I'm back!
Well, I'm back (for those of you who knew that I've been away). For those of you who don't, I've spent most of the last two weeks or so in Japan. Here's the highlights of the trip (cos there's way too much to put in one LJ post).
So, I was harassed into buying a camera at last, primarily by Gavin, the guy who sits next to me at work (he used to live in Japan) and my Aussie friend Alison, who insisted that she wanted to see everything I saw. I acquired a cheap camera (Pentax Optio A20) and started playing with it. Most of the images below were taken using its automatic setting, as I don't really know what I'm doing just yet. I've kept the number of images here to a minimum - I took over 280 photos!
The holiday I had booked was described as a self-guided tour. What this really means is that some days I was on a prebooked tour, other days I had free (or could book to other tours myself).
So, I started out in Tokyo. When you see images of Tokyo, you typically think of the flashy, neon lit streets a bit like this one:
That's the Ginza shopping area. Think a multi-street version of Oxford Street and you won't be far off. I found this place on my first day there when I was trying to stay awake to minimise the jet lag.
However, even in the hyper-modern capital of Japan, there are very traditional areas that provide a very vivid contrast. The best example I saw was at the imperial palace as shown in this photo:
A guardhouse at the imperial palace.
Apart from the imperial palace, I visited the Meiji shrine and Asakusa-Kannon temple in Tokyo itself. The shrines are for the religion Shinto and the temples are for Buddhism. The shrines tend to be surrounded by trees. In the case of a major shrine like Meiji, this gives the impression that you are in the middle of a forest, not the middle of a city. The temples however are much more clearly a part of the town/city they are in, with houses and shops very close by.
A painting on the ceiling of the Asakusa-Kannon temple.
My third day in Japan saw me on a coach heading north of Tokyo to a place called Nikko. This is famous for the Toshogu shrine to Tokugawa Ieyasu, the first of the Tokugawa shoguns. This place at first glance may seem ostentatious, but the sheer skill of the crafters that made the place shines through. If you ever go to Japan, this is one of the places to visit.
The 5 tier pagoda at the Toshogu shrine
The area below the shrine.
The gateway to the shrine
Recognise these three? This is where they come from. They guard a stable here at Toshogu shrine
The next day, I was off on a tour of several smaller places. The first was Hakone, a famous "onsen" or hot spring area, which included a trip to mount Fuji.
The one decent photo I got of Fujiyama, taken about 2300 metres up it!
Unfortunately, this would be the day when it rained and I didn't feel like bathing naked outside in the rain, even in a hot spring.
The next day, we continued westwards to Takayama, a small mountain town famous for its sake and festivals. Quite typically I left the town the day before the spring festival (and the sake got drunk in Australia while I visited Alison). It is quite picturesque with some very old streets:
After Takayama, we moved on to Shirakawa, home of the A-frame houses (well, one of the villages in the area). I always thought that they were originally from the alpine area of Europe, but apparently the idea was pinched from this area of Japan. Here's a piccie:
Next was a little town Gokayama, to try my hand at paper making (with the help of a young lady). Japanese washi paper is made in this region and is used for all sorts of purposes (I picked up some to repair my Japanese style lamp with).
The last stop in this section of the tour was an agricultural town called Kanazawa. We didn't have much time there, but the gardens were superb. I have refrained from posting the many cherry blossom photographs I took because they were spectacular here. If you get the chance to go to Kanazawa Kenrokuen in April (for cherry blossom) or May/June (for the Azaleas), take it!
Cherry blossoms in the gardens.
The gardens in the rain.
The cherry trees before Kanazawa castle gates (along with a lot of tourists and the odd tour guide).
Finally, I reached Kyoto after Kanazawa. This was the last of the three big things I wanted to see in Japan (the other two being Fujiyama and the cherry blossom). So, what did I do here? Well, first I took a short tour of Kyoto and Nara (the capital before Kyoto in the 8th century). This included a trip to Nijo castle, where I walked on the nightingale floor and the Golden Pavilion, a temple where two of its stories are covered in gold leaf! This was once a residence of an Ashikaga shogun who became a monk after he abdicated the shogunate. Here's a piccie:
In Nara, I saw a massive Buddhist temple. I believe this is the biggest wooden structure in the world. Take a look at how big it is:
The statuary inside is similarly massive:
Although you cannot tell the scale from the photograph, each of the leaves you see at the base of the statue is bigger than me!
I spent the next day wandering around Gion in Kyoto (the area where the Geisha work) until it was time for me to see the Miyako Odori ("cherry blossom dance", the dance the Geisha do only in April, cherry blossom season). It is very different from what you would see in a western theatre (go read Memoirs of a Geisha for a much better description that I could ever give of Geisha dancing). Here's a couple of photos to give you some idea of what it looked like:
The nearest equivalent to a chorus line (although they only dance). Also, in at least one respect more skill is needed by these performers than by the Geisha in the main roles
Two of the Geisha in the main roles.
The last big highlight of the trip was to visit Himeji castle. This is the best preserved castle in Japan, and has been used as the setting for films such as Shogun and some of Kurasawa Akira's films. This castle is very photogenic, so here is a couple of the best shots:
The castle behind the cherry trees.
The castle from the castle's gardens.
Congratulations on making it this far. You may have noticed that I have not talked about any museums. This is because I did not have time to go to any museums. There were at least two areas of Tokyo I wanted to visit that I did not have time to go to. That said, I did manage to get a couple of photographs of Japanese armour:
Samurai armour on display in Himeji castle
Ninja armour on display in the oldest street in Takayama.
So, I was harassed into buying a camera at last, primarily by Gavin, the guy who sits next to me at work (he used to live in Japan) and my Aussie friend Alison, who insisted that she wanted to see everything I saw. I acquired a cheap camera (Pentax Optio A20) and started playing with it. Most of the images below were taken using its automatic setting, as I don't really know what I'm doing just yet. I've kept the number of images here to a minimum - I took over 280 photos!
The holiday I had booked was described as a self-guided tour. What this really means is that some days I was on a prebooked tour, other days I had free (or could book to other tours myself).
So, I started out in Tokyo. When you see images of Tokyo, you typically think of the flashy, neon lit streets a bit like this one:
That's the Ginza shopping area. Think a multi-street version of Oxford Street and you won't be far off. I found this place on my first day there when I was trying to stay awake to minimise the jet lag.
However, even in the hyper-modern capital of Japan, there are very traditional areas that provide a very vivid contrast. The best example I saw was at the imperial palace as shown in this photo:
A guardhouse at the imperial palace.
Apart from the imperial palace, I visited the Meiji shrine and Asakusa-Kannon temple in Tokyo itself. The shrines are for the religion Shinto and the temples are for Buddhism. The shrines tend to be surrounded by trees. In the case of a major shrine like Meiji, this gives the impression that you are in the middle of a forest, not the middle of a city. The temples however are much more clearly a part of the town/city they are in, with houses and shops very close by.
A painting on the ceiling of the Asakusa-Kannon temple.
My third day in Japan saw me on a coach heading north of Tokyo to a place called Nikko. This is famous for the Toshogu shrine to Tokugawa Ieyasu, the first of the Tokugawa shoguns. This place at first glance may seem ostentatious, but the sheer skill of the crafters that made the place shines through. If you ever go to Japan, this is one of the places to visit.
The 5 tier pagoda at the Toshogu shrine
The area below the shrine.
The gateway to the shrine
Recognise these three? This is where they come from. They guard a stable here at Toshogu shrine
The next day, I was off on a tour of several smaller places. The first was Hakone, a famous "onsen" or hot spring area, which included a trip to mount Fuji.
The one decent photo I got of Fujiyama, taken about 2300 metres up it!
Unfortunately, this would be the day when it rained and I didn't feel like bathing naked outside in the rain, even in a hot spring.
The next day, we continued westwards to Takayama, a small mountain town famous for its sake and festivals. Quite typically I left the town the day before the spring festival (and the sake got drunk in Australia while I visited Alison). It is quite picturesque with some very old streets:
After Takayama, we moved on to Shirakawa, home of the A-frame houses (well, one of the villages in the area). I always thought that they were originally from the alpine area of Europe, but apparently the idea was pinched from this area of Japan. Here's a piccie:
Next was a little town Gokayama, to try my hand at paper making (with the help of a young lady). Japanese washi paper is made in this region and is used for all sorts of purposes (I picked up some to repair my Japanese style lamp with).
The last stop in this section of the tour was an agricultural town called Kanazawa. We didn't have much time there, but the gardens were superb. I have refrained from posting the many cherry blossom photographs I took because they were spectacular here. If you get the chance to go to Kanazawa Kenrokuen in April (for cherry blossom) or May/June (for the Azaleas), take it!
Cherry blossoms in the gardens.
The gardens in the rain.
The cherry trees before Kanazawa castle gates (along with a lot of tourists and the odd tour guide).
Finally, I reached Kyoto after Kanazawa. This was the last of the three big things I wanted to see in Japan (the other two being Fujiyama and the cherry blossom). So, what did I do here? Well, first I took a short tour of Kyoto and Nara (the capital before Kyoto in the 8th century). This included a trip to Nijo castle, where I walked on the nightingale floor and the Golden Pavilion, a temple where two of its stories are covered in gold leaf! This was once a residence of an Ashikaga shogun who became a monk after he abdicated the shogunate. Here's a piccie:
In Nara, I saw a massive Buddhist temple. I believe this is the biggest wooden structure in the world. Take a look at how big it is:
The statuary inside is similarly massive:
Although you cannot tell the scale from the photograph, each of the leaves you see at the base of the statue is bigger than me!
I spent the next day wandering around Gion in Kyoto (the area where the Geisha work) until it was time for me to see the Miyako Odori ("cherry blossom dance", the dance the Geisha do only in April, cherry blossom season). It is very different from what you would see in a western theatre (go read Memoirs of a Geisha for a much better description that I could ever give of Geisha dancing). Here's a couple of photos to give you some idea of what it looked like:
The nearest equivalent to a chorus line (although they only dance). Also, in at least one respect more skill is needed by these performers than by the Geisha in the main roles
Two of the Geisha in the main roles.
The last big highlight of the trip was to visit Himeji castle. This is the best preserved castle in Japan, and has been used as the setting for films such as Shogun and some of Kurasawa Akira's films. This castle is very photogenic, so here is a couple of the best shots:
The castle behind the cherry trees.
The castle from the castle's gardens.
Congratulations on making it this far. You may have noticed that I have not talked about any museums. This is because I did not have time to go to any museums. There were at least two areas of Tokyo I wanted to visit that I did not have time to go to. That said, I did manage to get a couple of photographs of Japanese armour:
Samurai armour on display in Himeji castle
Ninja armour on display in the oldest street in Takayama.