KYOTO

in fabulous kyoto, in the tiniest room imaginable: my bed touches 3 walls; i can sit on it & type on the laptop squeezed onto the narrow desk against the 4th. wall.  i must walk sideways to get to the window.  the bathroom is the size of a phone booth.  i thought it was a joke.  yet, it's a beautiful modern hotel, impeccably clean & well appointed, near the station.... and the most expensive hotel room i've had so far!  

last night masa & i enjoyed an 8 course ryotei farewell dinner that was out of this world, in the old part of town, in a private room in a traditional restaurant with beautiful music, decor & zen gardens.  in the morning we walked everywhere in the historic west side and in the evening we wandered around the ancient east side sections of kyoto, admiring the antique wooden houses and magnificent temples with zen gardens.   

i've got blisters on both pinkie toes that are so bad i don't know how i'll be able to do all the walking i planned in tokyo.  what a drag!  while i've still got masa for a few more hours i'm  going to get him to take me to a pharmacy to see what we can find to help me.  that'll teach me not to wear my pretty kashmiri slippers when i go walking in the city.  

so much to see & do it would take weeks to see everything on my list and also find the energy to go out to night spots, so i can admire the young japanese fashions styles & attitudes.  i saw a bit of that in hiroshima and himeji & hope to see more in tokyo.   yet whatever we've seen & done fulfills me so. 

i've got a seat reserved on the left side of the bullet train to tokyo this afternoon & hope i can see mount fuji, which was shrouded in clouds when we pased it last week.  

i also hope my hotel room in tokyo is a little bit bigger than this one so i can bend over to tie my shoes!

masa & i part ways today.  he's given me the trip of a lifetime which i'll never forget.  no one who doesn't speak japanese could do the countryside & mountain visits we did.  i'm forever grateful to him, my dear, talented, beautiful composer friend.  may he thrive & continue to do great work!  and, as i've taught him to say: zei gezunt!

don't know if i'll get on internet in tokyo, so this will probably be my last missive from japan.

sayonara!

MOUNTAINS

i'm high on a magic mountain, somewhere on the kii peninsula, having traversed a long, narrow winding road beside a wild, energetic stream, with waterfalls gushing from the mountain's heart at the top of the world.  steep green walls of forest & rock, perpendicular up and down on either side of us, with dark mountains in the distance and grey mists that melts into the sky.  logging & hydroelectric power; here & there exquisite wooden, pagoda-roofed mountain houses in tiny villages.  a tea house in the middle of nowhere, and nothing but tall misty mountains all around.  

we're staying this night in a ryokan with a healing hot spring they claim was hidden for a long time.  the dinner specialties are amago, a mountain stream fish sashimi style, and ayu, a river fish, grilled in salt, wild mountain boar & wild mountain vegetables served as tempura, sushi & in soup.  the meal is exquisite, with a dozen or more dishes & a small glass of the local alcohol, a mountain peach sake; the room overlooks a waterfall in the side of the mountain.  it's been raining all day.  everything is perfect.  i'm in a japanese landscape painting.   

masa is the best driver!  

so much more i don't even know how to tell it.  i'm in love with the country & the people.  in hiroshima i learned about article 9 in the japanese constitution, which declares the japanese renunciation of war & love of & desire for peace.  i'll copy out the article & write more about that another time.    

night has fallen.  right now i want to sit near the window & listen to the rain on the mountain.  it speaks a language i think i understand.

MORE IN JAPAN plus SOME NEWS

we've been crossing mountains & passing through tiny villages on perfect roads with no traffic - almost as though we are alone in japan - with occasional meetings with extraordinary japanese travelers who tell the most interesting stories.  too much for this email...  and the scenery - think of the old master japanese prints of mountains, forests, streams & waterfalls, mist covered landscapes, songbirds, and add the flooded rice paddies terraced onto the hillsides with water gushing down from the mountains.   ahhh, it's almost too much beauty to bear.

we came across a statue of basho at a mountain shrine.  yes, i have a picture of me sitting reverently at his feet, but i'm ashamed to say i left the camera cable at home so i can't download.  i'm using masa's mac laptop each night at the hotel but am unable to send my photos, which are pretty good, i think.  i'll send them to whoever wants when i return.

one of the many highlights of this journey is our nightly visits to the local hizakaya, a tiny country tavern, which we visit after checking into our hotel for the night.  the best ones are owned & run by an older woman, who pours sake & serves little plates of wonderful food, each thing a surprise that she prepares for us on the spot.  there are usually 3 or 4 businessmen at the bar with us & we all fall into conversation - masa translating, of course, although here & there a few words of english come out from the most unexpected sources.  people are so surprised to meet a foreigner in such out-of-the-way places, in the most remote regions in japan, and want to know about me.  and i want to know everything about them.  

i also had the best cup of coffee of my life at a coffee shop where the owner selected, sorted, roasted & brewed a perfect cup for us while we listened to bach music in the background.  

now, a new development: as we were crossing the snow-capped bandai mountains, on our way back to the sea of japan (and more raw scallops), masa got a call from an agent asking him to perform on friday the 21st. at a special concert in hiroshima.  what to do?  we talked about all the possibilities & i said i was willing to change plans & accompany him to hiroshima for the event.  he would have forgone it, but, i thought: how could i not?

so here we are, on the freeway, heading west instead of ambling north.  but what the hey?  i have loved & enjoyed every moment of our bucolic voyage for 10 days, & am certainly up to a change of pace & scenery - especially to see masa peform, something at which he is great.  and, fortunately, masa is a skilled man of the road who loves to drive.   after the concert we'll go to kyoto for a few days, then masa will put me on the bullet train to tokyo where i'll be on my own for 4 days until departure time.  i can't imagine a big bright city after the sweet tenderness of the japanese countryside, but i'm ready...  like i said, this is a trip of a lifetime.

more later.

MORE IN JAPAN

we're in the country, wandering over mountains & through valleys.  it's rice planting time, the paddies are flooded & studded with the tips of fine green leaves.  we've driven through tiny villages & towns in 5 prefectures so far, & stayed in a traditional ryokan in one of the oldest hot springs in japan, built on a river in the forest of the hanamaki area. right now, for a change of pace (& the luxury of internet), we're in the washington hotel in yamagata city - a business hotel in the top of a commercial hi-rise building, on the 24th. floor.  the city reminds me of grenoble, surrounded by snow-capped mountains.  i'm watching a cooking show on tv.  it was cold in the north but now we're in a heat wave.  whatever the weather, i'm happy & having the time of my life.  

i eat a lot of noodles & seaweed.

my japanese vocabulary has quadrupled!  4 words now.  masa patiently answers my questions & is taking great care of me, seeing to everything.  without speaking & reading japanese it would be impossible to visit this country.   all signs are in japanese, of course, no one speaks english, of course, & i don't understand a thing.  it was only by accident we discovered that international atm machines are located in the post office. - not in banks.  and i'm happy to report that all toilet seats are heated & equipped with warm sprays - in gas stations as well as restaurants & hotels - everywhere.   even in the ancient spa!  

and kitch!  don't get me started.  this is a nation obsessed with kitch. teddy-bears, fake flowers, dolls, knick-knacks, whatnots...  not a blank space anywhere.   and loud, garish pachinko slot machine palaces in every town. they love it.    

IN JAPAN

my mother always told me not to sit down on toilet seats when i was away from home but she didn't know anything about japanese toilet seats.  they are warm & inviting & when you are done with your business you press a button & get sprayed with warm water in strategic places, according to your desire.  this is a great pleasure!

 

masa picked me up at narita airport & then drove 12 hours directly up to the north of japan to a small village in aomori prefecture called tsugaru city. why? because he got a phone call from his friend, noriko, telling him the cherry blossoms were still blooming up there. we were invited to stay in the home of noriko, who took us to ashino park to see the magnificent cherry blossoms, which mean so much to the japanese. we traveled around the region, tiny villages on rice paddies, saw a shamisen concert, and a tachinebuta exhibit, and i ate the best scallop shashimi of my life. next day we headed into the mountains to visit a shrine & dinner at a traditional style restaurant, then to a spa with hot springs situated on a cliff overlooking the sea of japan. breathtaking views & great hot healing waters. we are in the most remote part of japan, with no tourists, or even cars onthe road.  it is all too beautiful & wonderful,  especially ｔｈｅ　ｄｒｉｖｅ　ｉｎ　ｓｈｉｒａｋａｍｉ　ｓａｎchi on the rocky isolated coast.  sorry, i'm having a hard time writing on the computer in the lobby of a hotel in the town of nashiro. so far i've only learned how to say thank you, which sounds like ari gateau.

 

Japan

Setting out again; Japan, for the first time. Organizing things in my apartment the way I want them to be when I return in three weeks. I do this every time I go away. There are deep, unspoken psychological reasons for this beyond the mere aesthetic, but now is not the time for that.

My friend, Masa, genius/composer/performer/ troubadour, has offered to take me on a road trip in the Japanese country side. We’ll spend ten days roaming around the coast of the Sea of Japan, stopping at hot springs, looking at mountains, birds, trees, Buddhas, and visiting small villages where Masa brings his beautiful music to schools & community halls, etc. How lucky I am!

Then, about five days in Kyoto & another five in Tokyo on my own. I feel foolishly fearless about getting around in cities where I don’t speak a word of the language and can’t read the subway signs, but know I will do it & enjoy it too. Thinking about temples, gardens, markets, Sumo wrestlers, No Theatre, sushi, ramen, izakawa, sayonara, madame butterfly, kame kazi, mishima, bonzai...

My flight leaves at 1 PM on Sunday, mother’s day; tomorrow, eleven and a half hours non-stop. I plan to watch all the movies I missed in the last two months, & take a pill. I’ve also got Karen Armstrong’s BUDDHA & the latest New Yorker in my backpack.

Masa promises to be waiting for me at the immigration gate at Narita airport. I’ll grab my small roller case, hit up an ATM, and we’ll be on our way.

Happy Mothers Day!