It's been a bit longer since I left an entry, for on the one hand I was on ski-holiday (report follows the next time) and on the other hand I (more or less) finished some courses at Uni.
Concerning this, last week I had to hand in 2 term papers, as well as holding 3 presentations (1 group and 2 individual pres.), of which one last 1 1/2 hours and was partly in English and partly in Japanese. Yes, it was an exhausting and time-intensive week. The good point: I don't have to do anything anymore for around half of my courses and the other half is not that trying.
But now to the promised summary of my Tokyo trip.
I went to Tokyo via plane of one of the Japanese Airlines from Kobe Airport. Note: Flight attendants pf Japanese airlines are all female, young and nearly always exceptionally beautiful, which is being stressed by their fashionable uniforms. This is by no means meant to be sexist or the like, it acts as unofficial requirement in Japan, and normally stewardess' are selected for the most part, on this (unofficial) criteria.
(The uniforms of the AUA, Austrian Airlines, male or female, I personally think to be very ugly)
The Kobe Airport is completely new (opened 2006), exclusively for domestic flights, that's why it's very small, and is situated on a small artificial island just south of Port Island (the Portliner-train connects both islands with the mainland).
Concerning the construction and operation of the airport there were some controversies, among others because the Kansai International Airport is practically in the neighborhood, but I won't go into them (inter alia economical, technical and political reasons). As far as I have heard, on Wikipedia (German and English) are some good summaries of the set of problems, for those, who are interested in it.
Thankfully I was allowed to stay at Helmut's, although his dorm is being built anew at the moment and therefore the dorm students had to relocate to a container-home for 1-2 years. Accordingly ,his new room is tiny (ca. 6.5m²), although the Japanese might not be bothered that much, they should be used to small space.
As mentioned last time afterwards we went to His Majesty where we met some acquaintances of Helmut, a Japanese and two Germans. Later in the city something weird happened: Somehow it occurred that Helmut and I were singing the Japanese anthem with the German girl (from Bavaria) and the flag in the middle.
Imagine the scene in more detail: Three foreigners, 2 men and 1 woman, in the middle of Tokyo, the woman holds up a little Japanese flag before her breast, whilst the men flank her and sing the Japanese anthem.
Yep, our assimilation is coming along quite nicely.
Resistance is futile.
By the way, the main station of Tokyo (station name Tokyo) is, architecturally speaking, built by English model.
After lunch we moved onward to Akihabara the famous Technical Geek/Otaku district in Tokyo. To say it in one sentence: You're interested in computers/ games/ Anime-Manga or the like? Go there. Now. You have to have seen Akihabara at least once, if you've been to Tokyo.
We weren't in Roppongi, but to say it in the words of an acquaintance: God does not exist in Roppongi, there is no God out there, that nigga gone fishing.
Instead we took a look into one of those, at the moment very "in", Maid-Kissa, meaning Maid Skivvy Café. In those Cafés the waiters are, without exceptions, all young, cute girls, dressed in, depending on the Café, different maid uniforms. They speak with high pitched, candy-sweet voices and in a grammatical form, which puts the guest on a special higher level/status, and another one which puts themselves on a lower one. Additionally they use phrases as if the visitor would come home to his mansion. This will sound for example like: "Welcome home my esteemed Master. In what way can I be of service to you today? Please relax while I serve you." etc. I'm asking myself, how long it would take at home, or even worse in the US, for the first demonstrations and protests of feminists to take place? We didn't actually go in, because we didn't want to wait for 1 hour, but one has to have seen such a thing.
In Akihabara one can very good observe the craziness of the Japanese.
As model kit:
I present: The Nazi-Beetle
Afterwards our companions went home, while Helmut and I set forth for the Yasukuni shrine, by a small stroll through the calmer regions of Tokyo. In those it's very nice and one feels like being in a smaller town, the size of Bruck or Graz (ed. 200.000 - 300.000 inhabitants); after all Tokyo is considered to be the "greenest" metropolis of the world.
The Yasukuni shrine is that specific shrine, which again and again is stirring up controversies in politics, since there the souls of the fallen of different wars from 1855 on are being venerated, but among others also some convicted war criminals of World War II, which infuriates China first of all.
I won't go into detail about the circumstances, since this topic, including references on politics, coming to terms with the past, religion and culture, would take up at least one, if not several, entries. It just has to be mentioned that it's by far not that easy to explain and handle as many people might think.
Next to the shrine there's also a museum with different exhibits, for example:
The pilot is waiting in front of his Zero-Fighter (Mitsubishi A6M) for the inspection by his commander
One of the two 20mm-guns of the A6M5
Found on Okinawa; artillery cannon with bullet holes
Aside from World War II, which is here actually called "The Great(er) East Asia War", since it also involves the fighting in China since '37, a major part of the exhibition is dealing with the Russian-Japanese war of 1904/05. However we didn't visit those exhibitions, because it was already pretty late, the museum was on the brink of closing for the day and it would take two history-freaks such as ourselves several hours for such a thing (not to mention the adjacent discussions).
Night was falling and after the return to Helmut's dorm I went home, using the Nozomi-Shinkasen this time around. 589 kilometres in 2 hours 48 minutes, indeed precisely 2h 48min as stated in the time table, I cannot mention the punctuality of those trains (Shinkansen) often enough (all right, maybe it took 2h 47min).
In conclusion: Tokyo is/was very nice and interesting and I would like to visit it again, but because of its size I wouldn't want to live there for a long time.
A great thanks to Helmut for his hospitality and his activity as tour guide!
The next time I'm gonna report about my Ski-trip to Nagano and also briefly about New Years in Kobe.
Interesting (and funny) facts/opinions about Japan:
Tokyo (東京) literally means "Eastern Capital" and is only official capital of Japan since 1868, ever since the Meiji-Restoration and the move of the Emperor from Kyoto to the former palace of the shogun in Tokyo, and in that Tokyo replaced Kyoto as capital after ca. 1000 years (a fact which many inhabitants of Kyoto still lament). The city is also bearing the name Tokyo only since that year, before that it was called Edo, and during the Tokugawa-Shogunat (start 1603) while not the official capital, it was the political and administrative centre of the country, as well as the domicile of the shogun. For that, the epoch of 1603-1853/1868 (1853-1868 is more or less considered an in-between epoch) is in general also referred to as Edo period.
Today there is not really a "City" of Tokyo. There are 23 inner city districts existing with around 8.5 million inhabitants, which all have a seperate administration and serve as cities of their own; the Tokyo prefecture, with 12-13 million inhabitants, which makes it the most populous, consisting of the inner districts and adjacent regions (whereupon interestingly some islands in the pacific also belong to it); and the urban area Tokyo, which extends into other prefectures (such as the city of Yokohama is part of it) and which is with 35 million inhabitants the largest metropolitan region of the world.
All 3 terms exist officially and are in use. In this regard it shares a certain similarity to Vienna, which is simultaneously a city, a state and capital of Austria.
Tokyo is one of the most important cities of the world and is despite its size considered to be very clean and green and also one of the safest major cities of the world. The author himself worries more about going through the central park of Graz at night, then trough the Ueno park in Tokyo (although Graz is certainly very safe too, no question about it).
This city is for sure on the list of cities, which every person should have visited once in his lifetime.
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