It’s been a long hot, sweaty summer; it seems like years since it’s been cool…

After three months of constant heat and sweaty clothes, we say goodbye…to a somewhat difficult time, including many significant events (of the natural kind). During this time, most days topped 35C (all days at least 32C), with most nights staying above 26C. The most recent of the events have been particularly hard and the after effects are still being dealt with. The train to Kansai has resumed as of this week, while international flights will not fully recommence until this Friday (21/9).

The issues up in Hokkaido are much worse, with the electricity generators which were knocked out (most of them) only now gradually coming back on line. Apparently there have been over 500,000 accommodation cancellations in Hokkaido, and it appears that cancellations have occurred in other areas around Japan, although not to the same extent. Certainly, there seem to be less tourists in Kyoto at the moment.

Since my last post, we have been out and about a lot more, both because it is somewhat cooler and, thankfully, my toe is now back to it’s old self, ie pain free. We have seen some of the damage that was done by the typhoon/cyclone and it is quite visible everywhere we go. A lot of old houses, mostly those that are unoccupied, have sustained significant damage, and many buildings with tiled roofs have incurred varying amounts of damage. In addition, many trees have literally snapped in half.

Two buildings near our home, which had been slightly damaged by both the earthquake and the previous typhoon have partially collapsed, and should now be completely demolished. Who is going to do this is another question. We’re not sure if the house down the road was occupied, or not, but it is still full of personal items, such as clothing, with some of it spread down the slope at the back of the house. It looks rather like the house has vomited!

Our main outings during the period covered by this post were going to the craft market which we had been to before, as a follow up (in much cooler weather) and to see the macaque monkeys at Arashiyama.

The craft market is held on the 15^th of every month in all weather, according to the official website, which we checked before we left home because it was a rainy day. When we arrived at the temple, however, there was nothing except a lone Japanese man sitting at the entrance. As we stood there, slightly confused, we overheard him telling some Japanese people that it had been cancelled because of damage incurred during the typhoon. He didn’t attempt to talk to foreigners who arrived there (including us), so most were wandering around looking perplexed.

We decided to go inside to see what had happened to the temple complex and it turned out it had suffered the fate that so many tile roofed buildings had suffered, tiles had been blown off and broken. The main damage there was the dislodging of ridge cap tiles on most of the buildings. The day wasn’t a complete loss, though, as we found a really good plant nursery in the area, which we will be returning to in our car in the future to make some purchases for our backyard.

On Monday, of this week, we finally made the journey to the Iwatayama monkey park at Arashiyama, which we had put off until I was capable of climbing up to the top of the hill where the monkeys live. It was a lovely day, high 20s (which I like best) and a bit overcast, so the sun wasn’t biting too much. The walk up is a bit strenuous, but it is through wooded areas and there are some seats along the way for those who need to do it in stages. I was surprised how well I did, given the six weeks of minimal activity I had just been through.

The monkeys are a wild troop, just as they are at Yudanaka in Nagano prefecture, which we visited in 2011. There aren’t as many in the Arashiyama troop (around 170), but still enough that you get to see plenty of activity and different behaviours. When we arrived at the top section, there were two macaques engaging in one clearly recognisable behaviour, much to the amusement of onlookers. Interestingly, they were engaging in the behaviour at very short and regular intervals, following a loud screeching noise from the female (which we assumed meant “ok, again”). Both were visibly exhausted, but continued engaging in the behaviour the whole time we spent looking around the park. I don’t know if this is usual ‘engaging in the behaviour’ conduct for macaques, I couldn’t find any information readily available on the internet about it.

Unlike visiting the troop at Yudanaka, visitors can feed the monkeys at Arashiyama but they have to buy the appropriate feed and then they have to go into a cage and pass the food out to the monkeys. I found it quite appropriate seeing the people on the inside of the cage and the monkeys outside watching them!! It is definitely worth the walk up to see the monkeys and to experience the behaviours (all of them!) of a wild troop. It is important to remember that they are wild animals and you must observe the rules about interacting with them, even though they are acclimatised to humans being there. The other positive about going up to the top of the park is the view of Kyoto you get from there.

Returning to the typhoon commentary, we saw many trees which were snapped in half around the area and some light poles which were bent over. The human cage building had also sustained some damage to the roof, but luckily it came out relatively unscathed. Also damaged by the winds was the famous bridge over the Ooigawa/Katsuragawa (same river, the name changes after the bridge), where the railing on the Katsuragawa side is broken and collapsed.

One thing I thought you might be interested in, before I sign off, is our recent visits to the dentist here. It all started when I was testing some toffee that we were making as part of a birthday dessert for a guest, which turned out to be stickjaw toffee and I broke a tooth on it…☹. Luckily we were able to find a dental surgery where someone spoke some English, because neither of us had learnt any language about caries, fillings, dental care etc.

Anyway, we are both part of the national health scheme here, which is available to all those who live here, and standard dentistry is covered in this scheme. On the first visit, x-rays are taken of your teeth, along with photos, then you get a general check up and a clean. All of this for ¥4,280!!! Since that time, I have had a number of visits, as they found a few small caries and they are now working on getting my teeth in order and my gums as perfect as is possible.

The fillings cost ¥1,900 each and a clean is only marginally more than that. I am also going through the process of getting a crown to replace the missing tooth. I can have a metal one basically free as part of the scheme, or if I want one that looks like real teeth, then it is going to cost what I suspect it would cost in Australia. They are very gentle in everything they do, including the hygienist, which is good since I have a bit of a phobia about dentistry. Even the injection is more ‘friendly’ here, playing the tune to When You Wish Upon a Star, as the dentist is using it!!!

Well, that’s all for now – cheers😊.

Only now? Where are they normally?

Trains expand in the wash…

??? Is that Spiky behind? Is Spiky spicy?

There are even Halloween toys for animals!

Well, the waiting is over and Typhoon 21 did live up to the hype (I have seen coverage in other countries calling it Jebi, but names are rarely used here). Apparently it is the strongest typhoon to hit Japan in 25 years.

Hi all, just thought I’d post a very quick episode to let you all know that we are ok and came through the cyclone/typhoon unscathed. I have to say, I am extremely glad it came through during the day because the noises at night and not knowing what was happening would have been quite scary.

It lasted about five hours here, with maximum gusts up to around 150 kph. We also received about 100mm of rain during that time. Having not been out today, I’m not sure what has happened elsewhere, but up here I saw pieces of corrugated iron fly past, some antennae came down and I heard some glass breaking but I wasn’t sure where it came from. This morning Craig found some pieces of glass in our front yard, as he was cleaning up – we suspect that some of the windows broke in a turret atop the kiln over the road, along with being the source of some of the galv. that flew by.

While I was watching the storm upstairs, the house vibrated occasionally, but otherwise we came through with minimal impact other than some pot plants blowing over, a metal lizard blowing off our wall, one of the chimaki blowing off our door and some bins blowing over. Apart from the glass, a part of our neighbour’s roof ended up in our yard (which they collected this morning). Interestingly, at one point my ears popped from pressure and an emergency light flashed on and off in the room I was standing in.

As you may have seen, Osaka was hit hard, with Kansai airport flooded and the bridge to the airport now sporting a tanker decoration, amongst other damage.

 on tv

There is also some footage around of something smashing into the glass roof at Kyoto station, with both it and shattered glass falling into the middle of main area at the front.

I’m starting to wonder if all of these events are being sent to prove how well built our new house is!!

That’s all for now (I hope).

Don’t drive on bridges in a typhoon

I didn’t touch it!

Where do I start?

A carpark

Cranes don’t like strong winds

I’m glad our shipping container wasn’t there…

Yes, yes, I know, it has been two weeks since I last blogged and I really am trying to maintain a regular weekly habit, but sometimes there just isn’t that much to talk about. As always, there is the weather and other events of that nature but right now, for me, it’s more of a waiting game: waiting for our flat to sell, waiting for our next guests, waiting for more bookings,… (waiting for Godot?).

This has also been a time of waiting for tropical cyclones. I say that, rather than typhoon, because the Japan Meteorological Agency uses the term “tropical cyclone” on their website, rather than typhoon. Not sure why. On the day that I wrote my last post, we were waiting not for one but two cyclones both heading in pretty much the same direction, nearly side by side. I don’t know how often this occurs, but it was interesting watching them move in sync, somewhat like a dance of the cyclone. The one further to the west was slightly ahead of the other and so kept it further east and moving very close to us – just west of a direct pass over us. Nonetheless, we received strong winds and some good rain although nothing like what the areas to the west of us received (again).

At the moment we are waiting for another, single cyclone, which is heading our way. This one is a lot stronger than the previous cyclones and the eye is forecast to pass very close to us. At this stage the rating of the cyclone is “violent”, but by the time it reaches us it will be “very strong”. This brings me to another term usage difference of the Japan Meteorological Agency – rather than use a numerical rating system for cyclones, such as category 1, etc, they use a naming system of “strong”, “very strong”, and “violent”. Violent equates roughly to a category 4+ in Australian terms (there is nothing higher here, while Australia has one higher category). Having checked on the electronic oracle, it turns out that the rating systems for storm strength vary from country to country, and depend on where the storm is.

In terms of temperature, the last two weeks have proven how wrong I can be – having said the hot weather had finally passed, it turned out that the seven day forecast was slightly optimistic and instead we returned to hot and humid weather.

One other natural occurrence during this period was another ‘rattler’, ie earthquake. Hard to call it an aftershock, given the first earthquake was in June, but it was more like an aftershock than a full tilt earthquake. It happened last Tuesday night and proved to me just how unnerved I have become about these things. I think it is just the issue of not knowing how strong and how long…(!!!)

This week we went to see a Bauhaus exhibition at the National Museum of Modern Art Kyoto (MOMAK), which we had seen advertised on a poster when we were out and about. I had never been to the MOMAK, so it seemed opportune that this poster caught my eye. On another nomenclature note, before moving on, most of the places I would call an art gallery are known as museums here – not sure why.

Anyway, the MOMAK is located in a precinct where there are three other museums related to arts and crafts, so is a good place to go to see a cross section of art works, both Japanese and international. Many exhibitions are held in these museums and they also have a very good selection of modern art in their collection, both Japanese and international. MOMAK has a particular emphasis on artists and arts from Kyoto and the wider Kansai area. There are also a number of other art museums dotted around Kyoto.

Looking out of the window at MOMAK to the Kyoto Municipal Museum of Art (under renovation)

When we arrived at the museum, it turned out there was another exhibition showing of a Japanese artist Higashiyama Kaii which took up most of the space in the museum. Not what we expected, but we thought it would be interesting to see everything on show. As it turns out, I absolutely loved this artist’s work and was very glad we saw the Bauhaus poster. He was born in 1908 and died in 1999 and was/is one of the most popular artists of post-war Japan. The exhibit comprised 68 paintings and 45 studies and sketches.

The majority of his works are landscapes, but he also painted some townscapes, particularly while he was in Europe. Many of his paintings are of significant proportions and, for me, some of them literally did take my breath away. The ones that I really felt an attachment to were quite soft and somewhat low light. It seemed he was trying to create an atmosphere as much as representing details or places. There were a number of paintings of dawn and evening and also at night, under the moon. Quite a few of the paintings comprised a landscape and its reflection in water.

There also was a full installation of some murals and fusuma (sliding doors) paintings which he completed for a hall at the Toshodaiji (temple), Nara. These were laid out as they would be in the hall, not just in a straight line, but rather as two or three walls together. The largest was a set of fusuma entitled “Sound of Waves” which literally rendered me speechless (or did I say “wow”?) as I entered the space. It is a 36-metre long ocean panorama painted on 12 panels which were set out in an L shape, as they are in situ. I stood there some time taking it all in, as did many others who walked while we were there. A number of us stood as far back as the space would allow, just leaning on the wall, letting it wash over us.

Part of Sound of Waves

Ok, enough superlatives! Unfortunately these fusuma are rarely available for public viewing, so it really is a once off viewing. The other fusuma, by the way, were painted in black and white and depicted mountainous scenery from China, as a tribute to the founder of the temple, who was from China. Also beautiful and awe inspiring. In total, the entire commission took ten years to paint.

Yesterday we left home (very) early, picked up Takako and went up to Ohara to visit the Sunday morning farmers markets (there are two, which are fairly close together. Ohara is such a lovely place, in amongst the mountains, and it was a lovely, sunny morning, so very pleasant overall (despite it being so early).

We bought some vegetables and locally made yuba and Takako bought some flowers (a bunch of yellow roses for ¥250) and then had a coffee in a café area made up for the morning market. While we were sitting there, a woman sat down next to us who happened to live very close to Takako, so they started chatting. The a family came along – a man, two women and two children – who also sat down around the table.

As soon as I heard the women speaking, I knew they were from Australia originally. The younger woman is married to a Japanese man and they have two children, and the older woman was her aunt. As you might have worked out from this description, we also struck up a conversation, with these people. The couple and their children live in Kyoto and attend the market recently, while the aunt was visiting from Hong Kong (her home now).

After speaking for a while, Craig and I started to suspect that the younger woman would know Takako’s daughter, because of the work she is involved in. She told us she had help established the annual Kyotographie exhibition and we know that Sara and her partner are involved in art and exhibitions here. Takako hadn’t been listening to our conversation, so when the opportunity came up we told her what we thought – and it turned out we were right! It seems that Kyoto is just like Adelaide, one degree of separation…and we had to travel to Ohara to find out. So, our circle of contacts grows 😊.

Cheers!!!

 Simplicity

 What is that thing in front of the wall for???

 The local bus station at Ohara

 Crepe Myrtle time