Kyoto Day Trip

Posted on August 19, 2013 by Casey Gallagher

On 8/18 I woke up pretty early (for me) in my hostel in Osaka, 8:30am, and got ready for a scorching hot day in Kyoto! It cost me about 750 yen each way to get there and back again, but didn’t take terribly long, because the JR line has a special rapid train that gets you there in about 30 minutes.

Kyoto was the imperial capital of Japan for over 1,000 years, however, the imperial palace not resides in Tokyo so Kyoto has faced a significant demotion. Many consider Kyoto to be Japan’s cultural capital. Relatively little bombing took place in this city during World War II, and it was spared as a target for the atomic bombs by an American general.

I arrived at around 11am, without having eaten breakfast, and decided to save money by walking nearly everywhere. This was already a bad idea by itself on such a hot day. I had wanted to basically book it straight to a certain shrine that I had heard about from some friends, so I headed in that direction. My first impressions of Kyoto were not good at all. Near the main station is a huge mass of low quality housing and buildings, basically a slum. As I proceeded to get lost, I continued to see a lot of this. However, the people in these areas were very friendly and nice (as opposed to what I saw in Osaka).

After some backtracking, I wandered into a temple complex that had some really cool shrines, as well as some humongous wooden buildings. I’m not sure when these were built, but they were very old, and building them must have required a herculean effort. After wandering through here, I continued onward to my original destination, Fushimi-Inari shrine.

Fushimi-Inari is unique in a few ways. This shrine is a Shinto shrine dedicated to Inari, the god of rice. His messengers are foxes (kitsune), which explains the many hundreds of fox statues present. Additionally, this shrine has thousands of torii (gates) to walk through, and the visual effect is quite stunning. There are also hundreds of small shrines throughout the entire mountainside that houses this complex. At some point, I decided to take a “shortcut” that left me lost in a bamboo forest (worth it). The whole shrine was very beautiful, but a little hard to walk all the way through on such a hot day.

After getting un-lost from the bamboo forest, I mostly gave up on long-distance walking as I was getting pretty scorched and the back of my shirt was completely drenched. This sounded like a good time for a soak, so I headed to my next stop, the Funaoka Onsen! I took the train to a station that I thought was close to the destination, but it ended up being abother long hike. By the time that I was close, I had pretty bad chafing going on from my pants, and a headache from not eating (also some dehydration). So I stopped in at a convenience store for some quick snacks and water. Then I was ready for the baths.

Funaoka Onsen is not really an onsen, as its waters are electrically heated rather than natural heat. It’s actually a sento (public bath facility). This particular sento is quite famous due to it’s age, beauty, and entrance policy. Everyone (that can afford the 420 yen entry fee) is allowed to partake. This includes Yakuza members (Japan’s organized crime group, similar to the mafia). In fact, on this visit I had the opportunity to bathe with two of them. They were easy to spot, with their large, spectacular tattoos, and the marks on their bodies (presumably from fights).

(The outside of the Funaoka Onsen)

The Funaoka Onsen has quite the variety of baths. After showering and getting clean, you can hop back and forth into several different baths. Two of these were relatively normal hot water baths, one was tiled and the other was made of wood. Then there were the jet baths, with massaging water jets. The last fairly normal bath is located partially outside and is made of rocks. This sento, however, also had:

An ice cold, freezing, outside bath – which I quite liked for short periods of time
A boiling hot death bath – I could only stand to immerse my legs in this bath for about 30 seconds
A sauna – I didn’t use this
A medicine (kusuri) bath – not sure what was in this bath, but the water had a reddish tint and it was pleasant
An electrical current bath – I used this for a couple of minutes, and it was a strange experience. You are, quite literally, being electrocuted as you bathe. This seemed to be accomplished by rows of underwater electrical sockets

All in all, the sento was an experience I would highly recommend. I felt extremely relaxed afterward.

My final stop in Kyoto was in Gion, the old style district where the lucky few might catch glimpse of a geisha hurrying down the street between appointments. I was not so lucky, so I just wandered through a few more temples (and more GIANT wooden buildings) before heading back to Osaka, feeling very tired and quite burnt.

Mt. Fuji Climb 8/10-8/11

Posted on August 19, 2013 by Casey Gallagher

Ever since planning my trip to Japan, I had wanted to climb Mt. Fuji. Mt. Fuji (富士山, Fujisan) is a recent addition as a world heritage site, as well as the national symbol of Japan．It’s on the back of the 1,000 yen notes and you’d be hard pressed to find a postcard shop that doesn’t sell Fujisan postcards. The mountain itself is 3,776 meters tall, and most of climbs (including mine) begin at the fifth station on the Yoshiba trail (Kawaguchiko), which is at 2,300 meters, cutting off roughly half of the climb. A few of my friends climbed from the very bottom, but that took them over 20 hours, and they were in very good shape and had good gear. Even starting from the 5^th station, Fujisan is no joke. Roughly four people die on the mountain every year.

My preparation was decidedly minimal. I opted to not buy hiking boots and went with tennis shoes from America. I also went with jeans, although I did buy a 105 yen pair of over pants in case of rain. For the top half, I wore a t-shirt as my base layer. My German friend left me a windbreaker and climbing socks when he returned home for the summer. Additionally, I bought a warm jacket at a used clothing store. To make up for my shoddy shoes, I bought some bandage type ankle wraps to wrap around my feet and ankles to simulate (somewhat) hiking boots. Additionally, I brought along several Calorie Mate snack foods, a few gel drinks, and 2 liters of sports drink. Finally, at the 5^th station I bought a flashlight (as we would be climbing at night) and a roughly 5 foot tall wooden Fujisan climbing pole.

(My climbing companions)

After last minute purchases and eating bland food at the 5^th station, myself and my two friends began our climb at about 7pm. My companions were Minh, a Vietnamese guy from Canada and Kohei, A Japanese guy from… Japan. I knew Minh from school and Kohei mostly through Minh. Climbing from the 5^th station to the 6^th was like a typical mountain/forest hike. The ground was mostly dirt and it wasn’t terribly steep. At the first building of the 6^th station we were handed a map, and we took a short break. The path from the 6^th to the 7^th station may be the most challenging part for some climbers. The dirt path quickly became a dusty slog with a ton of loose rocks that slide very easily. This portion was the most taxing on my legs, and Kohei tried to get us to rest at nearly every switchback (we ended up resting every 2-3). There are occasionally more huts in between stations, used to buy expensive snacks or to sleep overnight in sardine-like conditions. Also, at some of these huts you can get your climbing stick branded with a hot iron, for 200 yen each time as proof and commemoration of making it this far.

Upon arrival at the 7^th station, we got our sticks stamped and took a break for about 20 minutes. The air was becoming noticeably thinner, making the climb more challenging. However, we were rewarded with amazing views of the stars and of the Milky Way in the sky. During one of our breaks between the 7^th and 8^th station, we looked down and could see one of the towns at the bottom of the mountain was shooting off fireworks for a festival. The climb at this point became much more technically difficult, with large volcanic rocks dominating the landscape, frequently requiring the use of hands to scale.

At about the 8^th station, we got an extended break as I went in to use the restroom (also costs 200 yen to use), and waited 20 minutes for the lone stall to be vacated. After all that time, the man inside still had not left, so I just used the urinal at this stop. As I left, some concerned citizen was knocking on the door but not receiving an answer. I hope the gentleman inside was alright…

The climb from the 8^th station to the top felt like it would never end. The 8^th station was at about 3,100 meters and after each long climbing section we were lucky if we had gone only 100 meters. Sometimes it was only 50 meters each section. Because we were climbing in season and on a weekend, there were queues for the rest of the climb, and the lines moved slowly. Looking below (behind) us, we could see a long trail of flashlights, headlights, and lanterns. It was at about this point that Minh and I lost Kohei, pushing ahead to be sure that we wouldn’t miss the sunrise.

The rest of the climb felt especially never-ending. We passed the “original 8^th station”, then the 8^th and a half station. The climb from the 8^th and a half station to the 9^th felt longer than from the 6^th-8^th. Despite this, me and Minh only took one break during this point. Finally, at about 3:40am we reached the 9^th station. We sat down there for about 10 minutes before panicking, thinking that we needed to hurry to the summit. After hiking another 2 minutes we realized… the 9^th station is at the summit. We had succeeded!

Myself and Minh found a place behind a large rock, facing where the sun would rise, and began to wait. I posted a Facebook status update (yes, we had internet at Japan’s highest point), and waited. My elation quickly began to die down, as the sun was taking forever to rise and, in the meantime, I was rapidly becoming quite cold since we had stopped moving. Finally, at about 5am, the sun began to rise at a rapid pace. The view was spectacular. Minh took photos while I took some video.

(Minh’s amazing photo from the top)

By the time the sun had fully risen, I realized that I had come down with altitude sickness. I had never felt so cold in my life, and my stomach was not doing well either. I hurried over to the restroom, where I had the privilege of waiting in a 20 person line and to pay 300 yen for the honor of not throwing up in public. While in line we saw Kohei and reunited before I entered the stall closest to the line of people waiting (some luck). It didn’t take long for me to throw up absolutely everything I had eaten, and most of what I had drank on the way up. This also caused me to get a splitting headache. After exiting the bathroom, Kohei graciously allowed me to use some of his canned oxygen and I wandered towards the benches to attempt to get an hour or so of sleep.

I sent Minh to get my final stamps on my Fujisan stick, as well as to mail my postcards. By the time he got back, I was ready to get down the mountain. The three of us began heading toward the descending trail, but after about 30 steps, I kneeled down by some rocks and threw up some more. So much for my dignity. After this, I felt considerably better (but still not good).

The descent was considerably faster, but consisted of only dust and loose rocks. To descend Fujisan, you basically take 3 or 4 steps and then slide down the hill for several feet. It’s very possible to run down, but your legs and knees will protest. We took very few breaks, and descended in only 3 hours. I just wanted to get off of that damn mountain at this point. After reaching the 5^th station, we had to wait for over 3 painful hours in the scorching hot sun. Finally, we boarded the bus, and I probably slept for half of the 3 hour bus ride back to Shinjuku. Upon arriving in Shinjuku, Kohei managed to exit the bus and take 3 steps before his legs gave out. He had to take a taxi home, and go to work the next day.

The aftermath: I had to take the train home to my dorm, and I was very glad to have my climbing stick with me. Otherwise I would have looked and smelled like the dirtiest foreigner who ever set foot in Japan. With the stick, everyone who you see understands what you just went through and refrains from judging. At my local station, I ate a hearty bowl of Matsuya, then returned to the dorm to wash off all my grime in the public bath. Then I slept. The next day I rewarded myself with a massage, and spent about 2,500 yen shipping my climbing stick home.

Would I do it all again? Yes. However, I would do a few things differently:

Bring leg warmers or long johns – necessary at the top
Bring another jacket – only for the summit
Stay overnight at one of the huts to acclimate to the altitude, or at least bring canned oxygen
Drink water instead of sports drink
My shoes were okay – but hiking boots would have been more comfortable
Less sugar – my drinks for energy were nearly pure sugar – bad idea.

(Required Fujisan self shot photo)

The Good and the Bad in Glorious Nippon

Posted on July 2, 2013 by Casey Gallagher

I’ve been here in Japan for a while now; figure now’s as good a time as any to share some of my favorite things as well as my least favorite things. I’ll mostly ignore things that I’ve already touched on in the past (like expenses). People are people, and I don’t really find much terribly different between the US and Japan on an individual basis. I’ll probably be super surprised when I get back home, and find out that I’m actually wrong once I get to compare again, but for now, those are my thoughts. I can’t make judgments on the working related side of Japan, but for an exchange student I’d say that the good HEAVILY outweighs the bad.

(karaoke, serious business!)

The good:

There are a LOT of good looking women here in Tokyo. I suppose it’s to be expected in a big city, as I noticed the same thing in New York City. It’s just especially easy to spot them here due to their fondness of showing off copious amounts of leg. Carrying on a decent conversation is hard, since my Japanese language skills are low, but the ones who are relatively confident in their English skills are super easy and fun to talk to.
Flirting with said women at the pub after several drinks is fun. It’s really the only time that I’m not worried about how good or bad my Japanese language skills are, it’s just good fun. If my friend tells me: “Introduce yourself in Keigo!” (very formal speech) Then chances are that I will. It’s especially fun at my favorite pub which is located in the red light district of Kabuki-Cho. The beers are currently 70yen each, and it goes up by 10yen each month. (1 yen = approximately 1 cent). These are the nights that I use the most Japanese, and no English at all.
Tokyo is lively and fun (until the last trains of the night). There is a lot to see and a pretty good amount of things to do. There are events and festivals nearly every weekend (including Oktoberfest… There have been two of those so far and it’s really not the right time of year)
The public transportation is really good the vast majority of the time. Delays are uncommon; the whole system works in harmony and is very effective at getting millions of people to their destination every day. Normal tickets are pretty expensive, but my commuter pass from my dorm to school costs me about $35 a month and that’s a 40 minute commute each way. Plus with my commuter pass I can stop at any station between the dorm and school without paying extra. Outside of Tokyo, it’s even more expensive, but the options are pretty nice. You can take a regular train, or a bullet train, or a bus, etc.
The other exchange students are awesome. We have people from all over. A lot from America, a few from Germany, one from Ukraine, one from Poland, a few from Australia, several from China/Korea/Thailand, etc. I’m most impressed by the ones from non-English speaking countries though. My friend Daniel is from Germany and he speaks German/English/Japanese. For tests in Japanese class he has to translate from Japanese to German and then to English, or the other way around depending on the question. While speaking with the American students he has to converse primarily in English. We’ve actually got him dreaming in English now. ‘Murrica! The Asian students impress me a lot as well. A good amount of students on exchange from other Asian countries know at least 3 languages at a very high level (their home country’s language, English, Japanese, and frequently Chinese as well).

(Japanese chat room event)

(Avocado and Wasabi Burger from Wendys)

(More karaoke, with Akiko and Kat)

The bad:

People walk REALLY slowly! The average walking speed here would never fly in New York City, or any other big city in America that I know of. I’ve been told that this might be because of the humidity. Once you start sweating, it’s hard to dry off. I’m rather dubious about this claim, because even standing still the humidity is pretty unbearable.
Relating to the last point: The very second that a single drop of rain falls from the sky, up goes everyone’s umbrellas. This makes navigating through the slow walkers even more tricky. But again, the same reason was explained to me: Once you get wet, good luck getting dry again in the 90% humidity.
Relating to the last TWO points: The weather! Summer in Japan means rain, heat, and humidity all together in one lovely little package. I might as well start wearing my swimming trunks to school.
Most of the aforementioned good looking girls are wearing ridiculously high heels. I’m already short enough, and this just makes me appear even shorter. I do enjoy when they wear high heels and yet are still shorter than I am though.
The trains stop running at around 12:30am, which means I’ve pulled a few all-nighters in Tokyo. If they’d even run one or two trains an hour after 1am, it would be an improvement.
Citizenship: It’s quite hard to become a citizen of Japan if you aren’t Japanese. Additionally, Japan doesn’t allow for dual-citizenship so I’d have to renounce my American citizenship if I moved here permanently. It’s a minor complaint I suppose, but not being able to vote, even if I lived here, bothers me.

The really bad:

I’m getting REALLY sick of seeing this notice at the train station:

The red part on the bottom left means information from other train lines, and it usually indicates a delay of some sort. That isn’t what my problem is. The problem is the exact reason for the delay, which is often: jinshin jiko. A literal translation for jinshin jiko is “human accident”. In actuality, it usually means someone jumped in front of a train. I’m much less concerned about delays than I am with this needless loss of human life. It gets really disheartening seeing this message so often, frequently daily. Luckily, my train line seems to not be a very “popular” one in this respect, but my friend was on one that had someone jump in front of it. That story had a “happy” ending, as it was a local train already slowing down to stop at the station, so the train was able to stop on time, thankfully. Last year was the first year in over a decade that the number of suicides fell below 30,000. Hopefully it’s the beginning of a downward trend.

My Global Business teacher created a video about this subject, it’s called “Saving 10,000 – Winning a War on Suicide in Japan” and you can watch it in its entirety here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oo0SHLxc2d0 (It’s in English)

Odawara/Hakone Day Trip

Posted on June 27, 2013 by Casey Gallagher

On Saturday, June 15^th, Myself and 5 of my exchange student friends (Kellie, Matt, Anna, Daniel, and Cash) finally managed to escape the grasp of Tokyo and head out into the countryside/mountains. It was a long day, full of many new sights and experiences, and worth every penny!

This trip required me to wake up earlier than I ever had before since arriving in Japan… 6am! I groggily got up, shambled my way down to the public bath, where I got clean and shaved before getting dressed and meeting my friends at the dorm entrance. We then hopped on the train to Shinjuku to meet up with the girls so we could head out to Hakone. The previous day we had all bought our “Hakone Freepass”, which was definitely not free as we paid $50 each person. The Freepass covered all transportation out to Hakone and back, including trains, cable cars, rope cars, boats, and buses. Because of all that, it’s definitely worth the price. The train ride out to Odawara took about an hour and a half. The journey wasn’t terribly eventful, but after about halfway our group had nearly the whole train car to ourselves, which was a nice change of pace from normal.

At Odawara, we left the station and headed for Odawara Castle. The castle is in great shape and operates as basically a museum/gift shop. Photographs are not allowed inside the castle, so unfortunately I couldn’t take a picture of any of the weaponry or historical artifacts, but I could take pictures of the great view from the top floor of the castle. I particularly enjoyed how the floors were labeled. There was a first floor, a second floor, a third floor, a semi-fourth floor, and a fourth floor. The castle grounds also had a great flower garden area, as well as a place for festivals/events with musical guests (it also had some sad looking monkeys in a cage).

After Odawara we hopped on another train and headed for Hakone. The railway up the mountain was interesting, as it made use of several switchbacks. I caught a few glimpses of the windy, curvy roads for cars/buses to make the ascent on, and it made me REALLY miss my motorcycle. That road would have been the most amazing motorcycle road of all time. After the railway, we next had to take a cable car up a very steep section of the mountain. This was a short ride of maybe 10 minutes, and we soon made it to the next part, the rope cars! The rope cars were amazing, and the view was spectacular. I would not recommend this method of travel for anyone afraid of heights, as we were quite a ways above the forest canopy. For anyone else I would definitely recommend it. After the first summit, we then glided over the sulfur vents region, which was beautiful in its own way after I realized that wasn’t a strip mining operation (which was my first thought upon seeing it).

At the next station we got on our next rope car which would lead us over another forested mountain to our next destination, natural hot springs (温泉/onsen). Our温泉 was located at a resort that has rooms ranging from $150-300 per night per person. For this reason we skipped the overnight stay and simply went for our hot springs experience which only cost $16 a person. The girls and guys groups split up into our separate温泉 areas and we stripped naked, washed up at the showers, and then got in. The water felt amazing, and the experience was extremely relaxing, especially as I was sore from working out the night before. On a sunny day, we would have been able to see Mt. Fuji from our 温泉. Unfortunately, we had a cloudy day instead. There was a fun bit of awkwardness when I climbed out of the springs, and my friends were getting ready to get out, when the female employee showed up to get things set up for a meeting of some sort. She had trouble sliding the door open, and I felt like she might not have appreciated a fully nude American man helping her fix the door, so I just stood there waiting until she figured it out and then did what she had to do. She must have liked what she saw, because she came back in a few minutes later to do something else. After she left the 2^nd time, I quickly went back out to the温泉 to snap a photo.

After our relaxing soak in the hot springs, we reunited with the ladies and headed to our final rope car destination, Lake Ashinoko. Lake Ashinoko is a huge, blue, beautiful lake surrounded by forested mountains. Small boats are rentable from the harbor there, but we opted to use our Freepass again and take the pirate ship out to the other side. The journey was very relaxing and beautiful. On the side of the lake we could see temples, golf courses, traditional Japanese buildings, and a whole lot of trees. The small food stand inside the boat was interesting as well. You could buy Mt. Fuji beer, Mt. Fuji Kit-Kats (blueberry cheesecake flavored, very tasty!), other assorted Mt. Fuji ‘flavored’ items, and Ritz Crackers.

After enjoying the short cruise, we headed into the small town (Moto-Hakone) at the far side of the lake to get a bite to eat. We opted for a traditional, family-run Udon/Soba/other noodle shop. Upon entering, the mother offered us a place in the standard seating section. We insisted on sitting on the tatami mats in traditional Japanese style instead. This was a decision I frequently regretted during the meal. The traditional way of sitting in this type of setting is called the seiza position. The rest of my friends and I are incapable of doing this for more than a few minutes. However, they can all comfortably sit in other positions, like cross-legged. I, on the other hand, wasn’t able to find *any* comfortable position and had to switch every minute or two. Not the easiest way to eat a meal.

After eating, we walked over to our final sightseeing destination of the day, Hakone Shrine. I’m not particularly religious, but the experience was still great. We took a roundabout path to enter the shrine, rather than the main entrance, which lead to us coming upon the main building of the shrine fairly suddenly without any warning. The fountains, statues, and architecture were really a sight to behold. Everything seemed to have symbolic and religious value, from the dragon fountains, to the gates and walkways. People frequently come to these temples to leave prayers or wishes on small wooden plaques in front of the temple. I particularly liked one that was pretty clearly written by a young child. I don’t know what this kid wished for, but I hope it works out. Before leaving the temple, we headed out to the lakeside gate, where we took a lot of pictures.

After visiting the temple we wandered around for a few hours in Moto-Hakone. We stopped by a convenience store and got some food and drinks. A stray cat came running over to us when we sat down by the lake. She wouldn’t let us pet her, but she did appreciate Kellie feeding her a bag full of potato chips. The fog was rolling in, and the town was pretty deserted, so we let our minds focus on horror movies and zombie stories while we waited for the last bus of the night to arrive. We got on the bus and most of our group fell asleep until we made it back to Odawara station. From there it was another long train ride back to Shinjuku. By the time we got back into Tokyo, we had to catch what was nearly the very last train of the night in order to make it back to Hiyoshi and our dorm. It was a long, full, interesting day.

Fin. Casey

WOU Students Abroad

Author Archives: Casey Gallagher

Kyoto Day Trip

Mt. Fuji Climb 8/10-8/11

The Good and the Bad in Glorious Nippon

Odawara/Hakone Day Trip