The Travelling Life of Silvan Colani
January 2003 - Japan
Having been in Japan only once (about ten years ago) I was talked into a trip for Chinese New Year. It seemed an interesting enough proposition: spend three days in the Japanese countryside, living in a typical riokan, soaking in hot springs and admiring the winter landscape.
I asked LGT's Man in Japan to organize the domestic side of the trip, which he kindly did. The first conclusion I could draw about the land of the rising sun arrived promptly with his bill for the accommodation: Japan is expensive. If two decades of deflation have not made this country any cheaper, I wonder what will?
Anyway, the money was of course well spent and our itinerary took us from Tokyo by "Romance Train" (not as exciting as it sounds...) to Hakone, a popular weekend destination 85 mins from Tokyo. There you can enjoy cable-car rides, visit museums, poke around smelly volcanoes and cruise the scenic Lake Ashi - "all surrounded by the beautiful scenery of Mt Fuji" the tourist brochure proclaims, but that very much depends on the weather.
We checked into our riokan, the traditional Japanese guesthouse, where you run around in a kimono and slippers (which won't fit a gaijin foot) and sleep on tatami mats. A traditionally dressed lady brings tea, elaborate dinners and breakfasts and says nice things in Japanese, which you won't understand. There are several hot spring baths, communal ones and private, where you can soak your tired bones. All very nice. The food they serve is a ceremony in itself, but more about that later.
Let's go sightseeing first! With the "Hakone Freepass" you can spend three days of unlimited travel in the area, cruising around by bus, ropeway (Japanese for cable-car), funicular, train and boat. I must mention the boats in particular. There are four ships plying a circular route on Lake Ashi. One is styled like a Mississippi river cruiser while the others are 21st century replicas of a pirate ship. They are beaten in tackiness only by the swan-like paddleboats available for hire on the lake!
After our stay in Hakone, we headed back to Tokyo by Romance Train (Colani tip: book the seat in the very front for a stunning train driver's view of the journey into the city!) In Tokyo we had about four hours available, which we spent quite effectively despite the daunting size of the city. Firstly, we followed a walking tour through Shinjuku East district, which took us to the Isetan department store, where a "chocolate exhibition" was held on the 6th floor with lots of free tastings. Then we drifted into Golden Gai, an area full of small bars and pubs, followed by Kabukicho, apparently Tokyo's most notorious red light district. By day it was very tame and I reckon I must return at night one day...
We then dived into Tokyo's vast underground network and miraculously re-emerged at Tokyo station (modeled after Amsterdam's central station) from where we strolled past the Tokyo International Forum (a stunning glass architecture that resembles the inside of a giant whale) to the shopping mecca of Ginza. From here we traveled by underground and train back to the airport. Surprisingly simple really, with most signs posted in English and station attendants very helpful.
Communication, despite fears to the contrary, was anyway relatively easy. I often found the standard of English as good as in Hong Kong (where, admittedly, it is very low). In addition, most Japanese were highly impressed by my fluent command of their language - which is limited to three expressions: ohayo gozaimas (good morning), biru (beer) and syonara (goodbye). A typical conversation would thus go as follows:
Japanese man (in pain): Geri o shiteimasu! ("I have diarrhea!")
Colani: Ohayo gozaimas! ("Good morning!")
Japanese man: Isha ga hitsuyo desu! ("I need a doctor!")
Colani: Biru? ("Beer?")
Japanese man: Isha a yonde kudasai!!! ("Call a doctor!!!")
Colani: No biru? Sayonara... ("No beer? Goodbye...")
This brings me to the topic of food. As some of you may know, there is only one kind of food I have not managed to get used to in almost ten years in Asia - Japanese. Particularly raw fish and anything with wasabi on it. This is peculiar, because I eat cooked and smoked fish as well as raw meat (carpaccio, steak tartar, etc.). Well, whatever the reason, it was unlikely that I was going to enjoy the culinary side of this trip. Sure enough, when the fancy first dinner was served at the riokan, it consisted almost entirely (you guessed it) of raw fish and wasabi. It looked really pretty, but in nevertheless needed lots of biru to get at least some bits down. The fish head came cooked, which was a relief.
More difficult than dinner was of course breakfast - because you can't flush it down with biru (well, sure, you actually could...) A breakfast of dried seaweed, raw egg, pickles and dried fish is a real wake-up call, but at least now I know why all these office workers on the morning train look so grumpy! But to be fair, there were lots of tasty dishes too and I didn't really return home hungry.
The other thing I noticed is that there are wending machines for everything, everywhere. My book says there are over 20 million such machines all over Japan, dispensing anything from cigarettes to underwear (fresh or used, the latter for some weird erotic purpose). My personal favorite was the "liquor shop", offering beer in all sizes. Much more useful than your average Coke machine!
Another area that undoubtedly has taken up a lot of engineering talent in Japan are the toilets. Some had heated seats, presumably to avoid getting frozen to the pot in winter ("Argh, isha o yonde kudasai!" - call a doctor!). Others had a bidet, that backside shower which saves a lot of trees by reducing toilet paper usage. The other useful purpose of that mini shower is that if you're crawling totally drunk into your washroom, you don't actually have to stand up to have a drink of water! Cheers!
