Matsue Castle!

So after our week of study ended, Martin, Leonard, and myself stayed in Matsue until orientation began. We were kind of bored, so we decided to do some sightseeing over the weekend. The first day, we met up with a Matsue ALT, Shane (pictured in my last post) to go see the historic area around the castle, in the heart of Matsue. It was, needless to say, a great day.

The castle towers over the rest of the city, and can be seen for several miles, I first noticed it about a mile and a half away, close to the outer moat. It was built over a five year span from 1607-1611 at the beginning of the Edo period (1600-1868), and is one of only 12 original castles remaining in Japan. Of those 12, it is the third tallest at 30 meters high, and the sixth oldest.Interestingly, none of the stonework uses mortar. This is called the Gobozumi style.

The castle grounds were quite beautiful and sported great views of the city and Lake Shinji, as well as three restored turrets along the outer wall. Inside the castle, is one of the finest collections of Edo Period Samurai armor I've ever seen. Even better, unlike most other museums I've visited in Japan, this one allowed for pictures!

One of several suits of armor inside Matsue-jo's extensive collection.
There were close to a dozen suits, plus swords, bows, masks, and other samurai related material in the collection.

Matsue-jo (jo = castle in Japanese) also has an extensive moat network comprised of connected inner and outer moats that go out into the city for a mile or two. We took a sightseeing cruise along the moat after we saw the castle, and got even better views of both the castle and the surrounding town area, including the scenic Shiomi Nawate, a winding street that follows the northern shore of the inner moat and was at one time home to several important samurai families. The boat was small though, and some of the passages under the many bridges spanning the moat were so low that the canopy of the boat had to be lowered, forcing the passengers to lie down on the floor!

A crane along the banks of the inner moat. I snapped this shot during my boat ride.

After the boat ride, we decided to check out some of the sights along Shiomi Nawate, and wandered into the Buke Yashiki, a restored samurai residence, which was quite beautiful.

The Buke Yashiki samurai residence along Shiomi Nawate

Afterward, we walked on to the northeast corner of the castle district to hunt down a local microbrewery, and low and behold, if they didn't have one of the finest heffeweizen's I've ever had! All in all, a great Saturday, capped off with drinks and friends under the Red Umbrella.

Matsue

So I spent the last week and a half in Shimane's capital city, Matsue. Needless to say, I have hundreds of pictures and lots of stories, so I'll probably be posting up on here a few times in the next couple days to cover it all. Those on facebook can see all my pictures already, and if you can't see my facebook pics, good news, I've recently made myself searchable again, so go befriend me check out my adventures in all their photographic splendor!

Anyways, it took me 6 hours to get to Matsue from Ama, but that was because 1: the ferry stopped at 2 other islands along the way, and 2: I took the hour and a half long train through Yonago because I didn't realize their was a cheap 40 minute bus ride available from the port. I went down almost 2 weeks ago now, for a week of intensive language study. I didn't really learn anything new, but I did jumpstart my Japanese and I had a great time with some of the other JETs as well. After the class ended, three of us, myself, Leonard, and Martin, stayed over the weekend, because we live so far away, and had to be back Monday for 2-3 days of orientation. So I was actually there for a total of 12 days before I made it back to Ama. Great times!

The first night of having everyone there, we met some other Matsue JETs along the shore of Lake Shinji, to watch the sunset. The lake is the second largest body of water in Japan, and the sunset, as you can see, was quite spectacular, even on an overcast day. Afterwards, we went out to dinner, and later to Karaoke!

Pretty much every night for the last week and a half followed this pattern: Class all day, going out on the town with friends at night. Sometimes we went to the lake, others to Karaoke or bars, but usually to a meeting spot called the Red Umbrella, which literally was an enormous red umbrella with tables and chairs underneath. Another evening we went to a club for the new JET welcome party. I was late though because I went to an Onsen (hot spring) festival first with another ALT. We missed all the onsen being free, but still went to one for a half hour with a great view of the lake. I'm looking forward to going back to an open air onsen once the snow comes.

He was only behind that table because the bar was full

I also met an ALT with 10 years calligraphy experience. He actually wrote the wall scroll you can see hanging behind my friend Shane, in the picture above. (It says "Sake is the king of medicines.) He took me to a calligraphy class one afternoon after he got off work, which was pretty cool. It was almost like going to drug deal or mafia meeting from the movies getting there though. We were walking down a street and he just opened a random door to an old building. There was no light inside, and we walked down a hall covered in dilapidated doors and chairs until we came to an old creaky staircase. At the top was worn sliding door and behind that, an elderly calligraphy master randomly teaching a young Japanese boy the art of Shodo (calligraphy). It was pretty fun though, and afterward I bought a new set so I could start practicing after school in Ama. I might go over to the high school and see if they have a club for it.

Every night in Matsue was great, and now that I'm back home, I'm kinda lonely again. But work starts Tuesday, and I should start making more friends in Ama once I start getting out more. Although that may prove difficult since I bought a new couch in the city. Then again, it might be easier because I may be buying a new car next month. I'll be sure to let all of y'all know what's going on though. Oh, and I'll have more site specific posts up in the next couple of days.

Oki-Jinja

I ended my Friday afternoon off, with a trip to the Oki Shrine, or Oki-Jinja, a few blocks west of my house. The shrine is relatively new, but by far the largest on the island, and the only one where I have seen signs of worship, that is people actually praying or making donations, or selling souvenirs. Although the time to see it apparently is in the spring, when the cherry blossoms are in bloom, it was still a nice trip. The site doubles as a nature preserve, and the long gravel trail to the shrine was absolutely beautiful, not to mention peaceful.

Above: Walkway to the main shrine area.

The shrine is dedicated to the Emperor Go-Toba and was built sixty-five years ago to commemorate the 700th anniversary of the emperor's death. Go-Toba ruled toward the end of the 12th century, and was exiled to my island by the Kamakura Shogunate in the early 13th century, following the Jōkyū War. This shrine was built next to his house and burial ground.

Above: The main shrine. Below, Go-Toba's cremation/burial mound

It was a fun place to visit, and I look forward to many return visits. It's a very calm and peaceful place, and made all the more beautiful in the spring by its blooming cherry blossoms.

Across the street from the shrine, was the Ama Museum of history, which contained several interesting artifacts, many of which predated the Emperor's arrival on the island, including some 3,000 year old pottery. Unlike my previous visits to Japanese museums, this one, while not having any English brochures, did allow pictures. The best ones come from the 2nd floor exhibit dedicated to the late emperor.

Above: Emperor Go-Toba

Go-Toba was a man of many, many talents, including poetry and swordsmanship. The museum had many documents from his time, including some he wrote himself, as well as many blades he either crafted on his own, or had made by master sword-smiths.

Above: This document is over 700 years old and was written by the emperor himself. Those are his hand prints on the scroll.

Below: Katana blades crafted for or by Go-Toba

As always, you can see all of my pics on Facebook. On that note, it may be a while before I can update this blog. I leave for Matsue, the prefectural capital, tomorrow morning, and I'll be there for eleven days. I'm taking a 5 day long intensive Japanese course as well as 3 days of JET orientation. I'm kind of disapointed, I'll be missing a dance festival in Ama, but Matsue has some amazing sites, including one of the oldest castles in Japan, dating back to the early Edo Period. So those sites, plus being able meet up with friends for fun and karaoke should make up for it.

A Sunday Drive

Ok, so technically it was Friday, but that's beside the point. It wasn't a national holiday, but it is Obon, the Buddhist day of the dead lasting three or so days so I had the day off and decided to do some sight seeing around Ama. It was a beautiful sunny day, and I got some amazing pictures of some of the more notable features of Ama's coastline. I'm finally getting the hang of my car, and used it to drive to the Akiya seaside, where I took some more pictures of the beautiful scenery, you can see some below, and all of them on Facebook, in my "Views of Ama" album.

Mail

So, I've been told that my mailing address is quite confusing. That's understandable, which is why I'm about to explain it you now:

My mailing address. Send letters and post cards, **and packages** to me here:

977-1 Ama, Ama-cho
Oki-gun, Shimane-ken
Japan 684-0403

977-1 Ama [This is my Street address] ,
Ama-cho [This is my town name. Yes it's the same as my street address, the town is so small they don't need road names, just numbers. You still have to write this though]
Oki-gun [This is my district, sort of like a county in America],
Shimane-ken [My prefecture, or state name]
Japan 684-0403 [Country and zip code]


Please note I no longer have a seperate shipping address. All packages must be sent to my house, and if I'm not there, the postman will probably bring them to my school for me.

If anything changes, I'll be sure to let you know. If you ever want clarification, just click on "Mailing Address" in the contact info section of the blog, and you will be redirected to this post.

The Ketai

So, in a previous post, I mentioned my new cell phone, the NTT-Docomo N-01A. While it's already a year old in Japan, expect to see it hit American markets sometime in the year 3000, i.e. never. Why? I don't know the specifics, maybe it's because Japan's mobile phone market is leaps and bounds beyond the current demands of American users, or maybe most Americans, myself included, just wouldn't know what to do with the damn thing. I can't hardly get over the fact that it has 3 operating faces, touch, 90 degrees, and 180 degrees. I fully expect the next Terminator model to be based on one of these things.

Pictured above: The T-10,000,000

Need to check your email on the go? Not a problem. Want to listen to music on the go? Why not. Manage your bank account on the train? Sure thing. Lost? Just use the GPS. Need the weather report or a train schedule? Absolutely. You may be saying, "But Andrew, my current phone does all of those things." Oh really? Can you type in Kanji? If you're bored on the train, can you watch TV on it? If you need a price check at the super market, can you scan the bar code? Can you swipe it as a credit card, or lock it with facial recognition keys? Does it have Japanese to English and English to Japanese dictionaries? Can it scan signs in one language and instantly translate them into another?

No? I didn't think so. That might be half of the features of this thing. Like I said, I've no idea what I'm doing with it.

Kyanpuda Hoi!

So I've spent the past five days at Adobensha Kyanpu '09, that's Adventure Camp '09 for those who can't read Japanified English, and it certainly was an adventure. It started Thursday afternoon with, like all things Japanese, an opening ceremony, during which all the staff, myself included, had to give brief introductions. I couldn't really understand what everyone said, so I just gave the standard, "Good afternoon, my name is Andrew Hill, I am the new ALT...etc" speech that I've given a dozen or so times since coming here. Afterwords, the children were divided into groups and taught how to pitch their tents, and make bamboo torches.

The sea at night. Those lights are squidfishing boats

The group mind-set is very important to Japanese social behavior, and quite different from the individual-based societies of the West. Each group was in charge of taking care of itself throughout the camp, they elected a leader, and chose jobs, who would clean, who would cook, who would split fire wood, etc. Doing this both reinforced the idea of teamwork and acting as a group, yet still taught valuable skills to the individual children.

The next day, we were rained in and stranded at the Board of Education. We spent the day learning knot work, which I'll get into later, and whittling chopsticks from bamboo. I doubt an American camp, perhaps with the exception of the Boy Scouts, would let first graders split wood with small machete-like knives and then carve their own dining utensils with razors, but everyone seemed to know what they were doing here, and there wasn't one single accident the whole camp.

Raft Building

The following day, the campers boarded a bus which took them to the head of the trail for the small campground. I rode with some other teachers to a small marina and helped ferry in supplies. After all the supplies were unloaded, we had yet another opening ceremony, this one asking for the blessing of a local kami. Either a local priest or a school board member conducted the ceremony, which was really quite interesting to watch. I played along, clapping and bowing, out of respect.

Priest before the ceremony

After tables were built, tents were pitched, and lunch had been made, all the groups, staff included, set to making bamboo rafts for the main event of the camp, a race to the marina and back. I helped fashion the staffer's boat, and drew my face onto our flag, which looked pretty sweet. Needless to say we outdid all of the kids, in both size and quality of design. I spent the night in a crowded tent, then woke up at the crack of dawn.

Sunday the weather report didn't look very promising, but we got our rafts into the ocean anyway. When I say raft though, I really mean floating wood that you can cling to and rest your legs between fits of kicking. Four female teachers sat at the prowl, while Ko-cho sensei, the principal, stood on the only plank of decking on board and gave orders. Myself, and three other teachers held on and powered the raft the Flinstone way. Halfway to the marina, Ko-cho sensei offered me the helm, but the boat almost capsized from the rough seas shortly after, and we traded places again. The water was a bit cold, but the race was fun, and energizing. We let the lead student group win the race, and then came ashore in 2nd place. Over the next half hour or so three of the other four boats came in, while the crew of the last were brought in by motor boat, since their raft came apart at sea.

Building the staff raft

After lunch, we evacuated to the board of education, due to a chance of rough weather from the typhoon that grazed the western part of Japan last weekend. We were all safe, and the weather wasn't really bad at all. That night, we practiced some campfire songs, only two of which I could read, and only one of which I could sing: Kyanpuda Hoi, which roughly translates as "Yay, it's camp!"

The next day, we returned to the campground. The weather was the best I've seen since landing on the island (they've had an unusually long rainy season). The kids enjoyed some swimming while the staff dove for shellfish and passed the time whittling bamboo. (I now have my own set of bamboo chopsticks and a wooden spoon that I carved myself.) At lunch that afternoon, the staff made a special type of sushi, which I can only describe as sushi in party-sub form. If you don't know how sushi is made, you generally start with a mat of dry sea weed, then put rice and fish on top of it, roll it up, then cut the cylindrical sushi roll into bite sized slices. They did the same thing, but with a couple dozen pieces of seaweed, overlapping each other. Then all kinds of toppings were added to the rice, including the tentacles of a small octopus a teacher had caught that afternoon.

Makizushi!

That night, we had our closing ceremony, which began with a huge bonfire, lit by a light firework on a zipline. That was followed by camp songs, and skits. At the end, the bonfire had burned down, and the students stood in a circle with staffers and lit their bamboo torches. They then one by one laid them onto the fire pit to restart the fire.

Torch Ceremony

Tuesday was spent repacking. It was wet and cloudy the whole time, and to make matters worse, the ocean waves were now a couple of feet high, and we had to ferry out our supplies. While helping load one of the boats, I actually slipped into the ocean, totally frying my new iPod that Jenn had given me as a going away present ( ; ・). <--Japanese cyring smiley

Overall it was a great time though. I've thoroughly bored, and it was a nice change of pace. I got to meet and interact with my students, and now I'm pretty vamped for teaching. I also made several new friends at the middle and elementary schools, as well as the board of education, although I don't remember many of their names. Every night though, after a half hour long staff meeting, we'd have a small enkai, which usually translates to office party, though I'd characterize it more as sitting down and sharing a few beers with your coworkers.

During the enkai, I really got to talking with several of the teachers, since alcohol tends to boost one's confidence in their foreign language abilities, even if it's just a couple of Kirin Lagers. It was during this time, that I also got to try several new foods: Raw squid, fried flying fish, and not one, but two kinds of fish jerky. You read that right, fish jerky. The most interesting foods though were sazae, and awanbi. I wanted to include links, but I don't know that I'm spelling the names correctly, since google's not bringing anything up. Apparently they're expensive delicacies in other areas of Japan, but we ate them for free, the teachers simply put on snorkeling gear scraped them off the seabed. I'm not sure what sazae is, but think snails, on the ocean floor. Eaten raw.

Sazae

Awanbi might be a type of muscle, it was pretty tough meat. Awanbi livers on the other hand were incredibly soft and mushy. So much so that some of the Japanese couldn't even eat them. I tried everything, every night. Fun times.

As always, there are more pics on facebook. Look for more postings on my blog soon, as well as updates to contact info and changes to the layout. Sunday I leave for Matsue city, on the mainland for a week long language course, and prefectural orientation. I should have time for some good sight-seeing as well.

Pics

So, I haven't really taken any pictures of my house yet, I've spent days trying to clean it (it was really REALLY dusty). I haven't taken pictures of my phone yet either, but don't worry I will, it deserves it's own post (or internet domain, it's that awesome) I haven't really taken many pictures of the town either, because the interesting spots are on the other side of the island, which, as you are about to learn, is a long ways off, when you don't know how to drive a manual transmission on the left hand side of the road...

So Saturday, I didn't have anything to do or anywhere to be, but I still woke up at 6:30. Actually I woke up at 5:30 thanks to the local crows. They're massive, live right outside my window apparently, and seem to think, with the lack of roosters in the area, they need to crow at sun-up every day. Anyways, I eventually decided that I would hike back up to the ferry port, and try to hunt down a Sri Lankan named Sami in the Tourist-Info booth, because he speaks English.

I grabbed my map, studdied it, found the local junior high, which is about a 30 second walk from my house, and set out. I decided I'd take a different rout than I normally would, so I could see more of the island. Eventually, I lost sight of the sea, and my sense of direction, and came to a road sign which informed me I was not in fact on my way to the northern port, but was instead on track to go see the light house at the southern tip of the island. 9 kilometers away.



Well it was only 3:00, I was making good time, and was not intimately familiar with the metric system, so I decided I'd keep walking. Soon, the very flat road became very steep, and very narrow, and parts of it turned to gravel. But I kept on, determined to see the light house, and to prove to myself that I was still in shape. By 3:45, I was pretty high up in the mountains, but I had an amazing view of Nishinoshima, the next island over. I also had my camera on me and got some great pictures, although it was very overcast that day.

You can see the full album on my facebook page. Anyways, I kept on moving, and around 4:30 or so hit civilization. According to my map, which had already deceived me into taking this long and very lonesome road, also lead me to believe that I was relatively close to the lighthouse. I looked up though, and instead saw a small shinto shrine. So, I decided to take a look:


The shrine, Miho-jinja, isn't in any tourist guide, and is very small. I believe, thanks to Yagi-sensei's interpretation of a stone pillar there, that it was either erected to an exiled emperor, Go-toba, who was banished to Ama in the mid 13th century. He spent his first night on the island at this shrine, and is buried at a much larger one a short walk from my house. I'll be visiting it in the coming weeks.

Anyways, after the brief sidetrack, I decided I'd go find the light house. I stopped and asked a group of elderly women in my broken Japanese which way it was. Eventually, they pointed me down a road and I set out once more. After about 20 minutes, I was once again along the sea, but there was no light house in sight. At that point, I realized it was nearing 5pm, and would be getting dark soon. I had at least a 2 hour walk back home, so I turned around and went back. I made it home around 7 pm, just before sunset, tired, hungry, dehydrated, and I still never saw the stupid lighthouse...

I have Internet (やった！）

So after being in my new house nearly a week, and a two day ordeal with NTT communications, I finally have internet! Sweet sweet internet, and really really fast internet too (100mbps!). I have so much to talk about, I'll probably be posting things for the next few days, at least until Thursday when I'm set to go camping for a week (on the clock no less).

I guess I should start though, with Ama-cho, my new hometown. I was told by my predecessor and what little info I could find that Ama was a small island town of about 2500 people. It's actually a much bigger island than I was lead to believe, and the small town is really a collection of a half dozen or so small villages that dot the island. Weather has been very cloudy, but I guess that's for the best. I can only imagine the heat and humidity if the sun were out all day.

I haven't really had much to do yet, other than basic paperwork and formal introductions, a very set, traditional procedure in Japan involving formal language and bowing multiple times. When we flew out from Tokyo, I was told that it would take everyone in my prefecture up to 3 hours to get to their destinations. 5 hours later, I set foot on my island, feeling hungry, tired, and very hot in my suit.

After quick introductions with people at the board of education and town hall, I was brought to my new abode, a small house, with one bedroom, a bathroom/laundry room, a living room, and a kitchen/dining area. It's actually pretty roomy, and rent's only 25,000￥ ($250) a month. Later that night, I met my supervisor, and several teachers, and a small dinner at her house.

Since then, I've been driven around town and introduced to seemingly every school, board of education, and town hall employee in the town, including the mayor. I've purchased a cell phone, set up a bank account, and walked all over the place trying to explore the island. More on all of those adventures in their own separate posts.

I'm just glad for now that I have internet, because I was running out of things to do. I wake up every morning at 6:30 to an announcement over the town wide loudspeaker (the purpose of which I can only presume is to prevent people from having any excuse to be late to work). I'm up and showered and fed and exercised by 8:00 at the very latest, but I don't get picked up for work until either 10:00 or 1:30. Or in today's case, I didn't even leave the house and had the day off. Even if I worked a full day, there's nothing to do at the junior high school because it's summer vacation, and I'd be out at 4:05 anyways. My TV only picks up 3 fuzzy channels, all in Japanese (none of which show anime :( ), and there's really not a whole lot to do in town, at least not in my section of it. To be honest, it's been kind of lonely. But anyways, it's great to be back, more from me in the coming days