The End and a New Beginning

A quick pause, a nod, and respect for the dead: the Tsunami's number is still climbing. Indonesian Acehnese suffered the most as their family and friends were decimated and their land was bulldozed by the forceful and murderous wave.

Internet Site Non-Grata in China

Since my arrival in Shanghai, I have not been able to access my own blog. I could write, edit, publish, but I could not see the result. I tried accessing other blogs, such as stilleggplant.blogspot.com, but could not do it either. I think we all know what is happening here. The website filtering in this country is effective. Sometimes I just forget that I am in China, especially when Shanghai seems very cosmopolitan, wordly, and like other modern and progressive big cities.

Xin Tian Di and the French Concession

The Tranquil Sinan Lu in the Shanghai French Concession, originally uploaded by bloompy.

Xin Tian Di (the New Heaven and Earth) is located at the periphery of the French Concession. In the olden days, Shanghai is divided into different districts as a result of the Westerners trying to carve out a part of the city for their own fellow compatriots. Thus, Shanghai has the British Concession, the American Concession (these two later became the International Settlement), and the French Concession.

When I arrived at Xin Tian Di, I saw immediately the restaurant that my friend had recommended, Xin Ji Shi. I thought of going in but decided to walk around and take pictures first. The area retained and renovated the beautiful old-brick shikumen-style buildings (stone gatehouses). The complex, opened in 2001, is buzzing at night with the young crowd converging for eats and drinks and a little shopping. Instead of neon-advertising lights, the area employs small flags to announce the names of the businesses.

It was fortunate that I decided to walk around first, because then I bumped into T8, a restaurant that had been widely praised by critics and included in the Conde Nast top 50 restaurants in the world. My friend had also mentioned this restaurant to me, although he himself had never been. I will write a review of this restaurant in my yet-to-be created site, but for now, let it be known that this restaurant with a cuisine of Mediterranean and Asian fusion is worth going. The "M on the Bund" may have a balcony with a nice view of the Huang Pu River, but the food pales in comparison to T8. Stephen Wright, the executive chef here, is very friendly and approachable. The open kitchen -a square area where he and his staff performed their daily and nightly culinary tasks, protrudes into the dining room. From here he can survey the entire ground floor.

After this very satisfying lunch, I went to take a very long stroll into the French Concession, a walk that lasted for about 4 hours. I just followed the recommended stroll by the guidebook but occasionally strayed and went into the alleys and back ways, which always provided great opportunities for viewing the old "shikumen" style architecture. Of the 111 pictures shot today, some were of adults sitting, reading, working, socializing, and children playing. Yes, 111 pictures today and about 147 yesterday: ah, the joy of digital camera. You can just take as many with no worries about the developing cost. Even if you make a mistake, you can just take another one and delete the undesired ones later.

There was not much of a landmark in today's walk, except for the former house of Sun Yat Sen and Zhou En Lai on Sinan Lu; but the neighborhood alone was remarkable. I was surprised to find how clean Shanghai was: no trash lying around. (It was etched rather deep in my mind that most, if not all, Chinatowns in the western world and in Indonesia were always messy and littered with trash.) Just like the ones I found in the Bund area, the sidewalks and some of the buildings seemed very grimy, polluted, and could benefit from extreme scrubbing; but otherwise, the area was devoid of littered trash. Even when there was a construction (major and minor), the debris and trash were kept within its respective compound. Another friend did tell me that he had walked a little bit away from the city center, and that was where he found the run-down neighborhood with trash and puddles everywhere. There is a huge gap between wealth and poverty in the city.

Today I also came in contact with a lot of vehicular traffic; the fume proved too much at one point that I had to escape to a nearby garden, which happened to be the tranquil Ruijin Guesthouse, a sprawling compound with several buildings that are currently used for hotel rooms. I kept telling myself that I had to wash my face after I returned to my hotel. I must have looked like that grimy sidewalk by the end of the day; I need an extreme scrubbing as well, I suppose.

The Bund by the Huang Pu River

The Bund by the Huang Pu River, originally uploaded by bloompy.

Once in an exhibition at the now defunct Mill/Short Gallery in San Francisco, I attended the photographic show of a well-known Hong Kong artist named Fan Ho. The work was done decades before the gallery even existed, and the subject was Shanghai. The play of light and shadow in those black and white photographs remained permanently etched in the deepest pocket of memory. I dreamed that one day I would be able to see the architecture by the river that was immortalized by his camera.

That dream became a reality this morning as I went to see the Western-influenced architecture of the Bund by the Huang Pu (Wang Pu) River. I was originally planning to walk from my hotel to the site, but the concierge told me that it would take an hour by foot. Also, I was constantly reminded by the guidebook that Shanghai was not really a walking town the way Tokyo, London, and Paris were. Indeed, the taxi ride took some time but the traffic going to the Bund was not bad at all. While gobbling his breakfast, the enthusiastic driver slowed down to show me the vista as we approached the area. This caused the other drivers behind us to start honking like mad. I was delivered right in the middle of the Bund stretch, in front of the historic Peace Hotel (formerly the Cathay), whose ground floor currently housed the Citibank, the very institution I happened to need to visit.

According to the Lonely Planet Shanghai guidebook, the Bund got its Anglo-Indian name from the embankments built up to discourage flooding (in Hindi, "band" means embankment.) Bund buildings were first built on concrete rafts that were fixed onto wood pilings, which were allowed to sink into the mud. Thus, the bottom entrance step usually originated 2m in the air and sank to ground level with the weight of the building (Lonely Planet Shanghai, p. 30.) The architecture firm of Palmer and Turner was responsible for most of the buildings that became the famous façade of this mile-long stretch.

The area has changed drastically since the days the Cantonese photographer took his pictures of the Bund: The image of a solitary old man pulling a cart has been replaced by a mixture of noises coming from the creaking buses, screeching cars, and squeaking bikes. Across the Bund, right by the bank of the river, the city built a raised platform, parallel to the stretch, from which one could view the Bund on the one side, and the Pudong area on the other side. Pudong, the area East of the river, is the new development area of Shanghai where most of the new buildings took place. People say that the real Shanghai or the Old Shanghai is Puxi (the area west of the river) where the Bund is. Pudong is also the site of the Oriental Pearl Tower, a sight not unfamiliar in many of Shanghai's souvenir postcards.

Unfortunately, throughout my visit today, the haze never left the area. There was the sun peeking from behind the clouds, but this thin veil never really lifted up, leaving a gauzy impression of the Pudong cityscape. The angle of the sun also made it difficult to shoot a good picture, and as the name implied, "photography" depends very much on proper lighting. When I had my fill of shooting pictures, I crossed over the street by way of an overpass, and arrived at the side of the architecture. Aided by my guidebook and a culinary recommendation from a friend, I headed for the "M on the Bund" restaurant. I did not have a reservation, but I thought I would give it a try. As luck would have it, the famous restaurant, with a great vista from the balcony, was not full at all. I was seated not too far from the window. During the cold weather season, they closed the balcony, but the window provided a sneak peek at how charming it would have been to sit outdoors in a milder weather.

I ordered the set menu and set on reading my guidebook. Then I reviewed my pictures inside the camera, as well as took some shots from where I sat. By then, no one sat in the non-smoking area except for myself, so I had complete privacy. I took my time in that place, and when I finally felt satisfied, I left. I went on a second walking trip, this time along a stretch a block away from the main drag, but still running parallel to the Bund. I looked mainly at buildings that held some significance back in the heyday of Shanghai, around the 1930s, like the matching Hamilton House and the Metropole Hotel; and a Tudor building that used to house the former offices of the company that catered to Martini & Rossi. Although in general these areas are clean, the sidewalks are really grimy. They could benefit from some cleaning, but that may not be a priority in this city. The city is too busy focusing on building the skyscrapers across the river. I am just glad that they had the wisdom to keep this nostalgic façade of the Bund.

I shot some 145 pictures, although I sincerely doubted that any one of them would match any photograph of Fan Ho's, that Cantonese photographer.

Shang Hi, Everyone!

Shanghai Alley #1, originally uploaded by bloompy.

I still cannot believe that I am finally in China! I am at last in the land of my ancestors.

Pudong airport did not try to be beautiful; functionally, however, it served its purpose of ushering visitors into Shanghai and sending travelers out of China. My arrival gate was quite a long way to the immigration area, but once I arrived there, the passport check was a breeze; no questions asked. After grabbing my luggage, I went through customs, then got out to the welcoming zone filled with people who were picking up their friends and relatives. Once I went out of the airport and into the open air, four men approached me and aggressively steered my cart to go to their taxis. I barked at them and took hold of my cart. One of them cursed at me, so I decided to go back inside to ask for assistance. I wanted to know how much it would cost if I were to use a non-metered taxi, but the staff at the counter decided to escort me. With him, no one approached us. I was delivered to a legitimate taxi and off I went to Puxi, the "real" Shanghai, across the Huang Pu River. The ride would be about 40-60 minutes, costing about 150-200 Yuan, depending on the traffic.

The weather was beautiful: sunny and cool. My friend did say that travelling to China at the end of November and around the beginning of December would provide me with beautiful days like this one. Inside the taxi, I felt a draft (wind) from my right side, which at first I thought to be a hidden AC vent, but it turned out the door to my right had a hole and the air I felt was from the outside. I did not mind it because inside the taxi it was a bit warm. Along the way to Puxi, I saw many high-rise residential complex. Each complex had somewhere between 10 to 30 buildings, and each complex only employed a single design that was repeated many times. I have never seen so many housing complexes, but then again, I am now in the most populated country in the world.

The appearance of each complex varied from one complex to another: there were some that appeared very luxurious and some that looked dilapidated. They were all interspersed: there was not really one segment that was a poor area, and another that was glitzy; instead, I saw a few expensive-looking high rise buildings neighboring a seemingly mid-level priced housing, followed by a poor, run-down one, and then continued with a number of high priced buildings again; very interesting, indeed. The only common denominator was the airing of the tenants' laundry in the balconies. Even the ones that did not have balconies would put up their clothes-line by the window for maximum solar exposure.

Once we crossed a bridge whose named I never learned, I started seeing the familiar skyscrapers of Shanghai: the Oriental Pearl tower, the JW Marriott hotel (looking like one of the towers from the Lord of the Ring's second installment), the Jinmao Tower (the tallest structure in the city), the Four Seasons hotel, the JC Mandarin hotel, and some more. Once we got off the highway and into the surface street, suddenly I felt as if I were in Jakarta, Indonesia. The malls and the hotels had that typical Asian glitz, with each of them having shiny and glossy tiles, floor-to-ceiling glass windows, and a grand entrance.

***

I wanted to go to the Bund on my first night here. I thought that with not too many people around at such late hours I could shoot some pictures, but the concierge told me that after 10pm, the lights that made the Bund a glorious spectacle would be turned off. So, instead, I just walked around my hotel, trying to scope the area. I ate at a restaurant that had many stalls on the sidewalk. It was called Bi Feng Tang. I ordered the neck pork (I have never had this before), vinegared chicken feet and shrimp dumpling (har-kau.) I ordered the dumplings to be safe, just in case the first two were not good. Turned out the first two were great, and the dumpling was just so-so.

Having lived for almost a year in Tokyo, it is rather a relief to be in a city like Shanghai, where the prices are very inexpensive. After the late dinner, I walked on the street of my hotel, passing different cafés and restaurants. Sometimes the chilly night and the overhanging streetcar's cables made me feel as if I were in Berlin; and sometimes certain small shops in the area reminded me of Paris. There were many beggars, mostly women in their 50s; and they were very aggressive in pursuing people. Because of it, I felt as if I were in Jakarta, but I kept reminding myself that I was in Shanghai! A recent Asian Wall Street Journal article actually talked in length about the industry of begging that had been developing in China, where conmen employed the tactic of using disabled or deformed children.

I look forward to exploring this city that has been called the Paris of the East, and the Whore of the Orient.

From 0 to 100?

Odd but true. Some Japanese food labels carry the description of "Ages 0 to 100." Very interesting, indeed. One label was found on a bottle of salad dressing. It makes me think: are people over 100 years of age being advised not to consume any of these dressings because it may be too oily, too sour, or too salty? For crying out loud, they reach their centennial already. Let them have whatever they want! Or are they saying that babies right after birth could technically be bottle-fed with milk with a dash of vinegary dressing?

Almost Greek to Me

Since my travels to Europe in the 70s I have visited many public squares: in small towns and in big cities; during the fall, winter, spring, and summer; at dawn and near dusk, day and night. In my subsequent travels −after learning about the Greek agora and the Roman forum during college− I tried to recreate the feeling of being in that ancient marketplace, in that old public square. Did anybody ever stand and think that the very spot she or he stood on would one day be a subject of a study? What went on the mind of the people as they walked among the architectures that dwarfed them? In Nashville, Tennessee, stood the only standing replica of the Parthenon of Athens. While I was in college, many times I would visit the park where the monument stood and walked around the structure, but the feeling I was searching for eluded me.

Then today it happened in what I thought was the unlikeliest place in the world: the Ebisu Garden Place, one of the many contemporary temples to the gods and goddesses of commercialism. I have been to this shopping and dining complex cum brewery (the Yebisu Beer) many times, but today, because of the gorgeous mid-Fall weather of sunny and cool, I decided to walk aimlessly, in and out of and around the different buildings in the area. After three hours in the area, I walked on the ground level of a building with a tall ceiling. The portico was devoid of any Greek element: no Doric, Ionic or Corinthian columns; instead, it was simply rectangular columns that lined the sides of the building, supporting the overhanging roof.

The angle of the sun cast a shadow of the adjacent structure onto the wall of this building. Suddenly I felt as if I were circling a classical edifice in the ancient time. It was a weird feeling, because I thought such a reaction would only be available to me in the West, while touring similar structures. Here in the East, specifically in Japan, I thought I would be overcome by a site-specific sensation, such as: the Shinto shrines, the Buddhist temples or the Zen gardens. How foolish of me to be so narrow-minded. An exhilarating experience it was not; nonetheless, it was a gratifying feeling. At the time of the revelation, I was not thinking about the people in the future; instead, I was soaking in the moment of what I thought would be a walk among the giants in the ancient times, and oddly enough, that made my Sunday for me.

Soy Sauce Made from Human Hair

I did not know this, but today I was sent a link to an article that talked about how the Chinese and the Japanese used human hair for the production of soy-sauce. Further, the article said that the amino acid that was present in human hair provided an alternative to soy beans in giving soy sauce its flavor. What makes it dangerous is that the chemicals used to extract these amino acids are carcinogenic. While the Japanese used this method during the World War II because of soybean shortage (because of food shortages, soybean was consumed as soybean, instead of being used to make soy sauce), they stop the practice some time ago. The Japanese put a ban on the production of soy sauce from anything other than organic proteins. The Chinese soy sauce manufacturer, on the other hand, saw the use of human hair as a cheaper alternative to using real soybeans. For full view of the article, click the heading on this blog, or go to http://mdn.mainichi.co.jp/waiwai/index.html

Setting Back the Clock of Equal Rights

Maybe it is the trend these days to set back the clock of progress. The United States' stance on environmental issues seem to unravel decades of the move forward. Now, the Japanese government is tinkering with Article 24 of their Constitution, which guarantees the equal rights for all in terms of marriage and family. This past June, the ruling Liberal Democratic Party proposed revisions that would strengthen the family and community values at the cost of equal rights.

The following is an Op/Ed article from Asahi Weekly/Asahi Shimbun of the International Herald Tribune, dated November 11, 2004. You can click the title of this particular blog if you would like to go to the site itself. If the link is broken, worry not; the article has been published in its entirety down below:

BACKLASH: Revisionist thinking
By MIEKO TAKENOBU,The Asahi Shimbun

Women's groups have banded together to fight proposed changes to the Constitution that target their equal rights.

Women's groups are roaring back at proposed constitutional revisions that target their equal rights.

At issue is Article 24 of the Constitution, which guarantees equal rights for men and women in terms of marriage and family. In June, a group in the ruling Liberal Democratic Party issued a draft document that proposed rewriting the article to focus on the family--especially obligations to support the family--and community values.

A nationwide network of 12 women's groups has formed to resist the changes. At a news conference held Oct. 29 in Tokyo, women in the network spoke out on the issue.

``Should we return to the days before Article 24 when decisions about women's educational advancement, work and marriage were all made by the male head of the household?'' one participant asked.

Another said, ``Any weakening of Article 24, which defines equality within the home, would endanger the domestic violence prevention law, the Basic Law for a Gender-equal Society as well as the insurance program for elderly care.''

Participants included octogenarian Mutsuko Miki, widow of former Prime Minister Takeo Miki, as well as women in their 30s such as Hisako Motoyama, an organizer with nongovernmental organizations.

As written now, Article 24 states: ``Marriage shall be based only on the mutual consent of both sexes, and it shall be maintained through mutual cooperation with the equal rights of husband and wife as a basis.

``With regard to choice of spouse, property rights, inheritance, choice of domicile, divorce and other matters pertaining to marriage and the family, laws shall be enacted from the standpoint of individual dignity and the essential equality of the sexes.''

The proposed revision by the LDP group changes the focus of the article. A draft, posted on the Internet, proposed as a new ``public duty'' an obligation to support the family. The draft also said ``(Article 24) should be reviewed from the standpoint of stressing family and community values.''

LDP members who helped compile the draft say they are surprised at the strong negative reaction. Lower House member Kyoko Nishikawa said the proposal did not mean a return to the traditional Japanese family where the patriarch ruled with an iron fist.

``I think a Constitution that does not have any reference to the home is wrong,'' Nishikawa said. ``It is necessary to place importance on the home as the foundation. I personally think what should be included is a clause like `the home is the basic unit of society.' ''

Another member of the team, Yoshitaka Sakurada, said the negative reaction was due to a misunderstanding.

`Should we return to the days ... when decisions ... were all made by the male head of the household?'

PARTICIPANT Nationwide women's group network

``It will not do if under civil law a homemaker who cared for elderly parents did not receive an inheritance matching her contribution because of the provisions for equal division of inheritance,'' Sakurada said. ``The fact that the family is important should be included in the Constitution as a means of confirming that principle. We are not thinking about reviewing the clause about the equality of the sexes.''

However, Hiroshi Nakasatomi, an associate professor of constitutional law at Fukushima University, sees a direct relationship between the focus on the family in the LDP proposal and a review of the clause for equality of the sexes.

The LDP proposal points out that the family and community were destroyed after World War II due to egotism. In order to rebuild family and community values, the LDP proposal includes the provision for ``an obligation for supporting the family'' as well as a new provision for ``protecting the family as the duty of the nation.''

According to Nakasatomi, the unstated precondition of the proposal is that women would be expected to handle the obligation for supporting the family. As a result, a review of the equality of the sexes would come into play because the need would arise for a division of roles according to gender in terms of supporting the family.

One LDP member who is opposed to revising Article 24 is Upper House member Yoichi Masuzoe.

``The objective of constitutional revision is to adjust the Constitution to changes in society, but the proposal on Article 24 moves in the opposite direction,'' Masuzoe said. He added that the proposal to revise Article 24 was a political attempt to appeal to conservative voters.

``Since the LDP cannot attract the undecided voter, it tends to depend on the conservative support base from which it can ensure it receives votes,'' Masuzoe said.

Another woman who was surprised by the LDP proposal was movie director Tomoko Fujiwara. She finished a documentary this fall about Beate Sirota Gordon, the American woman credited as the creator of Article 24.

``Having lived in Japan for a decade from the time she was five, Gordon proposed Article 24 based on her knowledge of the real status of women,'' Fujiwara said. ``I wanted to show through the movie that her idea had taken root in Japan.''

Screenings of ``A Gift from Beate'' are planned in conjunction with efforts to protect Article 24. The film is scheduled to open in Japan next spring.(IHT/Asahi: November 11,2004)

Gone, All Gone

*sigh* My laptop is back and the hard disk is replaced, but a small chunk of my life is gone. I said earlier that losing the hard disk somehow did not sadden me because at the time, the US election did not go my way, but as I got my laptop back and started rebuilding, I realized how much I had lost. Did I not back-up my data in another disk? Yes, I did, to a hard disk with a capacity of 320GB! But alas, that darned LaCie Big Disk was corrupted just few days before the laptop incident. As a result, some files were damaged, including my photo and music collection. Thank goodness there was the desktop back-up. Now I do what I should have done long time ago: back-up onto CD-ROMs and DVDs; lesson learned...*sigh*

I have fallen off the NaNoWriMo and BlogMo wagon, but I am going to see if I can catch up. ...doubt it, but maybe I can make it a LoDecWriMo and LoDecBlogMo (Local December Writing Month and Blogging Month). Any takers?

But the Dog Ate My...

On the depressing day of the 2004 US election, my laptop hard disk was loose. Subsequent tinkering with it did nothing. The election apparently not going my way, I decided to go to Apple Ginza to have my laptop examined and was informed that I had lost the disk; completely lost it. Thank goodness it was still under warranty. It just happened that a few days before, the external hard disk that acted as a back-up system was experiencing problems too. Somehow, these two incidents paled to the news of the election; I was surprised to find myself at peace with losing the 70GB of stuff from that laptop and risking losing 160GB of data from the external hard disk... Needless to say, I will be without a laptop, and that NaNoBlogMo and NaNoWriMo will have to wait till my laptop comes back as I am typing this on a borrowed computer.

NaNo NaNo

Yes, yours truly has decided to join the NaNoWriMo and NaNoBlogMo for this month. What an earth possesses me to do this, I have no clue. If you are interested, go to http://50000wordsinnovember.blogspot.com or just click the title "NaNo NaNo" above. Why such name? The National November Writing Month invites and challenges bloggers to write a 50,000-word novel in 30 days. Yes, many a crap will have been produced by the end of this month, including mine. I am supposed to have written about 1600 words per day if I am to finish this on time, but as it is, I am already late!!! Second day, and I am only at 1006. Hm, the at-the-moment election coverage at CNN and BBC News do take away my focus, but what do they say about excuses?

Xmas Starts to Pop Up

In the mid-80s in the U.S., this was how things worked: Stores had their Christmas decorations and merchandise for sale the day after Thanksgiving. In the late 80s, Christmas-related items started to pop up after Halloween, moving one month ahead before Thanksgiving. Shortly thereafter, in the early 90s, Christmas items ridiculously showed up in July in a major department store in San Francisco, which is not too bad compared to the year-round Christmas-stores in some small towns somewhere in the United States.

Here in Tokyo, on my outing tonight, I saw the first hint of Christmas shopping season. With the temperature dropping steadily in Tokyo, with the light of day diminishing ever so quickly in the late afternoon, and with people donning their scarves and overcoats already, the Isetan department store in Shinjuku 3-chome started to put up their dripping lights, metallic red garlands, and glass balls. Just a few weeks ago, the Halloween decoration was up in several shops and cafés. I have yet to see how October 31 will actually be celebrated here: whether the Tokyoites will actually run around the city, go to work in costumes, or whether any locals (expats excluded) will go trick-or-treating.

My feeling was that in the U.S., holidays were mostly created so that retailers can have a reason for putting things on sale. Somewhere in the lobbying world of the Washington, D.C., there must be some reps from the card industry that tried to get new holidays created so as to generate new greetings cards and boost up sales. In Tokyo, there is already a new kind of day called "the White Day" in response to the Valentine's Day. You see, VD (yes, that's Valentine's Day) in Tokyo is for the women to "give things" to the men; therefore, the White Day was created so that the men could return the favor. There is yet any indication about what happens to children who give their parents something on Valentine's Day (why children do this to their parents in the first place really confuse the meaning of that day. Wasn't VD created for lovers or does the term 'lovers' have an expanded postmodernist meaning now?)

The original intent of Mother's Day and Christmas and the likes was to honor the people or the history involved, but really, these days, those holidays concerned more with what to get for whom rather than remembering the spirit of the event. Do I sound like a much repeated broken record out there? Perhaps. I better shut up and do my Xmas shopping now.

Here Quake, There Quake!

I thought I had left the earthquake country behind when I moved out of San Francisco, California, but the quake had found me hiding in Tokyo. Yep, just now, we experienced an earthquake followed by tremors in the longest span of time I had ever known. A year ago, when I was still living in San Francisco and my partner lived in Tokyo, we were talking on the phone. I was at home, and he was at a café with his colleagues. Suddenly, through the phone, he told me that he just experienced his first earthquake ever. Interestingly enough, few seconds later, in San Francisco, the earth moved under my feet. It was as if the ocean between us never existed with us experiencing different earthquakes in two separate countries at the same time.

Tonight's earthquake happened while we were both sitting in the study at home. We were both working on our computers when my partner alerted me of the first mild jolt. Immediately we looked at the Toraja (Indonesian) funerary dolls that I had placed on the top shelf of the bookcase; shortly thereafter came the swaying. My initial reaction was to head under the door frame, but foolish enough, I decided to ask my partner to join me in preventing the bookcases from falling. They were neither bolted down to the floor nor attached to the wall, and we had plenty of books. I thought if I were to die, I would like to be buried under those books.

Unlike any earthquake and aftershakes I have had before, this one had many tremors in the hours to come. Much later on while I was in the kitchen cleaning the counter, my partner rushed in and asked if I had felt another jolt. I said, "Not really," but as I just finished saying that, again I felt the ground shifting a bit. Then I saw the artwork swaying on the wall. We checked with CNN online and found out about the magnitude and center of the quake: "Ojiya, a city in Niigata prefecture (state), about 260 kilometers (160 miles) northwest of Tokyo. The quake was about 20 kilometers (12 miles) beneath the earth's surface, the Meteorological Agency said."

The Autumnal Equinox

The most recent Japanese holiday celebrated the Autumnal Equinox, a time when the sun appeared to cross the celestial equator. In the Northern Hemisphere, this phenomenon ushered in the Fall Season. And so it really began: the unbearable heat and humidity of the summer days slowly gave way to the cooler and dryer fall weather. In the past week, since September 27, it has rained almost everyday. A typhoon was supposed to be working its way to the city, but the only evidence I saw was the gusty wind. If there was a rainstorm, it must have happened during the time when I was fast asleep.

Slowly, the leaves in our trees start to cover the earth in our garden. It is true that only in any place that truly observes the four seasons could one appreciate the change of the season. I have lived in San Francisco for over ten years, but the year-round beautifully mild weather of the Bay Area had always left only a tiny hint for me that we were entering a new season. Here in Tokyo, where for the past three months I have been wearing the heat and humidity of my skin, I am now exchanging it gladly for the cape of cool breeze and occasional sprinkles.

Honor Thy Handicapped

When I was a student at Vanderbilt University many light years ago, I had a Classical Mythology professor, F. Carter Philips, who was an advocate for access for the physically disabled. I never recalled him mentioning anything about it in class, but one day, I saw him in a wheelchair, wheeling himself to the lecture hall. I thought that he had been in an accident, but as it turned out, once a year in Vanderbilt, he encouraged the students to pick up a "disability" and to act like it for an entire day to see how life could be for a person with a disability. I chose to be blind for a day, but nary an hour passed before I chickened out. To be blindfolded, holding a stick, standing in a busy intersection, and attempting to cross the road was way too nerve wracking for me. The exercise had an obvious objective: until we experienced how it was to be in such a condition, we would never be able to understand how frustrating it could be to live with a disability. The exercise also taught us to appreciate what we normally took for granted.

Long before professor Philips, however, my parents had taken us as children to the school for the blinds (my father was an ophthalmologist). Further, my high school (Loyola College Prep in Shreveport, Louisiana) obliged us to complete certain hours of volunteer work, which I chose to do at the Shriner's Hospital for Crippled Children. In the 70s, my maternal grandfather was semi-paralyzed from stroke, and decades later, in 1995, my father survived a massive stroke but ended up in a wheelchair. Disability is therefore rather a familiar sight, and I thank my parents, Loyola, and Vanderbilt for further educating me on the subject.

Compared to some other countries, the U.S.A. to me is very accessible for people with disability. Ramps leading to buildings, wider bathrooms in public restrooms, Braille on the elevator buttons, TDD (Telecommunications Device for the Deaf) and elevators are things that we tend to take for granted. In Hong Kong and in Japan, I see "guiding mark" on the sidewalks and lobby of certain buildings. These marks are rows of dashes (for straight walks) and rows of dots (for intersections or the beginning of steps). People with visual disability (the blinds) will "walk" their canes along these lines and dots to navigate them around the city. There are chimes or some sound that some traffic lights make to guide the blinds in crossing the roads. Other places in Asia, such as in Indonesia, attempt to accommodate people in wheelchairs by creating ramps, but these ramps are usually too steep (think about a 45-degree ramp) and/or too slick (in Asia, polished tiles are the norm in malls and shopping centers). None of these facilities will have any meaning without an understanding from the general population. In Indonesia, when my father was on a middle level of any shopping center, he had difficulties getting an elevator to go up and/or down; no one would yield to him. If we waited until the elevator came back down, it would be full; by the time it came back up, it was already full again. The elevator attendant, if there was one, most likely did not react to anything except for some pocket money.

In Takashimaya, a huge department store at the heart of Shinjuku, there are elevators designated for people with disabilities, parents with strollers, and seniors. One elevator even has two uniformed attendants, while the other ones are on the honor system. When there are attendants, it becomes much easier because they can bar unqualified people from boarding, but with the other no-attendant handicap elevators, it is a hit and miss.

At one time, when one of these designated elevators opened, it was chock full. This was not the first time that it had happened. Quickly I scanned the elevator and saw that 90% of the occupants were mostly young people who did not seem to need such an elevator. They all just stared at us and at the people with strollers behind us, but not a single person volunteered to get out. I paid no attention and decided to push my father's wheelchair and take my 72-year old mother and squeezed all of us in that crammed elevator. They were aghast that I would push the wheelchair into such a crowded elevator, but I simply met their disbelieving stares with daggers flying out of my eyes. Still, no one got off, but they can suit themselves. Few floors down, the door opened, and a befuddled woman with a stroller looked disappointed at the crammed elevator. I shot glances at the people around me to get them to understand that someone else more qualified needed the space, but either they were oblivious or they avoided eye contact. Behind the woman, four other sets of parents with strollers frowned.

Clearly no one in Japan wants to offend. On the one hand, the woman and the other parents with the strollers did not raise any voice, not wanting to confront; on the other hand the people in the elevator avoided eye contact and were either oblivious, inconsiderate, or just too ashamed to do anything else. I wanted so much to drive another point by getting out of the elevator and give my space to the woman with the stroller facing me, but as it was, my parents and I had been skipped by several elevators, too. Maybe I, too, was too selfish and inconsiderate.

The week before, in the same department store, we had been waiting for a long time, but when it opened, five healthy-looking ladies got on it and were turned down. The ladies did not budge, and as a result, we were asked to wait. Forget it; I seized the first available regular elevator and went up all right. It was a good thing that the store provided these designated elevators and the attendants, but as I said before, without a general understanding from the population, this would be worthless; even the attendants needed to be sterner.

The Narita Airport has an acceptable wheelchair facilities. Just like it is in most of the international airports in the world, it sends a staff member to aid the handicapped, including a separate lane for immigration and customs.

Tokyo has done some good in providing access to the disabled, but it could do more. The many subway stations still need better access, such as elevators, even platforms or designated ramps for boarding the trains (in some stations, a Metro staff, when alerted, will stand and wait for a train that carries a handicapped person; the staff will then lay down a wooden ramp that bridge the gap from the train to the platform.) Major stations do provide these, like the Tokyo and the Omotesando stations. There have also been many people who had provided help without being asked for; those Good Samaritans do exist. In Roppongi Hills one Saturday, unsolicited, two people rushed to help my partner and me lifting my father's wheelchair while descending a flight of stairs. At another time, a woman about to cross the road helped hold the door to a taxicab while I was trying to position my father. She missed her cross, but her help was much appreciated. The society does revere the older generation, and the older generation seems not to want to be dependent on the young ones. I am very confident that the people with disability here, just like disabled people elsewhere in the world, would like very much to be independent; however, for that to be realized, much more had to be done, and it can start simply with an understanding and appreciation from the people around them.

The Disappearing Acts

Finally the humidity in Tokyo subsided, giving way to the Fall weather. Since my return from Indonesia, I have not been savagely attacked by the darned mosquitoes, although I had stocked up on the repellants. It is quite pleasant to ride the bike in the evening.

Another thing that has been missing from my neighborhood here is the sound of the cicadas. In the summer, like clockwork, the cicadas will make their noise from dawn until dusk, but these days, I have yet to hear a single cicada sing.

Today is the National Holiday for the Aged. Ironically, some young people rushed to an elevator that was reserved for the handicapped and parents with strollers, and the meek elevator operator turned away my father (who was on a wheelchair) and me (the wheelchair pusher). I hope that the holiday still means something, not just another reason for a sale, the way it has seemed to be in the United States.

Australian Embassy Attacked

Poor Indonesia, like she needs another terrorist attack. This secular country, widely thought of to be an Islamic nation, suffers another blow just eleven days before its upcoming election on September 20. A friend of my cousin's had just passed the area when he heard the explosion behind him; he was all right. Another cousin thought that a mighty lightning had just struck because of the sudden blinding flash. Details are coming out as I write this.

BBC: Massive Blast at Jakarta Embassy
CNN: JI Claims Jakarta Car Bombing
MSNBC: Islamist Group Appears to Claim Jakarta Blast

The accompanying photograph was lifted from the Wikipedia.org website

Bloompy in Indonesia

I will be away from Tokyo but hope to report back soon. Destination: Indonesia. I hope the weather in Tokyo will be much cooler by the time I return.

I'd Like a Champagne with that Popcorn, Please.

All cinemas in Tokyo offer a ¥1000 admission price on the first day of the month. Without this discount, a ticket could be close to ¥2000 (bearing in mind US$1 roughly equals JP¥109). For the first time since my arrival I took advantage of this deal. Mind you, there is not much of a choice here with regard to the movies because of my language limitation. My European languages ability cannot carry me through an entire movie on one viewing only. American –mainly Hollywood– movies are indeed available, but they do not play at about the same time the American cinemas are playing them. According to a Japanese friend of mine, the theatres in Tokyo wait until a big holiday to launch a première for select American movies to ensure a big turn out and a sizable box office gain. Some movies play six months after its American première; but hey, a good movie is a good movie no matter when it is viewed.

The AMC theatres' reclining seats in the U.S. are so darned comfortable that I could fall asleep in that plush seating in a dark and cool auditorium; not necessarily so in Tokyo, at least not in the two cinemas I have attended thus far. The Shinjuku Takashimaya’s seats are stiff, making me think that the backing and the seat part are made of wood covered with felt: it has a plushy appearance but the feel of an old style school bench. The good thing is that this kind of seating will keep you awake to see the movie for which you had paid a lot of money. The rows are so narrow that basically your shin can tell you whether the person seated in front of you uses gel, mousse, foam or a hairspray to keep that funky hair-do.

The Virgin Cinemas at the new Roppongi Hills complex fares a little better in this department: plush seats and ample amount of leg space, but the theatre imposes a seat assignment when you buy the ticket. This reminds me of the cinemas in Indonesia in the olden days up until the late 80s, when you had to specify which seats you wish to take unless the ticket seller already assigned one for you. Like the ones in Indonesia, this Virgin Cinemas ticket seller showed me the map of my auditorium and offered me a few available seat assignments.

Once when I was in New York watching a matinée, I smiled as I saw the offering in the concession stand: alongside of the regular movie junk food like popcorn, nachos and the plastic cheese, gummy bears, there were baked goods, such as: carrot cake, blueberry pie and apple pie. These were not packaged pie or ready-to-go cake wrapped in cellophane. The server had to cut a slice from an entire cake. It was served in a mini paper plate (with a doily, no less!), a plastic knife and a paper napkin. I thought at the time that it was a novel, yet quaint, idea, until I saw what the Virgin Cinemas (and possibly in other Tokyo cinemas) listed the following in their concession offerings: beer, wine (red or white), or Champagne. Yes, maybe in other theatres, on any day these mood-altering drinks will definitely help us forget how much we had spent on the theatre to see a movie in a very cramped space.

Pointo Cardo, Anyone?

Customer loyalty is very important to any company. I know this. I have been a frequent flyer member since my university days back in the mid 80s; then came the other ones, like Ben & Jerry's ice cream; the AMC Theatres; a Sausalito T-shirt design store; Macy's (they calculate the amount you ever spend in the store card, and one day when you least expect it, they send you a gift.) But no city has ever inundated me with so many loyalty programs as Tokyo has. In the short time that I had lived here since February 2004, I had accumulated many more of these cards than I ever had while living for almost two decades in the United States. It is unbelievable the amount of cards that had taken residence inside my wallet. Anybody remember George Costanza's wallet (from the Seinfeld sitcom)? Mine is about to wrest the thickness record away from George’s wallet.

Sumimasen, koko de, pointo cardo ga arimasu ka? Excuse me; is point card available here? I have begun to recite that question every time I go to a new store (or any store I in which have never shopped before.) Mind you, retailers already make so much money from me, the least I could do is trying to get as much back from them. Sure, I am being their faithful dog, letting them have my address so that they can spam me and tracking my shopping habit. I don’t care; just give me back my bone! Arf arf!

Let me see what point cards this dog has dragged so far:
2 major department stores (not their credit card, but point card; there is a distinction here)
1 electronic store
1 pharmacy & sundry store
1 grocery store
1 coffee shop at the Century Hyatt Hotel
1 toy store (this will cease to exist once my nieces and nephews grow older)
1 noodle joint
1 ice cream parlor
2 soup places
1 crêpes stand (I am telling you, this is a street vendor giving out point card; what if it no longer vends the item at the same location?)
1 drycleaner
1 HMV (music) store, except that the iTunes music store causes slow growth in the point accrual in this card
1 art store
1 Roppongi Hills community card
1 Virgin Cinemas card

Some cards have an expiration date, and others impose a small fee to own them:
The toy store card – you will have to shop three times there before finally getting a point card.
The art store card – it costs ¥500, and subsequently, any transaction will have to be in cash, but you do get a whopping 24% discount (this one is actually the most direct in giving the discount, and a big discount at that).
The dry cleaning card - ¥500, and if you will receive a 10% discount, plus if you pick up the item(s) on the appointed day, then an additional discount of 5%.
The Virgin Cinemas card-¥500

Sometimes, these cards actually work against the vendors. One time, my partner and I were strolling in the adjacent neighborhood when suddenly he suggested grabbing something quick at the soup café. I welcomed the idea until I realized that I had forgotten to bring that particular card. When I was adamant not to lose a single point, he responded that the card had betrayed the café; it lost two sales that night because I had forgotten to bring the card. He said, get another card, then the next time, bring both and consolidate them into one. Ha! Did he not think that I had tried that before at a different store? Most of the stores would not bend the rules: in some, they actually stated it in the Terms and Agreement (not even in fine prints) that they would not consolidate two cards into one. Curses! Somebody must have told ‘em about me.

Lost and Found

It has been a while since I had any "Lost and Found" item; not just any item at home, but losing something in public and going somewhere to retrieve it. In Indonesia, 99.9% of the time if I lost it, I would never find it again. In the U.S., the percentage was slightly lower; I really had to depend on a Good Samaritan to submit that lost item to the Lost and Found department somewhere. Well, recently, yours truly, in his excited state of having swum in the clearest indoor pool water and best visibility pool ever, left the area without bringing his goggles. I realized it much later at home when I could not find the item in my gym bag. Two days later, I decided to go out and get a new set of goggles to bring to the pool, just in case I could not find the lost one.

An article in the New York Times few months ago mentioned the honesty of the Japanese people. A photo accompanying the article showed what seemed to be thousands of umbrellas in a warehouse. Turned out that those umbrellas that were found were usually submitted to the police station, where they stayed until the owners reclaimed them. Wallets with money showed up as well, and the rule was that if the owner did not reclaim the item within six months, then the person who had submitted it could claim the item.

I decided to see if I could retrieve my pair of goggles at the pool first. After I described the item, the staff looked at their logbook of lost items. In my poor Japanese I mentioned that I had lost it the previous Friday. Then two staff members said what seemed to be the Japanese "a-ha!" and informed me that the item had been sent elsewhere. Of course this was all explained to me in Japanese, but as usual, when I started learning a language, I found it easier to say things than to understand what others were saying. I looked at their hand gestures, retrieved all the recognizable nouns and adjectives, and deduced that the item had been sent to a glass-topped office next to the swimming pool building. That building seemed to house the administrative office that governed both the pool and the gym next-door.

I pursued it further by going to the adjacent building after my swim with the new goggles (I was, after all, inquiring about the loss already in my swimming briefs). First, a stop at the front desk, where the staff told me to go to the office around the corner; then, as I was about to leave, I saw her pick up the phone (maybe alerting the office that an absent-minded foreigner -me- was approaching). By the time I reached the office and entered it, I saw the welcoming staff hang up the phone; she was indeed informed about me by the other one.

This second staff had me fill in a form of what I had lost, the description of the item, my name, address and phone number. Then she took me a few feet away to another counter, by where she asked me to sit down. She then approached a much older colleague, a man in his 50s. They had a friendly chat, and then they parted. She went back to her desk, and the old man disappeared into a room in the back. Not too long thereafter, he came back with a clear plastic bag with the goggles. Before he even took them out, I saw already that they were mine. Still, I had a closer look at it, and with a beaming smile, I thanked him, and on my way out I thanked her.

I think I was more excited that the system had worked than actually finding the goggles themselves. Well, at least this time, it has indeed worked. We shall see if they will be able to find it when I finally lose my mind.

The Asakusa Samba Festival

About six weeks ago in one of the subway stations I spotted a poster of a Brazilian carnival but with a non-Brazilian dancers. It turns out that the Asakusa area of Tokyo holds a Samba Festival every year in late August since 1981, and this year, it falls on August 28. I have been looking forward to seeing this festival, but unfortunately on the day of the parade (yesterday) it was grey, gloomy, and drizzly. I ended up not going, but boy, did I miss that event. The parade went on (what would you do with hundreds of feather-clad dancers who had readied themselves since last August for this year's event?) but I could only enjoy them from the pictures provided by somebody else on the web. Here is one of those sites:
http://audiolicious.com/gallery/album14

I learn from the internet that there is a big Japanese Brazilian community in Tokyo, and there is a huge interest in the Samba. Many studios as well as organizations provide dance lessons for its afficionados. In fact, the main attraction of the parade in Asakusa is the Samba parade contest. More information can be found at:
http://web-japan.org/atlas/festivals/fes11.html

How Blue is My Pool?

Goodness, I have been rendered speechless in the first week of swimming in a Japanese public pool. First, the coordinates: the main swimming pool, measuring 50m X 20m, is located in Sendagaya, adjacent to the 1964 Tokyo Olympic Game Stadium. It is called the Tokyo Metropolitan Gymnasium Indoor Pool. Sendagaya is an area next to Shinjuku, the better-known area of contemporary Tokyo. A second pool is located in a level below and adjacent to the main one, and it is only half as big, 25m x 13m. Opening hours are from 9am to 9pm, all year round; this being an indoor pool, the weather outside has no bearing. The Sendagaya swimming pool does close one or two days a month. Usually one can see this in a schedule posted in the foyer or lobby area.

Two identical ticket vending machines are located outside of the building, few feet away from the entrance. There are several options: adult single (¥600), junior high student or younger (¥260), an adult with a child, and a "debit" card. You are on your honor as far as which ticket you get. This being Tokyo, it costs a whopping ¥600 for a one-time entry for an adult. In Japan, buying a card (instead of individual passes) does not necessarily entitle anyone to a discount. The highest-priced card in this vending machine, for example, cost ¥5000. I inquired to the staff if that might mean the admission price became ¥500, which would then allow me ten entries for the price of that card. She replied that with such card, I have to add a supplement of ¥400 which would bring the total to ¥5400 and thus would allow me 9 entries (which means no discount at all.) I found that very curious, indeed.

The card issued is like a business card with a magnetic stripe on the back. You put the card into a slot at the turnstile, and pick up the card when you pass through. There are two lockers (divided by gender, naturally), each with its own turnstiles and card readers. When you enter the locker area, you are greeted with a sign that politely asks you to remove your shoes. This being Japan, a plastic bag is offered for your convenience (to contain the shoes so as not to soil you and/or the locker.) One would need to put a ¥100 coin in the locker slot in order to close the door and retrieve the key. Later, when you open the locker with the key, the ¥100 will fall out into the bottom slot, where you can retrieve the coin.

There are signs everywhere, as well as a brochure for first-timers, that spell out certain rules like a swim cap must be worn at all times during swimming, and that nobody should use shampoo, conditioner, and/or soap to cleanse themselves after the swim. The reason is that the water is being recycled and re-used within the facility. Another rule was to have no jewelry whatsoever during training. I took of my earrings, but refused to take off my navel ring. As a result, I had to sign a waiver, which was then kept in the record book. If any guard ever stopped me from entering, I could just refer him or her to the record book.

There are eight lanes with a gradation of speed assigned to them: the outer two lanes are for the slowest speed swimmers, and the innermost two lanes are dedicated to those who try to catch up with Michael Phelps. At any time of the day, the pool seems always teeming with people, mostly young men and older women (I have only observed the main pool, not the second pool.) Most of the men seem to be high-scholars, with occasional grade school boys and old men. Most of the women seem to be in their 40's-50's, and almost always they appear to be friends who have come together and use swimming as a healthy social outlet.

The first time I dipped into the pool, the water felt very nice. The temperature was just right. I was in awe once I submerged myself completely: the visibility was so good that I could actually see the wall and other swimmers standing at the other end of the pool, about 50 meters away! I have swum my entire time in the States, both in public and private pools, and mostly indoor ones. Those pools are never of this size but the water temperature is usually poorly regulated and the visibility is very bad. Even after a cleaning, I would never be able to see the other end of the pool.

When I started swimming, it was a joy to turn my head left and right just to see the other gliding bodies racing at different speed. Because of the high turnout in this pool, circle swimming is mandatory (more rules: observe your speed and choose the correct speed lane, no passing, always stay on the right of the lane.) In the U.S., it is not uncommon to find a maximum of three swimmers in a lane during peak time, but here, there is no maximum number. Sometimes I see up to nine people swimming in the same lane.

The only flaw in this system is that because you are not allowed to pass, once you reach the wall, if the one preceding you is not going yet and s/he would not let you pass, then you are stuck with waiting. In my case, when I want to do an aerobic (as opposed to anaerobic) exercise, I want to keep going from lap to lap with no stopping in between. Usually when I find myself having to pause between each lap, I start to look around for a different lane. Sometimes it is all right to go to the slower lane with lesser number of people, but you just distance yourself so that you will not swim too fast and start slowing down behind somebody else.

The admission price is rather high. You can get a one-month gym pass with a pool at Tipness, for example, for about ¥3000/month, and you would have plenty opportunity to swim and to exercise at the gym. But, I have yet to explore that option. So far, I have been to the same pool for two weeks now, and each time, I still marvel at how blue and how clear the water is. I also enjoy seeing people young and old being very active in doing physical exercises. I have yet to arrive to an empty pool. Perhaps an early arrival or a late visit will present me that opportunity; until then, I will distract myself with the clear visibility of this cool pool.

Sendagaya Swimming Pool
at the Tokyo Metropolitan Gymnasium
1-17-1 Sendagaya
Tokyo
Tel: +81 (03) 5474-2111
¥600 adult
¥260 for children aged 3 yrs-old until junior high school

Mosquitoes: Japanese vs. Indonesian

I grew up in Indonesia, then moved to the U.S. (Louisiana, Tennessee, and California) and now am living in Japan. Those years of living in the U.S. were great; if not for anything else, then for the one reason that I did not ever have to deal with mosquitoes. Maybe it was the climate of where I used to live, or maybe it was the fact that I never lived in a lower level apartment, but my summers in the U.S. were pest-free (safe for those telemarketing calls.)

In Indonesia, there are only two seasons: the wet and the dry seasons, but mosquitoes thrive on both weathers. All year long, they are always around and doing their job. On the other hand,my many trips to Tokyo were never punctuated by any visit from a mosquito. Before my move here, times were passed in the hotels and those visits were hardly during the summer. When my partner and I moved here to our new place in Tokyo, we were delighted with the presence of a garden surrounding the building: it was a perfect playground for our two dachshunds. Spring passed with many evenings finding the patio door open to let the fresh air in.

Then, it all changed with the coming of the heat and the humidity of the summer: a Tokyo summer so notorious that my partner's colleague who got reassigned back to the US skipped town so fast I did not even get to bid him "Sayōnara." It was also then that we realized that our place was vacant for six months in the market before we snatched it: maybe people knew about the mosquitoes problem, the garden being a perfect place for them to hide. These days I refused to go out and play with the kids (the dogs) because no matter what covering I had, one or two mosquitoes always seemed to find an opening somewhere. My partner was attacked as well, but he did not seem to develop any allergic reaction to it: no bumps, no itches; with me, instant bumps and itches that necessitated me to rub Tiger Balm on them (believe me, that does the trick!)

I started thinking about the difference between the Indonesian and the Japanese mosquitoes, and here are some of them: An Indonesian mosquito's stinger (what do we call that: beak, needle?) is usually sharp, and when it sucks your blood, you do not know it until it is already too late. It is like having your blood drawn or like getting a vaccination with a syringe: the sharper the needle, the less the pain: the duller the needle, the more you could feel it enter the skin. The only preventive method would be if it lands on the hairy part of your body, which can cause you to feel tickled and thus reach for that spot and inadvertently shoo the bug away.

Japanese mosquitoes surprisingly never seemed to hone their needles. Their needles are so dull that I could really feel it when the pesky vampiric bugs drew my blood. Kidding you, I am not: many times when I thought I felt a stinger on my body, I reached for the area and found a mosquito flying away, and within the next few seconds, a red bump was there. I thought Japanese culture fostered a very diligent society and things were supposed to be more perfect than their counterparts in Indonesia, but I was left disappointed with the mosquitoes' laziness in sharpening their tools.

I have to admit, however, that Japanese mosquitoes are stealth-like: despite their dead give-away of when they commit their crime, once caught in the act, they fly so fast that one could hardly hunt any and kill them instantly. When I thought that I had killed one with a clap of my hands, I found out that it only fell down and tried to fly again as fast as they could. It was very difficult to kill them with bare hands. Indonesian mosquitoes, on the other hand, are a bit more sluggish. They also make the mistake of always making a sound (buzzing noise) when they are about to bite, which was like someone announcing that s/he is about to commit a crime and giving you enough time to get prepared for a defense.

Another difference that I have observed was that the Japanese mosquitoes work around the clock, non-stop, ad infinitum, day and night, night and day. In Indonesia, the pesky bugs only do their blood drawing at night time. During the day time, they take their siesta; maybe it is the unbearable heat and humidity all year long that cause them to be more laid back. They do work 24 hours a day, except that it is not continuous.

I went to Tokyu Hands (a kind of a mini Home Depot cum stationery store cum fabric store rolled into one) to purchase different repellants, and am trying hard to believe that the many ¥s (yens) spent on those items would actually work. There was even a hat net and a body net suit, much like those worn by bee-keepers, but come on, this is getting ridiculous. In my frustration, I asked my partner, "Where could they have gotten in except for the times we briskly opened the patio door to let the dogs in and out?" The answer came few days ago while I was pondering upon the Greek myth (this being the Olympic season) and thought about how Odysseus and his men had escaped detection from the Cyclops Polyphemus by clinging onto the belly of the rams. Right enough, when we were about to let the dogs in, we shook them, and guess what? Mosquitoes flew away from their bodies. Darn those literate Japanese mosquitoes! Where did they get a copy of The Odyssey?

Bicycle Happy

Tokyo is not exactly Beijing, where countless number of cyclists could be found wandering around town during rush hours. Nor is Tokyo like San Francisco, where on certain Fridays, hundreds of cyclists take over the downtown area in hope of raising consciousness in a city that could certainly afford to cycle more; but I do remember that once my city exploring left the confine of Shinjuku and into the other neighborhoods, I started seeing something I really enjoyed: mothers taking their children in a bike built for two; a girl giving his boyfriend a ride; a very old but sturdy lady (I am talking 70-ish) maneuvering her bike in a crowded alley.

At first I found it annoying that the cyclists (not "bikers" as bike here means motorbike) rode through the sidewalk. In some areas in Tokyo, the sidewalks are not exactly like those at Champs-Elysées, Paris. You can indeed find a broad sidewalk in the "Champs-Elysées of Tokyo," a.k.a. the Omotesandō-dōri, but when you get to smaller streets, the sidewalk could only accommodate two people walking side by side. That annoyance quickly dissipated as I realized that the city had not dedicated a lane for cyclists on the roads: only crosswalks have dedicated lanes for cyclists, but of course the pedestrians walked on those lanes as well. I still wish that any local government would look at Münster (Germany) to see what a dedicated bicycle lane should look like: In that small town, roads are for motor vehicles, sidewalks are for pedestrians, and in between them, cyclists have their own lane, complete with concrete pylons separating and protecting them from the autos. When there are no dedicated lanes, then it is understood that the cyclists could share the sidewalk, and they know which side to cycle so as not to hit any pedestrians.

When I finally moved to Tokyo in the winter of 2004 (February), I yearned for a bicycle. Going to Tokyu Hands or any bicycle shop is always a lot of fun because of the many varieties of available models. They have many bikes that could be folded in two, put in a shoulder bag (albeit a huge and heavy shoulder bag) to go; or those with a tiny little motor that could help you when facing an incline (the motor is operated with the help of a rechargeable battery.) The tires come in different sizes (and numbers! There is even a unicycle available for purchase!), from the tiniest (toy-like) to the biggest. I thought the smaller tires are for the kiddy bikes, but I have seen a lot of people in their 20s using these bicycles with small tires.

I was reminded of those parents who placed their kids in the seats behind them, and suddenly I was looking for a bicycle that could accommodate my own kids, the two dachshunds, Ptolemy and Galla. Once I saw a green bike with a huge, oversized basket and not at all proportional. The price was a whopping ¥15,000.00, I think. When I got close, I realized that they had called this bicycle "The Baker's Bicycle," and that basket was supposed to carry all the fresh-from-the-oven baguettes. The bicycle itself was a simple and a straightforward old-style bicycle.

Three months later, after seeing many different bicycles, at Tokyu Hands they displayed a bicycle with a dog (stuffed animal) in the basket in front of the bicycle. It turned out that this bicycle was made to carry a pet' it came with a very nice bag that fit into the basket. Immediately I had the staff take it down for me to inspect, but no transaction took place that day. There was some doubt with regard to the size of the basket, etc. The second time we came to inspect it, still nothing. Finally on our third visit, last night, we brought both of the dogs and fit them into the baskets (an extra basket had to be placed in the back if I wanted both of them to come along.) They fit perfectly, and so the bicycle had a new owner. The staff told me that all bicycles had to be registered with the police department, and the license would be valid for ten years. Fortunately, the department store took care of the registration, and it took a mere hour, a time that we passed on by having dinner in the same building.

On the second inspection of the bicycle the week before, we were informed that if we wanted this shipped, it would take weeks before it arrived; the packing and handling would take a long time. So, on the third visit, I braced myself and decided early on to ride the new bike with the dogs in it from the Shinjuku Tokyu Hands all the way home, which was rather far. Considering that this was my first bicycle ride in close to 20 years, and riding in Tokyo was not exactly the safest means in the world of cycling, I was rather daring. My partner decided to walk along with me, and he ended up walking one of the dogs while the other one rode with me in the doggy basket in front. The ride was brutal as it happened to be a hot and a humid evening, but the compliments from the passing crowd, upon seeing a dog in the basket, injected a sense of (delusional) parental pride; that, indeed, felt like a breeze to me.

The Golden Week

What a difference from yesterday: today is the start of the Golden Week, a cluster of Japanese holidays put into one week (albeit not necessarily starting from a weekend and ending on the next weekend). As an example, today is a day off for everybody, but tomorrow (Friday) is a work day. Then people are off again for few days in the next week. To me, this is like a mark into the summer season, much like the American Memorial Day is.

It is amazing how the usually busy Shinjuku falls silent around this time of the year. Make no mistake, there are still many people travelling in and out of the station, one of the major stations in Tokyo, but the number of people definitely decreases dramatically. In the vast public area a bridge away from the Takashimaya department store, one can walk freely without bumping into anyone, ever. The young people who usually sit around sipping their latte and checking their text messages are elsewhere.

There is a florist (La Palette) not too far from where I live. The staff work almost around the clock, catering to parties and businesses, and usually they close really late at night, seven days a week. It is therefore rather a new sight to see the business close for a few days. They, too, could use a break.

It is cool and sunny at the moment. I am thinking about going to Ueno or Asakusa...

Tokyo Weather

After a windy and drizzly Tuesday, Tokyo awoke to yet another gloomy day. With neither rain nor wind, the foliage in my garden stood still as if a willing model for a life painting. The two pots of lavender plants bought a couple of days ago now flank a low metal bowl that is filled with water, two fallen camellias, and a floating candle.

Oh, wait, the sun just came out.

Ah, too late; it has already disappeared again. Some Tokyoites said that the weather would go up and down three times before it finally settled into spring, but that stubborn rollercoaster of a weather has not yet decided if it wanted to remain in winter or to leap into spring.

The Hanezawa Garden

The Entrance to the Hanezawa Garden, originally uploaded by bloompy.

Our first impression when we saw the Hanezawa Garden from the outside was that it was a public park. The fortress-like compound, however, was too contained to invite outsiders to come in. Upon a quick entry to the complex, we realized that this was a private enterprise with nine enjoyments within: the Salon; the Sushi Bar; the Main Dining (serving French Italian Japanese cuisine); the Bar; the Cigar Room; the Garden Room; the Oriental Room; the Hanezawa Second; and the Terrace Restaurant (serving BBQ in the summer, from April until October, and shabu-shabu in the winter; all outdoors). The Garden Room, the Oriental Room and the Hanezawa Second are used more for private gatherings, available for rent at a cost.

In the Spring, when the weather was excellent, a lot of weddings took place here. Almost every weekend we could hear music coming out from the compound. Other than that, any other noise is provided by the weekend revelers who probably occupy the BBQ place, which is located outdoors.

Lunch at the French (French and Italian Japanese) restaurant is an excellent experience. Usually, during the weekdays, the place is teeming with ladies who lunch. I usually end up being the only man with a book in the dining room. Once when I came in, the room fell silent, the other ones probably wondering why I had strayed in there; but at another time, I saw a table of four senior men, enjoying themselves.

This Dining Room overseas a garden, which provided a nice vista during one's meal. During the day and in the summer, the beautifully manicured lawn are surrounded by lush vegetation. At night, the dining room is transformed into a cozy restaurant, with extremely dimmed ceiling light and lots of candles. The music they play tend to be contemporary pop and soft rock. Even sitting at the bar room next door, overlooking yet another side of the garden, was quite an experience in itself, especially during the twilights. The food never disappointed (more review at the following site: http://bloompyeats.blogspot.com).

For such a posh looking place, it was rather a nice surprise to find that the pricing was extremely inexpensive for Tokyo standards.

[UPDATED NEWS: December 20, 2005]
Sadly, the Hanezawa Garden has recently closed (December 17, 2005) due to aging facility. The architecture has been in existence since 1915. I have decided to keep the restaurant reviews in the Restaurant Review Section for sentimental reasons.