Lunar New Year in Yokohama

the monkey king in Yokohama

As I’m sure you know, dear readers, Sunday was Valentines’ Day, which in my opinion is kind of silly and arbitrary, but there you are.  The only reason it has anything to do with romance is because of a misunderstanding in the middle ages, and now we’re stuck with an obligation to buy people chocolate?

Fantastic cakes that go largely unnoticed.

In Japan, the chocolate companies introduced V-day as a time when women give their significant others chocolate (not cards, not flowers, but strictly CHOCOLATE), and this has since expanded to include all male family members, friends, and coworkers.  There is special chocolate (giri-choco, which translates as “obligatory chocolate”) sold in huge packages for office ladies so they buy in bulk for work.  They sell lower-grade stuff for the co-workers you don’t like.

If that’s not bad enough, “White Day” was invented in the 1960s by the chocolate companies as the day when men have to give chocolate to all the women.  So now the companies can sell even more.  Pretty brilliant if you ask me.  On the plus side, chocolates are freakin’ awesome here, as well as supplies for making them on your own.  I’ve seen chocolates painted to look like the planets, covered in edible gold, and various other fancy crap.

Do not enter! Octopus danger.

Anywho, every department store was crawling with ladies looking for chocolate, so after purchasing some loaves of whole-grain bread (I am so excited to eat it!!!) at a boutique bakery (the only place you can find such fancy things like that), I headed over to Shibuya from where I would catch my train to Yokohama for China Town’s lunar new year celebration (much cooler than Valentines’ Day, if you ask me).

Shibuya’s the place that you see in all the movies where the director’s all like, “Look how crazy Japan is! Giant TV screens everywhere! Oh, the craziness!” The spot right outside the station is it – there are four giant screens, and an intersection where people cross in all directions at once (see the thrilling video).

To be sure, it’s a kick in the pants to walk around there for an hour or so, especially if you live in Gunma, like myself. Unlike what most people think, Japan’s not like this everywhere, so it was pretty fun for me, although, I think if I lived there I would… well, I would never live there.

Yokohama skyline.

Model of Perry's ship (right) in a campy arcade made to look like old Japan

Yokohama, the second largest city in Japan, is also home to its largest Chinatown, due in large part to the fact that it was the only major port that allowed foreigners in the 1800s.

Every Japanese person (and very few Americans) know about Perry and his “black ship” – the dude who showed up and demanded Japan open its ports for trade, or face a pummeling by the U.S. military.

Cute cartoon Perry on a claw game.

Narrow alley with video games nestled in Japonica (it's like Americana, you know?)

Currently, the city is an interesting amalgam of cultures and times.  The mildly terrifying and aggressive actions of the West have been largely forgotten by the Japanese in favor of romance and nostalgia (and a bit of campiness) at our arrival.

Here's an old building!

There are many older western buildings and houses around the city, as well as a pretty strong foreign influence, with an abundance of European style restaurants, among other things.

The city through a lighthouse lens at the maritime museum.

Chillin' out and scarin' children. Does anyone really like this guy?

The sheer number of malls is kind of amazing, but it’s probably due to the fact that the Yokohama seafront is mainly an amusement area, and people here definitely see shopping as a major form of recreation.

That being said, there’s a lot of weird, ultra-modern looking stuff everywhere,

Yep.

and garish advertising mixed with tasteful design.  Also, it’s a bit dirty (for Japan), and polluted, but then, my basis for comparison is pretty far off.

The town itself, while providing a fair amount of neat stuff to gape at, doesn’t hold a candle to the people.  I’ve never been in such a large city where everyone looked like they were so thoroughly enjoying themselves.

Awesome sculpture, but it was a shame there weren't any giant marbles racing around inside.

Gung hay fat choy!

I finally made it to China Town a little after the lion dancing had commenced. This place is a huge chunk of awesome, I tell you what. It was totally packed, so it took a good while for me to get a good view of the lion dance (annnd get my head “licked” for good luck, as you will see).

I spent time wandering around the shops and chatting with the locals.  My favorite episode occurred in a Chinese grocery, when, after juggling my many packages, I spilled my change all over the floor. Everyone dropped what they were doing to help pick up the coins, one of which had rolled under a shelf and then rolled back out. The shopkeeper moved the shelves, and when I told her there was no need, showing her the coin, she laughed and punched my arm. After paying, I somehow managed to spill my change AGAIN, and everyone laughed and helped me pick it all back up. Everyone was delighted by my Japanese ability and wished me well when I left. I hadn’t gotten more than a hundred feet when a customer chased me down, laughing, to return a 100 yen coin I’d left behind.

Shark fin soup, anyone?

Not surprisingly, the proprietess of this store was a little rotund and sassy.

Many people figured out that the lion dancers hadn’t yet been to the stores with the red envelopes still hanging above the doorways.  These are for the lions, who “eat” them and bring the shopkeepers good luck and prosperity.  I went ahead of one of the troupes and shopped around in a couple stores, until I was lucky enough to get up close to the lion and shoot some really great video.  The dancers came all the way into the stores, thrilling the customers, whose voices you can hear in the background. One mother kept asking her daughter, “Isn’t he cute?” to which she replied, “Yeah, but he’s scary too.”

Crazy and bright temple

I made it to a spectacular temple which, despite the huge number of temples I’ve seen, managed to really amaze me. It was garish and bright, but really fantastic, all lit up with silk lantern dragons and phoenixes, candles, and ropes of LED Christmas lights. I stood around for a while, waiting for the right moment to ask someone to take my picture.

Inside the temple

There was a Japanese family of six or seven people, and at least three or four generations. “Grandpa,” a white-haired, stooped over and ancient man, was in charge of the camera for some reason. The family stood on the steps, taking photos for a while, the younger people giving direction and grandpa saying occasionally, “Huh? This good? Okay, let me take another one.” When the photos were done, the parents said, “Okay, let’s go home!” but the rest of the family was incredulous. “We came here just for photos?! Let’s look around!”

Phoenix

At this point, a younger couple was attempting to take a photo of themselves by holding the camera out at arm’s length, which I’d never seen before. Usually, one person will just volunteer to not be in the photo rather than sacrificing a good backdrop. I walked up and asked, “Tetsudaimashouka?” (Shall I take it for you?) and they were quite surprised. After taking their photo and checking to make sure it was acceptable, they took mine. Aside from the Japanese-speaking part, the fact that I just volunteered to help was a bit unusual, as people, despite being very polite, tend to mind their own business when it comes to stuff like that. We were all very happy with the results, and I heard them say as I walked away, “Wasn’t that awesome?”

Woohoo!

Cute cartoon Perry on a claw game.

Narrow alley with video games nestled in Japonica (it's like Americana, you know?)

Colin’s Visit – Part 6: New Years’

And finally, dear readers, here we are at the end of the visit!  We stayed with my former host parents and my host-mother’s parents’ house (her brother and nieces live next door, so it was a pretty big family gathering), and we stuffed ourselves with all the usual foods for this time of year.

Enjoy a traditional Japanese New Year.

December 30:  Making Mochi

Mochi is a glutinous paste made from sweet, sticky rice that’s steamed and pounded.  It can be made into sweets or savories (filled with sweet bean paste, covered in sugar and soy powder, wrapped in seaweed), or rolled out into sheets and cut into cakes that are dried and cooked or boiled later.  These days most families either buy it ready-made or make it with a small machine, but we got to try the old-fashioned way.

After making mochi, we ate some mochi, and then mandarin oranges and green tea, and then crackers and cake and more tea.  We sat with our feet under the kotatsu (a low table with a heating element attached to the underside and a heavy quilt to keep the heat in) talked, watched a terrible variety show, and played hanafuda.

December 31: Soba and the “Red and White Battle” variety show

On the next day, you eat soba (buckwheat noodles, grey in color) with tempura.  Naturally, obaasan (grandma) made the noodles by hand, and the tempura too (like, 2 cubic feet of it, it was incredible).  Everyone was so concerned that Colin got enough to eat, they gave him half of theirs.

After last night’s variety show with all the major J-pop stars in their awfulness, Colin left to go work on a paper for school.  Every year, NHK shows the “Red and White Battle,” a variety show where female musicians are put against male in a contest.  There’s some tolerable music, but it’s almost entirely devoted to bands like Girl Next Door and Exile that sing vapid pop songs sprinkled with English lyrics that make no sense that they didn’t write with a no band but a shitload of backup dancers.  Exile, for example, is something like 12 members, three of which sing.  You can watch the entire thing here.  At 51:00, there’s an American enka (traditional Japanese ballad and folk music) singer.  He actually speaks no Japanese, but his grandmother recorded a lot of enka back in the day, and he got interested that way.  Apparently, when he sings, he has no accent.

January 1:  The first shrine/temple visit and badminton

Stopping at a nearby shrine all decked out for the new year.

New Years’ in Japan isn’t the drunken orgy that it tends to be in many other countries, especially the west.  A few minutes before midnight, all the television channels cut to shrines, temples, and churches across Japan to broadcast the events – namely, people praying, receiving blessings, or standing quietly together as the old year passes into the new.  Perhaps it’s because I’ve gotten old, dear readers, or maybe it’s because I tend to subscribe to the “when in Rome…” adage, but at any rate, I liked the silence and austerity.  At midnight, there was no great hurrah – people just continued prayers, filing into temples, or whatever.

Around 5 past midnight, we all piled into the car for the “first visit of the year” to a couple local shrines.  The first was lit up, and many people were there, shivering and smiling and eating konnyaku and drinking sweet, hot amazake.  It was a weird feeling.  Neighbors were saying their first hellos (you say, “Nice to meet you, Happy New Year” upon seeing someone for the first time in the  new year, even friends and family), but everyone was chatting below a certain volume, and no one was overly boisterous, but there was a friendly, hopeful undertone to everything.

Approaching the main building.

Amazake and konnyaku

All of us at the shrine

We visited a second shrine, the actually “family shrine” that the family patronizes.  They gave us amazake and daruma dolls (red roly-poly dolls with white eyes:  you paint one eye while making a wish.  When it comes true, you paint the other one), a common New Years’ tradition.  We were the only ones there, besides the two or three old men tending the shrine.  They were happy to see us, and quite surprised to see Colin and I, especially.

We went to sleep, and then woke up to a fantastic meal – one of those deals with symbolic food, like fish for fertility and beans for wealth, or something like that.

whack that birdie

At any rate, it was incredibly DELICIOUS!  There was so much food, I need to move around and burn some of the fat that was accumulating from the past three days…

SO!  Time for badminton, the traditional game of New Years’ Day.

Colin and Otoosan BATTLE!

Okaasan (my host-mom) gave it a try

Action shot of Amari and otoosan

Amari and otoosan playing the more traditional Japanese version. The racquets are smaller and wooden, and the shuttle cock is SUPER small and fast. (Otoosan missed it, on his right)

Colin and I tried it. It was much more difficult, but also a lot more fun. We had some good volleys back and forth.

Fortunately for me, we didn’t make it totally traditional.  In that case, whenever you miss the birdie, you get a big, black mark painted on your face IN INK!  I can’t imagine that stuff washed off easily.

… and then Colin went home the next day.

Fourth of July

After spending a couple hours planning classes at the school and then shopping for some essentials at the grocery store, we all went down to the river to set off some fireworks.

off my porch

Out my front door - on the far right is Mt Miyogi

Incidentally, today was a gorgeous day, and I actually saw the sky for most of it.  The mountains around Tomioka were more visible than recently, but I know this is just a tease before the real summer weather starts up in July.

We found a nice spot with a little pavilion already set up, and it started pouring about 15 minutes after we got there.