Japan 2001

Japan Photo Gallery
Hokkaido, Honshu, Kyushu

After living in Japan for about 5 months, I got a few travels in and came home with about 50 decent shots.

Horse Jumping - Tado Style
Tado, Japan
Saturday, 01.05.04

Tado Rider

This was one of the crazyist things I've ever seen done with a horse. I have to admit, I don't have stacks of experience with horses, but this is really out there!

This event is meant to predict, or encourage the coming year's rice crop. I'm not sure which way the influence works, The test is to see how many horses are able to run up a hill then jump up on to a 2m (6ft) wall. Simple? No. You jump that high.
[more...]

Wanted!
Ise Jingu (Shrine), Mie, Japan
Sunday, 03.06.01

Last seen running with a pack of wild tourists, Chikako-san has been having too much fun while her husband, Kazunori-san, was selling cars. If you see her out and about having a good time, please remind her about Kazunori-san back at work!

Stay tuned for more details on this amazing story, including the adventures of Miki-san, Hiroko-san, and Kyameron-san in southern Mie! (full story below)

[photos]

Trip to Ise
Ise, Mie, Japan
Sunday, 01.06.03

Some of the mystery is removed about the activities elluded to in the earlier wanted posting (see above). Chikako-san and her band of wild sight seers have been documented here in this photo update from Ise, Mie.

On the right is a little preview of some of the crazyness that went on as Chikako and Miki pose with a popular Japanese cartoon icon.

[photos]

Universal Studios Japan
Osaka, Japan
Sunday, 01.06.17

It's pretty much what you'd expect: lots of fun. The longest wait we had in line for a ride was about an hour and a half, but that provided good time to chat and for me to work on my Japanese. And of course there was some learning of English going on as well.

It's about a 3 hour drive from where we live to USJ in Osaka, and we ended up paying about $20 each in tolls getting there! But with 4 of us in the car, it made it cheaper than the $50 bus and we could set our own schedule milling around. And we did just that!

A bridge at the Imperial Palace

To Tokyo!
東京
Tokyo, Japan
Sunday, 01.07.01

Natalie, visting Japan from Australia, had a pretty full on introduction to Japan. After being picked up from the Nagoya airport we were on the midnight bus to Tokyo. The 5am Tokyo streets were bare, but that quickly changed as the sun rose and temprature follwed suit. By 10am the Tokyo crowds lived up to their name as the biggest metropolous in the world.

Following is a narative by Natalie as she takes you on her pictorial tour of our visit toTokyo.
Onward!

Back from the North!
Hokkaido & Honshu, Japan
Wednesday, 01.07.23

Photos: Fuji-san
Honshu, Japan
16 - 17 July, 2001

Photos: Rishiri-to & Rebun-to
Hokkaido, Japan
12 - 14 July, 2001

Photos: Hiroshima & Kyoto
Honshu, Japan
6 - 8 July, 2001

With an aggressive itinerary planned out, Natalie and I enjoyed ourselves immensely on our trip to Hokkaido to climb Rishiri-zan and cycling around Rebun Island.

After spending a day and a half on the trains getting there, we wasted no time as we hopped from our last train arriving in the sea side town of Wakkanai straight onto the 6:30am ferry to Rishiri-to (island) where we pushed up all 1719m to summit Rishiri-zan (mountain) by 3pm. The wonderful view of the inside of a cloud that had engulfed the mountain peak, didn't entice us to stay very long. Our decent took us to the far side of the island and into town by 8pm with out anywhere lined up to stay the night.

The next morning, we ferried over to Rebun where, after being quite exhausted from the more than expected climb on Rishiri, we decided to take it easy and just rent bikes for the day and tour the very beautiful northern most region of Japan that way.

One ferry, 6 trains and 50 hours later, we arrived in Yokohama around 7pm on Sunday evening (7/15), just in time to go to dinner with friends of ours, and hosts for the night, Glenn and Andy, to "The Garlic Restaurant"

Back in the car, the next day, Nat and I drove to Mt. Fuji, scoped things out, rested up and started climbing Japans highest hill under a heavy torrent of rain, thunder, and lightning.

After climbing above the rain clouds, we summited at 4am, just as the celestial dawn was scaring the night away. True sunrise was soon to follow and we got a few pics of it all.

After hiking around the large brim of the creator of this dormant volcano, we descended, rested over night, and made an early get away towards home. I dropped Nat off at Nagoya and she headed off to visit Nara, and I got back to town just in time to roll into my 11am class, Wednesday morning.

Full story!
Photos: Fuji-san || Rishiri-to & Rebun-to || Hiroshima & Kyoto

Isidori Drumming Festival
桑名
Kuwana, Japan
Sunday, 01.08.05

I made sure to postpone my departure from Japan, because everybody said this was a festival not to be missed. How right they were.

Each of the townships in the city of Kuwana has a huge cart/carrage of some sort that carries a big drum like the one I'm beating on in the photo shown here.

The festival consists of each of these townships beating on their drums, accompanied by the sharp ringing sound of brass bells being hit by other members of the group.

This is all on parade through the town, with the ultimate goal being the big temple in town where judges rate each of the township teams.

All I have now are a few photos taken by a Japanese friend which were e-mailed to me after I got back to the states!

[Photos]

Sunday Drive
Komono, Japan
21 October, 2001

What started out to be a plan to go to Kyoto on Sunday, slowly evolved to a plan to hike into the local hills for the day... which then was then altered to driving around as a bit of rain started to fall while we were driving to the trail head. The plan was to take a short hike and lounge around in the sun, as it had shown the day before. But instead Peter and I found this cool old train on display along the seemingly remote back roads of our home town, Komono.

These photos taken with my very cool PHONE!
The Front	Controls	Inside

Nagoya Festival
Nagoya, Japan
14 October, 2001

Jumping right back into things when I got back to Japan, I got word of the big festival hapening in Nagoya, and was off like a shot. There were plenty of traditional Japanese displays, including various battle re-enactments, which were amazing. But along with that came the western influence of the marching brass band, uni-cycles, batons, and more.

That evening also resulted in visiting another festival in the small town of Tomida, where the annual "Lion Dance" was underway, photos from that follow as well!

[full story] [photos]

Sadoriffic!
Sadogashima, Niigata, Japan
02-06 November, 2001
[More/Photos]

The island of Sadogashima, just off the coast of Niigata City in the Sea of Japan proved to be an amazing discovery, one of Japans many treasures.

Of greatest interest to me were the traditions that I only got a glimpse of through the trinkets at the souvenir shops. Some very interesting artwork and craftsmanship alluded to an amazing dragon or demon dance, as well as what looked like a very elegant and graceful dance done by Sado women wearing the unique large brimmed straw hat which was folded down the sides of their faces.

In the Edo era, Sado was an island of exiles of sort... not like the way criminals were taken to Australia, but when the gold mine on Sado ran short of workers, the Tokugawa Government decided to capture mushukunin or people without proper registration in large cities and sent them to work in the Sado gold mine.

My host for the weekend was Dan Schneider, a friend from College. Dan is teaching English with the JET program and started last September. His home page has a few updates, but there is more to come after he gets his laptop and digital camera up and running.

[More/Photos]

Yea, English!
Kuwana, Mie, Japan
15 November, 2001

A community center in Kuwana that we teach English at felt it necessary to take us English teachers out to lunch. It was a great meal of Udon noodles or Soba noodles accompanied by the usual array of Japanese side dishes: Tempura, Tsukemono (crunchy pickles), Miso soup, Sashimi (raw fish), Sushi rolls (raw fish rolled in rice and seaweed), Chawanmushi (a pot steamed hotch-potch), and various other dishes, the names of which I cannot release for national security reasons.

But, it was great fun and the members of the class tell us they enjoy the English class very much. Many of them are also avid offyonder.com followers! So, to the right, as recorded by phone, are a pair of pics proving it all truly happened!

Turtle Talk
Takanabe & Kagoshima, Kyushu, Japan
15-20 November, 2001
[photos]

In keeping with what has turned out to be somewhat of an island fetish, my trip down south to Kyushu, the southern most island of the main Japanese islands, I also visited Kagoshima, a small island even further south!

The main purpose of the trip was to see another friend from college teaching English in Miyazaki and to attend the conference held by the Sea Turtle Association of Japan where another friend of mine was invited from the US to give the keynote address (see turtle article below). More on that later.

For now, however, you'll have to be patient as I work to get my digital photos from the trip up as I have less than 24 hours turnaround time before I head back to the airport on my way to China to visit our offyonder.com represenative in Shenyang, Everett "Walker" Griffiths.

E-Mail Update Archives

Hello Japan!
Komono, Japan
Sunday, 5 May, 2001

"TIJ" - goes the saying, That is Japan. For the unexplainable, of which there is plenty in this world of extremes. Like the little car I drive, and all the little cars here have a "reverse beeper!" Look out, little car backing up! [more...]

Sea of Japan, Biwa-Ko
Mie, Shiga, & Fukui, Japan
Sunday, 21 May, 2001

ROAD TRIP!
With the limited weekend time I have, Saturday night to Monday afternoon, I decided to make a run for the border and see how far I could get, and if I could get back in time for class! Well, the short of it is I did, and had an excellent trip to boot. [more...]

ミニカーでの小旅
五月２１
　私の休日は、土曜日の夜から、月曜日の午前中。休みの間に、どれくらいの所まで行けるか県境を走ってみよう。そう、月曜日の１２時からのレッスンに間に合えばいいのだから。
少しの時間しかないけど、すばらしい旅行になりそうな気がするぞ。さあ！出発だ。

日本語　- English

The Grand Shrine of Ise
Ise, Mie, Japan
Sunday, 3 June, 2001

It's about time I had a little slap in the face regarding Japanese culture. Coming to Japan, I knew things would be different. The culture, the food, the lifestyle, and oh, how can I forget the language! But these were differences I expected, and for the most part have not been surprised as related issues popped up. This last trip to the city of Ise in the Mie Prefecture, was different. [more...]

Hokkadio & Fuji-san
12-17 July, 2001

Hokkaido is the northern most of the main islands which comprise Japan. And Natalie and I went to the northern tip of Hokkaido. We were hoping for clear enough weather to see Russia for the first time, but the relatively close island of Sakhalin remained elusive.[more...]

Nagoya Festival
Nagoya, Japan
Sunday, 14 October, 2001

It doesn't take long to get settled into Japan, what with various festivals happening all the time. Amazingly, I managed to arrive just before the weekend of the Nagoya Festival. I was only able to attend the closing parade on Sunday, which was no little thing. The weekend activities included drumming presentations, various dancing and singing performances, tea ceremonies, martial arts demonstrations and even the Nagoya Regatta. [more...] [photos]

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