Ewens-Downing Adventures in Asia

One we arrived in “downtown” Kamakura Kenji led us down the street toward where the Daibutsu or Big Buddha was. It would have been pretty easy to find the way. Everyone else who got off the train seemed to be going the same direction. We poured into the narrow main street of the town. In the distance I could see our destination.

As you can see, the Big Buddha statue is quite impressive. It is the focal point of a large park area near the center of town in Kamakura. Though you can enter the park for free, to get to the Buddha you have to pay a modest admission fee. Once you pass through the gates a long stone path leads you to the Daibutsu courtyard.

As you approach the statue you get a feeling that the Japanese people hold it in high cultural significance. It has far more cultural meaning and reverence to them than just being a large, interesting statue. Even with the excruciating heat people were buzzing around, jockeying for position, trying to get photos of their friends in front of the statue. So of course we had to do that too.

On the right side of the Buddha was a passage that allowed you to go inside the statue. At the time it sounded like a fun thing to do. However, we forgot to factor-in the extreme heat and the fact that this 93-ton statue is made of metal! We wandered into the extremely tight entrance passage. It was obviously not designed for super-sized gaijin like us. There was a constant stream of people trying to get out as well as people trying to get in. We fumbled through, bumping and sumimasening (”Sorry!”) as best we could. Ron was ahead of me. Once I got inside the main part of the statue he said, “I gotta get out of here… I feel faint.” And for good reason. The inside of the big metal buddha was steamy hot! It was like walking into a big metal sauna! I took a few photos and then began my exit before the heat consumed me too. Getting out wasn’t easy. A swarm of Japanese school girls were screaming and giggling as they made there way up into the statue. Should I be polite and let them pass? I took up 80% of the narrow passage out of the statue. But I really needed to get out of there… So I’m afraid I took the initiative to get through and bumped a few of the girls moving through the dark passage. Their happy bantering turned into shrieks of horror and disgust as I side-swiped whole groups of them, causing them to nearly fall over. Well, better I get out than faint on top of them all, eh?

After our sauna experience in the Buddha we took a timeout to rehydrate and rest in the park. Once we felt up to it we went back down the main street to see what we could find for lunch. After some looking around we decided to eat at a nice family owned soba noodle restaurant. Soba noodles are often served cold. With the hot weather, this dish was just the thing for us. We relaxed in air-conditioned bliss.

We continued our way toward the train station again. Along the way I spied a woman preparing a traditional Japanese sweet in the front window of a little shop. I was just going to use it as a photo opportunity. But Kenji asked if we wanted to try it. Well, why not… We were on vacation after all. We went inside the shop and looked for someone behind the counter to help us.

Eventually the owner (I presume) emerged and asked us in Japanese if he could help us. Kenji ordered-up one of the sweets. We would share it since he said it was very rich. The sweet was pumpkin flavored and quite good. It was a traditional desert that had been made at this little shop for many years. What surprised Ron and I was that after we finished sharing the sweet the shop keeper served us all some hot tea to wash it down.

I’m very glad we stopped at this little shop. It was quite a fun experience to share with Kenji.

We got off the train at a more modern city area in Kamakura. Just near the station we found the main shopping district. Within minutes I zeroed-in on what appeared to be a Totoro and Studio Ghibli store. Totoro is my favorite Japanese animated film by Studio Ghibli, the Japanese Disney-like studio. So of course I had to do some shopping. As it turns-out, this was a flower shop that started selling Ghibli-ware to attract more customers. The shop was quite cramped and small. But it had some fun things. I made due, leaving with a full set of Totoro towels for home.

We continued our walk down the shopping district street. All of a sudden I spied something of interest in a clothing shop window. It was photos of black Shar-pei dogs just like our Jarra. We hadn’t seen any Shar-pei in Japan, so this was a surprise. I ran over and took some photos. One of the photos (on the right) really tugged at our heart strings. We were missing our little Pei quite a bit at that point. I went inside to see if there were any real life Pei to be seen. Kenji spoke with the shop keeper who smiled at our interest. She told Kenji she had three Shar-pei dogs waiting for her at home.

After strolling to the end of the shopping street, we made our way back again. Along the way I found this funny cat statue. I’m not sure what it was doing or what the sign said. But the pose made me smile. We got back to the station and took the next train back toward Yokohama.

After sleeping a couple hours to recover from “the incident“, I activated the rental cellphone I had delivered to the hotel via the web. I got in touch with Kenji, our friend who lives in the Yokohama area. We would meet Kenji at the Yokohama station and get some dinner together. So we took off for the local train station Sakuragicho that was just outside the Landmark Tower building we were staying in. We found a direct route from within the hotel around to a pedestrian bridge that went right to the station.

When we got to Yokohama station it finally set in: we were in Japan. Upon going downstairs to the main station platform we had to just stand for a bit taking it all in, there were hundreds of people… everywhere… going all different directions… silently not running into each other and getting to/from their trains. It was mind boggling for us initially. So many people in such a relatively small space. We stood with our mouths agape for a good couple minutes, wondering how we’d ever meet up with Kenji in this chaos. I called Kenji on cell phone and told him where we were in the station. In a few minutes he appeared ad we were off to find dinner.

On the way to dinner we went through some stores in the mall around the station. Inside the Yamaha music store Ron found an amusing package of “Piano Scatt” that I just had to have a picture of. Ron posed and made quite the funny face, don’t you agree? What ever could this package contain?? I did a Google search and couldn’t find anything. OK musicians, please comment and let us know what we found here. I assume it is some kind of piano cleaning supply?

We followed Kenji through the huge shopping mall, out into the streets of Yokohama that surrounded the station. There were blocks of restaurants and stores, all catering to the commuters returning from their jobs in Tokyo.

Kenji knew of a good sushi restaurant and we were game for our first taste of authentic sushi in Japan. It turns-out that this sushi restaurant was a “sushi belt” restaurant. In San Francisco we have sushi boat restaurants where plates of sushi revolve in front of patrons on wooden boats propelled along in a waterway by swift currents in a water trough. In Japan they don’t do this. Instead they use a revolving mechanical belt. This way the plates can make 90-degree turns with no problem.

We got a table and stared with amazement at the double-decker revolving belt. On the top level was the sushi plates along with little signs telling people (in Japanese) what things were. On the bottom level of the moving belt were tea cups, bowls and other dishes. “What a great idea,” I thought to myself.

To make the self-serve atmosphere even better we also had a hot water spigot right at our table. We could make all the tea we wanted, when we wanted, how we wanted. That was pretty cool. And what was inside the little bucket? It was FULL of picked ginger. Kenji ordered us up some special dishes as we grazed on a few things from the belt.

It was all very fresh and good. But because we had sushi in the US every couple weeks, it wasn’t too surprising of an experience for us. The one exception was the Miso Soup. Kenji ordered a bowl for him and one for us to share. It was a BIG bowl of miso soup had some salmon tails in it for meat. That was definitely pretty different from what they do in San Francisco. At first we didn’t quite know what to do with the tails. We had to learn to use our chopsticks better to get at the meat. Kenji showed us how and we finished our first meal in Japan.

We got back from Stanley in time to have afternoon tea at the Peninsula. Being that the hotel came from British origins, naturally they would have a proper English tea each afternoon. We had seen people having tea in the lobby restaurant. I was looking forward to it. Years ago we had tea at the Empress Hotel in Victoria, British Columbia. We wanted to continue the tradition at another famous world hotel.

After being seated we each ordered our selections of tea. I had an Earl Grey while Ron had the Darjeeling. It was fun to see the tea served with all the pomp and circumstance. They used little coseys on the pots to protect our fingers from the heat. In no time the three-tiered tray of snacks arrived. Per tradition we ate from the top-up. The first tier had butter scones. The second, finger sandwiches. And the third the sweets. It was nice to take some time out from the running around to just enjoy the ambiance of the Peninsula. While we ate and drank a live trio of piano, cello and drums played Beatles tunes from a balcony above. It was sublime.

The previous night Ron and I had dinner at the Peninsula. Our package included dinner for two at one of their many restaurants. We chose the Cantonese Chinese style restaurant, Spring Moon. The food was interesting but it wasn’t very spicy. In a word, it was a bit bland. We thought they might be dumbing-down the cuisine for the tourists. So on our second night we wanted some good spicy food. In our Hong Kong guide book Ron found a restaurant that fit the bill. The Red Pepper got rave reviews and was in an area we could get to easily. We hopped on the subway for spicy-town in the Causeway Bay area.

At first we weren’t sure we could find the restaurant. But then Ron spied their neon sign. Oh, yeah, this was it. We walked-in and instantly got ushered to a table. Our waiter was jovial and fun. He helped us pick a nice selection of dishes. The first course was the soup. It wasn’t described as such, but this was hot and sour; really hot! Most hot and sour is a brown color. This one was red with hot oil. After the first couple spoonfuls our sinuses snapped to attention. Our waiter brought over a box of tissue so we could dab ourselves. I declined having a second bowl of soup. But the wait staff seemed upset that we wouldn’t finish the soup. We told them to leave it for later.

The next few courses weren’t at all as spicy. But each held new textures and spice combinations for us to enjoy. In the middle of eating our food the waiter came and asked if we wanted more soup. We declined and said we were too full. He said OK, grumbled something and took away the rest of the soup. Perhaps we offended the cook by not finishing everything. Regardless the mission was a success. We got our spicy Chinese food. After leaving the restaurant we happened by Hong Kong’s own Times Square. They have a penchant for creating their own versions of famous world locations.