Where's Ron?
Japan, 1 December 2015 - 24 February 2016
Ron near Rotarua, NZ, January 2015
Holidays, Train Travel, Meals and Other Small Events Like Earthquakes
9 January 2016
Afton, Virginia, USADear family and friends,
While Ron worked on mastering the intricacies of the Japanese train system, I'm enjoying the New Year at home. On New Year's Day we had our traditional gathering, once a progressive dinner (moving from house to house for different courses), but now a "stationary progressive" because in our semi-rural area we spent too much time driving between houses and not enough time eating and socializing. Everyone brings one (elegant and/or festive, of course) savory and one sweet. There are 12 of us in the original group - we've been doing this for so many years I've lost count (20? more?), 11 in the years Ron is traveling, plus a varying assortment of grown children, out-of-town family/friends, etc - 16 of us this year.
After December's record-breaking warm temperatures in the mid-Atlantic, we are finally having seasonal temperatures, days in the low to mid-40sF (5-7C) and nights well below freezing. It was very bizarre to have spring things (forsythia, cherry) starting to bloom in December, and here in Nelson County, a big orchard area, we are all hoping the apple and peach trees that were starting to bud out will survive the cold of the remaining winter. Looking at the weather, I note that Ron's temperatures in Fukuoka are generally running 5-10 degrees F lower than ours in Virginia. So much for him getting away from winter!
Love to all,
Ellen
Holidays, Train Travel, Meals and Other Small Events Like Earthquakes
9 January 2016
Fukuoka, JapanHello, my dear,
I like to try making the distinction between a traveler and a tourist and find my current style somewhere in-between the two. Generally speaking when I used to travel by bicycle or backpacked through South America I considered myself a traveler. And when you and I rented a car in Portugal and New Zealand I felt more like a tourist. But as a traveler I want to see interesting and historical places and things and as a tourist I still want to meet people and experience the country as a local would. So nothing is all black or white.
Before coming to Japan I bought some rail passes, and have now activated and used the one week rail pass for JR (Japan Rail) West, which includes the Kansai and Sanyo areas, generally starting at the Hakata Station in Fukuoka and going East across the next island to slightly east of Kyoto. While it is east of Fukuoka, it is the area west of the Tokyo area, giving it the name. (I also bought a couple of 21 day rail passes which include most of Japan which I will start using next week). Living in Fukuoka and taking day trips on the train to several places is my attempt to have the tourist and the traveler experience.
JT and some others have asked: Why Fukuoka? My main plan was to rent an apartment on AirBnB and stay in one city in order to meet people, because from my reading I thought it might be difficult to make friends in Japan, and it looked to be very expensive to travel around as well as difficult because the signs are written in Japanese characters which I would never understand. So to maximize both types of experiences, I wanted to pick one city. Which? Alice recommended Kyoto, I had picked Osaka, and Harry made me reconsider, and his friend from Japan recommended two, one of which was Fukuoka. I decided I didn't want to live where all the tourist go, and as I read about Fukuoka I liked it more and more, especially for the weather (most southern with almost no snow) and not a center of Western tourists, but friendly to foreigners. Perhaps there was no "right" or "wrong" choice.
Now that I have made train trips to Osaka, Hiroshima, Kobe and Kyoto (twice) I don't know what the best decision would have been. Osaka was too large and congested. Kyoto and Hiroshima had lots of western travelers. I loved walking around in some of the older parts of Kyoto, found a vibrant life in Kobe (my favorite walking around city), liked the smaller size of Hiroshima, and feel at home each night I return to Fukuoka.
Train travel has been easy as well as more confusing. On the JR West pass, almost all of my trips were made on the Nozomi Express, which when I use the national pass, I can not use the Nozomi Express but can use the Shinkensen which I could not use with the JR West Pass. And although the Nozomi goes to Kyoto, I had to transfer at Osaka to another local JR Train which was slower and disturbed my sleeping. On the last day I wanted to go to Senzaki, a small town on the China Sea and close to Fukuoka but if I used the JR trains I would not get there until mid-afternoon and was not sure I could return the same day, and to arrive early I would have to use local non-JR trains which were also slower. So I gave up and looked for another small town, and then used Google walk to see what they looked like. I wanted a small beach town, but all the ones I could find seemed to have made their coastline a major industrial zone. So I am still looking for small towns to visit. Maybe I will return to Yanagawa. And I want to go south and see Allen's cranes.
With the rail pass you get a card to show which gets you through any JR gate and allows you to get on most JR Trains, with a couple of exceptions. There are large sign boards (lights) which announce the train numbers, track number, how many cars, which cars are for unreserved seats, and departure time (which is almost always correct to the minute). Perhaps it costs something extra for the Japanese to get reserved seats because there are always lots of people for the cars without reservations. But the Rail Pass holders can get reserved seats at no extra cost. I also like the reserved seat tickets because they provide all the info about the train: track, departure time, car number, seat number and arrival time (useful to set my phone on vibrate so I can sleep and be woken up to get off) and the number of cars in the train, needed to figure out where to stand to be at the door of the car number on the ticket. With the reserved seat I have always been able to get a window seat and usually had an electric plug.
My portable Wifi now works, is unlimited and strong and fast enough to download Democracy Now!, but I still cannot send mail from Mozilla Thunderbird (my main communication tool) and cannot watch or download the video of my grandson as St. George on the North Branch School site, a Word Press blog. Thunderbird is being blocked by a Japanese IP address, which is not related to my portable Wifi.
My social life is getting busier and more rewarding. Ali, my Italian restaurant hostess, her husband, Yosuke, the dance teacher and her sister took me to the restaurant where her sister's fiancee works. It is a chain and her sister works for the same company but at a different location. It was a remarkable experience and I hope I can give you a sense of what it was like. First we were given our private room. There was a table top burner for cooking, and at first glance it looked like a low table with padded seats on the floor - but what a pleasant surprise when I put my feet under the table and discovered there was a lower floor under the table allowing for me to sit in a normal [Western!] position.
First there were drinks and I had a glass of white wine and a glass of Sochu with Lemon Soda (very pleasant). As the dinner progressed I asked some questions and made some notes. The first plate, one at each end of the table, looked like very thin slices of tuna or salmon type fish but I was told chicken breast. I thought that was going too far with the raw foods, but it turned out to be smoked chicken which you dipped into a small dish filled from a nice blue pitcher on the table containing soy sauce and vinegar. It was very delicious. There was also a small round bowl with cod roe on top of a small piece of something white, which I understand was white yam, and some egg plant (which I can not say how it was prepared but excellent). Somewhere there were some slivers of white union and some kind of red sprouts. There was also a plate of tempura chicken which was dipped into a mixture of salt and pepper. At some point another side dish arrived with small pieces of something deep fried which I was sure I was not understanding correctly as chicken cartilage. I tried one and realized I had heard correctly. Crunchy and not bad but I thought tasteless except for whatever coating was used to fry it. We talked about them eating everything - but I didn't see any chicken feet.
The restaurant staff was very ethnically mixed, including a waitress from Nepal, and the cook of the next course, chicken soup, was from Burma. She placed a very large cooking bowl on top of the electric burner built into the table. Perhaps some of you will remember my evolution of chicken soup from Peru when I lived on a chicken farm to Vietnam where I had pho with chicken and nuoc mam [fish sauce], and Thailand where it was made with coconut milk and China and Indonesia where it was made from fish stock. I am sure this will change my chicken soup again.
The cooking bowl was filled with a very thick rich chicken broth made in a factory from only chicken legs and shipped daily to the restaurant (I asked). To the broth were added pieces of chicken legs, hearts and liver, cabbage, long white mushrooms (which looked like noodles with little caps to me), glass noodles, large leeks, tofu and the skin of the tofu which was considered a delicacy. From a long narrow dish of minced chicken, egg and Japanese yam she used a small wooden spoon to make take a spoonful and roll it around to make a ball and then drop it into the soup. There were a lot of chicken balls. There were small narrow drinking cups which were filled with the chicken broth and a tiny spoon used to add salt (maybe pepper) and a small spoon of very thinly sliced green onions. This you drank and refilled as the soup was cooking. (I could have drunk large mugs of this soup.)
At some point, she started with a large flat spoon to collect and remove anything solid still in the soup bowl, then she added rice, raw eggs, cooked it for a while and then served the second chicken soup. This was served in a bowl held close to your mouth and eaten with chop sticks and drunk from the bowl. There was a something light for dessert but I can't remember. Afterwards we walked back to the Italian restaurant and had something to drink. I had a cup of Assam black tea with brown sugar cubes. I was not allowed to pay for anything. What a pleasant dinner and evening with wonderful friends. Next they are talking about a sushi party in February.
And tonight I went to visit Yosuke's dance studio and watch him give dance lessons. Tomorrow there is a concert at 11 pm that looks like a combination of soul and hip hop music. And Sunday I am being picked up in her car by a Chinese lady I met at the language group dinner to drive up the coast to where we are going to eat cooked oysters. And I am now planning my trip to Tokyo and a city to the south. You know as much as I do about these events, but I will tell you more in my next report.
There are a couple of tidbits I would like to add. I think it was on Dec 12, late, when I was in my apartment and I had the sensation of the building making one large movement. I went into the hall and looked out my windows and nothing seemed to have changed in the activities. The next day I asked a friend and was told there was an earthquake. Nothing else was known and it was just like a normal event.
While I expected New Year's to be a big event, it was not. Reminded me of Tet in Vietnam when everything closes down. Not quite that bad but a lot of places were closed. This time is like our Christmas, when everyone gathers and celebrates with their family. Christmas appears to be the biggest dating night in the country when couples take romantic trips (to the best of my knowledge - anyone have additional info?) I used this period to make my train trips since my social life was going to be rather quiet.
Missed being at home for the annual New Year's dinner and the Christmas Dirty Santa book group party. Maybe next year I will spend the Holidays in Afton.
I am finding my time to be a good adventure but I expect it doesn't make much interesting reading, and I would be happy to just stay in my apartment for a few days to read, cook and sleep.
Love and miss you,
Ron
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Last updated: 23 January 2016
