Day Thirty-Nine - 072806 - Lecture on Discrimination in Japan and the Hawaii Festival

Okay so in class today we had a special guest speaker named Professor Takita-Ishii. She gave a lecture on ethnic and racial minorities in Japan and the particular problems they face in terms of rights and in terms of questions of citizenship. in the lecture she outlined the ways that ethnic minorities in Japan, such as Ainu, Burakumin, and Okinawans, have been positioned in the context of Japanese society. Additionally she spent a great deal of time discussing the positionality of Korean and Chinese living in Japan. Following the resumption of Japan's independence following the 1952 peace treaty, the Chinese and Korean who had been brought over to Japan during the war were stripped of their citizenship rights and to this day are unable to gain Japanese citizenship rights, despite having lived in Japan for generations. This has created a particularly difficult and I would say, unjust, situation that continues to exist to this day.

Ironically, I had met Professor Takita-Ishii previously when she was a graduate student at UCLA. During that time I was an undergraduate student, very involved with student activism, and it turns out that she had received hate mail from an unidentified student in one of her classes. The hate mail was loaded with racial epithets and slurs and since I was involved with Asian and Pacific Islander activist groups on campus, I got involved in this issue. The letter had been sent through intra-campus mail, but no action was ever accomplished in identifying the sender. It just goes to show that racism is alive and well in America, even on such supposedly open and egalitarian places as a major university campus.

Aside from the lecture, the only other big event was that Yokohama was kicking off it's annual Hawaii Festival that week, with performances and the like (http://www.hawaiifes.com/). There was a performance in the mall that I passed by on the way home from school. Pretty interesting.

Day Thirty-Eight - 072706 - Kid Cops

Okay so it's been some time since I updated this site, but hey I've been kind of busy. But I wanted to finish documenting everything that happened on my trip.

So today was uneventful, except for a small fair that was happening in the mall, where the police tried to do some community relations work with kids and their families. So they set up a police car, and booths and the like and demonstrated police technology, etc.

Kids could ride on the small police bikes and dress up like police. It was actually pretty entertaining. You can see a picture to the right of some of these kids dressed up like police. All told, I don't think I can think of any situation where cops in the U.S. do a similar type of community relations event. They must do similar types of things though.

But of course, the police in Japan hold very different kinds of functions in Japan than in the U.S. Police generally don't carry guns. You can get directions and assistance from police. They are actually helpful. What a difference.

Day Thirty-Seven - 072606 - Apartment Redux

Well it looks like we got pretty lucky because the center staff were able to help me find a place that was much cheaper than what we had been anticipating. The location is closer and the place is furnished so that will cut down drastically on costs. The neighborhood is pretty lively and either way we would have had to walk up an incline, so it looks like things have worked out well. Finding this place will significantly cut down on our costs.

The place has two rooms, one with tatami flooring as shown in the picture to the right. One of my classmates from last year had been staying in this place until now so I was able to meet up with her and get a look at the place. It is spacious enough and has the amenities necessary so that it should be just fine for next year. We don't exactly need luxurious living anyways, and this place is not that shabby at all.

So as mentioned before I had been able to meet up with Tseng-san who was my classmate last year. We had all suffered together during our classes but the other three classmates all continued on through the year-long program though I wasn't able to attend that year as I had hoped that I would have. But in any csae, it was good because I was able to talk to my former classmates and get some advice on how to get the most out of the year-long program in the upcoming year.

As you can imagine I am both anxious and apprehensive about the upcoming year. I've never really lived abroad before, other than these two summer programs, so actually spending a year out here will be quite an experience. I've been dreaming about this for so long and to see it be so close to reality is strange because, well, it's actually happening, and now that it's so close, it makes me pretty anxious. Most of all, I think as long as I focus on my studies I can hopefully reach my goals. Uh, actually I have to reach my goals or else!

Day Thirty-Six - 072506 - Bicycling for Hiroshima/Nagasaki

Okay so today I went to Shinjuku-eki after class to meet up with my friend May-yi and some of her friends. On the way out of the station I bumped into a lady who had a panel display that caught my eye. I stopped to check it out and had a small chat with her pictured to the left).

It turns out that she is part of a small group of people, young and old that has been bicycling around Japan in order to raise awareness about the hibakusha who had been victims of the nuclear bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. She was very nice and I got to learn a little bit about her group and what they are trying to do. It was very inspiring to see people do something like this especially now, some 60 years later, when many people have seemingly forgotten the horrors of the nuclear bombings. For myself, as someone descended of survivors, it was a welcome reminder of why the work that we do as historians is so important, so that "we will never forget."

Afterwards I was able to meet up with May-yi and her friends. We went to eat and talked about school and the like. Afterwards, everyone went to meet with May-yi's exchange partner Masumi, but I had work to do so I had to leave early.

On a side note, while we were going to meet up we passed by a band that was playing on the top level of the Shinjuku-eki. The lead vocalist was actually quite good. I think that this is the website of the group: http://www.minxzone.net. Free concert!

Day Thirty-Five - 072406 - No New Pics?

Okay so today I didn't really do anything but study and sleep and attend class, so I don't have anything to report for that day except that, through the help of the IUC staff I was finally able to find and lock down an apartment for next year. Whew! It's much cheaper and closer than the one which I had been thinking about so I am very relieved that we'll be able to save some money on this. More on the apartment later. . .

Day Thirty-Four - 072306 - Home Again (Naturally?)

Okay so today I met up with an apartment rental agent to check out an apartment. Overall the place looked decent although the location was a bit far away from everything in a rather quiet residential neighborhood. The place is somewhat between Yokohama and Tokyo so it is on the one hand not quite convenient for either, but the benefits include the absence of key money, agent fees, and other such drawbacks that are normative in the Japanese rental scene. Overall, the place looks good and the main issue is that I have to commit pretty soon with my options running out fairly quickly. We'll see how it goes. . .

Day Thirty-Three - 072206 - A Picture Speaks a Thousand Words

Today I met up with my friend May-yi and her boyfriend Fumi in Ebisu. Sadly I was a bit slow out the door that morning, but I eventually met up with them and we had a nice talk over a lunch of curry rice at a nearby place. The food was pretty tasty I must say (but then again I was pretty damn hungry). Fumi, like May-yi is a graduate student in Anthropology at Harvard University, who interestingly enough, is studying Japanese perspectives on whaling. We had a truly interesting conversation on whaling and I learned quite a bit about the government and local perspectives on whaling.

Afterwards we went to the Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography (http://www.syabi.com/). It was great timing because they had just opened up a new exhibit there called "things as they are: World Press Photo 50th Anniversary." The picture to the right is of a panel of the people who put that exhibition together, which we were able to hear.

I must say that the other main exhibit, called "World Press Photo 2006" was one of the more depressing exhibits that I have seen in a while. The World Press Photo group (http://www.worldpressphoto.nl/) puts on an annual photo competition that honors the best works in photojournalism each year, and the exhibition was an exhibit of the prizewinners. I was constantly moved by the pictures in the exhibit, and can only say that the exhibit hall was very, very quiet. One photo that moved me quite a lot was a picture of a father in Pakistan holding his son while his son is getting his arm amputated in the aftermath of last year's earthquake tragedy (To see the photo, go to the World Photo news gallery and click on the General News 1st place winner). For some reason the poignancy and pain in the father's eyes really moved me and struck a chord. There were also many other pictures as well that were incredibly moving. An exhibition like this truly shows you the immense amount of pain and suffering that still exists in this world even in the year 2006, when we as human beings are supposed to have progressed so far. I would recommend anyone to check out the other highly regarded images of the exhibition online at the website listed above.

Overall the day was quite a good one (the utterly depressing exhibit notwithstanding), and afterwards the three of us sat down and had a beer in a nearby restaurant. We talked some more about our work and experiences and overall it was a nice opportunity for us to talk a bit. May-yi and Fumi are truly nice and genuine people in the field and I was glad to meet up with them.

Day Thirty-Two - 072106 - Dinner and the Lingering Smell of Smoke

Today, under the planning of Dennis, who I knew from the University of Chicago, we had a small dinner after class with Suzuki-sensei, one of the Japanese language teachers at the IUC. She is pictured in the picture to the left in the middle. Overall it was a fairly decent dinner, and a good chance to practice Japanese. There was only strange student there (out of the many at the IUC; Again, why are so many of the foreigners who study in Japan so weird?), but overall it was relatively decent.

I was pretty tired that day especially after talking to the real estate agent. The agency smelled like smoke, since some employees must regularly smoke inside. It reminded me of the old days when people used to regularly smoke in their offices. Such practices have become much less common now, but even as recently as 2000, I remember being able to light up a cigarette right in the Shinkansen and in many regular restaurants. These practices have changed somewhat though there are still quite a few holdouts.

Day Thirty-One - 072006 - More Apartment Hunting

Nothing much to say about today, other than to say that the apartment search continues. I set up appointments to see a place on Sunday and also to meet up with a rental consultant for Friday, so things are moving, albeit slowly. Thanks to some advice from my friends I have had a few interesting leads however.

What a royal pain. The thing that makes it hardest is my lovable cat. Finding an apartment that takes cats is the hardest bit of all, combined with the difficulty of even affording a down payment for a year rental in the end.

Day Thirty - 071906 - Yasukuni Redux and Women in Japanese Policy

So our class went to Yasukuni Jinja today and it was now my third time visiting this place. Strange that I of all people should be here again. As you can see in the picture to the left it was raining that day.

I've already talked quite a bit about Yasukuni before, so I need not go over it again. Suffice to say that I was able to check out some of the movies in the exhibits again and think some more about what the exhibit is saying and the manner in which it is saying it.

Afterwards I went to the Doitsu Nihon Kenkyujyo again, this time to hear a talk by Patricia Boling from Purdue University who in her talk asked the important question of "What role for women in shaping Japanese social policies?" or just how effective is the current womens' movement in Japan in the development of policy.

Interestingly there has been an opening in the government to develop avenues for collecting information and feedback before developing policies related to women's issues in recent years. These moves, however, as argued by Professor Boling, while in some ways offering avenues for policymakers to hear about the compexity of womens' issues (many of whom are blissfully unaware of womens' issues to begin with) at the same time serves to limit more militant voices from being heard, and also serves as a control mechanism, where the government in essence defines legitimacy in the political process.

Ultimately, Professor Boling seems to argue that much of the movement on womens' issue in recent years has been framed by less by the militancy of a widespread grassroots womens' movement, but more by the political preoccupation with Japan's decreasing birth rate, which has been seen as addressable primarily by making policies that would make it more amenable for women to be able to work as well as raise families. Boling argues that a large proportion of the female population in Japan has not been participating in the political process around this issue, though some questions raised in the following discussion seem to raise questions about the discreet micro-level family planning decision making going on in Japan (eg. women choosing to get married later or not at all, choosing to have fewer children or not at all, choosing either family or work), and the difficulty of assessing how it is that such often personal decision-making is in effect translating into political policy. Overall the discussion raised some utterly fascinating questions regarding the current womens' movement(s) in Japan in the context of recent developments related to womens' issues and other issues such as population growth, caregiving, and the like.

Day Twenty-Nine - 071806 - Listen to the Rhythm of the Falling Rain

Okay so it's been raining a bit lately. That muggy slightly warm Japan rain typical for this time of year. Okay so maybe it hasn't been that warm, but still, it's a different kind of rain than I'm used to.

To the left is the umbrella shaker installed in various businesses, etc. What you do is when you are entering a building, you shake your umbrella in the slot, so that you do not track in water into the building. Very smart, huh?

It gets better. Many places also include a rack like that pictured to the right. Using the plastic bags on the rack, one can enclose their umbrella in a bag, and by doing so, one has another way in which to avoid tracking water into a building. Neat.

Day Twenty-Eight - 071706 - Apartment Search

Not much to say today other than it was a holiday. Didn't really have any special pictures, so here is one of the moving walkway that I take to school.

Did I mention that finding an apartment here is a real pain? There are completely new forms of extortion in the process. Rekikin, or key money "gifts" provided to the landlord that are never returned. Shikikin , or security deposits amounting to two months rent that are also often not returned. Mysterious monthly Kanrihi (management fees) or Kyouekihi (condo fees) fees get added to the Yachin, or rent. Additional agent fees also get factored in. Also you'd better hope you don't get stuck with a Hoshoukin (guarantor deposit) or a Kaiyakukin (cancellation fee) to round it all out. I've had to learn a completely new vocabulary just to find a place, and the clock is ticking. All told it'll take several thousand dollars even for a dinky little place. Definitely not a fun process.

Day Twenty-Seven - 071606 - Yuji Ichioka Memorial Forum

Okay, so today I went to a memorial event for the late Professor Yuji Ichioka at Tokyo University's Komaba campus. Todai, as it is called for short, is generally considered to be the top ranked university in Japan. On the left is a picture of the gate at the Komaba campus, of which there are five campuses that make up the school (http://www.u-tokyo.ac.jp/index_j.html).

Yuji Ichioka, for people who don't know him, was the originator of the term "Asian American," and a pivotal figure in the development of Japanese American history. He wrote the crucial work, The Issei, along with numerous other works. A posthumous work of his entitled Before Internment was recently published through the hard work of Eiichiro Azuma and Gordon Chang. Eiichiro graduated from UCLA with an M.A. in Asian American Studies and a Ph.D. in History and is widely considered to be Professor Ichioka's spiritual heir. He recently published a very interesting and important book entitled Between Two Empires and is pictured above to the right.

The panel was very good and had both Japanese scholars and Asian American scholars reminisce about their experiences with Professor Ichioka. In the picture to the left is journalist and scholar Tricia Toyota, along with Masako Notoji of the Center for Pacific and American Studies (http://www.cpas.c.u-tokyo.ac.jp/indexjpn.html), with Don Nakanishi, director of the UCLA Asian American Studies Center standing on the far right. Having taken classes with Professor Nakanishi, it was very strange to see him outside of the UCLA context. Actually it was very funny to see a number of people out here in Japan.

For myself, I had a number of experiences with Professor Ichioka, since I took a Japanese American History class with him while I was an undergraduate at UCLA. He was indeed quite a personality, but quite intelligent and detailed in his lectures. His classes tended to be quite demanding and he would be upset with his students if they didn't prepare for classes properly. For his class I wrote a detailed piece on my great-grandfather using archival sources that I had gotten some time ago. It was a very useful and important class and he gave me important feedback on my work. As a student activist I remember having a very detailed conversation with him about the question of departmentalization of Asian American Studies, at which time he explained very concisely what it meant to departmentalize. Interestingly, departmentalization has now become a reality at UCLA (http://www.asianam.ucla.edu/).

After the seminar, another student named Emily and I went to go get something to eat and talk. I had known Emily from a seminar class that we had both taken at UCLA while I was still in the M.A. program and she also studies Japanese History. It was quite a coincidence to bump into her there and it was really good because we were able to commiserate about the state of affairs in Japanese Studies these days.

It is my personal perspective that many of the American scholars who study Japanese Studies would benefit by taking some ethnic studies classes or other classes that deal with race more effectively. The lack of a strong self-critical race analysis truly hampers the field and produces work that often re-creates the idea of the exotic, "oriental" other that critics such as Edward Said have decried for so long. Often I have seen scholars, even from elite institutions decry the state of affairs in Japan and project criticisms on Japan, without being critical of the U.S. and their position as white scholars coming from the most dominant imperialist country on the planet. Many of these scholars also fail to recognize American complicity in the way in which some aspects of Japanese society operate, such as the long-time U.S. funding and support of the LDP and other questionable interventions in Japanese affairs. It is a truly deplorable situation in the field, and I wish more Japanese American scholars and Japanese scholars would contribute to American institutions to help to provide more balance and a certain kind of nuance that is often lacking.

By the way, we had ended up getting some food in Shibuya which is the station in front of which the picture of Emily was taken. At this station is a statue of probably the most famous dog in Japan, Hachiko, pictured to the right. Hachiko was an Akita dog known for his loyalty to his master, and would go to the station to wait for his master even many years after his master had died. You can see some pictures of Hachiko here (http://www.welcome-shibuya.co.jp/history/hachiko/). He is considered to be an ideal of loyalty by many people, and his statue is a popular place for people to meet at.

On a lighter note, a Japanese friend of mine said that she thinks that the dog shouldn't be held up as this ideal but was kind of stupid for waiting for his master even when he wasn't going to come. She thinks the dog should have just gone home! Quite a funny perspective!

Day Twenty-Six - 071506 - Signs

Today I didn't do much but relax and hang around the house. I think I needed to unwind from the midterms and all that. We have a three day weekend this weekend because of Marine Day (海の日) on Monday. From what I understand this holiday was only started about a decade ago and is to show appreciation for the sea.

The sign on the left is of a crosswalk. I thought the picture, with two kids crossing was funny because it was so illustrative. It shows two kids, one a slightly older boy wearing a baseball cap walking a girl with a bow in her hair across the street.

I thought it was slightly more illustrative than the signs in the U.S. which shows people who are somewhat more neutral and more stick figure like although the younger stick figure is wearing a dress. Here is a picture to the right for comparison. Funny.

Day Twenty-Five - 071406 - Karaoke

Okay so today we had our midterms in class and surprisingly I didn't do half bad. I didn't exactly ace the test, but did an acceptable job. It felt good to feel that I was making some progress and understanding the concepts.

After class a bunch of us decided to go out and get something to eat. My energy levels were a bit low, but I decided to go along. A man's got to eat sometime right?

Anyways, we ended up going to a local izakaya so we could complain and commiserate, etc. The food was good and I had a few drinks of Awamori to settle my stomach.

Afterwards a few of us decided to go to sing karaoke and that was decently fun. I have a Japanese song repertoire of maybe three songs total, but I was able to try out a new song I've been practicing and I felt that it was passably decent. It's the song "Arifureta jinsei" by Spitz. Still working on it.

I should mention that for some reason they stuck us in the kids room, which had toys and stuff in it. In the picture to the left the stuffed animal attacks Jen, one of the singers. I know, we were a bit drunk.

Anyways, somehow or another we ended up in the arcade {again} afterwards probably because it's cheap and we're all students.

Did I ever mention the way that some of these video game players are freaking hardcore with their video game play? Check out the hands on the guy to the right. He was hitting the buttons so fast it was like his life depended on it.

Day Twenty-Four - 071306 - Ships and Dead Jellyfish Stank

So today again, I didn't have much to report on other than the fact that I had a lot of studying to do since we have midterms on Friday. At lunch I did walk around the Minato Mirai building and the picture to the left is of the nearby convention hall.

As you can see, the building is designed to look somewhat nautical like a ship in keeping with the general theme that Yokohama is such a well-known port city.

Inside the place, they carried the ship theme through to the inside, and as you can see from the porthole motif and banisters, it is meant to look like a ship. Wow. . .I know this is so interesting to you.

So on to the dead jellyfish. There is a nice park nearby that people can relax in (and which I would avail myself of if it wasn't so damn hot!). From the park, folks can look into the water and see the harbor muck. You can see a few jellyfish and the like. At one point I came upon three jellyfish that someone had put on some stones as seen in the picture to the left. It is hard to describe but the smell of those decaying jellyfish was immense. Who would have thought that something so seemingly simple would get so putrid and rank so quickly? Anyways, I quickly left that place and went back to class. School as usual was, well, like school usually is.

Day Twenty-Three - 071206 - Train Lines and Trash

I don't have much to report on today since I spent most of the day studying and catching up on my sleep (probably more of the latter than anything). In any case the picture to the left is of a trash can on one of the train lines. Why you may ask? Because it's something of a rare sight since it is difficult to find a trash can on the train lines or the subways at all. At most they usually have places to deposit cans and the like for recycling, but no trash cans. The reason that I had heard before was that back in 1995 when the Aum Shinrikyo cult set off those big poison gas attacks on the subways, that they removed most of the trash cans to eliminate the possible risk that someone would put poison gas canisters in them. At least that's what I heard, but I don't know if that is the exact reason or not as to why it is difficult to find a trash can around here.

On a side note, it is interesting to note that there isn't much trash strewn about due to conscientious behavior on the part of most people, and the diligence of the cleaning crews. Quite a difference from most American cities where people seem to think that the whole world is one giant personal trash can.

Day Twenty-Two - 071106 - Language Exchange Partner

Okay so today after class I went to Shinjuku in order to meet up with my friend May-yi who I had met last year in the same summer program that I'm currently in. I didn't even know she was here, but I found out that she was here through another friend in the program. In any case, it turns out that she has been exchanging Japanese practice with English practice with someone that she had met while she was here for the summer, and since she will be leaving in a few weeks, she has been looking for a new language exchange partner for her friend.

I had volunteered and so that's why I ended up going to Shinjuku to meet up with the both of them. I ended up going there a bit early in order to avoid the rush hour traffic and ended up futzing around in record shops for a while. Interestingly I happened to bump into a shop that specializes in products from Hiroshima, so I went in and browsed around for a while. I was able to pick up a few small bottles of Hiroshima sake as omiyage.

Meeting the two of them later, we went out to eat and spent dinner talking and having an enjoyable time. It was great to catch up with May-yi and to meet Masumi. She works as a voice actress and was very nice to talk to. We spent dinner getting to know each other, and when I return in the fall, I will probably be doing a language exchange with Masumi. Overall it was a great time and afterwards I made the long commute home by the Shonin-Shinjuku express train.

Day Twenty-One - 071006 - Keio University and Great Food and Company

Today after class we took a field trip to Keio University (http://www.keio.ac.jp/index-jp.html), and on the way I saw these kids in the station and took a picture of them. I like the way the backpacks are almost bigger than the kids. Funny.

Anyways, the campus was cool. There were quite a few students and it looked like a fun place to go to school. At the school we went into a classroom and were split into groups where we got to meet the students.

Most of the students were economics students and the like, but despite the fact that our fields were somewhat different they turned out to be pretty cool and we had some nice conversations. The teachers made us play a game that was kind of difficult because they were asking us questions about the campus, which many of us didn't know about. It did spur communication though. Afterwards some folks exchanged information, and so we'll see how that goes.

Afterwards, Jen, Elie, Paul, and I went out to get some food on the way home. We stopped into a Korean food place where the women who worked there were very nice. They even hooked us up with some free Kentucky Fried Chicken! Anyways, I ordered bibimbop, and we had some good conversations about politics, and the program, etc. It was a fun time and afterwards, I was glad to have had such a good meal. Jen is from Irvine, and Elie and Paul both go to UCLA, so it kind of reminded me of home. My L.A. hometown that is.

Day Twenty - 070906 - Birthdays

Okay so today I was supposed to do something akin to studying, and I did, but I also had a morning internet date with my girl which was fun, though I fell asleep during the movie, much as I would have done at home. How sad, huh?

Anyways, later that night, one of my friends from school was having a birthday and so we went out to help her celebrate. We ended up at, you guessed it, the Okinawan place down the street. Funny, ne?

It was a decent night, and we talked, etc. until a not too late hour. We're serious students, you know! So eventually we went back to our mansions, but not after successfully downing a tasty bottle of Awamori.

I was pretty tired, so I ended up crashing pretty early. Then woke up early in the morning to finish my homework. Typical procrastinator.

Day Nineteen - 070806 - Tsukiji, a Museum (or two), and a Shrine

Today me and some friends Erin, Elli, and Paul woke up bright eyed and bushy tailed to go to Tsukiji Market (http://www.tsukiji-market.or.jp). Well, maybe not so bright eyed. Maybe a bit more like, uh, did we really wake up this early in the morning to go look at fish? The answer: a resounding yes.

So we took a few connections, first by the JR line to Tokyo-eki, and then on the chikatetsu to Ginza-eki, and from there to Tsukiji-eki. Once we got there, we weren't quite sure which direction it was. So, we just followed the old guys wearing boots and carrying baskets, as seen in the first picture.

Inside, the place was a madhouse of people and machines. Guys on electric carts would zoom around us tourists like an obstacle course. Huge fish were being moved en masse here and there. Booths crowded the area, selling all manner of sea creature, the likes of which undoubtedly served as inspiration for countless horror movies. I mean seriously, I have never seen some of these sea creatures before in my life and have no idea what some of them were.

To give you an example, can someone tell me what this is? Okay, so maybe I've seen just a few too many horror/sci-fi movies, but I swear that I had just seen this in some movie attaching itself to someone's face. Or crawling around in a swarm attacking someone.

In any case, the market was great. It was something of a lesson on where our food comes from, since those of us in the big city are so removed from the actual process of dealing with the live animals that we end up eating. Once in a while a whiff of decaying flesh would drift by that occasionally made me a little grossed out, but I got over it pretty quick. I think I love eating fish too much!

Here is a picture of some unagi, or eel. Pretty bloody scene right? But damn they taste good over rice. Eating isn't a very pretty process unless you're a vegetarian. But then you'd be missing out on a whole heck of a lot. My apologies to all the vegetarians out there.

They had a whole warehouse room filled with huge fish that must have weighed a ton. From what I hear, the Tsukiji Market will not be staying at the present location for much longer as it will be moving to a new location. I hope that they do not change the market too much. The beauty of the market is that it seems somewhat industrial and is constantly rushing with activity. It seemed to me to be a cross between "Alien" and "Blade Runner" at times. Very trippy.

One very interesting sight concerned the tako, or octopus at one stand. Granted that the arms of the octopus looked pretty wild, but the interesting thing was a sign that the proprietor had put up next to the octopus admonishing tourists not to touch the octopus.

That they would even have to put up such a sign was a terribly funny reminder of the stupidity of many tourists. I can just imagine some dumb tourist going "Gee, that looks interesting" and then sticking his dirty ass finger into the bin to poke the tentacles or something. It's so sad. It's especially sad because I have already met many people who can't seem to escape being the "Ugly Americans" that the world loves to hate so much.

At one point one of the drivers that I was taking a picture of flashed me a "V" sign. It was the money shot of the day but unfortunately it turned out a bit blurry. But hopefully you can see it somewhat here. Also, check out the carts that they drive around on.

At the end of the trip we ended up going to get something to eat. And of course, some raw fish was definitely in order. From the picture on the right you can see the spread that I ate. The sashimi was extremely tender, but at the same time not very firm. It was very tasty though.

From there we split up and Erin and I went to go check out a museum called the Tokyo Kokuritsu Hakubutsukan, or Tokyo National Museum (http://www.tnm.go.jp). To the left is a picture of her in front of the Kabuki-za in the Ginza District. Erin was able to hook up some tickets for an exhibit of the Price collection, which is this amazing collection of pieces from the Edo period, that only rarely get shown in such a fashion.

Before I go on to discuss the exhibit, I should mention that the museum had my favorite hand dryer in all of Japan in the bathrooms. It is pictured to the right. What you do is that you dip your hands down into the dryer. A blower blows the water off your hands as you move your hands back up. By the time you move your hands up they are completely dry. This dryer is much more efficient than the typical dryers that you find with the round air hole that you have to rub your hands under. And it kills less trees than paper towels. Pretty cool.

Okay, so the museum exhibit as shown to the left in a surreptitious picture I took was really quite amazing. Much of the art focused on Ito Jakuchu, who was a rather interesting Edo period artist who experimented quite a lot with different techniques in ways that were quite unusual considering the dominant techniques practiced by many schools at the time.

The exhibit was incredibly well designed and Joe Price, who collected the exhibit insisted on using innovative lighting techniques to showcase certain pieces. Also, contrary to usual Japanese curatorial practices, he insisted that the pieces not be shown behind glass. This made for an incredibly interesting exhibit.

Afterwards, we stopped by the Kuroda Memorial Hall (http://www.tobunken.go.jp/kuroda/index.html), which was dedicated to showcasing the works of Kuroda Seiki, who was a very prominent and important Japanese artist, considered to be the "father of modern Western-style painting." I was a bit tired at the time, so I mostly sat and enjoyed the air conditioning. The art, however, was quite interesting.

From there, Erin and I walked back through Ueno Kouen to the station. On the way you could see where many of the homeless people in the park live. There is a picture of a typical camp to the right. There were quite a few of these camps there and they seemed to have grown in number since the last time I went to the park. At one point a number of homeless people were gathered together to get free food from a local Christian group that was proselytizing. Not that different from America in that sense, I guess.

We caught the JR line and then headed to Harakuju to go stop by Meiji-jingu to check out the shrine. We really wanted to see the goths who usually hang out there, but there weren't many there at all, except for a few. That was somewhat disappointing. Instead, they had a few musical acts, many of which were, uh, not so good. There is a picture to the left of one.

Eventually we went onto the grounds to see the shrine. For some reason I always like to go this shrine. While there we saw a wedding that was in progress and you can bet that those people must be pretty loaded to have their wedding at this famous shrine.

Here is a picture of some of the priests. It was good to visit and pay my respects.

But eventually we left and we decided to go towards Shibuya to get some drinks. We actually ended up walking from Harajuku to Shibuya which seemed like a long distance, considering that we had been walking all day, that it was hot, and that we were carrying these huge books from the museum that we had bought.

On the way we bumped into a very interesting protest that was going on down the street. It seemed that it was a student protest demanding a lowering of student tuition costs. I'm not quite sure which schools the students represented, but it seemed to be a very spirited protest. It was a very nice sight to see, and shows how little truth there is to the myth that all Japanese are just mindless conformists to society.

Eventually we made it to Shibuya, however, and had a few drinks at a local bar. Later we went back towards Yokohama, and found a place that had some good meat dishes and cooked up some beef and chicken yakiniku. It was a great meal to end the day and by the end, however, we were completely tired out. We had probably been up and about for at least 16 hours, and when I got home I quickly plopped down and fell into a deep sleep.