February | 2020 | Addams in Kyoto

Hello one and all! Here we are in the second month of the year, and still no snow – that is, until the day I sit down to write this. I have to say, though, it is a pretty poor effort in terms of snow. The sun is out and the snow consists of very small flakes flittering around and gone before they hit the ground. There is a heavy snow advisory out, but I really don’t think it will be happening here.

Weatherwise, January was rather more like early spring than winter, with quite a few days in the low to mid teens, and many of them overcast. Not very cheery overall. So far, this month the temperature has been a bit up and down (today is cold!), but the forecast is for a maximum of 18C next week!!! The guests we had during January, who were from Germany, Denmark and Finland, all said this winter in their respective countries had been unusually mild, with little or no snow.

Speaking of guests, yet again they have been such nice people. One couple stayed with us for a week and I found myself missing them after they left. It is easy to build up a relationship over a longer period, and sometimes we really just click with some guests. This particular couple is involved in the theatre in Germany, one a singer and the other a choreographer. While he didn’t sing while he was here, we have seen clips of him singing with his band (a Queen tribute band). He also tours Germany in Jesus Christ Superstar (playing Judas) and other musical productions, and is soon touring with a rock classics performance ensemble around Germany, which includes Alice Cooper.

We also had a return guest stay with us for one night – a New Zealander who lives in Taiwan. He is writing a book on travelling in Japan as a vegan. He wanted a space that he could film a video that was somewhat Japanese and would be appropriately quiet, which we were more than happy for him to do. The book will be sold on-line as an e-book, and, of course, there is a section in it about us 😊.

Back in early January, we attended a Vegan Seminar hosted by some students from a local high school and a person I have mentioned before in this blog, known as Diethelper on Instagram. Chisayo (Diethelper) contacted us last year about attending this seminar and giving a speech (in English thankfully) about why we became vegan and also about the environmental situation in Australia (with reference to the fires). We said we would be happy to do so, and I set about preparing a speech (I have given many speeches during my working life, so felt comfortable about doing so).

On the day there were over 40 people there, including some people we had met before at various vegan events and at their restaurants. After the welcome the first item on the agenda was making bliss balls, of all things! They told everyone they originated from Australia and they provided a range of dried fruits, nuts and been pastes (red bean paste and black bean paste) to use – yum! After this, we were served a vegan eel dish. It was made with tofu, burdock root and shimeji mushrooms and served with rice and a dipping soup. Now, I have never eaten eel before, but I can tell you it was very good.

I should say that the event was held in a hotel and the chef there gave a brief speech before we ate explaining how it came to be that he started making some vegan dishes. He is not a vegan, but had a friend who couldn’t eat certain foods, so he started experimenting and has now added some vegan items to his menu.

After we finished the food, the speeches commenced. I had a full speech written, but wasn’t sure how and where it would fit in. Anyway, Chisayo had a 20 minute segment during which she asked a few people to speak about their experiences and I was one of these people. In the end I mainly winged it because it was a bit less formal than I anticipated. I had researched the situation in Australia, including what size area had been burnt, which I compared with Honshu (around half the size of Honshu was burnt in total), the main island of Japan. This had an impact on the audience, and Chisayo gave us some money to donate to WIRES before we left.

Chisayo on the mic.

Other than this, we have only had a few outings during this period; a visit to the Toka Ebisu festival in the Gion area and the Setsubun festival in the Heian-jingu jinja (shrine). We also went back to an antique shop in town to buy a pair of ranma which we had seen late last year and decided to go back to buy them – they were on special (a bargain, and I really love a bargain 😊).

The Toka Ebisu festival is based around Ebisu’s birthday on the 10th of January and held at the Kyoto Ebisu jinja. Ebisu, is one of the Seven Lucky Gods and considered the god of fishermen and commerce. There are numerous things happening on the shrine grounds each day and people go there to pray for success in their businesses for the coming year. As with all things like this, many stalls are set up outside the shrine, with most selling food and drink, to lubricate the festivities. Apart from paying my respects to Ebisu and asking for a prosperous year, we checked out all the stalls and then bought a new shikishi for the year of the rat to hang in our the stairway.

So, this doesn’t produce alcohol follicles?

Setsubun is celebrated on February 3rd, to commemorate the day before spring is considered to commence in Japan. Various traditions are observed which are meant to drive away evil spirits and bad luck and bring in good luck and cleanse the home and family for the coming year. We have previously gone to Yasaka jinja for Setsubun, but decided to see what rituals were observed at Heian-jingu jinja. While it is fairly boisterous at Yasaka, the ceremony at Heian was a much more formal Shinto observance. Despite this, there was a very funny moment early on when the children involved in the ceremony didn’t do quite what they were meant to and the Shinto assistants were literally running back and forwards trying to organise these children.

Preparing…

Yes, the mask does have two sets of eyes – not sure why

For fans of Monty Python...(sorry about the shakiness)

Slight panic…

After we left the shrine and had a warming beverage at Starbucks we headed home and then commenced our Setsubun mamemaki ceremony, which involves throwing roasted soy beans (mame) out the doors to chase away oni (demons) and attract happiness and good luck into our home for the coming year. Following this, we each ate our age plus one roasted soy beans for good fortune to finish this ceremony. Another thing I love about living here, there are so many opportunities to celebrate life.

Oni mask

We have to hope all these ceremonies help ward off the coronavirus, which is currently impacting the world. Here in Kyoto there has been one identified case to date, but it has definitely had an impact on the number of tourists visiting Kyoto. Around 50% of all tourists in Japan come from China, and so the travel restrictions are severely affecting many businesses here, particularly hotels, restaurants, kimono rental shops and all of the shops in and around the popular tourist destinations.

The centre of town is much quieter than normal and the other day when we visited the Kiyomizu-dera area, to buy some items for our business, it was much less busy than what is normal these days. You could really feel the relief of the shop staff that someone was in there buying something and notice the spruiking as we were passing other shops. It is likely to have a significant effect on those businesses which really rely on the Chinese tourists for the majority of their business.

As for me, I am being a little circumspect, given I have had pneumonia before. Viral pneumonia is a different kettle of tofu fish than what I had, which could be treated with antibiotics…
On a final note, our little street cat, Miro, continues to settle into our family, we just wish we could pat her, but she is still too wary for that barrier to be dropped. It will just take time and patience on our part.

Cheers for now, and stay healthy.