Japanese Yen

When in a foreign country, even looking through your spare change can be new and exciting!

The currency of Japan is the yen. In Japan it is represented by the Kanji 円, and abroad by the symbol ¥.

If you use the USD, it shouldn't be hard for you to make sense of the value of your yen. It takes 100 yen to make a dollar, so just think of each yen as a single cent. I found it helpful to mentally add a decimal point to values.


For example,

200 yen - 2.00 dollars - 2 dollars.
10000 yen - 100.00 dollars - 100 dollars.

The Japanese use coins more than Americans do, so you may have to get used to the idea that a pocketful of change might actually be worth something!

The biggest Japanese coin, and yes, it's very commonly used, is the 500¥ coin. It's big, heavy, gold coloured, and worth a little over 5$! As the highest valued regularly used coin in the world, I daresay it's worth picking up if you should drop one.

The smallest coin is the 1¥ coin. It is tiny and made of 100% aluminum, so it's incredibly lightweight and almost feel like play money.

Another thing to notice is that two of the coins - the 5¥ and 50¥ pieces, have holes in them. The 5¥ coin is particularly notable. While only worth five cents, it is mostly copper and quite lovely. Unlike every other Japanese coin, it lacks any roman numerals. It is also considered to have a special value because the Japanese words for "Five Yen" - "Go-En" are the same as the honorific word for "Fate". Therefore, the 5¥ coin is very commonly given as a donation in Shinto shrines.


All pictures taken from Wikipedia.

Kamakura's Daibutsu

No visitor to Kamakura, or even to Tokyo, should miss this Great Buddha. Housed in the temple Kōtoku-in (高徳院), it is a popular destination and so easy to reach on foot or by bus. Most maps of Kamakura depict the Daibutsu visually, so you need not read Japanese to find your way.

Cast in 1252, this Buddha was originally housed in a wooden temple. Notably, it was built completely with donations - no government funding whatsoever. A 1498 tsunami destroyed this building, and crushed hundreds of Samurai who were taking refuge inside, but left the huge bronze statue standing. Some repairs were done in 1960, particularly to strengthen the statue's neck, but otherwise it has been standing out in the open, in it's present form, for more than five hundred years.

The statue is made primarily of copper, with a large component of lead and tin. Even today we are not one hundred percent sure how it was put together. Originally the statue was covered in brilliant, shining gilt, but over the course of 700 years it has worn almost completely off. Specialists have said that that statue's balance, intelligence, powerfulness, and dignity surpass that of the Todaiji Buddha in Nara.

Among those impressed by the statue's longevity and serene demeanor are Richard Cocks, who after visiting in 1616 said that the Daibutsu must be larger than the Colossus of Rhodes, and Rudyard Kipling, who, after seeing the Daibutsu in 1892, mentions it repeatedly in verses throughout his novel Kim.

O ye who treated the Narrow Way
By Tophet-flare to Judgment Day,
Be gentle when "the heathen" pray
To Buddha at Kamakura!

If you go around to the back, you can see that this Buddha in fact has windows! It is hollow inside and in fact for a time it was a den for gamblers and the homeless.

Now you can go inside for only 20¥ - about 20 cents.








Mentioned in: Japan's Daibutsu

Sources:
http://themargins.net/anth/19thc/kipling.html
http://www.kamakuratoday.com/e/sightseeing/daibutsu.html

Food: Sukiyaki (Japan)

鋤焼 (Hiragana すき焼き, romaji Sukiyaki) is a type of Japanese hot pot. Thinly sliced beef, jelly noodles, and other vegetables including cabbage or mushrooms are cooked slowly in a salty-sweet mirin and soy sauce broth. When eating Sukiyaki, each person breaks an egg into a serving bowl and dips what they take from the pot into the raw egg before eating. (This is safe to do in Japan, duplication can't be recommended everywhere.) There are many Sukiyaki restaurants in Japan, and Sukiyaki is also very popular in homes, especially at winter parties.



My friend's grandmother made us this Kyoto style Sukiyaki the night we arrived in Japan. The textures were certainly different - especially the jelly noodles and the raw egg - but it all tasted delicious. The flavour was a unique mixture of sweetness and umami.

Food: Japanese Curry

カレー (romaji Karē, also known as Japanese Curry) is a type of curry with a rather interesting history. During the Meiji era (1869 - 1913), curry was first introduced to Japan by the British. At the time, India was under the control of Britain, and the British navy often ate meat stews seasoned with curry powder. Most curry served in Japan today comes from this originally British mixture. However, in more recent years many Indian restaurants have also opened in Japan, so it is possible to get Indian curry there as well.


Japanese Curry is usually served with rice, eaten with a spoon, and called カレーライス (curry rice). The most popular meats are beef or pork, depending on the region of Japan, although chicken and duck curries are also available. Common vegetables are onions, carrots, and potatoes. Another common form is カレーパン (karē pan) called curry bread or sometimes curry dougnut, which is dough wrapped around a bit of curry and then deepfried. Karē soups are also popular.

Karē restaurants are one of the cheaper options for eating out in Japan. Karē is also very easy to make at home, since many instant powders and blocks are available. If you like, you can easily try it yourself in the United States, since many grocery stores carry the instant varieties Vermont Curry and/or Golden Curry.

Food: Yakitori (Japan)

焼き鳥 (hiragana やきとり, romaji Yakitori) is a type of kebab popular in Japan. Literally, the name means 'fried bird', because most yakitori dishes are made of chicken. Yakitori-ya are some of the cheapest restaurants in Japan, and are found throughout the country. There are two main ways to season yakitori. One is with sea salt and lemon, and the other is with tare sauce (a sweet and thick soy sauce).

This googlesnatched photo shows yakitori with mushrooms and chicken together.

If you are picky about your meat, yakitori may not be for you. When you order your kebabs, you are literally asking for the part of the chicken that you want. For example, kokoro (chicken heart), sunagimo (chicken gizzard), kawa (chicken skin), bonjiri (chicken tail), shiro (chicken intestines), and nankotsu (chicken cartilage).

Less intimidating varieties include toriniku (white meat chicken), atsuage dofu (deep fried tofu), and enoki maki (mushrooms wrapped in pork slices).

Japan's Daibutsu

Japan is home to a number of fabulous Daibutsu, literally, 'Big Buddhas'. These statues vary widely in terms of size, material, personality, and style, from the 120 meter tall Ushiku Amida Buddha, shown on the right, to the Kamagaya Daibutsu, called "Japan's Smallest Big Buddha," which in my mind borders on the oxymoronic.


The first Daibutsu I'd like to showcase is the Ushiku Amida Buddha. At 110 meters tall, it is the third largest statue in the world, and more than three times the size of Brazil's Christ the Redeemer. Although I haven't seen it myself, it certainly looks impressive in this Googlesnatched photo.

However, the Ushiku Amida Buddha has two things going against it. Firstly, it's somewhat out of the way, compared to many of the Daibutsu which are in famous cultural centers. Secondly, and this one's a killer, the Ushiku Amida Buddha was completed in 1995, making it a whopping 14 years old.





Next up, The Great Buddha of Nara. This is the world's largest Buddha Vairocana. Work began on this bronze Daibutsu in 747, however, it has been repaired numerous times and had it's head replaced in 1692. It's nice and shiny, but it loses some of it's grandeur since it's crowded inside of a building.

Still, it's a must see if only for the sake of this building: Todaiji's Great Buddha Hall. It is, as it stands today, the largest wooden building in the world - and it's only 2/3 it's original size.









Last but not least, here's The Great Buddha of Kamakura. Although he can make no superlative claims, he is listed among Japan's official top 3 Daibutsu for good reason. Cast in 1252, this Daibutsu is more than 750 years old. He towers over the buildings around him while retaining a peaceful, otherworldly presence. Originally covered by a building like the Nara Buddha's Todaiji, his temple washed away in a tsunami long ago, leaving only the Daibutsu.

He is located in Kamakura, just a short train ride from Tokyo. This town features dozens of temples and makes a great day trip.

Still, the best thing about the Kamakura Buddha is that it's hollow in the middle, with windows on the back... and for 20¥, or about 22 cents, you can go inside.

Find out more in: Kamakura's Daibutsu

The Culture of Japanese Warning Signs

First, for comparative purposes, your good, old fashioned, everyday CAUTION sign:

I think most American's would agree that this is a fairly standard, unextraordinary CAUTION sign. A simple stick figure, a very abstract representation of a human being. It is genderless, faceless, emotionless. Devoid of all context, he trips and falls in a vacuum.

The signs I saw in Japan were noticeably different. They seemed to say, "You are not the only person in the world - take care not to forget it". From etiquette signs to warning signs, attention is drawn to the human situation, to the emotions involved. Emotional bystanders are depicted as almost as important, if not as important, as the central figure, who failed to heed the warning. This figure, too, takes on a persona: in the case of coming into some harm, he looks horrified, embarrassed. In the case of being a nuisance, he looks self absorbed or wicked.

I spent a lot of time on subways and trains, staring at advertisements, people watching (as carefully as I could), and trying to puzzle out the Japanese writing on various things. But my eyes kept coming back to these posters, to what they seemed to say about Japanese values.

Exhibit One:

I didn't take this shot myself. I actually took regrettably few shots of these signs, considering the awkward implications of using flash photography on a crowded train. Still, this serves as an excellent example.

The central figure here is a young woman who, being in a rush, decides to try and dash onto a train that is leaving. Well, this is discouraged for a number of reasons. It may delay the train, and it's not very safe for anyone involved. Predictably, the woman gets her foot stuck. As she screams, those in and outside of the train look horrified, anxious, embarrassed, and a wide range of other negative emotions.

The message: You are not the only person in the world. If you do something stupid, you will get hurt, you will cause a commotion, and you will draw attention to yourself. Are you sure you're in that big of a hurry?

I am not the world's most graceful person. I've lost track of the times that I've missed a step, or slipped, or otherwise embarrassed myself by not being careful enough. Most of these times, I turned bright red when it happened. The pain on the bottoms of my hands or even a skinned knee couldn't compare to my shame at having drawn attention to myself. When people came to ask me whether I was okay, I knew that they meant well, but I wanted to disappear.



Exhibit Two:

Sadly, this is the only one of the three pictures here that I took myself. It was a bad choice, too, as this is the one that popped up most often when I tried to do a Google Search for others I remembered! But it's a classic for a reason.

Uh oh, looks like someone didn't set their phone to manner mode. If the central characters phone was merely ringing, he might merely have been cast as the thoughtless, forgetful half victim. As it is, he is shamelessly, no, wickedly talking loudly into his phone on the crowded train! This goes beyond disregard for others as he seems to be taking pleasure in assaulting their ears. I for one wouldn't want to be sitting next to someone like that, especially with the red lightening bolts coming out of his shoulders!

The message: You are not the only person in the world. Only evil people who hate old women and pretty girls would talk on their phone in the subway. Are you evil?

-------

Exhibit Three:


I saw this sign many times while in Tokyo, but I did take this photograph of it off of Google.

Two women have been out shopping. They simply can't help themselves and start chatting and comparing purchases on the subway, with their things strewn out around them. Although they are very obviously bothering those around them, as evidenced by the huge white eyes of the bystanders, they evidently are living in their own little bubble and don't care.

The message: You are not the only person in the world. Don't take up more space than you're entitled to.

----

Exhibit Four:

This exhibit, unfortunately, exists only in my memory and your imagination. If someone has an image of this sign, please let me know! I would love to have it.

The central figure in this image is riding a long distance train. She neglected to sit securely enough - perhaps she wasn't leaning back, perhaps she wasn't wearing a seatbelt. At any rate, when the train stops suddenly, she goes flying forwards.

This being about one week into our trip to Japan, I turned to my friend Laura and said,

"You see? The girl coming out of her seat looks frightened and anxious enough, but also look at the reactions of those around her."

The passengers in the other seats, who had been more careful, looked similar to the bystanders in Exhibit One.

"Even the seat is reacting," said Laura, and I realized it was true. Each seat had been personified with eyes, eyebrows, and a little mouth. They were all looking towards the hapless girl, and they, too, looked horrified, anxious, embarassed.

The message: You are not the only person in the world. Fasten your seatbelt... for everyone's sake.

Photo: The Smallest Corner (Japan 2009)

,The Smallest Corner
Where: Kamakura, Japan
When: Evening, July 16th, 2009

A small city, a small street, a small corner beside a shop. What do you find there? In the United States I would expect maybe beer bottles and cigarette butts, maybe a trash can, maybe, at best, a potted plant or a bit of a store window.

With about four square feet of ground space, there is a lovely cabinet displaying some art, some ubiquitous and frighteningly realistic Japanese plastic food models for the restaurant behind, and the smallest bit of landscaping I think I've ever seen. The ground cuts away swiftly into a tiny pond, and a tiny tree rises above.

I almost don't know which impresses me more: the scale, or the flawless blending of practical, artistic, and introduced natural beauty.

Photo: MakuDonarudo's (Japan 2009)

Makudonarudo's

Where: Kamakura, Japan
When: Morning, July 16th 2009

This was the first Japanese McDonald's (Pronounced Makudonarudo's) that I saw on the trip, and one of my first glimpses of culture blending. I liked the juxtaposition between the woman standing there in the more traditional print clothing, looking slightly bewildered, and the advertisements surrounding her. Take a closer look at these advertisements and you'll realize they're a bit confusing for an English speaker. The poster directly behind the woman identifies three different visible products as Chicken, Juicy Chicken, and Juicy Chicken. I'd like to note that all three names are quite different in Japanese. I also enjoy the wrapper around the 'Chicken' that just says 'Chicken'. Good stuff.

Photo: The Night Before (Japan 2009)

The Night Before

Where: Kansas City, Missouri
When: Midnight, July 14th 2009

I took this picture right before I fell asleep on the night before our trip to Japan. What you see in this pile is our grand experiment in packing light - everything, down to the shoes - that Laura and I will bring to Japan with us.

You might guess that we came home with a bit more!