Last Thoughts on Japan

On April 30, we said goodbye to Kyoto, then traveled by train to the Narita Airport in Tokyo and flew our separate ways back to Australia and the U.S. There were three train segments: a local transit ride to Kyoto Station, a Shinkansen high speed train to Tokyo Station, and the Narita Express train to the airport. Love that high speed train! About 350 miles from Kyoto to Tokyo in a little more than two hours at roughly 185 miles per hour. Along the way, as we sped by on the train, we finally got a reasonably good look at Mount Fuji.

After nearly 30 hours of travel (door to door) and with some fitful sleep here and there, we are back home. Getting our biological clocks adjusted to the 14 hour time difference will take a bit of time. Days are nights and nights are days!

I don't know that I've ever traveled anywhere that has caused me to reflect more on what I have seen than this trip did. I started blogging back in Tokyo and shared some initial impressions of Japan. I have lots more now, and so if you care to read on, I'll share them with you.

The people of Japan: I felt very comfortable around the Japanese, whether mingling in crowds, riding together on trains, seeing them on the streets, or interacting with them in hotels, cafes, and elsewhere. During our brief visit to South Korea, I felt entirely different, and even here back home, I feel a strong difference. In Japan, I felt more smiles, more positive eye contact, less annoyance at my presence, willingness to interact, politeness, and safety. Families seem bound together and engaged with each other. Children seem to be adored and nurtured. The elderly seem to be respected and given accommodation. I absolutely loved watching the beautiful children of Japan. I could have imagined, when in Nagasaki especially, feeling some resentment toward us, given the devastation there, but there was instead a focus on the future, peace, and stability.

Bowing versus shaking hands: I miss already all of the bowing. The Japanese bow to each other rather than shake hands. This seems all at once to be a way of greeting, showing respect, and avoiding the passage of germs. After you pay for something at a cash register, you receive an expression of thank you (arigatou or arigatou gozaimasu) and a bow. When the train conductor opens the door to enter the car in which we are riding, he or she first bows to the entire complement of passengers. Almost every little response of yes (hai) is accompanied with a small bow.

Written language and displays: There are three forms of writing the Japanese language. One of them, at least, has over 1,000 characters and borrows from Chinese. There are two things about this for me. One, I marvel at how an individual acquires competence with such a complex written language over time. Two, the written forms are so beautiful--almost a work of art or forms of calligraphy. Indeed, much Japanese art and poetry incorporates these written forms. When on the streets of Japan or in other places where advertising or informative signage is seen, my senses were often bombarded with lots of color, amusing anime, beautiful photography, and digital forms, which include lots of music and animation. I wished I could have read and understood everything I was seeing, but it always held my attention nevertheless.

Religion: Christianity in Japan is quite limited--only about 1% of the population is Christian. The majority adhere to Buddhism and Shintoism, both of which are more ways of life (and compatible with each other) than they are true religions involving a deity. I liked that the predominant themes seemed to be morality, lessons from nature, respect for nature, devotion to the memory of ancestors and important events, and the peaceful honoring of all of these. This kind of spiritual life appeals to me. Accordingly, Japan seems an excellent counterpoint to so much of the flaming evangelism that I object to in our country.

Baseball: One thing I wish I could have done while there is to attend an NPB (Nippon Professional Baseball) baseball game. Baseball is a big deal in Japan, as is perhaps well known. I saw lots and lots of children playing the game, and there were ballparks and stadiums in many, many places. The professional games are nearly always sold out, and I understand there are led cheers and other forms of crowd engagement during games. There are some differences between the NPB game and our MLB game, so those would have been interesting (e.g. the ball is slightly smaller, and some of the field dimensions are different). Wouldn't it have been great to see a contest between the Hiroshima Toyo Carp and the Tokyo Yakult Swallows?

Metric: OK, this one might be said of most of the other countries I have visited too, but one has to admire the sane, rational use of the metric system of measurements over our absurd, irregular, and inconsistent English system of measurements. I begin to be more and more comfortable with centigrade temperatures and distances in kilometers. If I could do all of my woodworking and other such work in metric measurements, things would be easier!

Climate change and the cherry trees: Everything you may have ever heard about the beauty of the Japanese cherry blossoms is true. They are gorgeous. So are the numerous azalea, wisteria, and other blossoms we saw everywhere. Were it not for our chance to visit northern Japan at Aomori, we would have missed what the cherry trees can truly be like--they were perfect and at their peak there. They blossomed extra early (late March) in Kyoto and Nara and we only saw the tail end of them in Tokyo. Our guides lamented the climate change that has led to this problem. Wake up America, especially those of you in Congress and in the Trump administration who have your heads you know where!

Geography: I've always been clear on where Japan was and its relation to the rest of that part of the eastern world. Yet being there really forces one to focus on what a fascinating nation it is geographically. Japan is an archipelago comprising four main islands (Hokkaido, Honshu [largest and where Tokyo is located], Shikoku, and Kyushu). We visited cities on all but Hokkaido. A backbone of beautiful mountains descends through the island of the archipelago, and nearly 10% of the world's volcanoes are in Japan. Indeed, one of them produced a minor eruption while we were there. If you use Google Earth, take a closeup look at some of Japan's mountain ranges sometime, and you will see numerous caldera.

Food: One thinks of the Japanese eating lots of rice. They do, but we learned that consumption has declined over the years. Still, we were in Japan right at the time lots of rice planting was being done. Numerous rice paddies could be seen as we traveled by bus and train. Then there is the seafood. The Japanese eat lots of kinds of seafood, much of it in the form of sashimi or sushi. All of this that we tried was outstanding. They drink lots of healthy green tea too, and they flavor ice cream and other things with green tea. That the Japanese are mainly so slender and fit-looking is not surprising, given their diet. They do eat lots of pork and beef too, but one has to look carefully to see many individuals who are overweight. Kathie and I were both reasonably capable with the use of chopsticks, but we got lots more experience during this trip.

Cars: There are lots of cars on the streets in Japan, even though the transit systems are well-used and busy. One thing that surprised us was how relatively new all the cars seemed to be. There were older models around, though not lots of them. What we did not see were junked cars, abandoned cars, rusted out cars, or places where old, used, or wrecked cars were collected. I continue to wonder if the Japanese have given some extra attention to recycling old vehicles or if instead we just didn't see them. Similarly, with the way they keep their train systems up to date and modernized, I wondered where all of the old equipment has gone. By the way, the Japanese drive on the left side, just as the British and our Aussie friends do. For we pedestrians from the U.S., this takes some constant vigilance, lest you step out in front of an oncoming vehicle (look right more than left before crossing a street). One other thing we noticed was how diligent the Japanese are about adhering to pedestrian crossing lanes and walk/don't walk lights. You would rarely see someone dash across a road where there was no crosswalk, and where crosswalks and lights were placed, everyone waited patiently for the green walk lights!

Bicycles: Lots of bicycles are used in Japan. Many of them appear to be used for commuting or day-to-day travel. What surprised us was that they mostly use the sidewalks, so we had to learn to be really careful to avoid them. I never did figure out the etiquette for which side I was supposed to walk on or how to avoid being in their way. It just all seemed a bit random, and we frequently made mistakes and got in the way or had to quickly sidestep. Moreover, I was surprised that almost no one wore a helmet. Given the number of parents I saw riding with children, sometimes two children, I would have expected to see helmets. But no! We did see a few serious cyclists who rode on the streets and used helmets and who wore typical cycling jerseys and shorts, but they were in the minority.

Trains: I've commented quite a lot about trains in my several prior blog postings, so I won't say much more here. I will always associate Japan with high quality, well-run, efficient, dependable, economical, fun-to-use railroad systems.

Residences: We were initially mostly in cities, and so our impression of residences was/is that there are lots of condominiums, apartments, and multiplex homes. I know from some quick research that the density of people to space is higher in Japan than many other parts of the world. When we had a chance to see the countryside, while on tour buses or train trips, we did see more multiplexes and some single family residences. However, our general impression is that the Japanese live closer together than do we and in smaller spaces. All of this made me think about how we Americans strive for our larger homes on larger lots and sometimes for more isolated, solitary locations. In turn, this made me think about how some of these "wants" lead us to more wasteful lives and more demand for wealth than may be good for us as a people.

Gardens, landscaping, and trees: Japanese spaces, including the spaces around homes and public buildings and parks, are almost always beautifully landscaped, planted, and maintained. They have a way with plants, flowers, trees, rocks, and water and the combining of them into spaces that make one feel peaceful, comforted, in awe, and/or respectful. Working with wood the way I do, I have special regard for trees, and I saw so many gorgeous trees and types of trees. I saw cedars and gingkoes that were larger than any I have ever seen elsewhere. I saw trees that were carefully supported in their old age so that their own weight would not harm them. I saw trees being trimmed and pruned to accomplish goals of beauty or preservation, sometimes in ways I would not have expected. One of our guides acknowledged the connection that the Japanese people have to trees, and I thought I could see this throughout our visit.

Kathie and Margaret initially came up with the idea to do this trip. I must admit that I had, for a very long time, not looked forward to it. This was partially because I was quite troubled by the situation in North Korea and the general politics of the overall region. Moreover, I dislike flying, especially long plane flights. In addition, Japan had not been high on my bucket list, since there are lots of other places, including parts of the U.S. that I really want to spend more time visiting, including to see friends and relatives here and there. However, now that I've done the trip, I have to admit that Japan is a beautiful place, an especially interesting place, and one which has, as you can tell from the above, a place that has given me much to contemplate.