One Year Later

A year ago, I was up all night with a sick cat (Bailey had just returned from the vet after emergency treatment for a serious infection) when horrific news and video started shooting across the Internet. Japan had been hit with a huge earthquake, followed shortly afterward by a gigantic tsunami that tore coastal towns and fields apart. Later came new horror, as the Fukashima nuclear plant failed and spread radiation around the only nation that has been nuclear bombed in wartime.

A year later, some things have improved and some things haven't. Although much of Japan has returned to normal, the devastation of the areas hit by the tsunami isn't something that can be undone in a year. And lack of government honesty about what was going on in the nuclear plant has not helped matters; it has only stoked suspicion.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-japan-quake-trust-20120311,0,5531592.story

On this day, once again, the world's thoughts are with Japan.

My Thoughts Are With Japan

Ever since early Friday morning, when the first horrific images of the devastation in Japan from the earthquake and subsequent tsunami, the disaster has occupied many of my thoughts.


One reason is my fondness for Japan as a country. Amy and I visited it in 2004 and 2007, and thoroughly enjoyed both experiences, finding Japan a fascinating combination of the ancient and the futuristic. Although the greatest devastation occurred in areas we didn't visit, It's still jarring to see videos of mudflows consuming rice fields like the ones we bullet-trained through, or photos of visitors stranded in the same airport we used on both of our visits.

The other is personal experience. I was in Washington State when Mount St. Helens blew up, raining ash over the southern portion of the state. I was in San Francisco (in a high-rise apartment building) when the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake hit. I was in Los Angeles when the 1994 Northridge earthquake struck. For that matter, during our 2007 visit to Tokyo, a typhoon rolled through town (although that was not treated as a major disaster). I'm no stranger to the terror, disorientation, and disruption disaster brings.

And so my thoughts are with Japan. So are my hopes that this resilient nation, which has survived so much, will get through this disaster.

the Song of Summer

If you watch anime set in Japan during the summer months, you'll inevitably hear cicada songs in the background. Those are not just fanciful. Here's a snippet of video I shot while we were walking to the Ghibli Museum in Mitaka in September. The background sound is not machinery or traffic; it's just insects.

Japanese Conventional Artifacts

Here are some fun convention flyers I picked up while we were in Japan for Worldcon. The first is a manga-style flyer (helpfully translated into English for us foreign attendees) for the next Japanese National Science Fiction Convention, Daicon. (Remember to read right -t0-left.)
The other is the cover for the program for the summer Comic Market, or Comiket, for 2007.

I shot these clips on the first evening of our Japan trip (August 29, 2007) on the "Airport Limousine" bus that was transporting us from the Narita Airport to Yokohama.

The music is "Beautiful World," written and sung by Utada Hikaru. This song is from the Evangelion movie that premiered in theaters while we were in Japan.

I'll be posting more videos and other images from Japan in the near future.

Nippon 2007: Last Two Days; On to Tokyo

Sunday and Monday, the last two days of the Worldcon in Japan, were activity-packed for the two of us. On Sunday morning, we blew off most of the con programming, and walked around downtown Yokohama. The weather cooperated; the sun showed itself for the first time during our vacation, and the temperature wasn't too hot. During the walk, we noted the cicadas' song. In anime shows set in Japan during the summer, you will inevitably hear the cicadas chirping in the background. It's one thing to hear it in a fictional, animated show; and quite another to hear it in person.







After we got back, we hied ourselves down to the convention center for the masquerade. This was billed as the first westsrn-style convention masquerade ever held in Japan; but in reality the one at AX Tokyo takes that honor.





We scored places in the photographer's area, where we and a few others took pictures of the costumes as they came off stage. Although there were only 15 entries in the masquerade, the costumes showed an impressive amount of variety and ingenuity.







Unfortunately, one of the masquerade contestants was a visibly inebriated British man in a Japanese schoolgirl's outfit. The stage manager of the masquerade and another man escorted the cross-dressed gent into the photography area, apparently with the idea that taking a few photos of him would keep him mollified. Alas, he took the opportunity to swig booze and make obscene commments about a female contestant. (Fortunately, she only spoke Japanese -- or at least acted like she did.)

After the photos, we headed out to a pier for Donburo-con, a dinner cruise on Yokohama Bay for con goers. Our embarkation was delayed by a medical emergency (fortunately not ours), but after that we had a pleasant moonlit cruise around the harbor, sailing under numerous bridges. I stood on the aft observation deck next to artist guest of honor Yoshitaka Amano as seagulls frantically kept pace with the ship, perhaps sensing the food scraps that would soon be theirs.



And after that, we headed over to the Cosmo World amusement park next to the convention center, and rode the humongous Cosmo Clock 21 ferris wheel
, probably one of the biggest in the world. The wheel turns so slowly that it does not stop to take on passengers; folks just step in and out of the moving gondolas. The ride was smooth, and the view spectacular.







Among the other rides we noticed at the park was a shooting ride, where the passengers shot light beams at targets. The poster showed folks riding by a mermaid -- and shooting at her, as she apparently shoots back. ("Wow, look! A mermaid!" "Oh no! She's packin'! Waste her!")

On Monday, we packed up our goodies, checked out of the hotel, grabbed a soba-noodle breakfast at the nearby train station, visited a 100-yen discount store, and hit Worldcon in time for the very emotional closing ceremonies. Then we boarded a bus and headed over to Tokyo. More specifically, our destination was the Prince Hotel in Ikebukuro -- the same place we stayed during our 2004 visit to Tokyo. As soon as we had checked in and dropped our bags off at our room, we grabbed lunch at the same corner cafe where we ate breakfast on our first morning in Japan, over three years ago; and then hit one of the Meccas of anime shopping, the nine-story Animate shop across the street from the hotel. Several hours later, and several yen poorer, we struggled back to the hotel with our heavy bags; grabbed an Italian dinner at the mall attached to the hotel; and then turned in. Whew.

Once again, photos can be found here.

The Long, Long day

I awoke at 6 am on Tuesday; and by the time the sun set it was around 11:00 p.m. Pacific time; and, at my destination -- Japan -- 5 pm on Wednesday. Now, here we are in beautiful downtown Yokohama, getting ready for the first day of Worldcon 2007.

We went on a JAL flight our travel agency arranged; and there were several LA area fans and pros on the plane with us -- including the couple that sat next to us in the center aisle of the 747.

Amy slept for a good deal of the flight. I, as usual, had trouble sleeping on a plane; so by the time I hit the sack at the Sakuragicho Washington Hotel in Yokohama I had been up 23 hours.

The trip went fairly smoothly. The only complications were finding the counter at which the cell phones we were to rent were reserved (it was at the other end of the Narita Airport terminal from where we were); and a cab driver in Yokohama who took us to the Washington Hotel instead of the Sakuragicho Washington Hotel. (Fortunately, my meager Japanese was up to the task; "chigao," "wrong" or "different," is a good word to know.)

Here are some photos from the airport, and from our hotel room.

Yo! Jimbo!

On Wednesday, Amy and I took in a rare double-feature on a work night. The reason was a combo of Akira Kurosawa's two movies featuring Toshiro Mifune as Sanjuro: YOJIMBO and its sequel, SANJURO. We'd seen YOJIMBO on TV before (and we have it on DVD), but not SANJURO.

Seeing YOJIMBO on a big screen gave me a chance to appreciate Kurosawa's perfect screen compositions -- before I started getting into the story and forgot about such things. I didn't, however, miss the scenes that George Lucas apparently appropriated for STAR WARS. The bit near the beginning where a bunch of thugs brag to Sanjuro about how they're wanted by the law -- and then Sanjuro slices off the arm of one of them -- is a dead giveaway.

SANJURO reminded me of those Saturday Morning TV series from the '70's and '80's where they'd take some real-life celebrity (Muhammed Ali, or Mr. T, for instance) and saddle him with a bunch of teenagers for him to guide/mentor/humiliate. Here, Sanjuro helps a bunch of young and clueless clan warriors retrieve a government official from a corrupt official. Everytime the young bucks try to do something on their own, they screw up; fortunately they have Sanjuro to save their bacon.

In addition to the shoulder-rolling, self-scratching main character, the two movies have other recurring motifs, such as Sanjuro tricking stupider opponents, Tom-Sawyer-like, into doing things for him; and Sanjuro being asked his name, whereupon he will stare out a door or window (obviously enough for others in the room to follow his gaze), see some plant or field, and give the name of the vegetation as his family name.

Although the West may see Sanjuro as the ultimate movie samurai (and the basis for John Belushi's character on Saturday Night Live), he's actually more of a western character. He's an individualist in a culture that looks down on individualism; he's rude, blunt and sarcastic in a world that values subtlety and manners; and he does not fit in, a liability in Japanese society where conformity is a virtue. Further, YOJIMBO is often described as a samurai western, since Sanjuro fills the traditional role of a cowboy hero: He comes to a society torn by chaos; restores order, through violence; and cannot fit into the now-ordered society that results. It's no wonder that Sergio Leone remade YOJIMBO as A FISTFUL OF DOLLARS, and modeled Eastwood's Man with No Name after the samurai.