Shimanto Gakusha

So the second part of my little Nishitosa holiday was a weekend at the Shimanto Gakusha. It's a renovated school that now operates as an I don't know exactly what to call it--I guess a hotel or resort or something like that. It's very cool, a very casual place. Very much a summer camp feeling. As well as accomodation and food, they have a guided river experience every morning and evening, and a woodworking instructor and possibly, at busier times, other courses (they have instruments, computers, and a bookish looking classroom, so they're set to do many cool things).

Anyway, the best thing about it in my view is that they accept volunteer labour in return for food and sleeping space. Yay! I got a sweet little tatami room on the edge of the woodshop, all to myself (I was totally expecting a dorm situation). There was even air conditioning! I was also expecting that I might be doing a lot of work, but that wasn't the case either. I helped to serve breakfast and supper, portioning out prepared food onto dishes and arranging dishes on trays (each one exactly the same!!). That took maybe four hours each day, two in the morning and two in the evening. After breakfast, I did whatever light cleaning needed doing, and the rest of the time was mine! I also helped out with the cleanup after kayaking, but just because I was at the river and felt like it.

The first afternoon, I learned to kayak in Japanese which I have to say I'm rather proud of. I didn't crash! Okay, I cheated by already knowing how to canoe. But still! The Shimanto River has way more current than any place I've ever canoed, so it was a fun challenge. It also reminded me I really like paddling (I always think this every time I go canoeing, too; some time I should do something about it). I also went out for a kayak spin the second day.



Other than that, I wandered around the area, snapped river photos, read, and took a quick afternoon bike ride. A bike, a book, an ipod, and great scenery are definitely ingredients in my perfect afternoon. It was a really great experience--I'm planning to look for more work-for-staying-in-cool-places opportunities in the future.

The Shimanto River

Here it is!

This photo was taken from the bridge near the hostel I stayed at two weekends ago.

Japanese Word of the Day

暑い　あつい atsui
Meaning: HOT

Right now it's in favour as a greeting. ”暑い、ね！”　(Atsui, ne! It's hot, isn't it!) is the first thing after hello to say to anyone you meet. No matter where, no matter what the time of day.

It's so hot!!!!!!

Last Weekend in Nishitosa

Let me preface by saying that it is INCREDIBLY HOT HERE. I'm sure I sound like a broken record--I've been complaining about this to everyone I speak to. But it really is. Remember the conventional fire safety wisdom that if your door is hot to the touch, you shouldn't go out? During the day, my door is always hot to the touch. That is how hot it is. Eeeeeuuugh.

So anyway, last Friday at 4:00 AM (!!!!! for serious.) I set out with my neighbour and the other two members of her band. The Nudy's (that's the band's name) are all from Nishitosa, so they were looking forward to seeing family and friends as well as playing a show. We got to my neighbour's house around seven or eight. The band got right to practicing, and I got right back to sleep. They woke me up to go with them to their rented practice spot around eleven, and I spent the rest of the day being a hanger-on as they practiced and got dressed up in yukata for the show. I also went swimming with my neighbour in the (thigh-deep) stream outside her house.



Around three we headed to the area where Nishitosa Festival was being set up. It was a big lawn belonging to some kind of big building, right on the Shimanto River. A nice place for a party! It was the first Nishitosa Festival in ten years. There were several performanced lined up--some kindergarden students did a Yosakoi dance (not very skillful, but incredibly cute) and a local cultural group did some amazing drumming. Then there was some nice acoustic background music, followed by a short set from The Nudy's. Unfortunately, there was a schedule problem and they got abbreviated into only a couple of songs--after that, there was a live radio show. I would have liked to hear the girls play longer, and their friends and family definitely agreed!

Later, there was a bon-odori, a big circle dance. There's a special Nishitosa dance that has been danced for years and years(I forget how many, but a lot). I joined in.... much to my later regret, because a photographer from a PREFECTURE-WIDE newspaper snapped a photo of me dancing, and a couple of days later, there I was in full living colour. When I first saw it in Nishitosa, I didn't mind, because I figured it was local... but since I've returned to Kochi all of my students have been waving newspaper clippings at me. I will not post a copy here, because my dignity is already bruised enough! Hmph! Anyway, we stayed at the festival until it ended, and helped to clean up and take down the tents.

The next day, we went out for breakfast with my neighbour's father and older sister, and a former member of the band. It was nice to see her dad again especially--he played the father in The Face of Jizo when we put it on here in May. After that, the older sister very kindly gave me a lift to the Shimanto Gakusha, a kind of adventure-hotel-resort-hostel-thing. It's in a building which used to be a school, right on the bank of the Shimanto River.

And then I spent the weekend there, working for room and board, which I will write about in another post another day!

See you next week!

I'm going to Nishtosa village (population about 3000!) and a youth hostel on the Shimanto river for the weekend. Photos when I get back!

Akaoka day trip

Last Friday I went with a friend to Akaoka. The town is about half an hour or 45 minutes from Kochi by train. The train was the first awesome bit--we lucked out and got a "conductorless train" (but there was totally a guy sitting in the front, so what the hell) with a balcony-like outdoor space! So we spent most of the trip outside, getting blown away by train speed wind and watching the scenery.

When we got to Akaoka, we wandered through the streets. It's a very old town, and there is a lot of great traditional Japanese architecture. We were "OH ENGLISH HELLO"d by the lady working in a handmade/used goods store, and must have spent at least half an hour looking around inside, there was such a crazy amount of awesome stuff there. Old and new jewelery, obis (the ties for kimono), pretty traditional and modern sandals, old dishes and umbrellas, and even a couple of ancient and VERY awesome-looking cameras. I bought a children's obi to wear as a scarf, and was somehow given an umbrella... no, not just an umbrella. The raddest umbrella IN THE WORLD. It is neon pink and black plaid. I bless the previous owner who broke the curly part of the handle, thus enabling its being given to me many years later.

We also saw an old house than has been taken over by vines! Check out the pictures on my Flickr page; there are many! It looks like the house is TOTALLY FULL OF VINES but according to the neighbours, it's just between the window and the blinds inside. Anyway it looks creepy and awesome.

Then we made our way to the Ekingura, a museum of the paintings of Hirose Kinzou (known as Ekin). They're really dramatic story-paintings from the Edo period, and 23 originals remain in Akaoka. They're displayed outside for one night every year at the Ekin Festival, which is this weekend... but alas! I am not going.

And then we went one town over on the train, and ate awabimushi (abalone on rice) right beside the Pacific Ocean!

Trivial Things I Like About Living In Japan Episode 2

Particularly good pineapple juice.

Propaganda time!

The right wing in Japan is a little bit scary. They have these black vans that drive around, playing nationalist speeches and traditional Japanese music on loudspeakers. The music can sometimes be heard from up to two or three blocks away.

I wonder if it's an effective political tactic?

Japanese Word/Phrase of the Day

らっぱ飲み　(rappa nomi)

Literally, trumpet drinking; it means drinking wine directly from the bottle.

Please use it often in your daily life. (よく使ってください！)

Yeah, that was just showing off. So what!

Hanging Up 1 Million Cranes

I'm waaay behind with this whole blogging thing, so forgive me for posting a week late about what I did on the 30th of June, which is hang up a bunch of paper cranes. (Actually, I didn't do much--as usual, I wasn't entirely sure what was going on, so I did whatever I could see needed doing and then fell back on the convenient role of photographer.)

For the last 20 years, Grass Roots House and Peace Wave have been decorating one of Kochi's shopping arcades with 1 million origami cranes. The cranes are made every year by local elementary school students (and some old ladies). They're strung onto long strings, probably over a meter long, which are then hung on wire circles. Then the circles are tied to large bars in the upper reaches of the shopping arcade. The bars are lowerable using pulleys operated by button-push, and I am pretty sure they were installed just for the yearly crane hanging. The result is really beautiful.

And I think it's successful activism, too! The crane-making brings up peace topics in elementary schools--Mana and I made two recent visits to schools in Aki, in both cases to assemblies in honour of the beginning of the peace festival, and at both of which that school's contribution to the cranes was on display. I'm not sure if all schools do assemblies and the same kind of clear educational efforts as the schools we visited, but I hope so.

You mean... squid have eyes?!?!

A couple of Thursdays ago Mana and I went to Aki again to give another school presentation. On the way back, we stopped at a fish market. There were a lot of fish... mostly whole fish.

There were also cephalopods.

But most excitingly, there were squid! I had never seen squid eyes before. They are kinda cute, like cartoon characters. (Which came first: squid eyes or cartoon characters?!) It was exciting.

Canada Day Fireworks

Canada Day fireworks in Japan, you ask?

Yesterday I coincidentally met with a few friends who were planning to set off fireworks along the Kagami River. Unlike in Canada, small/medium fireworks are legal, and a summer tradition. I've seen young people setting off fireworks along the river a few times while walking there, so it was cool to do the same, and although I am not a big Canada Day celebrate-er, it was fun to accidentally do something special for Canada Day in Japan.

This photo demonstrates why fireworks might be illegal... but don't worry, no injuries!