In the Eye of Hokusai
Jul. 16th, 2022 07:10 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
steepholmMy prediction that this week would be quieter than last has proved true; I didn't realise how much wetter it would also be. I don't really care for the constant rain, but at least it's something I can relate to, and it has moderated the heat somewhat. Meanwhile, as I write the UK is gearing up a for an aircon-free 40-degree Monday. What a strange reversal!
Tuesday was taken up with a lecture for Miho, followed by a meeting with Satoshi Ando, a scholar whose work on place has much in common with mine; and then a visit to the Paper Ban restaurant (no, I don't know what the name means), for a hambaagu (not to be confused with a hamburger) in a demiglace sauce, with an onsen tamago on the side - a combination I well remember eating with Satomi in the same restaurant five years ago. Natsukashii!
I'd heard that Saitama's Daito Bunko University - a powerhouse of Beatrix Potter research - had created a Beatrix Potter reference library in the grounds of Saitama Children's Zoo, in the form of an exact replica of Potter's home of Hill Top at Near Sawrey in the Lake District. This I had to see, so on Wednesday I took a rather complicated series of trains and buses to reach it.
Saitama's Children's Zoo looks fun, doesn't it? But I was a bit surprised that I was the only guest. Luckily a blue-uniformed woman soon came and asked why I was there, and explained that the zoo was closed because of flooding overnight. Would it be all right if I just went to take a couple of photos of the outside of the Near Sawrey replica, I asked? She went to consult her colleague, but returning explained apologetically that it was too "dangerous" (i.e. their insurance wouldn't cover it). Oh, well, I said, it can't be helped - I'll just take the bus back into town. She made her apologetic face again, and explained that although the buses were running to the zoo (such as the one I'd just come on) they were not making the return trip, again because of the flooding.
I was puzzled by the unidirectional nature of the floods, but of course I'd come across the phenomenon before, with the train in Spirited Away. Sure enough, the bus stops going back to the station all had little signs confirming that they would be ignored, and sure enough they actually were. Luckily, it was only a half-hour walk back to the station, and I did get to see some Daito Bunka University buses, complete with Peter Rabbit livery.
Perhaps I would have missed them if things had gone as planned - who knows?
Thursday morning was a return visit to Katsura Bunko, Momoko Ishii's home library in Ogikubo. I'd been a few weeks before to photograph the outside, but now Miho had got special permission to have a tour of the inside too. Oddly enough, she'd never been, despite Momoko Ishii being a heroine of hers and the Bunko lying directly between her home and work - but the same seems to be true of all the Japanese children's literature academics I've met in Japan. As we know, it's easier to visit places that are far away that ones close at hand. Perhaps that's why I've never been to the real Near Sawrey?
Anyway, it was a fascinating place, at least if you're interested in 20th-century Japanese children's literature, in which Ishii was a linch-pin, both as editor, translator, author, critic and general advocate. And I got some pictures for my book, including permission to use this one from the early 1950s, which shows Ishii in her prime - albeit her prime lasted an awfully long time. She was still publishing well into her 90s, and died at 101.
Then there was a bit more teaching, a lecture on chirimen-bon - the silk books of Japanese fairy-stories used as souvenirs by Western visitors in the Meiji era - and bed.
Friday was spectacular. I met my friend Yuki at a specialist tamago kake gohan restaurant. It was nothing like the boiled rice mixed with a raw egg and soy sauce that I've occasionally had for breakfast here under that name, but a meal of great sophistication - so much so, that I ate it all before I remembered to photograph it. Then we went by monorail to Daiba and the fabulous Digital Art Museum there.
If you ever find yourself in Tokyo, I highly recommend it. I'm going to put a few pictures and vids here (click the picture to see them in action), but of course I can't convey its immersive delights.
Photos:
Videos:
After that, I wasn't surprised to see that they do teleporting in Tokyo now, too.
That said, before were allowed into the museum we had to listen to a series of instructions and admonitions in Japanese and English - about avoiding flash photography, etc. The Japanese list was quite short, and the English list had a lot of items - not eating and drinking, not chewing gum - that weren't included in the Japanese version at all. Presumably the assumption is that Japanese are too well brought up to need reminding of such basic manners, but even if that's true, making it quite so evident that you think foreigners less well mannered is rather ill mannered in itself - or so I think.
When I got home, I had my first taste of a weather warning siren, which went off at around 6pm, sounding a bit like the air-raid siren at the end of the Dad's Army theme, followed by these dire words over a loudspeaker:
「大雨警報が発表されました」 ("A heavy rain warning has been announced")
Since it had been raining all day anyway, this seemed somewhat de trop. But that's my last complaint about Japanese announcements for now. Don't worry, though, I will doing a "Complaining about Japan special" shortly, if only as a way of reconiling myself psychologically to the thought of going away soon, till who knows when?
Today I saw Yoshiko for lunch, before which we took a much more sedate tour of a Taisho-era mansion built by a Japanese industrialist (Furukawa) using an English architect, Josiah Conder. The outside looks fairly Western, but inside (where we were not allowed to take pictures) solid 1918 rooms in the English style of that time are mixed with tatami rooms, shouji and the like. It's a strange blend, but it seemed to work.
If it's for rent next time I come to Tokyo, I may take it.
Tuesday was taken up with a lecture for Miho, followed by a meeting with Satoshi Ando, a scholar whose work on place has much in common with mine; and then a visit to the Paper Ban restaurant (no, I don't know what the name means), for a hambaagu (not to be confused with a hamburger) in a demiglace sauce, with an onsen tamago on the side - a combination I well remember eating with Satomi in the same restaurant five years ago. Natsukashii!
I'd heard that Saitama's Daito Bunko University - a powerhouse of Beatrix Potter research - had created a Beatrix Potter reference library in the grounds of Saitama Children's Zoo, in the form of an exact replica of Potter's home of Hill Top at Near Sawrey in the Lake District. This I had to see, so on Wednesday I took a rather complicated series of trains and buses to reach it.
Saitama's Children's Zoo looks fun, doesn't it? But I was a bit surprised that I was the only guest. Luckily a blue-uniformed woman soon came and asked why I was there, and explained that the zoo was closed because of flooding overnight. Would it be all right if I just went to take a couple of photos of the outside of the Near Sawrey replica, I asked? She went to consult her colleague, but returning explained apologetically that it was too "dangerous" (i.e. their insurance wouldn't cover it). Oh, well, I said, it can't be helped - I'll just take the bus back into town. She made her apologetic face again, and explained that although the buses were running to the zoo (such as the one I'd just come on) they were not making the return trip, again because of the flooding.
I was puzzled by the unidirectional nature of the floods, but of course I'd come across the phenomenon before, with the train in Spirited Away. Sure enough, the bus stops going back to the station all had little signs confirming that they would be ignored, and sure enough they actually were. Luckily, it was only a half-hour walk back to the station, and I did get to see some Daito Bunka University buses, complete with Peter Rabbit livery.
Perhaps I would have missed them if things had gone as planned - who knows?
Thursday morning was a return visit to Katsura Bunko, Momoko Ishii's home library in Ogikubo. I'd been a few weeks before to photograph the outside, but now Miho had got special permission to have a tour of the inside too. Oddly enough, she'd never been, despite Momoko Ishii being a heroine of hers and the Bunko lying directly between her home and work - but the same seems to be true of all the Japanese children's literature academics I've met in Japan. As we know, it's easier to visit places that are far away that ones close at hand. Perhaps that's why I've never been to the real Near Sawrey?
Anyway, it was a fascinating place, at least if you're interested in 20th-century Japanese children's literature, in which Ishii was a linch-pin, both as editor, translator, author, critic and general advocate. And I got some pictures for my book, including permission to use this one from the early 1950s, which shows Ishii in her prime - albeit her prime lasted an awfully long time. She was still publishing well into her 90s, and died at 101.
Then there was a bit more teaching, a lecture on chirimen-bon - the silk books of Japanese fairy-stories used as souvenirs by Western visitors in the Meiji era - and bed.
Friday was spectacular. I met my friend Yuki at a specialist tamago kake gohan restaurant. It was nothing like the boiled rice mixed with a raw egg and soy sauce that I've occasionally had for breakfast here under that name, but a meal of great sophistication - so much so, that I ate it all before I remembered to photograph it. Then we went by monorail to Daiba and the fabulous Digital Art Museum there.
If you ever find yourself in Tokyo, I highly recommend it. I'm going to put a few pictures and vids here (click the picture to see them in action), but of course I can't convey its immersive delights.
Photos:
Videos:
After that, I wasn't surprised to see that they do teleporting in Tokyo now, too.
That said, before were allowed into the museum we had to listen to a series of instructions and admonitions in Japanese and English - about avoiding flash photography, etc. The Japanese list was quite short, and the English list had a lot of items - not eating and drinking, not chewing gum - that weren't included in the Japanese version at all. Presumably the assumption is that Japanese are too well brought up to need reminding of such basic manners, but even if that's true, making it quite so evident that you think foreigners less well mannered is rather ill mannered in itself - or so I think.
When I got home, I had my first taste of a weather warning siren, which went off at around 6pm, sounding a bit like the air-raid siren at the end of the Dad's Army theme, followed by these dire words over a loudspeaker:
「大雨警報が発表されました」 ("A heavy rain warning has been announced")
Since it had been raining all day anyway, this seemed somewhat de trop. But that's my last complaint about Japanese announcements for now. Don't worry, though, I will doing a "Complaining about Japan special" shortly, if only as a way of reconiling myself psychologically to the thought of going away soon, till who knows when?
Today I saw Yoshiko for lunch, before which we took a much more sedate tour of a Taisho-era mansion built by a Japanese industrialist (Furukawa) using an English architect, Josiah Conder. The outside looks fairly Western, but inside (where we were not allowed to take pictures) solid 1918 rooms in the English style of that time are mixed with tatami rooms, shouji and the like. It's a strange blend, but it seemed to work.
If it's for rent next time I come to Tokyo, I may take it.