New Year, New You

I really had no intention of coming back to Chinatown anytime soon.  Although I really enjoyed the shengjianbao (Meen set me straight on their name), it's been getting warmer and besides, it's a little out of the way.  But that was before I realized that I needed to fill up my event hours for my course on multiculturalism and decided it would be interesting to compare and contrast Chinatown Chinese New Year with Shanghai (and Harbin's) celebrations.

I'd planned to go with Flower Boy and his partner for the actual New Year's Eve, but after fighting a headache all day I surrendered, messaging him that I wouldn't be able to make it.  Instead, I made my way down my nearest train line to Motomachi-Chukagai the following night.  Leaving the station I followed the signs for Chinatown, but when I got to street level I didn't recognize anything - this wasn't the way I'd come before.  I didn't have long to consider my options, though; when I heard the drums I knew I was going in the right direction.

I followed them down the street and found myself under one of the gates of Chinatown, at a corner where a rhythm section was laying down beats for a dancing blue lion.  The tang of gunpowder hung in the air.

The two dancers in the costume were moving through a restaurant, blessing the place with good luck for the New Year.  They moved between the tables, shaking their groove thang (aka, head) at the customers.  They finally emerged from the restaurant, bowed at the entrance, and then moved on to the next business, where their arrival was heralded by a barrage of firecrackers before the process began again.

After watching from beginning to end, I moved along to let others enjoy the spectacle.  I moved up the street and got reeled in by the promise of tasty treats.  I stopped for an order of four shengjianbao at the first vendor I came across...after my initial discovery last time, I realized how many actually were there.  I was told they would be ready in seven minutes, although I think it actually took a little longer before the bowl of piping hot dumplings was placed in my hands.  As I nibbled a hole in the wrapper and sucked out the soup I scalded my tongue, but they were too delicious to wait for.  I ate them walking down the  street, passing the blue lion again before finding a trash can outside a combini to dump my bowl and chopsticks in.

I realized then I was hearing drums both ahead of as well as behind me, so I followed them til I found a green lion, and eventually a yellow one, and a red one.  At some restaurants, the dancers stood on one another's shoulders to stretch the lion up onto his "back legs," when he would snatch an envelope and a bunch of lettuce being dangled out of a window on the second floor of the establishment. 

On the way to my last lion I passed a temple and faced a moment of indecision before concluding I would return after seeing the lion.  In truth, I'd been looking for it.  Temple visits are a traditional part of China's New Year festivities, and I'd actually managed to come across the one I hadn't seen before, Guan Di Miao temple. 

The temple was bathed in light, and incense wafted over the wall.  I climbed up to the entrance, and decided I wanted to burn some incense.  I've mentioned more than once that I'm the Mormon flavor of Christian, and I've also mentioned that I enjoy visiting places of worship of other faiths.  I'm sure this might come off as contradictory and possibly even blasphemous to some who read my blog; on the other hand, I think that the ability to learn about other faiths and try to understand their beliefs is inherent in my religion, no matter what other Christians do.  So I paid my five hundred yen and received 5 sticks of incense and a ticket for admission.  A temple worker lit my incense in a brazier and pointed out the order in which to place my offerings in the large, open vessels.  Inside the building itself there were four shrines, accepting prayers to the deities worshiped inside the temple.  I stared particularly long at the ceiling, which reminded me of one I used to admire at the Nelson-Atkins. 

After leaving the temple, I started moseying my way out of Chinatown.  I passed by bustling shops full of "Made in China" trinkets that were definitely not at authentic Chinese prices.  It was an interesting contrast with the New Year back in Shanghai, where you'd think the city was deserted if it wasn't for the fireworks exploding nonstop for two weeks.  Lots of shops and restaurants were closed, although admittedly it was a different story in places like Yuyuan Garden, where there were enough people to make up for the empty streets elsewhere.  Yokohama's Chinatown definitely had a different feel...as does this blog...it's possible most of the content I wrote for the reflection for my before realizing that it was much longer than I wanted it to be, hence a more scholarly approach to my writing.  Rest assured, next week I should be back to my standard foul language - Hina Matsuri is coming up and I've got some truth to speak along the lines of protecting children from misfortune.

Flower Power

Once upon a time, Shaggy sent me a postcard from the Boy Scout Jamboree (I think).  It had a picture of a sunflower and said, "I knew you'd like this postcard cause you like that flowery shit on everything."  Likewise, I appreciate how excited Japan gets over flowers.  It seems like it should be too early for flowers.  It's only mid-February, and yet, they are peeking out all over the place.  I've been admiring early spring bulbs - daffodils, hiacinths, crocus, and iris - for sale at shops while I was out walking around, and broke down and bought some last weekend to keep in my windows...and maybe plant in the little patch of ground next to my balcony so I can admire them again next year (I'm not sure if my landlord will be copacetic, but if I don't ask he probably won't notice).

In all honesty, though, I should have just waited.  Although sakura season's still a ways off, the early birds are already feasting on ume, plum blossoms.  My friend Sensei went to Setagaya last weekend, and the photos she posted on Facebook made me jealous.  When I read that Yushima Tenmangu was hosting an ongoing ume matsuri - plum festival - I knew where I would be going before my Nihonga lesson on Saturday.

Before I went, I found myself thinking it might be a good subject for my next Nihonga painting (and at this rate, I'll need a new festival every 2 weeks to supply myself with inspiration).  I thought I would do a sketch before I left the apartment, but instead of looking up shots of Yushima Tenmangu I watched an episode of my old Most Favorite Ever Anime, Noragami.  See, I've learned a thing or two about names of shrines, enough to know the place I was visiting was a shrine for one of the gods in the show, Tenjin.  He's a Japanese original, a scholar and poet who was deified after his political rivals died mysteriously in succession, to become the god of learning.  And he loved plum blossoms.

Yushima Tenmangu is near Ueno Park - I got off the train at Yushima Station and followed Google Maps to the foot of a very steep set of stairs, capped by a stone torii.  When I got to the top I was greeted by an assortment of food stalls, which I promised myself I would check out after seeing what was going on.  The line of petitioners waiting to throw in a coin and clap to announce their presence wasn't too long, but Tenjin's popularity was evident in mountains of ema.  Since I am trying to get better at adulting I'm attempting to "budget," so I decided not to buy an ema myself (also, I have at least ten I still haven't painted), but I did join the line to offer a coin and petition for academic success.  At the moment my 4.0 GPA looks safe for this semester, but I'm still a long ways from earning my master's.

Before I did that, though, I checked out the golden calf (bulls are one of Tenjin's symbols) and washed my hands at the ablution fountain.  As I rinsed out my mouth, I realized they were playing music and was thinking how nice it was, but it wasn't until I looked around the corner of the nearest food stall that I realized the music was live - a flute and a koto in the midst of a traditional Japanese garden.

If this isn't fitting of the shrine of a scholarly poet, I don't know what is.  As I was wandering my way through the trees, I began wondering what my shrine would be like.  I realize it's not likely that I will ever be deified - my family may be good at holding grudges, but if I came back as a ghost I'm pretty sure I'd be having too much fun messing with people to seek revenge.  Still, for the record, I'd like to become the patron of mangaka, specialize in protection from fire, and have cinnamon incense burned in my shrines, in the event it does happen.

I was just thinking about how I wanted some drums at my festival, no matter how much I loved the flute, when I came across a stage set up at the back of the temple.  Nearby a small ensemble was playing strings and accordion, and I had a surreal moment where I wasn't sure what country I was in or the festival I was at (Germany?  Oktoberfest??), but the stage in front of me had drums set up, so I found a seat and did a little sketching while the audience filled up.  Finally a group of kids and middle aged women carrying lanterns took the stage, and I got to hear my drums...although I soon found myself wanting to get up and move to the music.

During the last song the kids got up and distributed small gift envelopes with little panda erasers inside.  When it was over I made my way around the rest of the temple.  I found a small display of ume bonsai that made me consider going back on my oath to never kill another bonsai tree again (this was a sort of expensive hobby for me in college - I sucked at keeping them alive).  I finally decided to check out the food stalls in earnest and snacked on a small cup of kara-age (tasty, but cold), and my new festival favorite, yakisoba.  The lady dishing it up was in no small way part of the charm - she placed some into the plastic container, then put the container in a bag before tilting the container hinge-down and stuffing the rest of the noodles in.  "Like Subway," she explained, as she handed me my chopsticks.  Maybe, I thought, but Subway could never be quite that fresh.

Bean Counter

So.  It's been a while.  January was a hard, cold month for me.  I was feeling homesick and just plain sick not to mention cold.  I had my second snow day ever as a teacher.  I was pretty pathetic - I had two posts I was sitting on, but neither came to fruition because I was in such a funk.  But now it's February, and that changes everything.

My good friend Sensei was teaching her Japanese class in my art room (because that's how crowded we are in the school) one day last week, when I heard a word I recognized, oni.  And then I heard Setsubun, which is a holiday and when Flower Boy said our cold spell was due to be broken, and after a quick search on them interwebs I realized it was this weekend!  I had to reschedule my nihonga painting class, because if I was there at 1 I couldn't be at any of the festivities throughout the city, but suddenly I had a subject for my first painting (all of which I'll tell you about eventually, but this post is for Setsubun...we'll save nihonga for a proper art post).

Once that was settled, I had to pick a celebration to attend.  Setsubun can be celebrated at home, by throwing dried soybeans at a family member wearing the oni, or ogre, mask.  This duty (or is it a privilege?) usually falls to the dad, but mine is in Iowa, and knowing him, pelting him with lucky beans would count as an invitation to annihilate us with flatulence.  So I looked through my sources to choose a festivity to attend.  Ikegami's known for wrestlers, and Senso-ji has a shichifukujin dance.  Gototen in Ueno uses chrysanthemum leaves instead of beans, while apparently plenty of celebrities go to Zojo-ji.  All of which was very well and good, but in the end I decided to go to a little temple in Setagaya called Shinryu-ji.

What made their Setsubun special was that instead of the red-skinned, black-haired oni in a tigerskin loincloth (the traditional face of the holiday), their procession features tengu, a kind of crow demon.  Being the otome that I am, with the interests that I have, there was really no choice.  I walked down the lanes from Shimo-Kitazawa station til I found the temple, where according to legend a tengu is enshrined.  Since they are thought to live on the mountains, and Shimo-Kitazawa seemed hilly at best, I found myself wondering if this was likely, but hell - they'd probably wonder what a white-skinned, red-haired foreign demon was doing here, too.  Who am I to judge?

It was just a little past one when I got to the quiet little temple.  The mikoshi was sitting to the side, a huge red face with a long, red nose its most prominent feature.  It wasn't too crowded yet, and the "pre-game" ceremony seemed to have just started, while attendants were still getting ready.  I've got enough festivals under my belt now to think this is the way to do it - show up early so you're already in place when the action starts.

The ceremony involved some chanting by a monk, possibly the head monk - he was old and well-dressed, so that would be my guess, anyways.  He had an accordion-folded  book of sutras that he flipped open and closed as he chanted, eventually flipping it all the back and shutting it as he finished his chant or his prayer.  There were lots of official looking people, men and women in suits, in addition to the regular temple attendants.  After the head monk finished and shuffled out of view, these came to the front of the temple porch, with their sake boxes full of fukumame.  There was some drumming and shouts, and they threw their beans out into the crowd, thrice if I'm not mistaken.  I was way too far back to catch any, but I figured my time would come, so I just stood in the back, enjoying the slightly warmer weather and the atmosphere of the day, keeping an eye on my surroundings so I'd be ready for whatever happened next.  (I say that, but actually I still missed it when they moved the mikoshi down the hill to the street running perpendicular.  Those tengu can be sneaky, I guess).

After a little more pomp and circumstance, they took their show on the road.  I let myself be swept out to the entrance to the temple grounds, where I had the misfortune of standing next to some other gaijin. They were talking about how everyone was taking so many pictures of their baby, which just about made me barf.  The woman kept asking her husband if he was taking pictures, and THEN one of the tengu started walking towards us, and she started talking about how she thought it was a medieval plague mask.

It's possible that one of the reasons why Hozuki is my favorite character is the fact that he freely beats on idiots.  He's kind of the animated embodiment of my id.

The procession came all the way down the hill to the street, and I went along behind it, trying to get some better pictures when the English speakers in the crowd weren't driving me batshit crazy with their culturally incorrect discussions...

This is the tengu they were talking about, by the way.  That looks nothing like a plague mask.  I could cross my eyes and let them go out of focus and it STILL wouldn't look like a plague mask.  Baka gaijin. 

I caught up and enjoyed the sounds of the drums (not taiko...in fact, I'm not sure I've seen any taiko since moving here, which is sad.  Maybe I'll have to look up the taiko lab in Tokyo...) and the conch shells being blown.  I also really loved seeing the traditional clothes up close.  Many of them were wearing a kind of kimono with a stiff shoulder line, and I caught myself a few times wanting to reach out and touch it to see how they made them stand up...was there a rod in that fold?  Lots of starch?  I probably could have gotten away with looking up their sleeves, but for some reason it never occurred to me...possibly because even subconsciously I knew that was a weirdo thing to do.

Finally the Big Boss tengu made his way past, with all of his coterie.  The mask and clothes were impressive, of course, but the real marvel was his shoes!  The geta seemed to be about 6 inches off the ground, and had only a single stilt underneath.  He kept one hand on the shoulder of the attendant in front of him, presumably to help him keep his balance.  As I told my mother one time, I can't help falling down in normal shoes...these would be a lost cause!

As the mikoshi was pulled past, the caboose of the train, I noticed I was standing next to a cupcake shop that looked very promising.  I was just thinking about going in and checking out their wares when half a block down the street the parade started throwing packets of fukumame.  You're supposed to eat one bean for each year of your age for good luck, and although I did complete the shichifukujin meguri just last month, I didn't want to leave anything to chance.  2018 needs to be a banner year.  So I sumimasen-ed my way up to the side of the parade, and walked along beside for a while, until the procession halted and the beans were thrown again.  I managed to grab 3 packs and was given another by a kind Japanese lady who must have thought I needed them.  I didn't count to see if I made it to 38...I was too busy making sure I didn't pass the cupcake shop.