I’ve been designing again, which makes me happier than I can explain to you. Gives my days some meaning? Although it kind of makes me feel like I’m cheating. I’m actually getting paid for doing something fun? Is that possible?
Click on the pictures below to see full sized proofs.
We had a quick false alarm where we all thought we’d be flying home on Friday. Luckily, jon and stephen both found extra jobs to work on and now we’re clear again to stay until the 8th.
I keep talking about aligning expectations as a key to happiness, and I think I may be on to something. A few weeks ago I was gung-ho about wanting to stay here on a three year contract. But now that our time is drawing to an end, I’m eager to go “home”.
So. In a last ditch attempt to make the most of our time, we’ve got a busy week lined up.
Last Sunday, I took a solo-trip to the island of Enoshima. I have some rad pictures of fuji to share with you soon. Last night we had stephen and jill over for dinner (which turned out really good – I’m going to post the recipes soon!). Tonight we’re going to a soccer game and tomorrow a ping-pong tournament! Friday we’re trying to organize a picnic/bbq with all the japanese friends we’ve made while we’ve been here. Saturday is “garden day” – where we’re going to rock it old’school in the park. Perhaps there will be day-drinking? Sunday, unfortunately jon has to work.
In the meantime, my book is coming together nicely. I’m at about 150 pages and nearly through our April adventures. Just need to work on typography a bit. I’m looking forward to showing it to all of you. Sesame is busy as usual, though I have to admit that having some extra help (thanks to Caren!) means life doesn’t suck. I’m designing more and I haven’t threatened suicide in like, three weeks.
Glad you asked. teamEggers is… working.
Mrs. teamEggers is rather grumpy about said arrangements, but I think she’s handling it rather gracefully. After all, actually working 6pm-7am, 7 days a week, sucks significantly more for Mr. teamEggers.
But you don’t see him complaining about it.
You may be wondering what *I’m* doing in my now jon-less time. I haven’t been terribly inspired to conquer new territories alone, so I spend my nights quietly. Having exhausted my supply of Murakami books, I’ve taken to reading trashy novels and drinking wine at the Spanish bar we recently found.
I’m also working on a coffee table book with the photos from our trip. I expect it to be around 100 pages long – 11×13.
Rereading all of our blog posts from the past four months has been really interesting. I look back at the posts from January and can honestly say I’ve learned some things about this crazy country. I no longer leave the house in well-disguised-terror and I can accurately tell the difference between a shrine and a temple.
My goal is to finish the book before May and send it off to print a week before we leave. I would really love it if we had it right away to show everyone when we got back.
In 1999 we were still developing film and showing off our photo albums. In 2009 we’re actually publishing books with the help of software like iPhoto, WordbPress, and Blurb. I love the future.
(the picture up top are of the snail-statues outside our apartment)
After a two hour train ride through a winding, tunnel filled mountain road, we arrive in Matsumoto. There, we set out immediately for Hokata, home of the Daio Wasabi far. A helpful (English speaking) tourism guide directs us to the best place to rent bicycles.
On our way to Daio we stopped at a temple.
While I can’t find any confirming information, I believe the placard said that it was the tokoji temple and these were the shoes of a great buddha. All who wore the shoes would have good luck, etc. Jon, who hates fun, wouldn’t put the shoes on.
The afternoon that followed was the sort of scene they have in movies. You know the kind when the grumpy, desolate girl from New Jersey is swept off her feet by a rich, older man and they have a whirl-wind getaway in the countryside somewhere? Yeah, kind of like that.
With sunshine-filled blue skies overhead, the country highways provided excellent views of the enigmatic Japanese Alps.
I had always seen these mountains painted in such a way that I thought it was the regional watercolour style of painting. I had no idea that that the mountain ranges actually appear to be fading of in the distance, like each farther peak was shrouded in an increasingly dense fog. There’s no other way you could paint them. My photos do not do them justice.
If I look at my monitor in the right way, this photo has a very distinct large circle where the sun is. It’s incredible. I just cant stop looking at it and thinking that “the land of the rising sun” really means something here.
After a pleasant 20 minute bike ride, we arrive at Daio. Daio is essentially the Disney Land of wasabi farms. We’re in wasabi-country and Daio is the one that tour busses line up at.
The grounds were beautiful.
The wasabi was tasty. My only complaint was that it was a little too family friendly. The “wasabi beer” was more like St. Patrick’s Day Kirin and the only discernable quality about the “wasabi ice cream” was the chalky aftertaste it left. Honestly though, if my only complaint about the day was that my ice cream wasn’t spicy enough, I lead a charmed life.
This is fresh wasabi root. They make special dishes that you can grind it in! The best thing to do is to grind it about 15 minutes before you’re going to eat it. We read later that wasabi is similar to wine – a small amount of oxidation allows the flavours to meld and cohere (ie: get spicy), but too long and you lose the freshness and potency. I’ve been exclusively eating bad wasabi my entire life and didn’t even know it.
After the wasabi farm we headed back to Matsumoto where we located our ryokan for the night. A ryokan is the traditional Japanese inn, are generally found in older cities and are traditionally crazy-expensive. We found this one for $60/night (each) and that included a Japanese breakfast in the morning!
We’ll go ahead and call it a smokin deal.
So these ryokan – they’re not like hotel rooms as we know them. They size is measured by how many tatami mats you can fit on the floor, and instead of a bed you have futons on the floor. (these fold out)
I hadn’t really expected to stay in the “lap of luxury” for $60/night, but I also was a little nervous about how comfortable sleeping on the floor could be. Boy, was I wrong. I don’t know how they do it, but these little guys are like nests of love.
But I’m getting ahead of myself. When you get to the ryokan, they ask you to take your shoes off at the door and they give you slippers. There’s a 3 room dining area where you fill out your paperwork (and also where breakfast is served in the morning).
There’s a little zen garden in the middle. I wonder how many buildings we pass have this hollowed out center to let nature in? It’s one of those things I would have never guessed existed from the exterior of the building.
There’s a house bath and a house shower, (though since there were only 8 rooms, we didn’t really have to wait long for them) and two sets of toilets. Very small. After the proprietress showed us around, she brought us to our rooms where we mistakenly walked right in with our slippered feet. Silly us. You take the inside slippers off before you enter the bedroom. (You also take them off before entering the bathroom too. There are usually separate slippers provided for these rooms.) The japanese must have deep seeded fears of their feet getting cold.
The room was really cute. There were two sliding doors to get in, acting as a shoe-chamber. On the opposite side of the (very humble) room was the window that overlooked the streets and the river. For insulation I presume, there were four different screens to slide open before you reached daylight.
They also gave you robes to wear while you were there, and in the halls you’d see the other guests shuffling around in them. Very different than what we’re used to. I’m glad we got to experience it.
Jon is, of course, much too tall for everything here. (the sticker says “mind your head” but is chin-height for him!)
Now that we’re settled in, we head off to explore a bit. We’re at a bit of an impasse with our eating establishments. We like to eat at challenging restaurants. Places with character. We like to allow the chef to cook for us, what s/he cooks best. I think in america, this is well accepted and is a mark of pride for a lot of great chefs. In japan, it’s tricky. We WANT to eat at the good places, that are frequented by the locals. But honestly, they scare the shit out of us. Logically we know that the worst that can happen is they tell us to go away (there aren’t any anti-racism laws here). But even assuming we get in the restaurant, it’s really difficult to convey that we WILL eat whatever you put in front of us – just make it good. you know? ugh. I get frustrated and tangential about this.
The point of the story is that we heard of this particular restaurant. Armed with a general idea of its location, and the proper kanji to look for on the store-sign, we actually found it. And then we stood outside for a few minutes, paced, and tried to work up the courage to go in. It sounds stupid, I know. But imagine that you’re standing at an essentially unmarked door that very well looks like it could go into someone’s living room. Inside you hear salarymen laughing loudly, having a great time in what is very likely a 10 foot square room. You know that as soon as you slide open the door, all eyes will go to you and, because you’re a 25 year old white girl, they’ll probably keep staring at you.
Okay. so we do it. Open the door…. and the place is PACKED. There are people everywhere. The chef (who speaks some english) tells us their full – he’s very sorry. bah!
After battling with some disappointment issues, we finally head off to our second choice – kura, who’s known for their local specialty basashi, or raw and thinly sliced horse meat.
I also had some taru-sake (aged in cedar so it has a really manly, smoky, woodsy quality) out of the traditional wooden box, or masu.
Dinner was good. I wouldn’t call it earth shattering or ground breaking, but it was good.
Tomorrow we get to the main attraction, but this was our sneak-peak for the night:
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