I Like Pigeons Because Nobody Else Does

We made it back on Saturday evening, after having made the 2800 mile trip from Pennsylvania to California. We had a fantastic trip and I’d do it again in a minute. I’ll fill you in on the details later, but here are some photos from late summer in rural Pennsylvania.

English-speakers, there is nothing wrong with you computer. This is in Japanese. 

ごめんなさい、　私は　長い時間　日本語を書きませんでした！　このごろ　　非常に忙しかったです。

二週前に　私のアメリカの友達は　日本に　来ました。　友達は　日本で　素晴らしい　時を過ごして、　日本人が　とても　優しいと思いました。私たちは　日光と箱根と東京とたくさん面白い所に　行きました。週の末に私は疲れました。　でも　素晴らしい　時間を過ごしました。

先土曜日に　Geneと私は　東京に行って、　ニュウ　サンオ　ホテル　に滞在しました。ニュウ　サンオ　ホテルは　アメリカの軍用のホテルです。　

たくさん　ともだちは　私の相撲の写真を誉めました。賛辞をありがとう　ございます。私は日本の文化の経験を感謝します。

今日　写真を撮るために　しょうぶ園に　行きました。

After the long day in Nikko on Monday, we decided to take it easy on Tuesday and visit Kurihama Flower World and spend some time with Godzilla who lives in a playground at the top of the hill. Since the Iris Garden was a letdown, I wasn’t expecting much for KFW, but we were struck dumb when we approached the entrance and saw a whole mountainside in riotous color:

You can’t see the full grandeur of this place through my crummy wide angle lens, but the field extends much further than shown in this photo.

The path on the right takes visitors to the top of the hill to a playground and Godzilla’s new home.

Back in 1954, Godzilla was aroused by the H-bomb test at Bikini Atoll from his long sleep since ancient time. His gigantic figure emerged out of the sea off Tatarahama at Kannonzaki in Yokosuka City. Four years later, he landed on Tatarahama beach as a concrete slide in his own image. Once in the movie so terrifying as a horrible monster, he, Godzilla, gradually gained popularity among children. Subsequently, he changed his figure into a slide, often surrounded by frolicking children on school trips. Later on, however, he was demolished in 1973, extensively worn out as directly exposed to the sea wind.

But he resurfaced, cutting a dashing portrait for the new millenium; he’s donned a fetching yellow bandana and holds a handful of doughnuts while crapping out kids all day…

In October 1999, Godzilla which had came back into life, landed on Tatarahama and went up on the hilltop in Kurihama Hana-no-kuni (Kurihama Flower Land), where he settled his own overwhelming figure as Godzilla Slide. This time, his magnificent body is no more made of concrete with cracks here and there but of much evolved stuff of tempered plastic. He towers into the sky above Kurihama in the very image of gigantic Godzilla as was filmed in the movie produced by Toho Film Co.

While out and about on a photography excursion one day, I found a hotel called Sagamiya overlooking the lovely rock formations and gnarled, windswept trees in Arasaki Park. A friend of mine sent me their website and it looked pretty swanky so I figured it might be a good place to take visitors one day. I made reservations last week, but the owners were a little concerned that gaijins might not be amenable to raw fish. I assured them that it would not be a problem since I am quite fond of sashimi and my visitors were coming to Japan with the intent to really get a gutload of culture. Bring it on I said. And they did, in a big way:

A beautiful boat of sashimi you might say…except that the lobster was still alive which unnerved us quite a bit. I could go the rest of my life without ever eating meat again and remain quite happy, but I may have to begin excluding fish also. I just don’t like killing anything and I pained me to still the lobster still moving. As much as I like sashimi, this was even a bit much for me. My Carolina-BBQ-eating friends from Raleigh and Greensboro were simply aghast that a restaurant would serve such a meal. Of course I’d experienced this before - multiple times – so I wasn’t quite as freaked out as they were. I think most Americans are so divorced from the reality of where there food comes from that many of them have no idea that they’re even eating creatures that were once alive.  I have to give them a tremendous amount of credit though because they soldiered through that meal like real epicurean pioneers. They tried almost everything and I was thrilled that they threw themselves into uncharted waters. Cultural immersion mission accomplished!

Yesterday was the second really nice day we had this spring. Today is the third.  I went for a walk up behind our building to the one and only log on this base. A favorite activity of mine is rolling over logs to see what’s underneath – you just never know what you’re going to find. A snake, centipedes, beetles, salamanders, slugs, whatever. This quest proved fruitless, but through careful observation of the plants along the way, I did manage to find some other interesting creatures:

a spider

An akashigame, Cydnocoris russatus. I don’t think there is a common name for this species in English, but we do have a variety of simliar species in the US. The Japanese name means red reduviid bug and it is a member of the Reduviidae family of insects which includes assasin bugs.  Don’t ever pick one up because they can deliver a hell of a bite:

藪下さん、この芋虫の種は　知りますか。　A caterpillar, I have no idea what kind:

A weevil (Ornatalcides (Mesalcidodes) trifidus) feigning death:

Here’s our place from the back. That’s Gene standing on our balcony but you can’t see him very well.

No students today…or yesterday.  The weather sucks, so I decided to take advantage of the light and go to a nearby place called the Iris Garden. This time of year the fuji (wisteria) are blooming and the Iris Garden is full of hundreds of vines laden with purple, pink and white fragrant grape-like sprays of flowers.  The Iris will start in a month or so.

Everybody freaks out over the cherry blossoms, but personally, my favorite flower here is the ajisai, or hydrangea. They usually bloom in June during the rainy season, but there are some white ones in bloom now. Not nearly as spectacular as the blue ones, but lovely nonetheless. I have some kind of fixation with hydrangeas. I think it’s because my Pappy had a big blue one growing behind his house and I remember always visiting it when it had flowers and of course some of my best childhood memories are from time spent with him. Anyway, seeing them just makes me feel really good in a warm and pleasant and sappy way.

 I thought those of you who’ve never been here might like to share in the delights of living on a Navy base. Here is it, unPhotoshopped, unedited, in its full-frontal horror and paralyzing glumness:

This is the main drag upon entering through the main gate.

A little further up the road…

I just love driving by a rusted battleship every day, inhaling the diesel smoke it farts out on a regular basis.

If you have kids, you’re privileged to live in this little slice of Shangri-La:

If not, your quarters are in a tower. This is ours. That’s my blue car on the left. Don’t laugh -it cost ¥30,000 which is about $260 and I’m going to sell it for more than that.

  There are hills all over the place into which tunnels and passageways were dug by the Japanese military when this base was first built. They’re all blocked off and concreted up, but I’d give about anything to get in them and explore. When we first got here I was driving around with a realtor and he told me that in one of the hills is a whole hospital from WWII. I don’t know if there’s any truth to that because the guy was struck me as being somewhat of a blow-hard.

Wait! I just found this on the Yokosuka Naval Base Historical Tour website:

Between 1938 and 1945 more than 260 caves in more than 20 separate tunnel/cave networks were built all over the base. There are more than 27 kilometers of tunnels and caves that we know of scattered in a hodgepodge fashion around the base. Many more tunnels are scattered throughout the city of Yokosuka. During the war, these tunnels and caves provided areas in which work could be done in secrecy, safe from air attacks. A 500 bed hospital, a large electrical power generating facility, and a midget submarine factory and warehouse were among the many facilities in caves around the base. During the war, more than 800 personnel actually lived in these caves. Each naval base department was ordered to dig its own caves, which accounts for the lack of an overall organization to the cave and tunnel system. In 1992, a complete survey of all known caves was conducted, and all the caves except for three still in use were sealed up for safety reasons.

No way! This is killing me! I’d love to explore these things!

stay off the stairs children!

On the opening page of the base tour website, it says this:

Now come on and find out about attractive and exotic atmosphere which you can only feel here in the City of Yokosuka.

Just kinda funny to hear American culture being described as “exotic”.

We went out for dinner last night with friends and are now suffering the consequences of the Japanese custom of your neighbor pouring your drink for you. When other people keep refilling your glass it’s kind of tough to track your intake. And of course there’s always the issue of being polite – if someone gives you something it’s a little rude to refuse – in any culture - so you just keep downing whatever’s in front of you. And that has resulted in disaster for me on more than one occasion. But don’t take that as a complaint, because we had a great time, as usual.

Friday’s weather was about as perfect as it can get; not a cloud in the sky and very low humidity. It was a great day for ume (plum) viewing, so I went to Zuisenji in Kamakura to enjoy the afternoon in the plum garden. Unfortunately, bright sunny days are not the best for photography because of the harshness of the light and I’ll need to go back another day next week for some better photos. I wish there was a way to capture the smell of an ume garden in full bloom because it is a singular and wonderful experience that can only be found here in Japan. The air is perfumed with the sweet smell of the blossoms, but not so much that it is overwhelming. It’s a fragrance that I will always associate with Kamakura.

For those of you in the northeast USA suffering in the ice, snow and bitter cold, here are some springtime photos:

I went to Kita (north) Kamakura station today, had a bowl of soba at a small restaurant and then walked to Kamakura station, stopping anywhere along the way that looked interesting. My intent was to see if there were any ume blooming in any of the temples. The white ones were in full bloom, but many of the pink trees had yet to reach their peak. In just a couple of days they should be open. I really love this 100mm lens. 

The squirrel is not like the north american gray squirrel. It is an invasive species from Taiwan and there are no native squirrel species in Japan. Believe it or not, there are also north american raccoons in Kamakura too. That information comes from a friend of mine who is a very reliable source. They rifle through his trash cans at night and are a serious pest. Both animals are escapees from the pet trade.

I had a hair appointment in Harajuku on Tuesday at 3pm, so I left the house at 9am with the intent of checking out Kappabashi, Tokyo’s kitchenware district. But I read the Japanese news that morning and found that there were sakura already blooming in Ueno Park. I figured I’d check out the sakura then head to Kappabashi Dori and then on to Aki’s to get beautified. The weather was fabulous – about 60F and full, warm sun.

Ueno Park has over 1000 sakura and 5 of them were in bloom in early February. I would not be surprised if that set a record. It wasn’t hard to find the trees – all I had to do was look for the crowd of people oohing and aahing (exept they don’t ooh and aah here, it’s more of an ehhhh) and snapping photos.

I was hanging out with the crowd admiring the trees when I heard a man’s voice yelling something with some amount of distress and anger. I turned and saw a tiny and toothless old man running up a hill into the trees chasing a large orange tomcat.  A second later I noticed a large parrot in a cage and deduced that the bird belonged to the old man and that the cat was stalking the bird.  A beautiful parrot sitting in the sun was just too much for me to resist so I approached the old man and said to him あなたの鳥は素敵です! (Your bird is beautiful!). That icebreaker worked because the man grinned at me half in shock that I spoke intelligible Japanese and I proceeded to have a conversation (I am sure I sounded like a 3 year old) with him about the bird.  The bird seemed to be very well taken care of as evidenced by his flawless plumage and outgoing demeanor. So I asked the bird 英語が分かりますか (do you understand English?). I don’t know what I was expecting but it certainly wasn’t for the bird to respond to me in Japanese…but that’s exactly what he did followed by a giggle that perfectly mimicked the old man’s laugh.

I hung out with the bird and man until I’d exhausted my limited Japanese and had to start repeating myself. There were a couple of Peruvian guys (for some reason there seems to be a lot of Peruvians here and I have no idea why) playing traditional music and singing so I sat down to watch them and stalk passersby with my camera. I’ve really been wanting to get better at taking candid street shots and Ueno Park is a great place to practice. Last week I bought a 100mm f2.8 macro lens and it has turned out to be probably the nicest lens I own. The sharpness and color of the photos is just unbelievable. I took a photo of the parrot that left me speechless when I downloaded it on my computer.  Although not the best compositionally speaking, the color and definition of the feathers just blew me away.  You can’t see the quality on the photos I post here because I have to shrink them for the web.

As I was sitting there taking pictures I was accosted by another old Japanese man who talked without taking a breath for 5 minutes at a time. His English was quite good and I was audience to a 15 minute dissertation on the advantages of smiling at foreigners and how sad it was that the Japanese crowd assembled in front of us couldn’t determine with any accuracy if the men performing were either Peruvians or Native Americans. He thought this was a terrible and embarassing cultural faux pas on the part of the Japanese. I refrained from telling him that I initially thought they were American Indians until I heard one of them speak Spanish so as not to cause him to think just one more person on this planet was a cultural clod.

I ended up bagging the Kappabashi excursion because I would have had to hurry and after enjoying the sun I didn’t feel like spending time in the concreted shade of a narrow street. I got some lunch and got back on the train to Harajuku and spent the afternoon in a salon chair trying to stave off thoughts of the ride home on a train packed full of salarimen.

It’s a good thing I had fun on Tuesday because on Wednesday morning it all came crashing down when Gene called from the hospital. “You’re not going to believe this” he said “This is the last place I thought we’d end up.” We’ve been waiting for weeks now to find out where the Navy will require Gene to serve out the last two years of his sentence. A year ago he told some Navy guy who was in charge of rearranging the radiologists that he’d prefer either Bremerton, Washington or Jacksonville, North Carolina, but aside from that he’s had no communication with anyone in charge of the decision.  I set myself up for North Carolina thinking that since Gene was a relative newcomer to the Navy, and given that he voiced his preferences, they would send him somewhere that the more experienced people think is crappy, like Camp LeJeune in North Carolina. Well, that “crappy” place is exactly where we wanted to go. I think it’s not high on peoples’ lists because there’s nothing there but redneck towns and forests – but that’s the appeal to me.

So I had myself all set up to return to NC this summer and had visions of returning occasionally to Raleigh to see friends and work at the wildlife center in Durham, exploring the Outer Banks, and spending lots of time in the pine forests of coastal NC. Stupid me. Back to the phone call. Gene continued, “San Diego”. I desperately hoped that this was just one more of his attempts to rankle me but he wasn’t kidding. I didn’t take it too well. The last thing I want to do is live in a city of 1,255,540 people. The second to last thing I want are neighbors. And the third to last thing I want is to live in California, where half the population is made of plastic and the other half can’t say much beyond “I’m between jobs. I’m writing a screenplay.”

Several people have tried to tell me I’ll like it. For example, a couple of them said they have a zoo. Zoos are prisons for animals. It’s not like a typical city, it’s spread out. Well OK, but there are still 1,255,540 people. There are all kinds of nice neighborhoods. Key word there is neighbors. Even nice neighbors are still neighbors. I don’t want to smell their stinking grill or listen to their kids or otherwise know they are there at all. After living in one of the most densely populated places on earth I want - no, I am in dire need of - solitude.

I realize I am most likely being prematurely negative, but frankly, I’m pissed off and it will take some time for the bitterness to subside…or it may just fester and rot me out from the inside and I’ll end up doing a Ted Kaczinsky. I really shouldn’t make this too difficult on Gene because it is a good career opportunity for him and I don’t think he’s terribly bummed out about it and I don’t want to ruin it for him…but goddammit, I’m so pissed off. Part of it is the fact that someone else is pulling the strings in my life. Some faceless guy shoving around papers on some desk somewhere who doesn’t even know that I exist. I hope I read this a year from now, happily slaving away at a wildlife rehabilitation hospital in the desert treating eagles and coyotes, and realize that I was all wrong, that I find that the Plastic People are really sensitive and deep and not the shallow materialistic bimbos that TV has made them out to be that there is something really charming about living in the middle of 1,255,540 people.

After all, I’ve lived among 12million people for the last 19 months, 1,255,540 people will seem like a ghost town. Right?