the Ages...

I step out onto the street and head in the direction of Miki, who's waiting with her chai at Starbucks. Iggy's on the ipod, and the music triggers a lengthening in my groins muscles, the usual preparation to strut. However this day on Karasuma, I'm blocked by a wall of uniformed adolescents, dilly-dallying, だらだら-ing in my way. Doin' the schoolkid shuffle. Miki believes this is due to weak abs. You can see it on the trains in the slouch and the curved backs, as if their bodies were designed by Dali. (Dilly-Dali?)

Miki and I had thought about taking a train down to Kyoto Station, but it doesn't look too far. In today's post-rain light, it looks to be hovering over the end of the boulevard like the Mothership . Once there, we find the building's subterranean arcades packed with the next demographic, marriage-able girls bucking the system with their other unmarried friends, looking for a lunchtime table under which to let down their heavy shopping bags.

South of the station, we jump a generation, finding the old-timers watching the world pass-by, through the dual fogs of memory and a liquid-humid afternoon. They're in the parks around the ruins of Rajomon and Saiji, their rigid figures sitting near rigid stele which mark time in their own ways. A large cluster of the elderly can be found at a gateball tourney just north of the tracks where Bullet Trains fly past with no time for ruminations.

A generation down, the middle-agers are at the other end of Umekoji Park, gathered for a Bike Rally. They drink beer from plastic cups while walking around the hundreds of bikes proudly lined up for inspection by these enthusiasts. These aren't Harleys, or even bemirrored Vespas (which would allow my own participation). No, these men are Honda SuperCub enthusiasts, eyeballing the svelte bodies of these mini machines and taking notes on little pads. Each Cub has a numbered tag like a bizarre sort of beauty contest. I wonder how many of these guys are postmen in the real world.

We move north, following a map from the Heian period, seeking out more stele that demark where the ancient regal chosen few slept and had their cups, with little apparent concern beyond the current phase of moon and turn of phrase best used to capture it. On any given day, we probably pass a dozen of these markers, but today we stop and fill up on history. At the northern apex of our route, we find the Heian Period Museum. Its presence seems to be a conciliatory gesture to angered locals, since the office building which houses it is built on palace ruins. Inside is an impressively massive model of the city, around whose perimeter we walk, looking for familiar spots. And, as I'm sure everyone else does, we look for where our house now stands. I'm especially impressed by the display of earthen strata from a nearby dig. Working our way down from our modern detritus, we pass through historical periods marked by soil of different shades, coming finally to a point before man's footprints began to leave impressions, and such measures of time didn't exist anyway. On the wall nearby are a few scroll paintings, showing time not marked but time wiled away. While I've often seen paintings of the cushy Floating World, today I find my first representation of the lives of the people outside Heian's walls, whose taxes made it all possible. Back on the streets, we continue our meander amongst their descendants...

On the turntable: Count Basie, "Atomic Swing"

On the nighttable: David Geraghty, "A Snake in the Shrine"

On the reel table: "Uwasa no Onna" (Mizoguchi, 1954)

Cows Coming Home to Roost

My martial arts training predates my yoga practice. In fact, I started the latter because I found that Japanese budo training doesn't have much in the way of warm-ups. (The strong emphasis on stretching in US dojos I figure to be more about liability than flexibility.) After I began teaching yoga 4 years ago, I found myself growing worried about injury. My budo training has thereafter suffered, being too afraid to really put myself out there. This anxiety about injury has become self-perpetuating. A couple years ago, I began to feel a twinge in my right elbow, ironically caused by yoga, albeit in the Extreme Sport Style of Ashtanga, as taught in Japan, usually by former fitness instructors who get their "license" after a mere 2 week course, with their knowledge of the body seeming to go no further than "heads, shoulders, knees, and toes." (Knees and toes.) The elbow had been fine awhile, but around Golden Week I began to feel the twinge again. So I gave myself a couple weeks off before going back up to Takeuchi. And of course, I badly injured it on the very first technique, within minutes of arriving at the dojo. Then I wisely continued to train for 2 more hours, feeling the hyper-extension getting more and more hyperer. The next day, I felt like lead weights were hanging off my arm, with a decrease in mobility of about 20%. Well done. This further feeds the fear. I love budo, and my move to the Kyo was initiated by the chance to train here. But the nagging voice in my head has grown more confident. Can I train in a way that avoids injury and still allows me to teach? Or are the two mutually exclusive? As my odometer rolls toward my 41st birthday, my doubt grows.

I did teach this week, but badly. Murphy with his damned Law brought many beginners around this week, so I was forced to demo some pretty flaccid poses. I need to keep healthy. I have begun to teach more around town, and am bringing a couple big guns to Kansai for workshops. Plus Shugendo training season is coming soon. I give myself 6 weeks off from Takeuchi, though I'll try to at least watch practice, keep my feet wet...

Bizarrely, in the days following the injury, mukade began to show up in the house again. (For any yoga students reading this: Remember, this blog is my writing practice, and that last sentence was pure fiction. So please, enjoy that savasana.) One was trying to blend with the sofa, Ninja-style. I didn't want to kill him, so I rigged a mukade catcher (co-designed by W.E. Coyote and the Acme Corporation) consisting of Tupperware, a newspaper, and a tea tray, then I introduced him to our neighbor's yard. The next day, another Ninja had shown great dedication by getting itself boiled alive in our bath. Within moments of this event, fate made me read that centipedes are messengers of Bishamon, the Japanese name for the god of warfare. Wondering if this was some portent regarding my elbow and training conundrum, a few days later we hiked out to the Bishamon Temple in Yamashina to see what he wanted. But the god was strangely silent. He did introduce us to a small figure in an adjacent shrine, that of a Fudo stature wrapped by a great white serpent. In many traditions, including Christian, snakes represent knowledge. (Cue Eve, Tree of Knowledge, apples, etc.) Fudo represents Immovability, Strong Intent. Fudo is the Japanese name for Acala, another Hindu figure, closely related to my Yoga name, "Tejas", meaning spiritual fire and intensity. A CLUE!. I have been quite heady lately, more into books and this Mac than much else. Has my quest for wisdom and ideas begun to constrict my body, snuffing out my desire to train and improve in both yoga and budo? Hmmm.

Walking back along the canal that runs between Biwa and the Nanzenji aqueduct, we see another snake on the high curved concrete embankment. We can't tell whether it was live or dead, but this snake doesn't seem appetizing to the kites above or to the feral cats who haunt these parts in great numbers. OK, I get it Mon. Knowledge is only so palatable to the cats who are more about instinct, or the kites who live by reflex and concentration. Feed the body. Feed the body.

But it still doesn't sink it fully. We leave the canal and climb up toward the crest of Higashiyama, to that place where 6 trails intersect like spokes on the Wheel of Dharma. I try to let memory lead me to the hilltop home where PsychoSanta now lives. It's been 6 months since we put him there. But my head fails me. I give over to the feet, which take us along deer trails and down a fun and hilarious descent to Oku-no-In. But the head's not down yet. It wants to go up to the Amaterasu's cave behind Himukai Jinja. Feet defiantly follows a narrow path between the aerials of new ferns and too a small cemetery, whose grumpy keeper we had the misfortune to meet a week before. We hop the fence and as we cross the unkept grounds, I wait for his voice to call out, "Chopper, sick balls!" The "Stand by Me" reference lingers as we walk the rails down toward Keage.

Body trumps head. Head tries to raise by writing this post. A lovely rain falls outside, lulling ears and eyes toward sleep. Head folds. Body rakes in the winnings...

On the turntable: Duke Ellington, "Centennial Edition"

On the nighttable: John Updike, "Your Lover Just Called"

On the reel table: "Songcatcher" (Maggie Greenwald, 2000)

Wishes. Horses.

If this were a humane world, China would cancel the Olympics and use the money to help its people.

If...

On the turntable:  ...silence...

On Gold Rails (pt 2)

Satisfied, we headed deeper still, to Miyama and the primeval forests of Ashiu. This area has been leased by Kyoto University since 1921, their forestry students living and studying up here. Another old unused small gauge rail line follows the Yura River deeper in deeper into the wild.

It took us a while getting up here. We'd boarded a bus from Demachi, packed with first year university students standing and yammering their way toward a party at some pork-barrel mountain lodge resort. Miki chatted with a 90-something man who was going mountain herb hunting despite his children's protests. My own neighbor was an old woman who was elated in her grandchild winning a Judo medal, now certain to represent the nation at this summer's Olympics. She narrated our passage through the northern part of the city, superimposing upon the modern blight a mental map of memory drawn more than half a century before. As her stories subsided, so did our forward motion. Somewhere in the curves above Kurama, a car had gone off the road, and own bus was too wide to get by. So we all got to unfold ourselves from our neighbors and pace the roadside awhile. Miki and I sat beside the streambank and laughed about how with the delays and overcrowding, this trip felt more like an Asian voyage than a Japanese one. After an hour we started again, the bus getting lighter and lighter the further north we went. For the last hour or so I daydreamed that I heard "Greensleeves" played over and over again.

The bus went no further than Hirokawara, so we grabbed our packs and set off up the road. It was a long slog up a narrow switchback road, us sweaty and weary on the hot asphalt. We had a couple more clicks to the trailhead, but got lucky in hitching a ride with a young business-type who'd left Nagoya that morning with hopes of getting to the sea by nightfall. Happy to finally get on the trail, we walked along the ridge, the steady increase in height bringing more mountains into sight. The trail then cut down a hillside so steep that it was tough to keep a steady footing. Halfway down, one of my (Platypus) water bags decided it could take no more, and hurled itself into the gravity. I stood slack-jawed as I watch a quarter of our water supply somersault down toward a stream far below, giving off a catherine wheel of water every time it came into contact with the forest floor. More impressive was how it came to rest nearly on the trail again. (Well, they do say that water always takes the quickest way down.) We eventually made it to the stream which we then followed toward the river beyond. Winter had been brutal here. This narrow valley was littered with boulders and trees, making it now impossible to find the trail. Half of the trail markers were on fallen trees, and so many others were marked with tape that the forest looked like a zebra. We followed a narrow path which climbed again. Hairy in parts, it finally got us to the river and a grove of cedars. We needed no more incentive to camp; we'd only been going a few hours but the descent left us spent. We sat on a narrow patch of earth where the stream met the Yura, watching the sun drop behind the ridge and the forest slowly lose its shape.

I hadn't slept too well. This area was infamous for both vipers and bears. I could swear I heard the sound of the stream change, as if something momentarily blocked its path. Miki made tea and I cut bread. The soft morning light played off the river in front of us. We stayed until it was time to leave. We followed the rail line proper now, keeping a pretty consistent height above the river. Where the streams ran down to join the river brought hazards in the form of bridges in various states of disintegration. I usually find great joy in the fact that nature always trumps the things made by man. But myself being man made, I found this less than heartening today, as the bridges swayed beneath every step. A couple had been lost entirely. After an mere hour's walk, we came to one that I just couldn't go over. The older(!) bridge crumbled into space, but portions had been lashed to a couple of logs that were crossed by wooden footholds, the whole thing tied to the crumbly rock cliff by wires. This newer bridge had once had six support beams, but five of them were visible on the rocks 15 meters below. The sole remaining beam was listing into the void. A sign had warned that the crossing was impossible, but we tried anyway. Miki went a few steps out and came back. I went maybe two, then panic overtook me. Even without backpacks, I couldn't do it. Leaving our packs on the trail, we went down to the river, trying to find another way across, but were afraid of getting off trail too much, especially in an area as wild as this. There was simply no way to get those packs across. Back up on the trail we sat deliberating for a long time. Just as we decided that it was humanly impossible to proceed, a man in his 50s came up. We told him the situation, and he agreed that the bridge's condition was worse than when he'd come a few years ago. We watched him crawl partway out on all fours, then come back. He said that yeah, with our packs he wouldn't do it, then he turned and literally strode across, impervious to the wobbling below his boots.

Dejected, we walked back toward Ashiu. I wish we'd never met that guy, and could be safe in our illusion that no one would have made it over. I had been concerned with bears or snakes, but what had really done me in was my own fear. Sure, our decision to give up was prudent, but this was the first time I'd given up on something because I was afraid. My taste of my pride as it slid down my throat was bitter.

From Ashiu it was easy to hitch a ride out. We took a series of rides south, occasionally getting out to walk through the countryside sunshine awhile. We had the our lunch in the shade of a small shrine on a hill beside the road. From far off, I again heard the ghost music playing "Greensleeves." Miki told me that out here, the buses played music loudly so that people could come out and flag a ride. The bus we'd ridden the day before had indeed had music. All along I'd thought it was somebody's cellphone, ringing and ringing and ringing...

Our last ride was with an ancient couple with poor hearing. Miki complemented the driver on his keen ability to negotiate the winding road, as he sped far too fast through turns. What Miki took for confidence, I saw as fear, a mad dash toward the safety of straight roads. And she continued to praise this old guy, who was totally oblivious to his hubcap flying off into the valley below during one turn, or of flattening an immense snake on the next. Safe in Kurama then, where the train took us away from snakes and bears and bridges, and toward Italian meals and films and clean sheets.

On the turntable: Count Basie, "Plays the Blues"

On the nighttable: Xi Xi, "A Girl Like Me"

On the reel table: "Fast Food Nation" (Linklater, 2006)

On Gold Rails (pt 1)

Flowers of white were beginning to climb the trellis, emitting the scent of jasmine which has since overtaken all the rooms in the house. The hills ringing the valley were alive with color. Spring had settled in, and it was time to hit the deep mountains.

But first, a test run. It was a Tuesday, recently politicized as Showa Day, but will forever be Green Day to me. Into the green of the day we went, walking an old train line along and through the hills above Takarazuka. The rails led us along a river dense with picnickers, setting their tarps and tents on the uncomfortable stones of both banks. (A bank holiday?) The middle reaches of the river here grew wild, white taffy pulled between the huge boulders still hanging on despite inevitability. We'd passed through a couple of tunnels, but along this stretch they'd grown longer, taking up to 10 minutes to reach the arch of sunlight at the far end. We'd brought a torch to keep our feet from tangling in any obstructions on the uneven floors, but I spent a good part of the time training the beam on the smooth stone walls, looking for the tiny bats that I'd heard slumber here. Quite often we'd kill the light and stand still and breathe, engulfed by the dark and the silence and the lack of any sensory cues but the cool damp air. The other people we'd pass didn't seem so comfortable with this loss of bearings, chatting nervously until their giggles were lost in the dark behind us. And we'd too move along, passing from the black to the grey and through all the spectral colors finally settling on green, with the sound of our footfalls beginning to grow in pitch until lost to the roar of the rapids below.

On the turntable: Dizzy Gillespie, "To Bird with Love"

On the nighttable: Brian Daizen Victoria, "Zen at War"

On the reel table: "Cafe Lumiere" (Hsiao-hsien Hou, 2003)

In the Sky with Diamonds

Albert Hofmann, father of the mind-altering drug LSD, has died at age 102.  His last words were reportedly, "Like wow, man!"  

On the turntable:  "The Silk Road: A Musical Caravan"

On the nighttable:  Stephen Barbar, "The Vanishing Map"

On the reel table:  "A Hen in the Wind"  (Ozu, 1948)

Rough Gods

On Kojin bridge,

the scent of rape blossoms,

nearly knocks me off my bike.

On the turntable: "KCRW: Sounds Eclectic Too"

On the reel table: "Sanjuro" (Kurosawa, 1962)

Sign of the Times

This week, The Japan Times changed its look.  The new layout and font makes it look more like...

... a webpage.   

Is this a psychological attempt at drawing those readers who get most of their news online?  Once again, technology trumps tradition.  

Sad.

On the turntable:  Richard Thompson,  "Grizzly Man"

On the reel table:  "Yojimbo"  (Kurosawa, 1961)

Setting a pic: "Flying Sempai"

Winter into Spring

I was in a hotel, around where Gion meets the hills of Kiyomizu. The hotel was a week away from opening, and its long sprawling carpets had seen little contact with human feet. It was a bit odd to be here, in a building complete but for the people it was built for. The owner of the place was a former sommelier from France, Japan born, but now morphed into something unique due to decades away. I listened to him speak of his time abroad, of the organic vineyard he owned, and how each region has its own distinct flavor, and a sip of your own homegrown can be like tasting the soil from which you have sprung. And despite the rapt attention with which we all held him, and despite my own fascination with his words, soft and nearly inaudible due to the fountain in the corner, I could feel the anger welling within me. I kept asking myself why I had been brought here, why was I not up at the dojo, or home with a film. And the anger bubbled up more, cut only by a slight smile at the thought of being a character in "The Shining," sitting at the bar in a big empty hotel, on the brink of losing my shit.

Flashback a week. Miki and I are settled in on the sofa with an Ozu film. His movies usually work on me like a hot bath, melting into the still camerawork, the slow edits, miles away from the frenetic cutting I was raised with, being of the MTV generation. Yet tonight, I found myself fidgeting, my ass unable to find the right connection with sofa, my hands busy looking for something to do.

I then realize how high my stress levels have been, how absolutely at sea I've been due to the demands of my coursework. An afternoon at my drums, for the first time since last summer, brought my full concentration to something else, something non-heady. 'Drifting too far from the shore.' For some reason that line from the old spiritual had been in my head during midterm in Vermont, and now today, it seems prophetic. I'm done. I've gotten a lot out of my course, but to carry on this last month or so, merely to get a license in something I don't really plan to use, feels superfluous. Purely ego driven. And once the decision is made, the air seems a little bluer, my breathing more free...

On the turntable: The Lemonheads, "It's a Shame about Ray"

On the nighttable: Michael Zeilenziger, "Shutting out the Sun"

On the reel table: "Flavor of Green Tea over Rice" (Ozu, 1952)

Legalize It

Japanese woman and American guy walk into the Ward Office...

...and walk out married.

The things we get up to on our Tuesdays...

On the turntable:  XTC, "Skylarking"

Sunday papers: Guttersnipe Das

‘Convenient’ is the cousin of ‘automatic’ and requires almost as little attention. This (Tokyo) is a terribly convenient city: we live with no attention at all. The most fashionable and coveted possessions, cell phone and iPod, are tools for ignoring one’s surroundings. Why not make a new ad campaign: Anywhere but here!

On the turntable: "Love and Rockets, "Seventh Dream of Teenage Heaven"

On the reel table: "Clerks II" (Smith, 2006)

Forgotten Fragments from February...

...Last seen around Groundhog's Day. Their long shadows gave them away.

Seen from Chubu plains,

Southern Alps tempt me

With their white cauls

...into the embrace of a sudden snowstorm,

somewhere to the north of Kumano's wild peaks...

Someone more clever than I once said that living in Japan is like creative camping. This fact became even more real to me when I bought a hibachi as a way to beat the high cost of kerosene this winter. I like the idea of an open fire in my living room. Quick! Grab the marshmallows!

On the turntable: Little Creatures, "Radio Collective"

On the nighttable: Stephen Levine, "A Gradual Awakening"

Holiday Leftovers

Two unwritten poems from back in December...

Matsuho no Sato Rotemburo

Awaji Ohashi gilded

like a LiteBrite set.

Colors dance on the water

as naked fishermen

enter the bath.

Kakure Nembutsu

Monks dance the forbidden dance

Bouncing from foot to foot,

clad in orange,

like atonal Hare Krishnas.

On the turntable: The Beatles, "Magical Mystery Tour"

On the reel table: "Drunken Angel" (Kurosawa, 1948)

March of the Swivelheads

What the hell happened to March?  And why is it winter again in Kyoto?

On the turntable:  Ute Lemper, "Punishing Kiss"

On the reel table:  "My Blueberry Nights" (Wong Kar-wai, 2007)

My favorite joke

Descartes is on an airplane.  A flight attendant asks him, "Would you like a drink?"

Descartes says, "I think not."

And disappears.

Happy birthday, Rene, you silly deluded fou!

On the turntable:  Bill Laswell, "ROIR Dub Sessions"

On the reel table:  "Raiders of the Lost Ark"  (Spielberg, 1981)

This week in Kyoto...

Terra Gallery, Nijo/Teramachi.




On the turntable: The Beatles, "Rubber Soul"
On the reel table: "I am my Films" (Herzog, 1978)

Trainline Hiking

Sunday came around once again. The word Sunday most often serves as a synonym for hiking, yet today I didn't like the look of the sky. It wasn't raining, but the clouds were just daring me to make plans. So I did that other synonym for Sunday, which is sit on the sofa with tea and book. Somewhere along the way, an idea nudged it's way between sentences.

So Miki and I biked down the hill to the train station. This being March 23, or 3-23, we bought a ticket for close to that sum, which was 320 yen, and got off at the corresponding station for a day of unadulterated ambulation.

Now it's your turn. Go forth and roll, wander, swan, stray, tramp, roam, cast, ramble, rove, range, drift, vagabond! Just do me one better by not forgetting your camera...

On the turntable: "The Complete Stax-Volt Singles 1959-1968"

On the reel table: "The Scarlet Letter" (Wenders, 1973)

Ghosts on the Road

The weather gods bestowed on us a perfect day of 19°C, so Miki and I put on our best shoes and set off for the San-in do. It starts from the old pleasure quarter of Shimabara, where a small gate poked a hole through Hideyoshi's protective Odoi wall. We followed Shichijo-dori west through Katsura and beyond. It was a long 14km slog along busy roads and the only time our feet left concrete was when we'd duck into a shrine, those rest areas of the gods. The worst part was over a pass into Kameoka, walking on Route 9, with it's busy Sunday traffic. We moved quickly and nervously along a shoulder so narrow that it hardly deserves the name, my own being far broader. Walking into a rapidly setting sun, which blinded drivers who'd barely see us as centrifugal force pulled them toward us on curves. Atop the pass, we sat at a shrine and ate dried coconut, our nerves shot. Besides the shrine, there was nothing around but a dead decaying village, a few moldy love hotels, and two new cemeteries, most likely filled with people foolish enough to have attempted this same walk.

But I'm not here today to tell you about that. On the far western outskirts of Katsura, where the city meets the hills, we saw a mentally handicapped teenager driving a train. In his mind anyway. He had the hand gestures down and was creating his own sound effects. It was right out of Do'des'ka'den. Seeing me, he came to chat about the trees, forecasting the buds soon to come. He followed us, but Miki and I, fearful of him being in traffic, sped up a bit. We soon came up to a sign telling us that 150 years back, three rebellious Choshu samurai had been overtaken and killed on this spot. We moved into the forest to where their graves quietly lay. There were no flowers, but the stain of candle wax on the stones told of how the villagers, whose ancestors had killed these same men, had since adopted them. And as we pondered this, and the large black crow lurking about, our friend rode up in his train. He kept saying, "O-Samurai-san," his hands taking the hilt of a sword that only he could see. As Miki and I looked at some of the other ancient stones on this small hill, he began to clean the graves, and this was where we left him.

On the turntable: Krishna Das, "Breath of the Heart"

On the reel table: "The Darjeeling Limited" (Anderson, 2007)

 

Opening Day

Now, I've been a Yankees fan from way back.  That '78 one game playoff against the Sox was one of the best parts of the highlight reel that is my childhood.  But imagine my shock when I was in New York last fall, being told how Yankee Stadium was to be torn down to make way for a new ballpark in 2009. Then I hear the rumor that Steinbrenner is planning to sell the team.    He finally went too far this time, selling tradition to pad his retirement.  So, I decided to burn my own tradition to the ground.

Most of my family is from New England, and are die-hard Red Sox fans.  I found great joy in being up there last autumn, watching Boston go through their pennant drive and World Series win.  It's time to change sides.  To make it official, I've already given my Yankees cap and T-shirt to the homeless.

"Judas,"  you say?

"Go Sox!"  I say.

On the turntable:  Kronos Quartet and Asha Bhosle, "You've Stolen My Heart"

On the reel table:  "Kagemusha"  (Kurosawa, 1980)

Sunday papers: Graham Greene

"Any word one uses from habit means nothing at all"

--The Honorary Consul

On the turntable: Vangelis,"China"

How was your Friday?

My Friday was Good, not great.

This guy was having a pretty good day too...

More fishsticks?

On the turntable: "Ska Wars"

On the nighttable: Eric Schlosser, "Fast Food Nation"

On the reel table: "Early Spring" (Ozu, 1956)

Busy

Neglected emails,

Drift up my inbox

Like ghost ships

On the turntable: Kodo, "Mono-Prism"

On the reel table: "Sweeney Todd" (Burton, 2007)

Optimism

kerosene seller

makes his rounds

under 18 degree skies

On the turntable: Kimie, "Dragon Scales"

On the nighttable: Michael Hoffman, "The Coat that Covers Him"

Gumshoeing in Eire

Today is St. Pat's. If you say the title of this blog with a bad Irish accent, the last word sounds like "Nag." Which is horse. So, at the risk of beating a dead one, I thought I'd post an excerpt from my travel journals written while in Ireland in February 2005. I had gone out into the country in search of relatives who'd married in Maryborough in 1874. Maryborough now goes by the name Portlaois, a town best known for its insane asylum and prison...

Early the next morning, I headed for Portlaois. On the bus, the young couple who sat behind me looked pretty rough. I sat and looked out at the drab outer rings of Dublin lined with houses made of soda bread. Perhaps it was the heavy sky, or my sleepy eyes, but all looked desolate and lonely and I felt sick of travel. I should have been thrilled at my first sight of the Irish landscape, but instead I was unimpressed with the highway busy with trucks, and the bogs devoid of all but bare trees. Essentially, it looked like northern Indiana. Once off the highway, subtle aspects of the country's beauty began to appear, in the form of huge clovers lining a road at the edge of the forest. In Kildare, I giggled at the sign for the National Stud, picturing a suave guy with a nice pad. Beyond this, a couple open fields contained a surprising number of lambs. Two of them seemed betaken with a pig.

Minutes off the bus in Portlaois, I found myself at the Catholic Church where an Ash Wednesday mass was just beginning. I was hoping that this was where Brigid Comerford and Michael Dunne( my ancestors) had been married, therefore sharing a spiritual and temporal link. I queued for my ashes, then lingered around. For a 10a.m. mass on a weekday, it was pretty packed, including many students in uniform. I wondered how many people in here might be family. I lit a votive candle for Ken (my late son), then went to the sacristy to talk to the priest. I was worried he'd be too busy to talk and I kicked myself for forgetting that it was a church holiday. He seemed a nice guy, but rushed. He answered my questions in a three minute monologue, then brushed me off with a "Best of luck to you, Ted," Dougal-style. It wasn't rude. On the contrary, he dealt with my needs efficiently, yet lacking the time to ponder properly, he moved on. I liked the way he'd say something like, "Now go to the parish office, where Mary and Polly will look it all up on the computer." Personalized.

Back on the Street, I moved from the tourist office to library to court house to art center. I was looking for someone who knew local history, but everyone modestly recommended everyone else. I decided to stroll. At first, I didn't like the town much, a series of busy roads and shopping malls. (Including a health food store next to a butcher's, and a place called Abra-Kebab-ra.) Then behind this modern facade, I found the older center of town. Main Street was a cobblestone street of narrow sidewalks, shops, and pubs. Compared to England's rows of controlled uniformity, Ireland seems more organic, with varied structures of differing sizes. Smaller sized roads formed zigsaw puzzle shapes at the town center. I must've walked all the roads at least twice, past the ruins of two churches, past the beautiful stone train station, past the new Heritage Hotel (which had no heritage to speak of, but served as a nice metaphor for my day), past a WWI monument with a Private Dunne, past M. Dunnes' Grocery. There was a strong Chinese Connection here, with three restaurants all closed for the holiday. I'd seen a Chinese guy at mass this morning. Being both Ash Wednesday and Chinese New Year, he was having a busy day. I also saw many of the same faces and they no doubt noticed me, again and again, ambling without apparent purpose. In others, I saw my own face, and in many boys, I saw Ken's. Many schoolgirls seemed to be speaking what at first sounded French, but must be the local dialect. I also heard my Nana's vocal inflections in the conversation of three old women. It's amazing how that was passed to her in the new country.

I thought that the church ruins on Church Street were where Brigid and Micheal had been married, but in the records at the library I found an article saying it'd been abandoned in 1804, after having first converted to Protestant. It turned out to instead be the ruins on Church Avenue, a fact explained by the gals in the parish office. I had almost not gone in, but it was there that I found the most concise information, such as the villages where Brigid and Michael had come from. It left a small mystery since Comerfords are traditionally from around Mountmellick in the north, yet her town was south of here. Plus, the Dunnes are from here in Portlaois, but Michael's village is even further north than Mountmellick. The clan has a massive gathering near there in the summer. In any case, it was amazing to handle their wedding register from 1874.

Ultimately, the most amazing info came at a pub, which I'd chosen because it looked the oldest in town. I had a beautiful plate of chicken and potatoes, plus a pint of Smithwicks, over next to the hearth. The bartendress herself was from Mountmellick, and knew many Comerfords. When she'd asked me what I was doing there in town, I was embarrassed to be a cliche'd American looking for his ancestry. In fact, had I been asked directly if I were looking for family, I was prepared to answer with, "Yeah, they stepped out for smokes 130 years ago and I haven't seen 'em since." But this woman was quite friendly and told me that one of the older Comerford matriarchs had died last November, having had 15 children. She also said she saw a resemblance in me, especially around the eyes. I was thrilled to hear this. She took my contact info and said she'd pass it on. (Days later, I'd find an email from one of the clan.)

All in all, I'd had a great day, walking in the steps of my ancestry and playing detective. And the moral of my Irish parable is...

If the Church can't help you out, the pub certainly will.

On the turntable: Masabumi Kikuchi, "All Night, All Right, Off White Boogie Band"

On the nighttable: Ken Wilber, "A Brief History of Everything"

On the reel table: "Stroszek" (Herzog, 1976)

Sunday Papers: Kenneth Rexroth

"Life is a tragedy to those who feel, a comedy to those who think."

On the turntable: Fumio Karashima, "Great Time"

Greenaway

Watching

Nightwatching

on an art house screen

nearly as small as my TV.

Sitting in the back row,

crane my neck,

watching

Nightwatching,

image reversed

on the dusty projector room window.

On the turntable: Hoppy Kamiyama & Bill Laswell, "A Navel City"

White Day in Hammersmith Palais

"Lovers in Japan
They won't notice anyway
They're all too busy fighting
For a good place under neon lighting

The new couples are not concerned
With what there is to be learned
They got birthday suits, ha you think it's funny
Turning chocolate into money"

(Apologies to Mr. Jones & Mr. Strummer)

On the turntable: Stonium 90, "Police Academy"

On the nighttable: Shuhei Fujisawa, "The Bamboo Sword"

On the reel table: "Yuwaku 3" (Walch, 2006)

Chinese Imports

Fuzzy Kyoto,

Yellow sky

On the turntable: Sting, "Demolition Man"

On the nighttable: Rory MacClean, "Magic Bus"

On the reel table: "Il Postino" (Radford, 1994)

Sunday Papers: Joseph Campbell

"Hinduism, like Judaism, is basically a racial religion: one is born a Jew, born a Hindu. Buddhism, on the other hand, is, like Christianity, a religion founded on belief: a creedal religion, hence a world religion, open to all equally, no matter of what mother born. And that, finally, is the meaning of the symbol of the virgin birth. It is neither of race, nor of caste, but absolutely of the spirit."

--The Mythic Image

On the turntable: Coldplay, "X&Y"

On the nighttable: Bruce Chatwin, "On the Black Hill"

On the reel table: "Stagecoach" (Ford, 1939)

Plus One

february already come and gone,

tracing its shortcut thru the year

On the turntable: Groove Armada, "Back to Mine"

On the nighttable: Nicolas Bouvier "The way of the World"

On the reel table: "M. Hulot's Holiday" (Tati, 1953)