Finally after trzing many blog designs I setteled on this very light one to accompany me through my next travels in this wonderful country called Japan! Stay tuned there is a lot to come! If I have time ;)
So lately I enjoyed a great time with my friend Fujii san!! A wonderful Osakajin!! =D He is a professional Photographer!! We ate Sushi together at his favourite Sushi restaurant where the fish was indeed very delicious! And then we went to a Japanese Onsen! Where as always, being NOT naked made the Japanese a little shy ;)
He helped me in my moving out from my house too! So I am very thankful to him!!
DISCLAIMER! I don't know why BUT you must ZOOM OUT to get a good view of the Map, it's worth it!!
So using web2 technology I start presenting my trip to Kyushu!
I enjoyed it SO much! It was a great trip thanks to my senpai and friend Higashi San. I used a seishun 18 Kippu, a 5 day ticket which costs around 70 Euros. You can go with this ticket wherever you want in Japan! Start was Osaka, through Kobe, Himeji and Okayama where I changed to the city liner, a train going through Hiroshima from Okayama to Shimonozeki. From Shimonozeki you take the train to Kyushu. Please click on the line or the markers after zooming out!
The view was spelendid! Its so great that you can't even go to the toilet, because you don't want to miss it!
This picture was taken before arriving at Hiroshima!
The Japanese inland sea is so famous, that there are even ferries touring it only for sightseeing! When I was in Shikoku I could really see a lot of them!
Passing through Hiroshima!
And again the Bright Blue Sea! Click it to appreciate it actually!
Incredible isn't it!
Now, if you look to the other side you could see actually this!
Wonderful Emerald Green..
The houses had a very distinct architecture which was a little bit different then the one in Osaka or Kyoto!
Last but not least a small movie which you can actually see in the Map!
How was Kyushu? Can we top this crazyness? And could Arafat finally go to the toilet? Next! In the coming days!
Find a map with places I visited, click on a tag in the map and see a movie I shot, another tag and see Pics and Infos I took! Want more info? Click on the Wikipedia link.. Let's see how much Web2 we can digest, heh ;D
I am relaunching my blog right now! Mainly language and Google Maps integration.
Je suis entrain de relauncher mon Blog, plusieurs langues c'est aussi plus de fun :)
Bin gerade dabei rauszukriegen wie ich am besten in 5 Sprachen mein Blog schreiben könnte.. theoretische möglich würde dies an der Zeit die ich investieren müsste scheitern.. Mal gucken!
If I figure out how to write Arabic on my Linux box, then also Arabic will be supported!
I want to present you today some selection of Japanese food you would not usually see in a magazine about Japan. The Japanese cuisine is as every other cuisine in the world rich of delicious dishes and full of imagination!
This is one dish of the Kyoto Kaiseki Ryori which consists of up to 13 dishes, Japanese haute cuisine! I got invited by my best friend to try this out! The taste was good, but as you can see the presentation top notch.
Red rice! I forgot the name.. I ate this in a wonderful traditional Sobaya (Soba "house"). It was very delicious and very nice to look at. This type of rice is said to grow only in special places it is very rare and eaten as a delicacy and not as staple rice!
In the same Sobaya delicious Soba with Natto, Oh man!! I want to eat this again.. Soba are noodles made from Buckwheat, very popular in winter! Now there are more and more specialized Soba and Udon shops which sell the noodles as gourmet food.
In the famous Nishiki Ichiba this wonderful wide assortment of pickles. The variety of colours strikes the eye..
No doubt, Japanese love seafood! This ends sometimes with some very wired combinations.. Tuna with sesame on an ice stick..
efish is a very surprising Cafe I visited with some friends in Kyoto. Everything in white with a gallery on the second floor. You can visit my post about Japanese design to see some of the elements of the Gallery!
Everything was kept in white which gave it a very clean feeling, very shiny and light.. The real attraction was the Lengthy aquarium! WOW as having myself an Aquarium and loving to watch (and actually eat) fish ;) I thought this is rare!
The Aquarium looks stunning. The fish is some Neon Type! Very small and appealing to the eyes! It brings colours into the white facade. And the fish life into the cafe. The design of the Cafe was also very nice; symmetric and clear, very Japanese in its proportions with a #wonderful# view on the river. sweet!
I was very surprised by the fact that there were some magazines in the Cafe which made it somehow cultured for me! Generally in Japanese Cafes there is nothing, or Manga.. So seeing design mags and very good books even surprised me alot! Very classy cafe.
I was guided by a very good friend of me to a Tatami maker to get a glimpse on one of the most famous elements of Japanese culture.
Even though Japan is very well known for the Tatami, it originated in China. Nowadays it is known as the traditional Japanese flooring in traditional style Japanese houses.
I took a look at how to repair a Tatami! And Believe me it was indeed exciting!
The covering mat had to be changed.
After laying the straw mat on the Styrofoam or Hard-straw mat the straw mat gets stretched, the borders get covered by some sort of trimming and everything is cut on the edges to fit the Styrofoam mat.
the sewing machine sews everything together!
And you have at the end a perfectly looking Tatami!
I am testing google map right now on my blog to show you exactly where I am when I take my pictures. This will be a BIG leap forward for all of the readers of the blog! you will know where I took the pictures! Maybe with flickr and youtube you'll get some multimedia goodness too! I hope you'll enjoy web 2.0! :)
Update!!
Succeeded in: Adding tags Inserting flickr pics with linking to flickr And inserting information about the pic!
This is my FAVOURITE band of all time! Pizzicato five. They were very famous in the nineties, but their music is so Avantgarde that if you don't know that fact you'll think this group formed just now!
Enjoy the admiration of Japan for India which already started with Buddhism entering Japan some 1400 years ago till today!
I was last weekend at my friends house in Otori, a countryside small city to the south of Osaka. Arriving there I was surprised by how nice the houses and the streets looked. Old countryside Osaka at it's best! My friends are the official notes keeper of the priest in their eleventh generation. Well this should mean something..
The house of my friends was also a very traditional house, a "farmers house" as they called it which is characterized by the fact that it is REALLY big compared to city houses. Well if you know (or remember) till Edo period the farmers were after the Samurai the second highest class in the Japanese Cast system! So it makes perfect sense that their houses were so big and beautiful. Simply put the farmers of Japan were rich AND they had status.
hmm, Japanese cherries.. ;)
And some nice "Tanbou"s (rice fields) giving the city it's countryside charm!
We ended the night in a Japanese restaurant, as all of my friends know that I am a Japanese food otaku! =) It was very delicious except for the Sashimi which was too expensive for the quantity we got.
Entsuji is a very fine temple in the north of Kyoto. Founded in 1629 by the Emperor Gomizuno, it became a Zen monastery later.
The Temple displays the gardening style of Shakkei (lit. borrowed scenery), The main element being Mount Hiei one of the many Meccas of Japanese Buddhism.
Mount Hiei looks really beautiful. In Japan Mountains play a central role in the religious life of the people. Mount Fuji is the most prominent example, Mount Koya is very famous too and many other mountains. The tradition of reverence to Mountains and nature continued through the religious development of the country.
Last but not least the "window of enlightenment" of entsuji. Enlightenment "IS" buddhism. It is the goal of every buddhist believer to get enlightened. The form of the window shows symbolically Enlightenment.
Comme certains d'entre vous le savent, Bebs est parti aujourd'hui vers la france. Und tres bon ami que je vais regretter. Mais on va se revoir en France! :) Ca serait ma premiere fois de visiter vraiment la france apres des annees de francais et de culture francaise..
So Bebs went today back to France! I wish you good luck, and a bright future!
I was with Yumi in a very cool cafe called efish in Kyoto! A trendy Cafe showcasing very well youth culture in Japan and especially in the Kansai region! The first floor was already a blast, with a very nice and clear design and some fish.. But this will be the topic of the next post ;) On the second floor there was a gallery displaying all sorts of small things.
Japanese design borrows heavily elements from old Japanese culture. Simplicity of the form, Symmetry and asymmetry used respectively to achieve an overall sensation of unobstrusiveness and clarity.
Japanese love "playing with forms" and with objects. Explaining this to my friends costed me nearly one hour! ;) So I'll not delve too much on to this point in this post..
So as you can see Japanese design has many elements which make it unique and very fresh to the outsider! Take a look at your walkman and let your fantasy play with its design ;)
Usually I take the monorail to go from the place where I live, near "Yamada" station, to "Shibahara" a station 5 minutes away from the main gate. Using The Monorail I see everything everyday from a birds perspective. After some time you get used to that! houses are small, big fields undefinable.. And the Skyline of Osaka your everyday companion against the not so interesting passengers..Suits and top notch dressing..
So today I had a radical change of perspective when taking the "shuttle bus" a bus relating The Toyonaka Campus to the Suita Campus. The bus takes the same route but instead of seeing the area from above you are in it actually. You see BIG houses, apartments, people, streets, cars, life around you and the tiny objects become suddenly so big!
Your perspective changes radically! Feelings of security of control and of distance are lost! it's the same place but you have a totally different relationship to it!
I thought WOW we use Airplanes for travelling through the world! It's exactly the same as with the monorail we see the same regions but with an unconnected feeling. Flying over India has no relation whatsoever with being in India! Isn't this shoking?
This very popular motorcycle illustrates for me the essence of one very popular trend in modern Japanese design, or better, one of the many characteristics that give Japan it's cultural identity.
The Motorcycle looks at first sight very clumsy! But if you take a nearer look it is very symmetric.
This feeling of #big# and debording like a Sumo wrestler is very characteristic of Japanese design. Many things are made to look big and debording..
Then the colours! As you can see some white with a very strong and shiny green! Here in Osaka we are at the same level as south Italy or north Africa, so strong shiny colours are very very popular and are part of the culture.
Las but not least the motorcycle itself which looks like American motorcycles, long and heavy. Which shows clearly the strong American influence on modern Japanese culture.
So today I wanted to combine the love of the Japanese for flowers, which is apparent in every corner in the city! With my department: The Department of Physics at the Univeristy of Osaka. I am in the 7th floor, so the highest of the building.
From the main entrance facing the "chuugoku" highway till the center of the Campus could you see flowers embellishing the road.
From the main entrance...
Far into the campus...
Japanese have an obsession for "Hanami" literally meaning "seeing flowers" but which I would translate to "enjoying flowers"! They do not only do Hanami in the time of cherry blossoming, but starting from spring with plum blossoming then cherry, through summer with differnet kinds of floral plants, till automn where the leafs start to change to red! Every flower is a possible target for Hanami! Reasoning about it's beauty, it's smell and it's relation with the current weather. So you could say Hanami is not only looking at flowers, but feeling the flower in relation with the current environment. Relating ones own inner feelings to the nature surrounding one. Very Japanese indeed..
The variety of fruits in Japan is nearly the same as in the medeterranian! With some differences in form and colour!
Incredible but real! I found figs in a garden near the place were I live.
A RED sunflower!! Never saw that before.. On the background what you see are neither oranges nor grapefruits! Some Japanese citrus fruit which even my friend didn't know it's name.. Citrus fruits are found here in an endless variety..
The last fruit the Loquat is in Tunisia incredibly popular!! I thought it is a native to the south Mediterranean until I read the link! Well my world views changed already some times.. So the shock was far milder this time.. ;)
The Author writes (with some reordering to make things clearer):
"There is the way things are and the way we'd like them to be. The reality and the facade. The real reason and the pretext. The substance and the form. Being direct and being diplomatic. And the truth and the white lie. In short, that is honne and tatemae, respectively.
Since avoiding conflict and trouble is extremely important in Japan, using diplomatic language is often used rather than the direct approach. It's said that in formal situations a direct "No" is avoided and there are a thousand nicer alternatives -- which can be true, but it depends a lot on the situation and social status of the parties involved. Japanese may say things very politely and vaguely, but if the meaning is not clear it's perfectly acceptable to ask for clarification."
Nothing more to add here..
One thing I can say from my experience is that if you don't understand Honne and Tatemae after sometime you'll get completely lost in Japan, and I really mean lost..
I was in Kyoto with Yumi doing some sightseeing, and she showed me this GREAT cafe. The Atmosphere was so moody, very Indy. I love those Cafes! In Germany I was with my friends all the time in those places, so I enjoyed it alot to be with her there.
Generally, in Japan, Cafes are the places to go for women and couples. Men go to Family restaurants and Izakayas.
Japanese women love "Le Chic", anytime anywhere! And it does not matter how much it costs. Men want to live more Macho-like, so avoiding everything smooth is an Art for itself here.
Well but that should be written in another post ;) Let's enjoy now these nice pictures :)
Very Indy atmosphere, with a Japanese counter and Western chairs and tables for the guests.
This set-up is found everywhere in Japan. Why the counter is always Japanese is beyond me..
Yumi bought a Magazine called "The Big Issue". I didn't ask her about it even if she was trying to show it to me all the time, I was afraid of it!! I thought, woah THE BIG issue... Too much for my poor feelings.. I'll ask her next time ;)
To all of you who are wondering what is so special about Japanese vending machines I want to present you this picture!
Doesn't it look so bright in the night? Attracting you to buy some refreshments.. Saying to you, come to me.. come to me.. I am the Light..
The Japanese vending machine is an institution, it originated before the "convinient stores" which open 24h/d, the VM were usually the only way to get things 24h/d. Even after the CS came the VM stayed as popular as ever.
So I was returning from my friends house using a JR train and luckily I got the wrong one!!! =D Instead of taking a "local" train which stops at every station, so also at the one I wanted to go out off, I got an express train which only stops at 3 or 4 stations. To my surprise the whole train was decorated with publicity about Germany and German companies. I felt very happy :) I want to share this special view with you. This German Logo was literally everywhere in the wagon!
I don't know why this guy is looking so happy at that map in front of him.. And the even more important question, why did he use so much gel in his hair?? He's doing the publicity for Lufthansa by the way!
Triumph, a famous company for bras and pants.. As usual.. Sex sells..Everywhere.
