Pee Pole

Last week my supervisor stopped by to drop off some important information. He had a stack of papers, on which he had jotted a few translations, and a small package. He handed them to me and began explaining - somewhat awkwardly, but who can blame the poor guy - that I would have to submit a urine sample in this tube and then have a series of physical examinations (chest x-ray, eye test and other related things). I laughed and asked him if this was a cockroack check - he laughed but didn't say much else.


It turns out this was a campus-wide general health check up and not just a way to ensure that the dirty foreigners weren't carrying anything dangerous. Here is a photo of the "pee pole" - for real, every student on campus was issued one of these. Amazingly, I didn't see any of them used inappropriately or filled with beer of any other kind of silly joke. I can just imagine if such an item was distributed on a North American campus! And the best part is the cartoon of the girl pee droplet and boy pee droplet (appropriately in pink and blue) on the front demonstrating how to fill it, just on the off chance that you have made it all the way to university without really figuring out where your pee goes.


So, three questions on my question sheet and 6 rapid fire tests later I was finished the check up. I can't imagine that the tests will catch anything very serious because it was all done very quickly in a series of buildings. The only time spent with a physician was when I walked into the "exam room", the nurse nudeged the doc to wake him up, he read my question sheet, listened to my heart for maybe 3 whole beats then smiled and said "you are ok".

Tourists in Sapporo

After Kyoto, we escorted mom and Meg up to Sapporo to show them around here. They were appreciative of our efforts and rewarded us with a suitcase full of Canadian products that we had been missing (iced tea mix, Dove products, hair care products for non-Asian hair types... silly comfortable things like that). Ahhhh, familiarity!

We spent the first day in Sapporo and the highlite of the day was a visit to the Ishiya Chocolate Factory. Any visit to a factory is interesting, but this one went over and above our expectations. The place was carefully decorated and left visitors feeling like a child walking around the Wonka factory. The only thing missing was Oompa Loompas - although the atmosphere was so convincing that I wonder if they are there, somewhere, hidden from tourists.


The best part was eating massive chocolate parfaits at the cafe, with a ghost player piano behind us playing a tune and the clock tower saluting the top of the hour. The clock tower is fun and I don't think that we even saw half of the dancing characters that came pouring out, surrounded by bubbles blown into the air.

For dinner we went to the Sapporo Beer Factory for Genghis Kahn (Korean Lamb BBQ). We didn't have time to visit the museum (read more about that here), but the feast of lamb and seafood was great.


Our next day was spent in Otaru, a neighbouring coastal city with glass blowing artisans and some of the best sushi in Japan. We looked through shops along the scenic canal area of town and ate a delish lunch of fresh sushi. Fantastic!


The final day of mom and Meg's visit we took a bus out to Jozankei - a nearby onsen resort town (we have been there before, but didn't walk around town, read about our last visit here). We had hoped to do some short hikes and soak our feet in the free public foot onsen along the side of the street, but the weather was too cold for that. We did take advantage of the foot onsen meant to bring health and longevity, and we walked through a tunnel at Iwato Kannon-do where 100 Buddhas line a 120 meter long cave dug into the mountainside.



We finished off with a visit to our favorite keiten sushi restaurant (conveyer belt sushi) and our first trip to the top of JR Tower. We were joined by our friends from Brazil, Dai and Natalia. The sushi was great and the chefs always put on a fun show as they shout to each other and fill orders. JR Tower observatory is on the 38th floor of the tallest building in Sapporo. The view from there was fantastic and the best part - they built luxury toilets against the glass wall of the deck on one corner where you can "relax" and enjoy the view of the city!


The view from JR Tower looking towards our apartment.

Kyoto Sights

We spent 2 action-packed days touring around Kyoto with mom and Meg. The first day we got up early and hit the "western style" breakfast in our hotel then bought 1 day bus passes and headed for the famed Golden temple.

Shawn was an excellent tour guide and only once had us board the wrong bus (pretty good for his first time there and no literary skills in kanji). Stop one on the list was Kinkauji temple, the famous "golden temple". We tried to get there at opening and beat the crowds, but I am not sure that there is ever a time when this place isn't busy. We did manage to get there while the sun was out and that made the temple look really impressive. I have been told that when it is overcast the gold plated walls don't look quite so stunning.

At Kinkakuji, my sis had her first chance to visit a Japanese style toilet. To clarify, this shouldn't be confused with the Cadillac toilets that do everything from heated seats to air drying your bottom (read about those here). No, this was a traditional style Japanese hole-in-the-floor style at a very busy tourist destination - in a word - filthy! This began what my sister would call, a study in Japanese toilets, that continued through the duration of her visit.

My mom's "first" at Kinkakuji was a sample of a traditional Japanese sweet (read more about these here). It was pounded rice dough filled with sesame paste. My mom's discovery with this trial - she really doesn't like the taste of sesame and the rice dough was "like raw pie dough". The rice paste is an aquired texture, and tends to be unappealing to the north american palate. This began the collective operation "avoid sesame flavoured everything", that would continue through the duration of the visit. Here is a photo of mom making Meg finish her sample.


Next stop on the tour - Nijo Castle. This was a fantastic place, a UNESCO world heritage site right in the heart of Kyoto. It is a walled castle, with a moat surrounding it, beatiful artwork on the walls and rock gardens. Built in 1603 as the residence of the first Tokugawa Shogun, it was the home of shoguns for over 200 years. One amazing feature of the palace is the Uguisu-bari or Nightingale floor. It was designed to squeak no matter where you step on the floor. It served as a security alarm against intruders. The sound it made when 10 or 20 tourists are strolling along the corridor was beautiful.



Lunch was in the Sanjo shopping arcade near the castle at a small chinese food place. The fact that the floors were sticky and the cook wore rubber boots should have been an indication that we should continue on and look for food elsewhere.

In the afternoon we walked through part of Sagano Bamboo Grove, a large bamboo forest to the west of Kyoto. It was a windy day and the trees sounded like wind chimes as they knocked together. Shawn felt like he should climb a tree and have a sword fight like the scene from Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon. We also visited one of the quiet temples near the forest. There were far less tourists here and it was a great way to end our first day, watching the light fade over Kyoto from this scenic temple.



The ride back to the hotel wasn't quite as zen, as we found ourselves on a packed commuter bus riding back to Kyoto station. Not a very comfortable experience, but one that is certainly truly Japanese.

The next day we got another early start at the very popular Kiyomizu Temple. It was a busy place overlooking Kyoto from the east. The narrow winding roads that lead up to the temple are lined with tourist shops and small places to eat. The roads are narrow and quickly become packed, wall to wall with tourists walking to and from their buses that can't navigate the narrow roads.


A quiet corner of the temple housed 500 Buddhas, 500 small stone statues who have been carefully covered with red aprons.



From Kiyomizu we walked north along the small roads and eventually found ourselves in Maruyama Koen (park). We were lucky to be there to see the begining of the cherry blossom festival. The park was packed with giddy Japanese people on holiday with friends and family and soaking in the flower display. They lay out tarps to stake claim to a territory where they will meet friends later to have o-Hanami (cherry blossom party). Here is a photo of some of the action. Unfortunately, we weren't prepared with a cooler of food and a tarp, but we did take advantage of the makeshift "beer garden" to have our own small hanami.






Our time in Kyoto was short, but we managed to see so many great places. Kyoto is an easy place to tour. The city buses offer easy and cheap access to many interesting places, but Kyoto has so many places to see, we will definately have to return. I close this blog with a photo of one of the most famous sakura in Japan, a 300 year old tree in Maruyama Koen. I still can't believe we were lucky enough to be there while it was in bloom.

First Guests

We had our first guests join us in Japan. Mom and Megan came to visit (that is why we took the holiday to Nara - read about it in the previous post). They had a layover in Osaka so we flew there to meet them and tour Kyoto for a couple days before coming back to Sapporo to show them around here.

The day they arrived, we checked into our hotel where we would be staying with them. Then we took a walk to Sanjusangen-do temple in Kyoto. This temple boasts 1001 Buddhas and 28 Deities. Constructed in the 12th and 13th century, it was stunning, and very busy compared to Nara. There are no photos allowed in the temple, lucky that my sneaky Japanese camera has a "museum" function that supresses flash and sound so I was able to sneak a couple of pics.



There was a beautiful garden outside and we were happy to see some of the early sakura blossoms while there.


From there we walked to a nearby and newer Buddhist temple. We arrived while the monks were praying and had the good fortune of walking around the ouside deck and listening to the monks chanting. Here is a photo of a couple of the monks leaving the building that is dressed in beautiful coloured flags blowing in the breeze. We watched one young monk rush out of prayer and drop his cell phone from the sleeve of his robe. It is funny to see the combination of old and new here.


From there we went out to the airport to greet our guests. It was great to see mom and Meg and I think that they were both glad to be off the plane after a long flight. It is strange to host guests in a foreign country. We wanted to be more familiar but being unable to read and speak efficiently certainly limits the amount of hospitality one can provide. We had a beautiful couple of days in Kyoto and were so lucky to be there for the beginning of a very early sakura season, but I will save description of our tourist adventures for subsequent blogs.

Sacred Deer

Nara is the first permanent capital of Japan. It was established in 710 and lasted as the capital for about 75 years, the resulting character of these circumstances is some magestic temples set in a quiet, less travelled location. The city is only a short 45 minute train ride from Kyoto, but because Kyoto has so many jems to tantalize tourists, few make the trip to Nara. In my opinion, the short ride is well worth the day to see it.

Shawn and I hopped on an early train out of Kyoto - we took the express by accident and had to fork over an extra 500 yen (something that we did frequently in the coming few days of train tripping). We arrived early while the city was still waking and found the bike rental shop. We were lucky to rent the last two bikes in the compound, to the chagrin of the line of foreign tourists behind us. Shawn's back tire had a slow leak and my front brake was toasted, but it didn't matter much because the city is pretty flat and easy riding.

The bikes were a great way to see Nara park, a huge greenspace in the east of the city where many of the most interesting temples and sights of the city reside. The sacred deer (see photo above) also live in the park. Shinto religion believes that deer are messengers of the gods, and so this herd has been revered for centuries and are even enjoy legal protection as "national treasures" and "important cultural property". They have been hand fed by tourists for long enough to be relatively domesticated and were a highlight of the visit. They didn't jump when you reached out to pet them, or push them, or when cars passed by narrowly missing them with their side mirrors. My advice, you can buy "deer crackers" and hand feed them, but it is much more fun to watch others get mauled by agressive deer. That way when you want to haul one over for a photo, they don't smell it on your hands and loose their minds.

Our first stop in the park was a 5 story pagoda (this was the first place that we met the sacred deer - you can see them in the foreground of this photo).


Our next stop was Todaji temple. It was built in the 8th century and claims to be the largest wood construction in the world. It houses a massive bronze Buddha that was cast in 752. This Buddha has seen its fair share of earthquakes and has even lost his head a time or two, but it has been restored and upkept beautifully and is a sight to see. The temple is guarded by what they claim is the largest wood carvings, they were impressive but sadly live behind chain fencing, probably to prevent bird nesting.






Stop number three was the Kasuga Shrine. A shinto shrine with over 3000 stone lanterns along the paths around the shrine. My only regret is not seeing this place at night with the lanterns lit up, maybe next visit I guess. This spot was wooded and provided a beautiful spot to get off the bikes and have a stroll in the forest.



We ended the day with a walk through the narrow street that are lined with shops peddaling everything from Hello Kitty in the arms of a giant Buddah, to tennis shoes and school uniforms. We had a great and easy day in Nara and I would put this close to the top of the list of destinations to see in Japan for anyone interesting in visiting.

The Bicycle Orphans of Sapporo

When the first snowfall hit, it seemed that most people stopped riding their bikes. This makes sense because it was icy and slippery through the snowy months, but the boggling part is that people just flat stop riding. They don't bring their bike home, pack it away nicely for the winter and wait for clear streets to ride on again. No, they just leave their bike wherever they were the night of the first big snowfall. The result is hundreds of bikes parked along the sides of sidewalks that get covered by the snowplows as they clean the streets.

I can imagine that more than a few snowblower operators through the winter have the unfortunate experience of munching a hidden bike while trying to clear a massive pile of snow from in front of their building. And it has been strangely sad to watch the snowbanks melt back and lonely bikes emerge from the shrinking mound.

Recently, as more and more bikes have been appearing, notes have been taped to the seats of many of them. Of course, being the illiterate imbecile that I am here, I can't read the kanji that is scrawled on the notes, however it seems that the notes are used to determine if someone is coming back for the bike or if it has become one of the hundreds of orphaned bikes of Sapporo. The city periodically collects these orphaned bikes, I am sure in part to clear the sidewalks to allow pedestrian passage.

Today the city, in partnership with the University Co-Op, hosted a bike redistribution for the foreign students at Hokudai. So it seems, that the orphaned bikes will have a home after all. Shawn and I went down to the bike distribution to adopt a ride for him for the upcoming summer. Here are a couple of pics from the event.



The ironic part of this bike abandonment and redistribution, is that they rigorously track the identification numbers of the bikes. Each bike is liscenced with the police and if you are stopped (an occurance which is unusually common for foreigners - they should maybe check us for cockroaches while they are at it) without your papers or without the records in order with the police, you can be charged with stealing the bike. Yes, that's right, charged with stealing the bike that was recently hauled out of a snowbank and given away to keep it from ending up in a landfill. So I guess the lesson here is, don't go cutting out the middle man and just help yourself to the orphaned bikes. When the snow melts in the spring, wait until you can fill out multiple copies of paperwork to get the bike from the snowbank.

St Patty's Day

We spent St. Patrick's Day with friends listening to live blues. St. Patricks Day doesn't really have the same (or any for that matter) atmosphere here, but we got together with some other foreigners to create our own.

We went to a great spot in Sapporo called Buddy Buddy With the Door. It is the sister pub to our favorite hang out, the Famous Door. Both spots serve good food, have plenty of international beer and are styled in New Orleans fasion.

The stage that the band plays from is on the second floor, on what is designed to look like a small second story balcony that could have been plucked right out of Bourbon street. It is all set in an old building that has loose floorboards that shift your chair when the staff walks behind you, adding to the ambiance. The band was a bunch of local musicians and they lit the place up for 3 long sets before turning in their instruments for a plate of gumbo and settling in at a table with other local folks.

Here is a photo of Shawn chatting with an American friend while the band plays above. It was a nice night with good company and good music. We will definately visit this place again when they have live music again.

Spring Anticipation

The snow is melting fast in Sapporo and people's focus has shifted even faster. Images and displays of sakura (Japanese cherry blossoms) are now everywhere you turn. Grocery stores feature sakura specials, tea shops are selling their seasonal sakura blends and the convenience stores have specially packaged junk food with blossoms on the packages.

The Japanese fascination with the cherry blossom is seated in the short duration of the blossoms (they bloom for only 2 weeks), representing the delicacy of nature and life. The geography of the country dictates that trees in the south begin blooming around now and the blooming continues in a wave that moves northward through the country, finally ending here in Hokkaido some time in May.

Blossom viewing is so culturally important that there is a specific word for the act of cherry-blossom-viewing, "o-hanami". In true Japanese style, even natural phenomena like tree blooming is carefully scheduled and regulated. The Japanese meterological society is tasked with the all important job of making predictions of precicely when the blossoms will emgere (these forecasts are called sakura zensen). Now, I don't mean that this agency makes a guess at whether the blossoms will be early or late in a given year, or make predictions for major centers only - they actually forecast the day that the first blossom will emerge in every city in Japan. They use some kind of complicated system using winter temeratures, precipitation and probably a touch of Japanese intuition. Their predictions are surprisingly accurate and are used by cities to schedule and plan festivals and for families to book holiday time to go to o-hanami. It is taken so seriously that a couple of years ago the meterological agency made an official apology to the entire country when their initial predictions were off by a couple of days because of what they called a "computer error".

The "blossom front" moves northward at a rate of up to 30 km per day in some areas. People in all major cities are employed to observe the blossom status in specially selected locations and on particular "indicator trees". Their job is to go to the tree in the morning and note the status of the tip of the branches so that the "blossom status" of that city can be accurately catalogued.

Although it will still be a while for us to wait for o-hanami in Sapporo, we will soon take a short vacation to see my mom and sister in Kyoto at the end of the month. Based on the 2008 sakura zensen (you can see the website here) we will be there very close to the time that they are forecasting the first blossoms (called kaika). We will definately be there too early to see the full blooming (called mankai), but we hope that we will be lucky enough to see a small show. Kyoto is said to have some of the most beautiful spots to see sakura in all of Japan.





We will be sure to get lots of photos of the sakura once it arrives here in Sapporo - until then, here are a couple of shots that I took with my keitai (cell phone - so Japanese... I know) of the displays in the shops. And to close, Haiku by Masuo Basho.

Temple bells die out.
The fragrant blossoms remain.
A perfect evening!

Honto Bar

Last Saturday night we met some friends at our regular hang out (we are now Norm and Cliffy to this Cheers - maybe not so much of a permanent fixture, but we get welcome hello's from all of the staff when we arrive, even the cook comes out to say hello). We had dinner and some laughs then a few of us decided we wanted to listen to some live music down the street.


I may have mentioned this place in previous posts, as we have been there before. It is a tiny little postage stamp of a place, smaller than most small coffee shops at home. Despite that, they manage to cram a full 10 piece band into one side while customer line the opposite wall. The owner dresses the waitresses (cute young women of course) in all kinds of ridiculous theme outfits. The last time that we were there was around Christmas and there were three waitresses dressed in naughty Mrs. Clause outfits. On top of having to wear these silly get-ups, they were expected to take orders, bartend, serve drinks and food, hand calculate bills, and on top of that, pay close attention to the song that the band was playing and drop everything that they were doing and get to the back up microphone when it was their song to sing back up on! This time the santa outfits were in storage and it was red hot bunny time. This poor girl looked terrified most of the time.


The horrific conditions of the wait staff aside, this place really rocks when the band it playing. You can't beat having to ask the sax player to back up so that you can squeeze by to get to the bathroom. They take requests and play all kinds of rockin' tunes from the 50's and 60's. And even with the cramped conditions, they will shuffle around and make just enough room for us to dance in the aisle if the mood hits. The only downfall is that the owner (same guy who chooses the staff uniforms...) insists on singing lead vocals and seems oblivious to the fact that he doesn't speak enough english to sing Elvis Presley and that most of his hired musical talent all have a better singing voice than him. Nevertheless, it is a fun place so we headed there last weekend after dinner.

This place is only open on Saturdays in the winter and is generally pretty busy. When we arrived, people shuffled around and made room for us in the few empty chairs that were left. Strangely, there was a Japanese man dancing (normally if anyone dances it is the Brazilians, never the Japanese). We ordered a round of g&t and sat back to enjoy the chaos.

We weren't two sips into our drinks when the Japanese dancing man came over to our table. Seems that he had taken a shine to one of our crowd and wanted a dance (no wait... I should say demanded a dance). So he took Shawn by the hand and pulled him up on the dance floor. As you can imagine, the rest of us were falling off our chairs in hysterics. The guy (who was probably no bigger than me) insisted on leading and spun and twirled Shawn around. When Shawn wasn't paying close enough attention, the guy would spin him then tap his own cheeck as if to say "when I spin you, make eye contact with me". Shawn of course, isn't used to someone else leading (let alone dancing hand in hand with a tiny little dude!), and when he missed a couple of cues he got a little slap on the cheek - this is not a joke! The guy actually slapped him on the cheek! Here is some of the evidence I could gather between fits of laughter.



Taking those photos was no easy task. For one thing I could hardly see because I was crying big fat crocodile tears of laughter, but also because the Japanese man beside me kept putting his hand in front of my camera and telling me "dame, dame" (=stop!). When it was all over I asked the guy beside me why he didn't want me to take photos. He told me that the man, who had an obvious crush on Shawn, was very famous and that it is bad for anyone to take photos of him doing such things. Right on! Scandal!

The rest of the evening progressed without quite so much excitement, although the man continually kept coming over to our table and putting his hand on the back of Shawn's chair or pulling a chair up beside him and gazing intently. We finally left the bar and were saying goodnight to our friends on the street when we saw that Shawn's buddy was on the move and following us out. We ran into the street and dove into the back of the nearest cab and giggled the rest of the way home.