The Warm Winds of Kyoto - Part Two

Cicadas, everywhere, wherever there are trees.  The first time I hear them, walking from Daimon station to my hotel, I think that it's the sound of industrial machinery somewhere in the distance.  These fearsome little bugs whine, whoop and wail throughout my adventures, providing me with a looping soundtrack that I miss immediately upon my return to England.  I'm conscious of the fact that my photos cannot capture their roaring vigour, so when the noise is at its loudest, I try to take video instead.  Unfortunately, I can't explain to people what they are listening to, as the cicadas completely drown out my attempt at commentary.

Smack in the middle of one of Tokyo's most vibrant districts, the Meiji Shrine typifies everything that I love about Japan's iconic monuments.  The gorgeously constructed wooden gates (known as torii), the wide, sweeping pathways, and the ultimate stillness of the shrine itself, where even the aforementioned cicadas whisper rather than sing.  Shinto is an ancient religion that reveres the spirits (or kami) which live in natural places.


There can be fewer places more in tune with Japan's beating heart than Meiji itself.  Named for the Emperor that prompted Japan's restoration at the end of the eighteenth century, the outer precinct houses a collection of murals, and the pathways are lined with barrels of wine and sake which have been donated to the shrine.  You can get married here if you wish.

 


The inner precinct houses a treasure museum, and visitors are encouraged to buy a prayer board, which is about the size of an airline luggage tag.  The expectation is that you write your wish upon the board and tie it to the ropes strung between the trees.  I quickly survey what visitors are wishing for - health, love, money, Christiano Ronaldo to join Arsenal.  Each of us gets what we want from the process.


A minute's walk from the entrance to the shrine, a procession of smiling teenagers leads us to the top of Takeshita Dori, and then we are down into the colourful madness of Harajuku.  The area is a pedestrian expanse of small independent shops selling all sorts of tourist nik-naks and branded clothing.  In the busy times, simply standing still or lifting your arms in the middle of the street is impossible.

It struck me here that city living in Japan would not suit someone with social phobias.  Nearly 14 million people live in the city of Tokyo, but another 20 million more live in the metropolitan surrounds.  The sheer density of people here is matched only by their friendliness and curiosity.  I slip through the crowds, and badly in need of a way to quench my thirst, I opt for the first cafe I find.  It is a Spongebob Squarepants cafe, complete with bright yellow plastic furniture.  Embracing the surreal nature of the moment, I order a mango frappe.

Another thing that I noted here is the frequently bizarre nature of English slogans, which are everywhere in Harajuku.  So many times, I see random phrases on shirts or as the name of shops.  Who decides to call their fancy clothing boutique 'Store My Ducks', or wear a t-shirt that says, 'Born free, eat my cool'?  If I ever want to make a shitpile of money in Japan, I'm going to write an algorithm that cribs random phrases off the internet and prints them onto t-shirts.  Unless someone else has already had that exact idea, which is a distinct possibility.

Shortly after leaving Tokyo, I spend a short time in Osaka, where I visit Universal Studios.  I freely admit that I'm not really a theme park person, being neither a fan of thrill rides or of long queues, both of which predominate here and at the Disney Parks in Maihama.  The Universal Park does have a fairly spectacular parade to end the day, which culminates in this 'last thing you'll ever see' shot of a fifty-foot Elmo float descending onto me.

I've heard it said that Japan is an expensive country, but that didn't fit with my experience at all.  While I was there, a debate was raging on the news about the 1000 yen/hour minimum wage (about £5/hr) and more than once, I was able to eat a sound three-course meal with sake for under £20 a head.  Try doing that in central London!  Next time, I'll talk some more about food and souvenirs, about my faltering attempts to master pachinko and about a too-successful visit to Akihabara, where a stint on claw machines nets us enough plush toys to exceed our baggage allowance.

The Warm Winds of Kyoto - Part One

I arrive in Kyoto by shinkansen in the early afternoon. Japan is famous for many things, but up till now, I'd heard little mention of the summer weather. Europeans desiring guaranteed sunshine flock to Spain, Florida or the Caribbean, but I'd never previously considered August in Kyoto. When I step off the train, it's 39 degrees centigrade, with humidity at 90+ percent. The winds are even hotter.


Not for the first time, I'm pinching myself that I'm here at all. I've already spent a week in Tokyo, where I've posed with Hachikō, watched the tuna auctions at Tsukiji and visited the magnificent Meiji shrine near Harajuku. One bullet train journey later and I'm creeping through the whispering bamboo forest at Arashiyama. In two days time, I'll be leading a procession of deer to the largest Buddha in the world. It's every bit as bizarre and magical as I'd hoped.

I won't get ahead of myself.  I get off the plane and am instantly bewildered by the choice of drinks in the airport (a bottle of Pocari Sweat for you, sir?)  I find myself making notes about the tiny things that intrigue me.  Within hours, my notepad is full and I am scribbling in the margins.

Tokyo is a rush of colour, but its inhabitants are a monochrome palette.  From early in the morning till late in the evening, weary salarymen are the city's stock in trade.  In their white shirts and black trousers, each one is barely distinguishable from the next as they flood across the street at Daimon.  I try to follow them, and immediately learn that crossing signals are observed impeccably by pedestrians, but drivers treat them only as gentle suggestions.

Past the statue of Hachikō, the bright billboards and electronic screens at Shibuya turn night into glorious day.  Here, where the language barrier makes subtlety of meaning impossible, advertising is stripped down with amusing results.  On one wall, a cat recommends a particular brand of washing powder.  On another, I am offered a product made from placenta that will make my skin sparkle like snow.

The Japanese metro systems are clean, efficient and easy to understand once you have grasped that certain lines are owned by different companies.  You might make the mistake of buying a ticket for the wrong line once, but you'll learn quickly.  Compared to England, the price of everything, from food to travel, seems ridiculously cheap.  In no time at all, I'm eating lotus root tempura and drinking more gekkeikan than is good for me.  In one location, they stand the glass in a wooden box, and fill both to the point of overflowing.

Taking advantage of my distorted sleep pattern on arrival, I head to Tsukiji fish market on day one, only to find that arriving at 5am means that I am too late to join the organised tours.  Three a.m., I'm told.  Three a.m., where I queue a day later in a sweaty box room with fifty other curious-and-slightly-crazy insomniacs, all for the joy of watching gruff men cut the heads off flash-frozen fish with a bandsaw.

There is something quite horrific and yet still deeply compelling about Tsukiji, and I fear that words may never quite do it justice.  The tuna are laid out in slick rows, looking more like munitions than creatures that were alive mere hours before.  Their tails are carved open with crowbars so that buyers can sample the product ahead of the auctions.  Tuna is big business here, and individual fish can cost the equivalent of thousands of pounds.



Outside, you are led across a courtyard which is a hive of trucks, forklifts and other industrial vehicles which sweep around you in a mesmerising mandala.  There seems to be little in the way of earmarked paths, and people, bicycles and other vehicles compete with one another for first access to available space.  I am left amazed that serious injuries are not a daily occurrence.  On my near side, a veritable mountain of empty boxes is bulldozed into a rubbish pile.



If it seems for one moment that I regret my trip to Tsukiji, I can only say that it is something that has to be seen to be believed.  I recommend it both as a cultural experience and so that you can see how much effort really goes into getting food onto your plate.

On the way out, numerous market stalls are selling
products fresh off the boat.  In the spirit of adventure, I buy a sea urchin off the griddle.  The dark spikes are rended by a single slash of the fishmonger's knife, and I am into the flesh, which is creamy, fishy and fruity all at once.  As with the market itself, they're an acquired taste, but I suggest that you give them a go.

The other great thing that I got from the market was a new idea for a writing project - but I'll let you in on that another day.

In part two of this travelogue, I'll share with you the joys of chirruping cicadas, Shinto rituals and a fifty-foot Elmo.  Sayonara for now!

Vignettes

Hello there, just a quick update today as I'm making progress on the book, and am keen to take advantage of the opportunity. I am now nearly halfway through the final draft, and when I'm back from Japan, I'll be looking into cover art and getting everything finalised for release! Exciting times :)

One of the other major considerations I've had for a while has been getting a mailing list set up (and if you're not already signed up, all you need is an email address!) Now this is arranged, I have a way to communicate directly with my readers, and they can help shape what I produce in future.

One of the ways I'm hoping to encourage email sign-ups is with a certain amount of unique content that won't be available on the web. The idea that I have is for something I'm calling 'Vignettes' - unedited short scenes, 750 - 1000 words in length, that will vary stylistically but will hopefully capture a little bit of what my writing is about. I'm going to aim for one of these a month, as it should be possible to do this without severely impacting on my writing schedule. I can make them seasonal, or link them to things happening in the world, and hopefully provide something beautiful and entertaining that people will be able to read and enjoy quickly.

So sign up! Tell your friends! And look out for 'Vignettes', the first of which will be coming soon! :)

On Worldbuilding - Guest Post by Lesley Smith, author of 'The Changing of the Sun'

In my previous post, some of you may recall me making reference to my friend and fellow author Lesley Smith, who publishes her debut novel, 'The Changing of the Sun' on 7 October 2014.  I'm thrilled to announce that Lesley has agreed to give away a paperback copy of her novel to one lucky reader of this blog, so if you'd like a copy, please send a message containing your email address to my Facebook page or my Twitter (a DM is fine in this instance) by the end of September.  One entry will be drawn at random from those received and the winner will be notified shortly after.

On Worldbuilding

My inner architect loves world building, it’s an ordered, logical process which pays off if you do it well.  If the foundations are strong, are balanced, it pays off later on.

The starting point for my whole trilogy was a solar storm.  Here on Earth we’ve had a few over the last couple of years and we know what they are and the damage they can do.  But how would an alien planet with a technologically-inferior society survive?  How would they even know what was coming … what if someone remembered seeing the event during a future time? What if someone the locals might think of as a deity decided to walk in a mortal skin to lend a hand?
 

I did my degree in theology and religious studies, with a year doing Classics as well.  I learned about other people’s faith even as I was finding my own and, I think, had my gender been different or I was born somewhere else, I would have become a child of the cloisters or a priest.  I went to Japan and was bowled away by the beauty of Shinto but also by the balancing of religions within their society, there’s a saying which says you’re Shinto when you’re born, Christian when you marry and Buddhist at death.  I’ve always liked that idea that you can be whatever you want to be without needing to hedge your bets or support one faith or another, each has its place within society and life.

My roots of Kashinai culture came from Japan: I visited temples in Kyoto, Shinto jinja in Sendai and Tokyo, a church in Takatsuki and the holy city of Tenri, founding place of a New Religious Movement called Tenrikyo. 

My first sight of the real Japan actually was on the bus from Narita. It was a simple torii gate and the melting pot of religions left an indelible mark on my soul: I went further into Kamigamo Shrine than even the Emperor of Japan, I listened to the yamatonokotoba, the ancient ritual words, walked in the womb of the earth under Kiyomizudera and, after a spontaneous invitation by a kindly young priest, watched a small child being named and presented to the tutelary kami.

Religion, faith and ritual, they will always find their way into my fiction.

So why did I make my seers, and my main protagonist, blind?  There are lots of blind seers in Classical mythology, characters like Tiresias or Odin, who lose their vision (either partially or completely) but gain supernatural knowledge.  It’s a trade off, in some ways, and while in Japan I discovered native shamanesses called itako (巫子): young women, usually blind, who could speak with spirits, who could act as barriers between the world we live in and the ones beyond.  They learned scriptures by rote, they led aestic lives and had positions of respect in their communities.  Now, the vestiges are left by miko, who still do sacred dances, the last shadows of their original roles as powerful religious leaders.

When I started writing Changing, I knew I wanted to make this idea of blind female seers, the Oracles of Aia, an important part of the story.  I knew the basics of the mythology and, while it’s briefly mentioned in Changing and the prequel, once upon an age before there were dozens of oracles, living amongst their own communities and guiding them independently. 

By the time of the novel, however, the Aian Order has become strictly institutionalised.  Validity means being tested, meant living with others in a tower away from those who they served, appearing only on the holy days at new year when the sisterhood would walk a prescribed route through the city.  The last oracle to refuse to come to the capital, to the city of the Disembodied Goddess, met an unpleasant fate because the current High Oracle can’t face the idea that, one day, she must pass the mantle on.

Changing is about stepping up when you want to run away, about speaking when everyone wants you to be silent.  The role of an oracle is never an easy path, there will always be people who either want to doubt or can’t face the truth, but if enough people work together and have faith, then they might just be able to save themselves from extinction.  The Kashinai made a leap of faith, most of them anyway, and it’s going to ripple down through their history and the second and third books in the trilogy.

Four Thousand Words reviews 'Strange Weather in Tokyo', by Hiromi Kawakami

'Strange Weather in Tokyo' is billed as a gentle love story about two lost souls who discover one another against a backdrop of sake bars and walks through the countryside around Tokyo.  One of Norwich Writers Centre's 2014 Summer Reads, it shares a place with such illustrious company as Ivan Vladislavic's 'Double Negative'.

Young office worker Tsukiko has little spare time and no close relationships with friends or family.  What time she does have is spent in the bars and restaurants of her home city, indulging her gourmet desires and drinking alone.  Over a period of weeks, she finds herself sharing space at the bar with her old high school Japanese teacher, and the pair strike up a bond that surprises them both.

Over the next few months, the pair go mushroom picking, market shopping and island hiking, and we follow their understated conversations that often tail off into comfortable silence.  It wouldn't be overstating the truth to say that this is a story that sneaks up on you.  So unassuming are the opening chapters that when affection builds for the relationship, you are genuinely surprised.

I'm quite specific in that my affection was for the relationship rather than for the characters directly.  The two central characters are the only ones of any direct consequence, and I found myself appreciating them as well-constructed without particularly identifying with either of them.  The protagonist, Tsukiko, comes across as far less warm than her love interest, the seventy-something teacher she still calls Sensei.  She is for the most part skittish and withdrawn, only really coming into her own in the moments she allows herself to feel genuine emotion.  Sensei is perpetually calm and reserved, a man with a twinkle in his eye who despite being in his golden years still enjoys the things that bring him pleasure.

The pared-down twilight world in which they live is almost entirely self-contained.  There is no social commenatary, with none of the passage of time evident in Ishiguro's 'An Artist of the Floating World'.  Nor is this a story about a place, with the muted Tokyo they share clearly one well-walked and known; there is none of the vibrant colour and raw beauty, say, that is captured on film in 'Lost in Translation'.  While Sofia Coppola's story is about two people who find commonality in an alien world, Kawakami's work is by contrast about two people who have embraced the world in which they live so fully that they are in danger of being absorbed by it to their own detriment.

At one point, when referencing the river by which she walks, Tsukiko observes, 'Occasionally people would throw themselves into it.  Most of the time, instead of drowning, they would be carried downstream and then rescued, to their dismay.'  The parallel with the journey she herself is undertaking is clear to the reader without necessarily being apparent to the character.  She follows a clearly defined path that is only really brought under examination when faced with an outcome that she doesn't expect.

Short but nonetheless packing an emotional punch, understated but still engaging, 'Strange Weather in Tokyo' is recommended to those who will enjoy a slow-burning tale of a relationship that rises and falls with the seasons.  For me, it is a success of sorts, but less a true love story than an elegantly simplistic character study of loneliness.

Four Thousand Words reviews 'Ink', by Amanda Sun

Author: Amanda Sun
Publisher: MiraINK
Published: July 5th 2013
Pages: 384
Format: Paperback
Source: Bought

Add It: Goodreads, Amazon UK, Amazon US

Note: This review was first posted on Faye's blog, 'A Daydreamer's Thoughts', which comes highly recommended to all readers of fiction.  Thanks Faye! :)

Summary:
On the heels of a family tragedy, the last thing Katie Greene wants to do is move halfway across the world. Stuck with her aunt in Shizuoka, Japan, Katie feels lost. Alone. She doesn’t know the language, she can barely hold a pair of chopsticks, and she can’t seem to get the hang of taking her  shoes off whenever she enters a building.

Then there’s gorgeous but aloof Tomohiro, star of the school’s kendo team. How did he really get the scar on his arm? Katie isn’t prepared for the answer. But when she sees the things he draws start moving, there’s no denying the truth: Tomo has a connection to the ancient gods of Japan, and being near Katie is causing his abilities to spiral out of control. If the wrong people notice, they’ll both be targets.

Katie never wanted to move to Japan — now she may not make it out of the country alive.

** CAUTION ** This review contains spoilers ** CAUTION **

A girl, ordinary but special. A boy, misunderstood. Two dead mothers. Special powers. Fighting. Tears. A bag full of ‘My heart soared and I knew I couldn’t live without him’ cliches. Welcome to Young Adult Paranormal Romance fiction review.

In a genre where vampires, werewolves, zombies and faeries have received critical attention from every possible angle over the last few years, publishers are desperate to find something new and interesting, so Harlequin Teen must have been very pleased to find first-time author Amanda Sun’s novel about kami, spirits from the Shinto belief system, which in this particular incarnation take the form of individuals whose drawings come to life.

To walk us through this genuinely intriguing premise, we are introduced to spunky-but-vulnerable blonde-haired orphan gaijin teenager Katie Greene, who is living in Japan with a nondescript aunt due to an improbable set of circumstances with her extended family and US Social Services following the death of her mother. When she meets Yuu Tomohiro, a slouching, distant anti-hero who nonetheless guards an improbable heart of gold, she unwittingly stirs his kami blood to the point where dark and dangerous things start to happen.

So far, so good. Katie is a likeable if slightly bland main character, but Sun’s initial steps seem uncertain ones, with a notable over-reliance on colour as a visual medium in many scenes, including the one where we first meet Yuu. In the space of a few short paragraphs, we see his then-girlfriend’s black book, pink-and-silver nails, his own navy blazer and copper hair, and so on. The girlfriend is swiftly removed from the picture, and a pregnant might-be-girlfriend is introduced and immediately discounted within a few pages. This leaves the way open for Katie and Yuu, though their initial fleeting hints of romance are somewhat untidy, veering from the Bridget Jones-esque moment where she climbs a tree to prove to him that she can make an exit (simultaneously displaying her underwear to all and sundry) and a scene immediately afterwards where he tries to walk into her to intimidate her into leaving him alone.

Yuu is a vast disappointment as a love interest. He is an example of the stock teenage ‘bad boy’ mould, constructed directly from lazy cliches. In two consecutive scenes, we see him beating up boys much younger than him, and then when he thinks nobody is watching, he helps an old lady onto a train. Despite numerous references to how troublesome and dangerous he is, Katie is intrigued by his non-existent sense of mystery (where does he go when she’s not around?) and stalks him around the neighbourhood until she discovers that he breaks into a fenced-off archaeological site in order to be able to draw his magical sketches without attracting undue attention. Given that both his personality and his magical powers are still almost completely unexplored at this point, the idea of a dangerous guy who finds redemption through drawing sadly reminded me of the villain Raymond Calitri from the most recent film version of ‘Gone in 60 Seconds’ (2000). Calitri is an unintentionally comic figure, a supposedly vicious killer who nonetheless finds time to talk at length about his interest in carpentry. It is not a welcome comparison.

Characterisation is easily the weakest part of Sun’s debut. Without much effort on her part, Katie soon garners an alternative potential love interest called Jun, but he is suitably interchangeable with Yuu, given that the two have the same magical powers, the same interests and the same dependable white-knight qualities that seem so out of place in seventeen-year old males. Fortunately, Sun makes sure to avoid confusion between the two by giving them different coloured hair. The background characters are treated in a similarly off-hand fashion and seem about as substantial as the paper creatures that the kami create in the novel.

Since reading ‘Ink’, I have seen several online comparisons between it and the ‘Twilight’ series, a comparison which is to a degree inevitable given the subject matter and the lack of freedom that an author has to really explore their themes if they want to attract the attention of a major publisher these days. I cannot comment on the comparison as I have never read any of Stephanie Meyer’s work, but in common with the first ‘Twilight’ movie, the first half of ‘Ink’ moves at the speed of continental drift. However, unlike the first ‘Twilight’ movie, the midpoint in ‘Ink’ sees a dramatic improvement when the kami premise is explored and the characters actually start to do things.

Notably, there is a scene where in a bizarre attempt to force her away, Yuu takes Katie to a love hotel, treats her aggressively and kisses her forcefully. Without wishing to make light of the seriousness of the situation that Katie finds herself in, I have seen this referred to repeatedly online as a rape scene, and I can assure any potential reader that ‘A Clockwork Orange’, this is not. The truth is that the scene, like much of the novel, is so emotionally unengaging that I found myself wondering why it appears at all.

It is a tremendous shame that this sense of inconsequentiality pervades the novel to such an extent, given that Sun’s writing style is generally very good. Her dialogue is believable and enjoyable, and she does an excellent job of capturing Shizuoka through Katie’s eyes. Her use of pathetic fallacy is one example of technique applied subtly and unobtrusively. The settings, such as ‘the stomped-down grass and broken branches’ of Toro Iseki, or the ‘barnacle-encrusted base of the snaking orange hallways’ of the Itsukushima shrine, are distinctive and effective.

If my disappointment at ‘Ink’ is palpable to you, you should be aware that as a 35-year-old man, I am not the likely target market for this book. Nonetheless, I was quietly optimistic that ‘Ink’ had the potential to be genre-defining in the way that ‘The Hunger Games’ or ‘Divergent’ were. While it would do the book a disservice to describe it as an opportunity lost, it would be true to describe it as an opportunity that is not fully realised, for while the action scenes in the second half are well-observed, the characters left me feeling largely ambivalent and the romance seems thoroughly contrived. While I would certainly read more fiction by Amanda Sun, I would expect that the subsequent volumes in this particular series will pass me by.

Before I finish, I would like to make a special mention of the ‘Ink’ cover art, which on my pre-release copy is absolutely beautiful and one of the reasons I was attracted to reviewing it. Suffice to say, if Katie had been formed as well by her actions in the novel as she is captured in brush stroke on its cover, ‘Ink’ could have been something very special indeed. Sadly, it seems like it was not meant to be.

Sprung

Spring is here!

I'm in the mood to celebrate the warmer temperatures and longer days. I also noted that the most popular blogs on this site tend to employ pictures far more than I currently do, so I'm bringing some colour to the season.

My favourite thing about spring is cherry blossom. I love the way that the flamingo-pink flowers are so wonderfully contrasting with England's usual green and brown backdrop. So I took some pictures of blossom on my trusty digicam, and uploaded a couple here for you to see.


I would love to visit Japan, and their national interest in the cherry blossom is one reason why. The Japanese cherry blossom variants are almost pure white, and their progress is reported in the daily news as it sweeps northward across the nation from January to May, marking the changing of the season as it does so.


One of those things that I miss about the gardens from my childhood is an absence of colour, smell and sound. We just don't seem to have the aptitude or work ethic for gardening in my generation. It's a great shame, because a beautiful garden is a joy to behold. What a difference it would make to England if we all planted one tree, or one flower, each. It might bring back the bees, for a start.