Time To Unwind In Tokyo

20th August, 2010 - Ok - first things first.... I admit I haven't been posting many new blog entries of late. There's a reason - several. Firstly - had child #2 (kind of changed priorities), second - have been holidaying in Japan (yeah - ninth trip... man am I behind on my posts), and third - there's some big news which you can read about on my sister blog (Raising Adelaide). Anyhow - I'm back at home - busy as usual, but I want to get stuck into these posts. Real quick.

So where were we - oh that's right - Odaiba. We had a totally full-on day there, T-chan with her friend, and me with L-kun visiting all the different and very interesting things (in the middle of a very hot Tokyo summer day). After the end of the day, we decided to visit another old friend. But I won't spoil the surprise. First thing we did was jump on the Tokyo Monorail that stops at Odaiba, and wound our way to Hamamatsucho. The monorail is a slightly expensive, but a worthwhile experience in Tokyo... 470 yen will take you end to end, from Haneda Airport to Hamamatsucho.

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Only 1 minute after getting on the Monorail, L-kun was fast asleep... we got off at Takeshiba Station and found a quiet place to sit down by the harbour, watching the boats come and go. L-kun slept soundly in Mum's arms for an hour, whilst Mum and Dad had some quiet time together. It was a strange afternoon - but amidst the hustle and bustle of the trip, and especially of the day - it was great afternoon break together. Just goes to show that for all the excitement of sight-seeing in a big city, sometimes you just need to sit back, relax and unwind.

Bon Odori - Dancing Through the Veil

14th August, 2010 - Every year, come the middle of August - at least in Hokkaido - something mysterious happens. It's known as Obon, one of the most important ritual festivals in Japan (outside New Years). It's traditionally associated with the return of the spirits of the departed to the world of the living for 3 days of the year (typically the 13th - 15th of the month, but more on that at the end). It's an important part of Japan, yet, I had not experienced it before... and was kind of curious. The original plan involved going to the city to see the Bon dancing in Odori Kouen, however, it was a big day, so we instead decided to have a look at one of the local dances in the neighbourhood. Disorganised as normal, we missed the start... just...

Now I'll give a quick description of the popularly believed Buddhist origins of Obon (as sourced from the Shingon Buddhist site). I say believed, as obon, like Christmas, is most likely an amalgam of different meanings. The day almost certainly takes its name from the Buddhist Urabon Sutra - which itself is a transliteration of the sanskrit Ullambana and which means to "hang upside down". This sutra tells a story of Mokuren Sonja, one of Sâkyamuni Buddha's disciples whom had supernatural powers (of course) which he used to find his deceased mother... only to discover that her soul had fallen into the world of Hungry Ghosts and was suffering immense pain. He then asked Sâkyamuni for guidance, to which he was told to make offerings to the priests coming back from their summer retreat. Which he did, with the result: - problem solved. [At this point in the story, I do pause and reflect on the commercial acumen of mystics back in those days... nice one Buddha!].

It's actually not that easy to find reliable info on the web [the irony of this statement does not escape me], but according to one of my books ("Japan: How We Breathe & How Our Hearts Beat"), obon's origins were in fact found from a much older seasonal tradition. Indeed New Year and Obon marked the transition between two halves of the calendar, and both involving ancestor worship and the offering of crops for thanks and for prayers. It was supposedly later that this was combined with urabon-e, and combined with the Chinese traditions of filial ties. Yet still, at it's heart there lies the tradition that like the Chinese Ghost Festival, or even Samhain (one origin of Halloween), for a short time the veil that separates the living from the dead is lifted. In this case, thankfully only for the spirits return home, to be honoured by their family. Indeed, obon remains a time when families return home from all over Japan to be together.

The dance, bon odori, originates as a welcome to the ancestors spirits, where the dancers would visit homes of people who had deceased during that year. I've also read that the dance may have originated from the buddhist monk, Kuya Shonin in the Heian period, but really the custom that we now know became popular in the Edo period... in fact was so popular and grew to such extravagance that the dance was officially banned between 1673-81 AD. 

The dance itself involves a large open space, in the middle of which is constructed a tower or yagura, upon which the musicians (and drummers in particular) are positioned. Around the yagura are a number of concentric circles, along which the participants dance. The dance is slow, rythmical and often based on local traditions... for example in Hokkaido, the fishing song Soran Bushi is apparently popular (though I can't recall it at this bon odori).

The following video is a bit of a grab-bag of the dance. Unfortunately the video is pretty crappy - apologies for that - but you get a bit of a sense of the music and the movements at our local bon odori. Actually, this was about the end of our videocamera, that just died in terms of it's autofocussing. Perhaps the spirits of the dead didn't appreciate my camera skills [insert spooky music here]...WOOOOoooooohhh.

It's a community event as much as a religious one... and indeed it's perhaps moved beyond religion to be just another thread in the fabric of Japanese life.  It's also a family occasion with lots of small children with the their parents. And indeed the first part of the evening is dedicated to them with fun and games (and even giveaways to the best child dancers). 

It's nice to see the yukata, or summer kimono, which is often worn out to special events such as this (and especially to fireworks for some reason).

Apart from the occasional yukata - worn predominantly by the very young and the very old - this was a fairly casual neighbourhood events. It's not quite to the standard that you will see in some areas, but I sort of think that's not important. Instead it's a occasion to bring community together - and I have to say that the dance itself is not unlike the mass-hypnotic dances that you might read about in tribal areas.. it is quite repetitive (in a good way) and quite rhythmical. The beat of the drum stirs something in your heart - even if your not Japanese.

I'm not sure if this is something new - but there was a fairly large emphasis also places on best costume-style awards. Not unlike a Halloween influence. And I have to admit that most of the theme costumes escaped me... for example the person that dressed up as what I think was a Stonehenge megalith. I'm not sure why, but they deserved a prize just for wearing that on such a hot night. And given that it's in the middle of a hot Japanese summer, there's always lots of beer being consumed. So it's quite a lively social event, at least in the neighbourhood. 

And of course - there were other strange costumes being worn. For example some gaijin fool and his child decided to dress up in their jinbei - a traditional summer clothing in Japan, but not the sort of thing you'd see someone wear down the street... let alone in front of hundreds of people. I'm sure most of the people were wondering what the... especially when the two of them started joining in the dance. Ah... what fools... But of course, that's me. And always the shy type, it took a lot of encouragement (yet surprisingly no amber courage) to get me up. Even though we stood out like sore thumbs (even amongst the megaliths) I didn't once feel out-of-place, and indeed I think the festive mood was just positive all around.

Now I have to admit something - until recently (about 5 mins ago) I had assumed that obon was celebrated at the same time everywhere in Japan, but when they switched from a lunar to a solar calendar (way back when...), the nation split on when to recongnize obon - with some areas having a July Bon (especially in Kanto region), others celebrating it in mid August, and even others maintaining the old lunar calendar timings. Supposedly, one of the reasons why obon was held in August was due to heavy farming workload in mid-July that didn't leave any time for preparation. It just goes to show that after many years of going to Japan, that you still can be surprised by things... and no matter how much you think you know, the country defies being defined by any one person.

As the evening wore on, there were less and less people, but as we left, I had the feeling that there was going to be dancing well into the night...

So - obon, and bon odori may not be the flashiest of events once you get into the neighbourhoods... but I suspect that this is where the true heart of bon odori lies. I'm not sure that the veil between worlds was lifted, or that our music and dance welcomed any spirits. It certainly awoke the spirits of those that danced though. And even to this day (over a year later) my son still sings the music (cha-cha cha chan-ko-chan...). And he's not the only one. 

Food Faux Pas... Or Just Faux Parfait?

7th August, 2010 - My family had popped into one of the Aeon shopping centres in Sapporo, and were thinking about having lunch - and that's always a pleasant though at times confusing task. Always so many options - especially when you stand outside a row of shops each with their foods on display. And it got me thinking of why is it that Japan seems to be largely unique in this tradition. And reminds me of when I first came to Japan, in 2003, and didn't have any idea about anything. It's embarrassing, but I didn't know it was all fake. At least most of it is... I can still recall going past one little cafe which had some pasta dishes out... and T-chan was explaining to me that it was all fake. To prove it she stuck her finger in the dish to show it was plastic. It turned out to be real... oops. Now that's embarrassing - a food faux pas? Maybe, but it's also a rare exception.

Most cafes have displays out the front, which are known as shokuhin sanpuru or food samples. They pretty well tell you all there is to know about the dish, and are a god-send for foreigners who are unfamiliar with Japanese (or Japanese food for that matter). Though most make ordering easy, some can also be a little harder to interpret  such as spicy hot (karai) foods.

It always amazed me how much attention to detail there was in these food displays. Most of them literally look good enough to eat. All they need is to invent the perpetual smell, and it would be perfect. But one question kept coming into my head - why? Was this really about making foreigners lives that much easier? Actually, it's quite an interesting tale; which I can't hope to justice - but will try. [Note: the best sources of info I found on the net was from an Asahi Shimbun article by Chisato Yokota, a really good post by Steve Edwards on SeekJapan, a great newsletter from Yoko Howes , and an interesting expose by Japan Times by Yoko Hani - drop us a line if you know of others].

Now the story goes something like this, the practice of creating fake or display foods originally started around 1917 in Tokyo, with the fake foods being created out of wax. By the mid 1920's these wax creations were being used by a restaurant as a means of cooking up some extra business (bad pun I know). Apparently, it worked. Then along comes the manufacturing entrepeneur Ryuzo Iwasaki, who developed a technique for producing fake omuraisu in Osaka in 1932. Strangely he had been initially attracted by the anatomical models that were being made from wax around that time... I'm just wondering how differently things would have turned out if he'd remained fascinated by the anatomical models - choosing doctors by the organs they displayed out the front of their surgeries? Er... food was definitely a good commercial move Ryuzo! Indeed, the popularity of food displays is often attributed to the sudden influx of foreign foods into Japan, and the need for a universal language... the WYSIWYG of the early twentieth century. That may or may not be true, but I don't think that it's something that modern day Japanese would give a second's thought to.

It was a great success, and started the Iwasaki fake food company. From those humble beginnings it turned into an industry worth billions of yen per yer. With cash in pocket, Ryuzo returned to his hometown of Gujo in Gifu prefecture; where a significant gathering of fake food companies have been established. The question remains - why? And more importantly, why don't other cultures use the same methods? According to one Japanese writer, Nose Yasunobum, this comes from a Japanese trait to eat first with the eyes... the reality however is that if you were to ask most Japanese why, they would shrug their shoulders as if you were asking why the sky is blue. Whatever reason, it is now a cultural norm - and one which is convenient for so many travellers to Japan.

It's hard to conceive of just how many of these displays are made - I mean after all, the sheer number of restaurants/cafes in Sapporo alone are countless... then if you consider the main cities of Tokyo, Osaka and Nagoya - it's hard not so see how big the industry has become. Yet for all of that, this food is designed to achieve one thing only. To make the shops food look more appetising than anything else you're going to see. I guess it's also somewhat of a status symbol... the nicer the displays, the nicer the impression of the shop. Of course, if the food doesn't taste as good as the advertisement looked...that's a different story. And yes, over-sell definitely occurs in the food-display business as well. But that's a testament to the power of suggestion, and the desire of the normal punter to want to believe in finding the perfect hamubagu, tonkatsu, omuraisu or parfait. Don't we all deep down want that?

Apparently these faux food displays are not only used in shop-fronts, but also in advertising... as they allow a higher degree of photographic freedom and "consistency". They don't melt. Not the best advertisement I would think if people realised that the fake version looked better than the real thing. The thing is, that these fake foods often have to be assembled with the same sorts of skills and techniques as the real things... and often the best makers have strong cooking backgrounds as well.

You can buy fake food displays off-the-shelf (see below), but the best ones are customised in terms of how the shop actually makes it's food, from the dishes, to the ingredients and style employed. This starts with moulds being made of actual dishes produced by the shop... though how this happens without the food turning into indistinguishable mush is a trade secret. We know that silicone is an important step - but the more important part is the artistry in the painting, glazing and especially in the manufacturing of those semi-transparent ingredients. This not only adds to the time taken to develop, but also means that it's harder to change your menu at the drop of a hat. It also means that the displays are going to cost a whole heap more. Indeed a shop can spend many 1000's of dollars on complete menu display.

Now many people that travel to Japan end up wanting to see if they can get their hands on examples of these faux foods - as they tend to make for quirky souvenirs. Now I've not personally done this, but the best place to find these goods is in the area known as Kappabashi-dori, or more commonly Kitchen Town - in Tokyo. This is often said to be accessed from the Asakusa area, but can also be reached from Ueno (see below). But be prepared - whilst I've not been there myself, I understand that it's pretty awesome in a non-eating sense. Not only will you find an almost infinite variety (ok - infinite may be stretching it) of goods/utensils used in the restaurant trade, you'll also find the shokuhin sanpuru. Though it doesn't come cheap - and indeed you might end up paying far more for the sample than you would for a plate of the real food. You can expect to pay around the 800-1000 yen mark for the simplest/smallest of food displays (and here I'm talking key-chain size). For more substantial dishes you could be looking at over 6000yen per dish. If you've still got a hankering, you can check out some very nice images of fake food displays over at TokyoTimes.

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At the end of the day - there's little value in trying too hard to dissect the cultural histories that generated this famous food tradition in Japan. Instead, we should just be thankful that it has held firm against the constant threat of homogeneous globalisation. Indeed, the Japanese are exporting the idea to Korea and China. I wonder how many decades it would take before it reaches the shores of Australia. Hopefully not too many...

If you want to see more, please check out this LuStation YouTube segment on the fake food industry in Japan:

(Source: LuStation, used with permission)

It may take a bit of getting used to - and some might be worried at the faux pas in confusing the fake from the real thing... but for me, it's about making the dining experience as much about engaging both the eyes, mind, tongue into a truly complete experience. And there can be nothing embarrassing or socially awkward about that. Can there?

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This is one of my entries for the August 2010 edition of the JFesta theme-based blog. Whilst it may not be "edible" in terms of food - anyone that has travelled to Japan would know that it an essential part of the Japanese eating experience. Stay tuned however, as I'm also about to post on a typical supermarket experience (in Sapporo at least)... another important part of any food experience.

I Wonder What That Building Is... Recycling in Japan

4th August, 2010 - Well this really was supposed to be a quick post... about a plain old big building I saw... but the post has sort of expanded a bit. During my first few trips to Sapporo, I'd always noticed these rather large imposing buildings dotted around the city... and they always looked just a little odd to me. It's embarrassing, but I always thought it looked like a power station... of course, now the whole world knows what a Japanese nuclear power station looks like... but I had both an active imagination and not much sense.

And eventually I just had to ask my wife, what is that building?.. to which she replied, "oh that, it's just a recycling building"... hmmm, that was a little disappointing, but then again, in this day and age, re-cycling should be interesting to us all.

Indeed, Sapporo like many cities in Japan has gone re-cycling crazy. Not only do you have to pay for each  bag of rubbish you throw away, but you have to separate your waste into combustible (paper), non-combustible, PET plastics, cans. Newspaper recycling occurs periodically with large trucks driving around the city blaring announcements for people to bring out their paper. This all goes towards acheiving 3R concept of reduce, reuse and recycle. Indeed, there are towns in Japan moving to a zero waste concept, where they separate their household waste into 34 different bin types. Now that's over-kill if you ask me. Back home in Adelaide, we just separate out into rubbish, recyclables and green-waste - and in some places in Adelaide the recyclables are put in the same (separated) bin as the normal waste!

Now for those travelling to Japan, here's a few signs that you might see...

 Combustible, i.e. paper (kami)

 PET bottles

 Non-combustibles, i.e. non PET plastics, (pura)

 Cans, aluminium (arumi)

Steel, (suchiru)

(thanks to wikipedia)

And of course, most of the public bins also require you to separate your waste into cans (カン), bottles or bin (ビン), and PET bottles (ペットボトル) as shown below. However, if you're observant, you might see that somehow the cans and bottles on the left have been swapped. Just goes to show that no system is perfect.

The other signs that you're likely to see are combustible or moeru gomi (もえるゴミ) on the left, and non-combustible or moenai gomi (もえないゴミ) on the right.

Indeed, here's some rough figures (a little dated now) on Sapporo's municipal solid waste (MSW) situation:

(Source: Waste Management World)

It shows an interesting thing, only 20% of waste back in 2003 ended up in land-fill, but a staggering ~70% was incinerated. I guess it means less land-fill, which is a good thing... but... 

And that's where things get a bit murky... as I'm sure that "recycling" in the context normally means the re-using of materials, e.g. recycled paper and cardboard. Incineration is considered recycling here in terms of waste recycled into energy. Waste-to-energy conversion through incineration is generally considered an undesirable method today, especially due to the potential pollution problems that it can cause, such as the release of dioxins into the air.

Overall the move to a greener, more sustainable society seems to be occurring. Indeed, Japan generates far less waste than most, at around 400 kg per person per year.

(Source : OECD data)

And interestingly this relatively low per capita rate also extends to CO2 emissions, with Japan lying quite competitively for what is a significantly industrialised country. Of course these things are not necessarily linked. What is perhaps more scary (for me personally) is just how bad a polluter Australia is on a per capita basis... thankfully we've only got a population of about 22 million (compared to China's population of 1.3 billion).

The Japanese are good adopters of new concepts - and have taken to recycling seriously. Recycling is certainly a big business in Japan today... but it's still a complicated affair with Japan developing concepts of Eco-towns which represent huge waste recycling centres for the conversion of waste.  For all the acceptance of the need to recycle, it's hard to know how much consideration is really given to what happens to all that waste once it leaves the front door. Then again, given that they produce almost half (per capita) of what we do here in Australia, I'd say they're doing something right.

So we get back to that strange building I photographed way back at the start of this post. It turns out that we were both right. The odd building may be "recycling" but it's also a power station of sorts. But as with many things in Japan, it's never quite so simple...

A Sizzling Japanese Tradition... Hanabi

2nd August, 2010  - Now, as I've posted about before... summer in Japan is synonymous with fireworks, or at least it used to be.  I suspect that the tradition will disappear, like so many others that have been "made safe" - which reads made boring. So as summer comes to Japan again, it's a good time to be wetting the whistle for hanabi!

Now, despite my initial disregard for safety, there are a few safety tips. Always, and I mean always point the fireworks away from yourself and anyone else. And always have a bucket of water to dip the fireworks into at the end. The fizzzzle sounds are always a treat for younger children - perhaps as much as the fireworks themselves.

Now the packs of hanabi that you can buy (just about anywhere, including supermarkets) generally have a variety of fireworks in there... and enough to keep you going for a while. They range from the small to the large fireworks. On the small scale, there's the little senkou-hanabi, which are a very old traditional Japanese style firework. These are quite interesting in that they contain the "gunpowder" in a little section at the end of a long tapering paper twine. On ignition it burns forming a hot, incandescent globule at the end... within a few seconds it's emitting a series of sparks... until the wind, or a shaky hand force the drop to fall. This is a great thing for children (and adults) to see whose will last the longest. Let's just say my hands were too shaky....

On the other hand, they also have quite large fireworks as well.... and they're a treat to watch go up. Of course, this all causes a significant amount of noise, light, and smoke that break through the hot Summer night air. We most probably don't get a sense of the mood of Japanese people (as we're now visitors here), but this seems to be getting less and less common a sight. For us, we want to make the most of the fun, and tradition, with L-kun, before it disappears into blandness.

As mentioned previously - in Australia, it's next to impossible to have your own fireworks (as it requires a licensed pyro-technician to purchase and set up anything bigger than a sparkler). To be honest, I don't know the statistics of injuries due to fireworks in Japan, and yes, I can imagine that there are plenty of burnt hands etc. I suppose with all of these things care needs to be taken, and definitely adult supervision!

Daddy Arrives... Finally... in 2010.

30th July, 2010 - Well, this is a little strange... I'm writing this in "now time", but most probably won't post it until I've finished my posts from previous trips. So, here I am. On my way to Japan. T-chan and L-kun had already been in Japan for about 6 weeks, having a good time with Ojiichan and Obaachan (grandfather and grandmother)... and enjoying an unseasonably hot/humid summer. I have to admit that I was somewhat worried about just how hot it was going to be in Japan - especially coming from a cold and miserable Adelaide winter.

Still - my first reaction when stepping off the plane in Narita was: it's actually not that bad. What was all the fuss about. This was further heightened by the trip to Sapporo (departing from Narita about 4 hours later) which was conspicuous for it's lack of view from the window seat. Cloudy the whole way.

L-kun and Okaasan waiting in the public area

Arriving in Sapporo, I had been a bit worried about how L-kun would react. New Chitose Airport is quite frustrating in that they separate the new arrivals waiting at the luggage belts from those waiting for their loved ones by a series of big glass windows. So close... but unable to hug or even really talk to each other while waiting for luggage to appear. Those 6 weeks of just seeing Daddy on Skype were over... and L-kun was stoked to see Daddy. Even if he Daddy did seem to take forever to find his suitcase.

It was great to T-chan... 1.5 months without my gorgeous wife had left me a hollow man. And I was so happy to get a squeeze from her at the airport. Don't expect any great shows of intimate affection in public however. That's not the Japanese way. Especially in front of her parents.

Sapporo's New Chitose Aiport is getting bigger and bigger. Impressive - but still for all that work, it's a very, VERY long way from the city, and even longer away from home. We stopped off at the rest-stop along the highway to have some home-made rice balls (onigiri) and tea. Time to stretch the legs and breath in some nice fresh (warm) Hokkaido air.

At the rest stop....

I hadn't slept at all during the night flight from Australia - not that unusual for me. Of course, it was hard to take some time off to rest during the day as L-kun was full-on and I didn't want to miss a second of it. He was even more handsome and funny than when they had left Australia... and his Japanese had improved more in those 6 weeks than they had in perhaps years of myself. Impressive - but also somewhat sobering at my own lack of dedication to improve my Japanese.

That night I hit the sack early and was literally asleep before I had time to say "oyasumi"... goodnight.

A Child's Heaven, A Parent's Hell?

23rd July, 2010 - Japan is, amongst other things, a country of distractions. It is the country of Pachinko (perhaps the ultimate mind-numbing distraction), land of Manga, the birth-place of Karaoke, and the home of any number of other activities. It's also well known for it's electronic entertainment, and you're never too far away from some form of arcade centre. Our local Aeon shopping centre is no exception, with two venues (on  either end of the building) to satisfy the requirements of the you and old alike.

Some games, like the Taiko drum game, are just plain fun (who can not see the fun in bashing away at two large drums?), and some (like the one below) are just a little strange... or should I say Japanese....

Others are a little more traditional (with a bit of oversight from Anpanman, of course - just to keep things in order). It's nice to see that after all these years, that merry-go-rounds are still a firm favourite amongst children.

At the end of the day however, game arcades are fun places... bright flashing lights, loud grating sounds, countless violence and gambling undertones, and of course endless opportunities to spend money. It is indeed  a child's heaven. Oh - and don't forget what happens when you decide it's time to leave. Ah - how quickly heaven can descend into a neon, tear-streaked hell. L-kun hadn't quite got the hang of the whole in-moderation concept yet...

Actually L-kun loves game centres (not surprising), but we tend to steer clear of them. They're good for a treat, but shopping at Aeon often ends up being a continual battle of wits (and will) to determine who can out-smart the other in steering a course towards the games.

In this digital age, perhaps we're being overly protective in trying to limit L-kun's exposure to the cheap thrills of the arcade. Indeed, perhaps it's nigh on child abuse, retarding his finger-eye coordination. Still, we think at 3 years old, he'll have enough time to enjoy the fun and games of the Japanese arcade when he gets older...And has his own pocket money.

Of course - now if Daddy wants to play......

O-sushi... O-yummy (even at home)

19th July, 2010... Just to show that sushi doesn't always need to be delivered on a train... and indeed, it can be lots of fun to eat as a take-away (from a nice sushi shop). Actually, L-kun's sushi eating was pretty well limited to the non-raw-fish verisons at this stage. I'm sure that will change.

I always think T-chan's family order too much...as, I've not actually arrived in Japan at this stage, this is only for the T-chan and her parents... It seems a lot, but it never quite works out that way. Yummy.

Toys and Food... A Good Day Out

8th July, 2010 - Shopping with L-kun can be great fun... whether that's in Japan or in Australia. Although I have to admit that we have more fun in Japan. The strange thing is that there aren't as many dedicated toy shops (that we've been able to find in Sapporo at least). Most of the toy shops are sections in other shops.

If you've experienced any good toy shops in Sapporo (or Japan in general), please let us know! I'll mention one that we found in Tokyo (KiddyLand) a little later on.

But the good thing about a 3 yo is that they can make anything into a thing of wonder. Like the fake food displays that sit outside many (if not most) cafes. They were a constant source of amusement for L-kun....and I have to admit the first time I came to Japan I was somewhat mesmerised by these very authentic and realistic looking food displays. I always wondered which came first - the food, or the food display (and they just made food to look like the displays). Still, it's one of the good things about travelling in Japan... you will always have a pretty good idea of what you're buying.

And who can resist poking their finger in to test if it's real or not?.... I wonder if the shops ever put the real thing out there?

Birthdays and Issho Mochi... Hopefully You Won't See This Dish on Iron Chef.

24th May, 2008 - It was a big day... actually, this was my last day in Japan for this my fifth trip, and it was L-kun's 1st birthday to boot. Whilst I was about to leave Japan, T-chan and L-kun would stay on a few more weeks to spend quality time with her parents. It was a somewhat bittersweet birthday celebration.

But let's talk about a particular Japanese tradition that's related to first birthdays; known as issho mochi. The first thing to know is that it involves mochi (see exhibit A below)... for those that don't know mochi is a very traditional rice cake made by pounding a glutinous rice down to an even more glutinous paste which is formed into a large flat cake shapes. In this particular (somewhat bizarre) tradition, the issho mochi weighs around 2 kg in total. Now what, pray tell would one do with 2 kg of rice cakes?

Well... first birthdays were very important in Japanese culture, and hence worthy of special attention. Now issho means 1 shō, where shō is an old volume metric equalling 1.8 litres (approximately). Stick with me here, as you never know when that will come in handy - say if you end up going back in time to feudal Japan, for instance, or if you're buying sake, which still comes in measurements of shō to this day. For that matter, the common rice-cooker cup size is 1 gō, where 10 gō equals 1 shō. Sayonara Metric System. When you convert volumes of mochi to weight, it comes out to 1 shō weighs about 2 kg. I didn't say this was going to be easy, did I...

   Now 1 shō is pronounced issho; and it's just that ishho also sounds like (drum roll) "a whole lifetime" in Japanese (by that I mean they are homophones... two different words that have the same sound). Now how the Japanese managed to link all of these things together to come up with a first birthday tradition really beats me. I suspect however that it came down to a very industrious young mochi seller somewhere that had a good sense of occasion. Still, however it happened, the Japanese have linked the 2kg chunk of mochi to wishing their children to have a life time of good luck; a lifetime of never having to go hungry.

So... how does this relate to the tradition? Well, clearly when you combine a 1year old baby with 1 shō of mochi you equal lots of laughs, some tears, and lots of happy mochi sellers. And the best way of combining them is by getting your child to carry the mochi. Yes. Carry. 2kg of processed rice. Ok... they may need some help... enter the bib... this used to be a wrapping cloth (furoshiki) in olden times, but you can't say that they Japanese don't move with the times.

Wearing the appropriate clothing (and disregarding any apparent OH&S implications) the child is weighted down front and back with the huge rice cakes. Ganbatte L-kun (good luck)!

Somewhat surprisingly, L-kun took it all in his stead... and didn't cry at all. He even managed a few steps (but considering this is all he could managed even without the mochi this was quite an achievement)... before retiring to a more sensible posture. Sitting on his bottom.

And the end result was 1 slightly bewildered child, 2 very happy grandparents, and about 2kg of mochi that was not going to get any tastier the longer L-kun wore it. Having said that the mochi was edible (of course), and was indeed eaten. As this was my last full day in Japan however, my contribution to the whole eating thing was sadly limited to a very nice breakfast the following day.

L-kun did eventually succumb to the effects of mochi exertion, and retired for a small nap. I wonder what he was dreaming of? Most probably about all the ways that he could pay back Mum and Dad when he gets into a retirement home.

With the formalities over however, the last night party started. In typical fashion, our last meal was a sushi and sashimi... and even my favourite yakitori. There was also a liberal supply of Australian wine involved as well. It's always difficult leaving Japan... not least because my stomach is normally about 2-3 kg heavier. And that's just from the meal on the last night.

L-kun eventually awoke from his late afternoon nap to enjoy (somewhat sleepily) his own special baby cake. Yes, it's a cake designed to be able to be eaten by babies. Now... I have to admit that the decoration most probably could have been improved a little... and I suspect it looks like something I had decorated. (unfortunately as T-chan and I get to a ripe old age, our food will start to progressively resemble the same sort of thing).

But it apparently hit the spot... going by his smiles. Perhaps because there was no mochi in sight. We had a great night, and L-kun discovered just what a good idea it was to have birthdays in Japan. Lots of presents to be had, and lots of spoiling. And why not... Happy Birthday L-kun!

And a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all of you reading this in 2010!