Reporting live from Singapore...

Miss me yet?

OK, not much time to put up a proper post yet, but the 7 days in Indonesia was a blast. Got to see my parents, my brother (who was on a coincidental home leave) and some of old friends from school (elementary school, high school). Most important thing of all was that I got to eat some of the food during the short course of the trip.

Also another very special thing was to be able to spend the first few days of Ramadan with the family. It's been 7 years, so it felt so good to have the sahur meal together, as well as the fast-breaking time together, too - eating the traditional Ramadan foods. Bliss.

Now the short 7 days are behind me. I am on the next short stop: Singapore. My brother has been relocated here since earlier this year. So, this stop is deemed necessary. Besides, I need to go buy a nice suitcase at one of the discount shop here.

We just came back from a visit to the Night Safari at the Singapore Zoo and had a BLAST! Not only the usual zoo stuff was going on, but one of the nocturnal giant flying squirrel decided to fly so low tonight and had a flying crash into my brother's kneecap. A handsome animal, yes, but not so bright in the flying department. Ha ha.


*Photo was excerpted from Nature Photo Society

OK... well, it's midnight now and I'm beat. So maybe later this week I will put up a proper post.

Good night.

Buh-bye!

It's time for another 'tootles' message. I am leaving for Indonesia tomorrow morning to see le maman et le papa for a week.

Unlike my usual departure, thanks to the horrid workaholic summer and a spur-of-the-moment decision to go home, this time I haven't had time to actually prepare anything for the homecoming. No gifts had been purchased, no phone calls have been made to organize a get together, only a couple of e-mails sent to some old friends.

You see, normally I will freak out about this - being an avid planner-down-to-the-minute freak that I am, but to my own surprise I am not at all concerned about it this time. All I know is I got my passport, my ticket and that my flight is in the morning, so I should just make sure to get my butt to the airport 2 hours prior. I'll just go ahead with the flow from there.

OK, well, I can't be completely unconcerned about the trip, though. I have to pack.
Oh, crap. I just remember that my luggage is broken from the NY trip. Hmm... alright, must travel light, I'm going to buy a set of nice luggage in Singapore when I visit my kid brother after Indonesia.
With that being resolved... that leaves to finding a duffel bag to carry some of my stuff to Indonesia. I think I have one. If not, well maybe I can run to Don Quijote for a light duffel bag later toniht. They're open till 5 am.

How do I want to go to the airport? Bus or train. I'll decide tomorrow morning when I wake up. Maybe the limousine bus, can't be bothered diving into the sea of people in Shinjuku station at 8 in the morning. OK, bus it is. No need to organize ticket before hand, I'll just do a walk in tomorrow morning. They run every 15 minutes anyway from Shinjuku bus station.

Do I have money? No, I don't. OK, must make a stop at the ATM.
Hang on, I might still have some Rupiah at home. Must check on that.

Do I need coat? Oh you silly Indonesian, it's always summer there. Dry summer. Good.

I guess those are all the essentials. Cool. I'm ready to go.

Let me know if anyone wants postcard from Indonesia, addresses to be e-mailed to taiko.tari@gmail.com.

Don't miss me too much while I'm gone! Be good!

Notes from my travel: Hokkaido

Today was tremulous, to say the least. I came in just before midnight on Sunday and was forced to wake up for the busy day today was.
In my list: overcome some crucial multilingual interface problem for an online qualitative research kicking off Wednesday (still not particularly solved yet as my counterpart is enjoying their Labor Day Monday. OK, don't panic, they may read their e-mails tomorrow...), as well as paying a visit to the immigration office to extend my visa (3 hours wait, but everything was in order) and rehearsed for the guitar orchestra (shameful lesson, my teacher was not impressed I didn't have much practice this past week).

Wanting to put the hecticness behind me, now I am sitting down in my living room with a drink in hand, I put Richard Bona's "Scene of My Life"... I decided to empty my thoughts into a pensive I call a blog. My choice wandered to the wonderful day prior where I roamed free on the roads of Hokkaido.

Sunday morning...
With no particular reason, I was awaken at 5:00 am. My body always spots the differences of beds, and I'm guessing it doesn't like the bed in my room at Hotel Doral.　The hotel itself is not bad, and it's a very good deal for 6,500 yen. I tried to　force myself to sleep a little longer, but all those Sapporo beer we had at Sapporo Bier Garten, pushed me awake. Fine. Might as well get an early start. I did have a very ambitious itinerary.

At 6:30 am my colleague from Australia sent an SMS, "ARE YOU AWAKE AND ABLE TO TAKE ME TO SHIN CHITOSE AIRPORT?"

"YUPE! BEEN UP AND SHOWERED FOR A WHILE NOW. SEE YOU DOWNSTAIRS IN 15 MINUTES."

And so we embarked on our journey to Shin Chitose airport. My colleague had an early flight and it was only 58 km anyway from where we were, I was flexible to change my route.

After dropping A off at the airport, I decided to head towards Shiraoi. According to my travel book, Shiraoi is the nearest Ainu preservation museum from Sapporo area.
Realizing that it was only 7:20 am, I decided to take the regular roads. My reasoning for this: well, I did have the whole day to do this exploring, might as well stop at any place I wish to do, rather than rushing here and there with the expressway.

10 minutes on the road, I was so happy I took the regular roads. The streets of Hokkaido are fantastic! Cars can finally be driven as they're meant to be, very unlike in Honshu!



On my way to "Poroto Kotan", I stopped at a lake where swans were lounging around enjoying the morning sun. Some 20 kms away from it I made another stop at the scenic seaside. I spent about an hour lying there in the sun, enjoying the spray of water from the waves breaking while enjoying the horizon. This is really something you don't see everyday in Honshu.



I finally arrived at the Ainu museum of Poroto Kotan (The Big Village) at 10:00. I was happy I went there. The open air museum displayed the rebuilt Ainu houses, live art (some music and dancing), some improved like village talk by the 'chieftain'. It was all good, but I felt that there were some missing information. So for this part I was not particularly impressed. I am more unimpressed when I saw that at a corner of the village I saw that they have put 4 bears in very small individual cages. I felt that was very cruel.





What I enjoyed the most was when I wandered into the actual museum where they displayed stuff from the ancient Ainu days. There I met an elderly gentleman who's working on a part time basis to help explain about the Ainu culture and tradition. We got into talking when he spotted me struggling to read some of the display explanation which were only available in Japanese. He was a wealth of information regarding the Ainu culture! He was a walking encyclopedia indeed - answered all of my little questions with additional extra explanation. We even went as far as comparing the indigenous people of other regions and tried to dig the root where 'indigenous' cease existing and became a race, and what effect civilization have on humanity, culture et al. Very interesting conversations.

After talking for an hour, I realized I had to go. We found me a book in the museum gift shop, only to realize that he's given me much more information than that was listed in the book!
Thank you, Kind Sir! I wish I had asked him his name to remember him by, especially after he drove me to my car that was parked 1 km away (trying to avoid having to pay the steep parking fee by the entrance - I'm cheap when I'm traveling).

After Poroto Kotan, I decided to see Lake Toya, a lake that was formed from a vanished volcano and it was side by side with a new volcano that suddenly appeared about 30 years ago.
When driving to Poroto Kotan were mostly seaside, going to Lake Toya required me to go drive through the farms, mountains and forests. I was the queen of the roads! The streets were empty, my iPod was blaring loud, I sang at the top of my lungs and then I saw a farm with many, MANY, black cows.
I drove some more and I saw another farm with one cow and 2 goats.
Fab!








Arriving in Lake Toya, I saw the lake with the three mountainettes. Very cool.
And then I drove up to Showa Shinzan (the new volcano). Pretty impressive. The volcano is still fuming with sulfur. Got some pretty interesting shots there.







After all that drive, the day had become late. It was already 3 pm and I had to be back at Shin-Chitose airport by 8 pm so I could go home.
Realizing that I had only 3 more hours to spend in leisurely manner before heading back to the airport, my next choice of destination was Noboribetsu. I needed a bath, I figured... Why not go to a hotspring!
Noboribetsu proved to be a bit of a drive down to the South West coast of Hokkaido. From the high altitude driving down was a bit of a challenge. It was really foggy and raining in some parts. Finally found an onsen that was still open for the late afternoon, got cleaned up and relaxed...



I calculated the drive I've done for the day, by that point: 210 km! Not bad!!
After visiting the hell mountain after the bath, I decided to call my adventure for the day to quits. Yeah, I gotta make my flight at 9 pm. So, I drove back the 77 km from Noboribetsu to Shin Chitose airport.

After the Nippon Rent-A-Car dude dropped me off at the airport - realizing that I haven't had a proper meal the entire day, I decided to give myself a treat. You can always count on Japanese airports: they have good restaurants. My choice fell on Sushi Hanabusa. My farewell meal was sea-urchin bowl and some salmon sushis on the side. The sushi-master who was very friendly and kept me company throughout dinner gave me a gift: a small bowl of prime sea urchin. He would not hear me paying it since it was his farewell gift for a person who loves his Hokkaido sea urchin. Thank you, Sir, from the bottom of my heart!





Now, I am here and back again in Tokyo.

With a toast, I am thinking fondly of the kind people I encountered during my short visit in Hokkaido, the beautiful scenic places, the Ainus, the brilliant food, the free spirit drive, the cows, the milk, the cool weather. I dig Hokkaido!

I will be back!

In Sapporo

This was definitely a very productive day. Woke up in Tokyo, took care of business and finished some stuff related to the upcoming trip to Indonesia, worked intensively until 3:30 pm, departed to Haneda airport. Next thing we know come 7 pm, the five of us were already landing in Shin-Chitose airport, 58 km off Sapporo.

My first impression of Hokkaido was the smell. It smelled as if you were walking into a big farm. Strange that I didn't see any cows anywhere, but then realized that we were at one of the largest airports in Japan.

Second impression: the roads were huge, like in midwest US. When the bus from Nippon Rent-A-Car picked us up, we were driving through the darkness (yes it was pitched dark already in Hokkaido at 7 pm).

Third impression: it was chilly. FINALLY! I brought my fleece jacket - I was good. My colleague didn't realize it was going to be somewhat cooler in weather - the city girl that she is - she was shivering and suffered from some hiccups accordingly.

Fourth impression: people in Hokkaido are very friendly and pleasant. They seemed to be very pleasantly surprised once me or my Australian colleague opened our mouth and started speaking in Japanese. They liked to chat, too, and picked up conversation left-right-front-and-back. Very un-Tokyo like.

Fifth impression: the food. Ah... the food was EXCELLENT!!!! We had the best first meal in Sapporo comprising Hokkaido king crab legs, scallops, salmon roe, sea urchin, potato, asparagus, etc. We ate until we felt like exploding. Brilliant food!

First 5 hours in Sapporo had been great. I am looking forward to the coming 2 days.

Must get up early tomorrow morning. I salute you good night!

Sapporo!

I go to Sapporo tonight. JA!

Got some work to do in Sapporo on Saturday.

Am looking forward to go because I have never landed my feet on the land of the North.

It will definitely be cooler than it is in Tokyo.

The weather forecast indicated sunny weather for the entire weekend.

Other than feasting on the much raved about seafood, I plan to spend 12 hours on Sunday to drive about and visit an Ainu village.

The entire island is populated by 'only' 5.6 Million - not even a third of Tokyo's population. Very much looking forward to NOT meeting many people there.

Have a nice weekend, everyone!

ITTE KIMASU!

Day 3 - Magic. Pure magic.

Magic 1: Miyake Taiko workshop

Having left my phone being charged at the minshuku, I woke up that morning with no concept of time. All I know: the sun was shining, but the temperature was not murderous yet. I concluded that it was sometime before 8:30 am.
Later after I fetched my phone I recognized that it was already 8:20 am (ha! my prediction wasn't off!) and I had to decide my game plan for the day.

In my agenda:
1. Take a shower
2. Miyake Taiko workshop at Sado Island Taiko Center (right by Kodo village - about 20 minutes car ride)
3. Waraku Daiko performance at 1:15 pm at Kisaki shrine
4. Everything else after #1,2,3 will be weighed accordingly after

I quickly drove back to the campsite to have a word with Divelydoo and Lady M. Basically I would be gone for the entire morning at the workshop and will not be able to make it back to the performance venue until 30 minutes prior.

9:30 am - Driving up to the workshop venue was completely blissful. The weather was so nice that day. The sky was blue and driving through the highest mountain in Sado island provided you with the nicest breeze when you have your windows open.

Sado taiko center is located right by the Kodo village. Only a few years old, the building looked brand spanking new. All wooden. After checking in our names, I wandered inside and found myself at the deck with a breathtaking view of Sado island.



The Miyake Taiko workshop was led by Mr. Akio Tsumura of Miyakejima Geino Doshikai and his 3 sons, along with several members of the group. What is so special about Miyake Taiko workshop is the miyake taiko hitting technique. A drummer performing the miyake taiko technique will be beating the drum at a very low stance. This technique was first introduced by Tsumura-sensei. Him and his three sons are the masters of this technique and pride themselves for having Kodo members as their students.



At the workshop we were introduced the basic hitting technique of the miyake taiko. The posture, the way to handle the sticks, the rhythm to be used, verbalizing the rhythm and the general understanding about it. After those explanation, without further ado, Tsumura-sensei quickly divided us into groups of 8 and started the practice.
Whoa, it was a serious work out! Well, try to half squat and move your entire body left and right while half-squatting while hitting the drums at the same time, then you'll know what I'm talking about.

Shortly after the workshop wrapped, I quickly change into my Waraku Daiko performance gear. It's the year of my brand new frog-woman shirt! Haha!!! It was quite a drama getting changed at the Sado Taiko Center ladies room since everyone seemed to want to get out of their sweaty outfit post-workshop. When some fellow students and some Miyake Daiko instructors saw me emerged in my frog woman gear, they began to ask questions.

" Why are you dressed like that?"

" Where are you going? Are you not sticking around for a little bit with us?"

"That's a lot of frogs on your shirt!"

Flustered, I said, "Sorry, 'd love to chat, but I really have to run, my taiko group is scheduled to perform at 1:15 pm. I really have to go!!!"

One of the instructor then said, "You have a performance soon after this workshop? Are you insane?? You are crazy and you look about it anyway. GO! And good luck!!!"

As I dashed to my car, I thought for a moment of what he said... Luck. Yes, that is exactly what I need!

Magic 2 - Waraku Daiko Performance

Having been so excited about the workshop experience, I hadn't had a moment to worry about Waraku Daiko performance. And for Pete's sake the first song would be featuring the flute piece! Oh dear...
I sped up with the car as quickly as I could and got to Kisaki Shrine at 12:45.
Catching up with my breath, I saw Sensei has already lined the drums down at the foot of the stage. All of Waraku members have dressed up to the nines and got ready for the performance in 30 minutes time. "OK, this is it!" I thought.

The performance started with "Kunpu", a new piece that was created for EC 2007. This song featured 4 novice flautists and Sensei, together with 12 drummers. This song was played quite peacefully. I lost my breath here and there, but it wasn't too bad.
(Sato-san in the lead drum)

Following "Kunpu" we started playing "Waraku Daiko" - this is our 'anthem', we have played this so many times that I think every Waraku member can play this song sleeping.
(Nakahara-san in the lead drum)

Third song in the program was "Habataki Daiko", a very upbeat song, also featuring one nursery rhyme "Momotaro-san".
(Divelydoo in the lead drum)

Following after that we played "Da-Da-Da". This song was written for my first Earth Celebration performance. In short, this song and I were 'born' in the same year, and thus my very strong attachment to this song.
(Taiko Tari in the lead drum)

Finally, "Nidan-uchi". This piece featured doing a piece of music using two taikos on both sides. Usually two drummers will be playing an identical piece simultaneously, in front of each other and then swap position and play again.
(Sensei in the lead drum)

The performance was fun. Not particularly our best performance, but fun nonetheless. We made some mistakes, but trust me, if you have 16 drummers on stage, it really doesn't matter much.

There was a bit of misunderstanding between Sensei and myself. He didn't remember that my workshop venue was up in the mountains, so my initial absence had caused some panic, but luckily I didn't realize there were phone calls and angry messages until AFTER the show - otherwise I would probably have been shaken to bits right before everything started. (I'm so sorry, Sensei, for all the problem this had caused, I never meant it to happen.)

I also want to mention a special thanks to Lady M and Nao for taking such wonderful pictures for us to remember the performance by. Thank you very much from the bottom of my heart.

© Nao Horota copyright all rights reserved. 2007

Magic 3 - Collaboration Performance featuring Kodo, Zakir Hussain, Tamango, Mio Matsuda, Yosuke Yamashita, and Giovanni Hidalgo

After the franticness and craziness from the earlier part of the day, I was so happy to sink myself into the warm water of the hot-spring near our campsite. Just like yoga would do it, I felt my tiredness and muscle tension slowly released itself from all of my fingertips. Slowly but surely they slipped away...

We hung out at the harbor market until the ferry came to pick up Divelydoo and Lady M to take them back to Tokyo. After that 5 pm arrived, I joined some of the Waraku Daiko comrades who were designated to line up for grabbing seats. Unfortunately at this 3rd day we couldn't get the front row seat, our number was on the 90s and there were more people before we arrived, so we had to settle with being on 5th row. I didn't camp at the shrine that morning anyway, so I shouldn't complain. I should just cherish the fact that the weather WAS nice and Kodo decided to sell the additional tickets. So the fact that I could actually get a ticket after all this depression, I should be completely thankful about that.

The third night performance was UNBELIEVABLE!!! It was an out of this world experience!

For the first time I listened to Mio Matsuda singing... She has the voice of an angel. So beautiful. She sang a few songs in Portuguese and wore the funnest blue dress that made her look like the queen of the carnival.

Yosuke Yamashita played really intense jazz pieces. This was also my first exposure to his live performance, and he was just a very impressive pianist! Herbie Hancock, beware!

And Tamango... good ole' Tamango... He started tapping away and danced with the quickest rendition of tap movement I've ever seen in my life. I think he has no bones in his body, that everything just moves at his will. Amazing that dude!

Giovanni Hidalgo and Zakir Hussein, my deepest admiration to the two maestros. These two percussionists understood the meaning of soul, speed, virtuosity, precision and depth. Every piece, every beat they made, every touch they put on their tabla and djembe - every single one of them was heartfelt. So beautiful.

Last but not least... my beloved Kodo. There is never enough words that I could use to describe just how magnificent they are. Every single one of them. Some of the highlights that I personally noted from the evening performance: the Kodo girls presented a very cute tap dancing piece using their geta, Mitome doing the Odaiko piece, the miyake taiko performance featuring Yosuke Oda-san at main, Kaoru Watanabe and Motofumi Yamaguchi flute duet, Arai on the chappa and jangara, Eichi Saito on the big drums, Tsubasa Hori on her shime shishi daiko solo.

Out of this world, truly out of this world. When they came to perform the encore where they played the much loved song, known by all living Kodo fans, "Irodori"; I could not stop myself from becoming extremely emotional. It was so magical. The drums, the dancing, the flutes, the collaboration... There were at least 35 musicians on stage at their perfect imperfections. So many diversities, yet combined they performed such an explosive performance.

Thank you, thank you very much for the phenomenal performance. Thank you. Domo arigatou gozaimashita!

See you next year!

Day 2 - "Der Weg ist das Ziel" (The Journey is the Destination)

I woke up to the sound of birds chirping in my ears. It's morning! I bolted up right and got completely disoriented. Why is everything so dark??? I thought it's morning already!
I reached to my phone only to realize that it was my alarm clock that sounded like the chirping birds and that it was only 3 am on the Saturday morning. It was time for me and Lady M to start our shift lining up for the color coded ticket at Kisaki Shrine.

"Lady M.... good morning. I'm sorry but it's time..."

"OK, give me 5 minutes."

While Lady M was getting ready, I walked to our car to get it ready for the 5 minutes ride to Kisaki Shrine to start lining up. We got to the shrine and everything was very quiet and dark. I counted how many bodies were sprawled on the earth heading towards the ticket box... 8. 8 people were there already and I thought that 3 am was early enough to start the queue!
Lady M and I spread our blue tarp and position my sleeping bag on top of it. Hmm, cozy.
Confident that there will be no action going on for a few hours we passed out immediately once we stretched our legs under the stars.

At 5 am, 2 Waraku Daiko comrades turned up to take over the shift.

"Hey, you guys, we're here to take over! You can go back to sleep in your tents now."



I smiled cheerfully. There is no way I am going to sleep now. An avid morning person, it is impossible for me to close my eyes when the sun is out. And it was such a BEAUTIFUL day! We must go about and do something!!

We decided to go and visit a beach for the morning. Yes, we should take advantage for being up that early and do something somewhere.
Going back to the campsite, we realized that it was only 5:30 am. Letting Divelydoo slept some more, we sat by the waterside and stared into the serenity of morning. The horizon was so scenic and everything peaceful.



At 6:15 am we were well on our way to the beach. First we drove to the north west direction of Ogi, trying to trace back the beach we found the year prior. We drove on and found ourselves at a beautiful cliff overlooking the waters, and decided to drive a little more wishing to find the beach.
We passed a lighthouse, but still no beach. Unsure of what to do, we continued on and next thing we know we were going up and up and up. I looked at the navigation system a little gob-smacked... a beach surely will be down on the sea surface, not up in the mountains. Lady M then wisely said, "Well if we go up, surely we will go down at some point, we might end up at a beach, you know. We shall just enjoy this beautiful drive - as the old saying in German said 'der weg ist das ziel'!"

That has a ring of truth. So, I continued on driving.



After some more 15 minutes going up and leveled with the brightest and greenest spot I've ever seen on the island, I gave up looking for the beach. So I told Lady M and Divelydoo that we are going to the one beach which location I am positively certain: Sobama Beach!

Oh the water was delicious!!! The sun was high, but not burning. To be very honest, Sobama beach is not exactly the most beautiful beach in the island. But, hey, it's still a beach!
We had a blissful dip into the ocean we went back to the city. Failing miserably to find an onsen that's open early in the day, we decided to crash the shower at the Japanese inn where everybody else were staying at.

The second day of the celebration was pretty much laid back. I joined a flute making workshop with a well-known flute maker Ranjo-san.


Ranjo-san the flute master

We were also able to enjoy some fringe shows. One particular fringe show that I enjoyed tremendously was "S&T Taiko Talk" featuring Eiichi Saito (one of Kodo's founder) and Kazuaki Tomida, who was formerly a member of Kodo player and now had gone solo. This fringe show was HILARIOUS. Saito and Tomida started the show in a top form improved comedy and combining it with taiko performing. They were so funny. There was also a piece where they communicated using only taiko sounds, no words. They said the taiko sounds "Don doko!" or "Don suko suko" or "Teretsukutsukudon". Then they would act the part, angry, or laughing, or sad or sulking or nonchalant, and then they will start 'speaking' the taiko sound really quickly and had an argument with each other and THEN played the part they're saying while hitting it.
It was pretty freakin' amazing! With my taiko background, I understand that verbalizing the sound of taiko makes the hitting easier, but doing it at their speed needed a great deal of rhythmical control and synchronization. Heck, that really took serious concentration - and for them to do such an amazing duet lightheartedly... BRAVO! Yeah, I've decided long ago that all Kodo members must be clones of human and robot breed.



PEEKING INTO HISTORY

It was only 3 pm and I was contemplating what to do next. Should we just hang around the fringe shows or do something somewhat different.
One of the drummers suggested that we took off to a historic town called Shukunegi and enjoy the ancient setting. Hmm... Having never heard of this place, my curiosity was aroused and I agreed immediately to take her there.

We drove towards Shukunegi, unsure where to look, we predicted we're in the area and saw a giant hall with a giant boat peeking out from it.

"Hey B, do you know where this place is at? This hall can't be it, right?"

"I don't know, Tari. But it should be somewhere here."

I looked around, it's either the boat hall or green paddy fields.

"OK, guys, we're going to make a stop at this... well, boat museum it seems like, and I will ask for directions there."

My suspicion was right. This museum was not where Shukunegi village is located, it will need about 5 more minutes drive down the road, but we have to know what we're looking for otherwise we will miss it altogether. The kind lady clerk at the museum fumbled through her documents and produced a map.

"This is where you need to go. Look to your right, that's where the village is."

The three of us then spent about half an hour at the boat museum. Divelydoo who had once attended a boat making course found this stop completely worthwhile. She had to take a closer look at the boat displayed and everything.
I was impressed by the massive size of the boat, but not having a particularly deep interest in boats in general - I decided to sit calmly in front of the fan and enjoyed the breeze in peace.



Carefully following the instructions given by the museum lady, we drove on to the direction of the port of Shukunegi.

Observing the surrounding, I suddenly cracked up laughing. This is ridiculous! I had passed this road like 100 times before and how I had failed to notice the historic village in the past 4 years was beyond me. It had been there all this time. And if I had taken my eyes away from the coast line for 2 seconds to look to my right, I would've noticed that!

Quoting from the JNTO website:

The hamlet of Shukunegi is located at Ogi-machi on the island of Sado-ga-shima in the Sea of Japan, and is part of Niigata Prefecture. There are now just over 100 simple houses clustered together in the small inlet. The hamlet began as a port town in around the 13th century, and grew rapidly from around the 17th century, with increased shipping in the Sea of Japan. All over Shukunegi visitors will find vestiges of these earlier days. The homes of ship owners built on fortunes made in trading are open to the public. Pillars and fittings in these houses are lacquered in red. Living rooms have high ceilings and ornate household altars. An example of the largest type of ship or Sengoku-bune (a junk able to hold 1,000 koku of rice) used in those days has been restored and is on display to the public. This ship was based on drawings of Sengoku-bune built in Shukunegi in 1776.

We walked into the village and suddenly you were walking into history. The houses were old and wooden and all built next to each other. There was this one house whose shaped is like a boat. It was very tranquil and beautiful. The more special touch of this village is that people still live there. We ran into a postman who was slaloming the very narrow street by the canal and there was a tiny shrine where procession was still taking place.





If you could arrange to come to this village well before 4 pm, you could actually knock on the doors of any of the houses and arrange to have tea with the owner (if s/he is there) for 400 yen and then the house owner will be showing you inside his/her house while tell you tales of history.

What a special visit! Thank you Drummer B for suggesting to go to this place. Every year, a new discovery!

HISTORY IN THE MAKING

Just like the previous day, we were already geared up to go at Kisaki Shrine 5 pm for the evening concert. We made it up there in time and secured a good block for 12 people in front of the stage. Hehehe... that was very good.



Performing for the night was the much celebrated Indian tabla player Zakir Hussein. It was amazing to hear the sound that his hands produced. Quoting from a Drummer World article:

Zakir Hussain is today appreciated both in the field of percussion and in the music world at large as an international phenomenon. A classical tabla virtuoso of the highest order, his consistently brilliant and exciting performances have not only established him as a national treasure in his own country, India, but gained him worldwide fame. The favorite accompanist for many of India's greatest classical musicians and dancers, from Ali Akbar Khan and Ravi Shankar to Birju Maharaj and Shivkumar Sharma, he has not let his genius rest there. His playing is marked by uncanny intuition and masterful improvisational dexterity, founded in formidable knowledge and study.

That's what Drummer World wrote, and that's what we got. Except he wasn't accompanying any other musician, but he was accompanied by Dilshad Khan on an ancient Indian instrument sarangi.

At the second half, a series of Okinawan musicians tackled the stage. From the Ryukyu dance master Takako Sato, Ryukyu Genno Dan, the sanshin trio. Several members of Kodo also came on stage at this second half and performed the drumming part.

It was so magical and rich. I know that this year's celebration was to highlight the 20 years this celebration, but to have all this on one stage, under the starry sky, celebrating with 3,000 other people - it was heavenly.

This is history in the making.

Amazing.

Day 1 - Blue Start and Sparkling Finish

THE BLUE START



We docked at Ryotsu port on Sado island at 8 am that day. We quickly queued to get our car out of the parking place and head down towards Ogi, a city at the Southern coast of Sado island. The drive is about 50 km from Ryotsu through the mountains and along the winding coast line.



That early in the day, the traffic was pleasant. Having driven 120 km/hour in the past 4 hours, I found it quite challenging to keep the speed below 70 km/hour. The problem is that the other drivers are quite obviously Sado locals, and being islanders, I don't think they quite understand the meaning of haste.
These people definitely are not devoted Kodo fan like this freaky driver, and thus no one needed to be at Kisaki Shrine down by Ogi port well before 9 am to be able to score the early entry ticket.

We made it to Ogi at 9:10 am. After parking the car I ran to collect my ticket and ran again to the shrine to exchange it with the color-coded entry ticket. Deeply disappointed for getting a green card, not the red. I sulked for a little bit, until Beating Drum Ruth poked me on my shoulder, "Hey there, we got RED tickets!!!" I was.... what? what?
But of course!!! I forgot for a moment that a carload full of drummers and drums had left earlier on Thursday morning, and of course they lined up to get the red tickets for us.

Next stop was to drop off the two drummers at the Japanese inn they are staying for the weekend and and for us to set up camp. Lady M and myself did not want to camp all the way over at Sobama beach anymore, like last year, since it means a 15 minutes drive from the happening area, and we will be far away from the Waraku Daiko clan.
So we found ourselves a small park, merely 3 minutes walk away, where we saw some tents visible there. After consulting with some campers on one of the big tent, we decided to stay there.

As we were contemplating the space, I saw a man walked by and smiled at me.

"Are you Tari?"

"Yes, yes, I am."

"I'm Ted! I recognized your face from your blog."

It was nice to meet Ted at last. We've been corresponding our blogs because of this celebration. And since we both have been reading each other blogs for sometime now, it was like meeting a longtime friend again. Ted also introduced us to his lovely Miki.

After a while we both had to return to our business of setting up camp sooner rather than later, as the sky was looming grey and it seems like it was going to rain.
Something horrible then happened. Unaccustomed to setting up the tent, I was stuck at some point. Lady M came to help and then we heard a loud CRACK! No no no no noooooooo. This is not supposed to happen. This is not even my tent! Oh Divelydoo is going to kill me!!!!
Stuck and confused we were unsure of what we were supposed to do, then a nice fellow camper approached from the next tent.

"Are you OK?"

"I think we broke one of the pole. Now we're trying to figure out how to overcome this issue otherwise the tent couldn't be setup."

"Let me get the boys to help you."

She hauled 3 boys from her giant family tent. They inspected the broken pole and nodded wistfully. "We need some duct tape to cover the damage and hold them together."
One of them ran to their car and fetched the tape. Just seconds after the pole was mended, the sky tore open, thunders were breaking and the earth started crying.

Boy, was I NOT happy!

The boys from the next tent dragged all of the tent stuff under their tent's roof and then they dragged their giant umbrella to to cover it while 2 of them set the tent up. In 3 minutes everything was finished. Thank you, you boys!

Now that the tent is all setup, I was a great deal calmer, wistfully willing the rain to stop, we hailed towards the Harbor Art Market. We need to find something to eat or something to do, generally.

What a mood killer the rain was, everything was suddenly covered, not many people out and about and even the Fringe Show wasn't even going on. When Lady M suggested us to go back to get some rest in our tents, I quickly agreed.

I was feeling so blue. Generally I'm not crazy about the rain, but especially on Earth Celebration - I hate the rain. Defeated by tiredness and somber weather, I slept for a couple of hours, I even managed to squeeze in 1 hour in between to call dad and wished him happy birthday.
After a couple of hours, I was awaken with a very still sound. I got up immediately and felt 1000 times happier to find that the rain had mellowed down! Beating Drum R also rang to inquire about tickets for the following day and generally talked some senses into me to get rained on and change my attitude a little bit to be more positive.

Lady M and I decided to find something to eat or drink and generally be a bit more productive. We caught the last 5 minutes of the last fringe performance for the day. It was rather ridiculous, mind you, we were huddling under the umbrella while watching the performance under the tiny roof of the shrine.
After 5 minutes, we decided to leave back to the Harbor Market and find ourselves some food or drinks.

Time passed by quickly after that.



THE SPARKLING FINISH

We got back to the shrine at 5 pm, since we were the designated seat grabbers for the evening - we had to line up to enter the concert that early. You see, to see the evening Shiroyama concerts people had to line up according to their color coded ticket. The seats are not numbered. Well, basically it's just an open field, so if you want to be in front of the magnificent stage, you run as early as your turn allows you to.

Here are what you need to do when you want to strategically position yourself at the best area at Shiroyama Concert:

1. Line up early at Kisaki Shrine to get your tickets exchanged into some color coded card. You want Red. Red is the first one to go into the mountains.

2. When you managed to secure a red card, that means you can start walking up the mountain to concert place from 5 pm, according to your numbers.

3. You walk up with the red card bunch. Be sure to carry your original ticket together with the red card.

4. You walk up to the field opening and a staff will start lining you up according to the numbers written on your red ticket

5. Then with 10 people block, you could start walking into the field and secure seats. The staffs will ALWAYS say that we should not run. That there is plenty of time to get it. Well, I choose not to listen to them. I always run. I run or skipped or anything that is equivalent to getting there faster than walking.

6. Don't forget to bring your tarp as you run to the aimed spot.

7. Spread tarp. You need to secure as many seats as possible to secure however many people you have in your clan to be comfortably seated with enough legroom.

8. Man your tarp to make sure no one shift them until your entire clan arrive and you can begin to breath easily again.




Well, this is at least what I religiously do in the past 4 years of experience. This day, we got our special 'corner' in front of the stage. While waiting for the concert to start some members from Kodo came out and gave us a quick entertainment while fishing donation for the Chuetsu Earthquake victims. I donated some money and scored a photo opportunity with my favorite drummer in the whole wide world: Tsubasa Hori. She is only 4 months younger than me, but her musical accomplishments are perfectly applaudable. Always the front woman for Kodo with the many many front men, I found her my true inspiration of all sorts.



And then the wicked performance began. Kodo played flawlessly that evening. Seeing them on stage there at their home and outdoors can be considered a spiritual experience. The beating of the drums felt like a thunder in your heart. New to the stage this year was a giant drum that was visibly formerly a tree. The songs came one by one, the movements, the unison, the precision, the devotion - all sincere, all heartfelt, all was perfection.
It was phenomenal.



After 2 hours, the concert finished. I did not want to leave, except at some point they made us leave.
Well, we had to rescue Divelydoo at Ryotsu port anyway, she has just arrived all the way from India and desperately needed to be picked up!!!

Divelydoo, my sunflower, had arrived. I finally felt content. After the amazing performance by Kodo and the arrival of Divelydoo, everything is perfect, just as it should be at Earth Celebration.

I closed my eyes that evening with true happiness in my heart. I listened to the soft sound of water at the sea, looked at the stars in the sky.

I know I was at home.

This is Earth Celebration.

It's a very hot day...

Yeah, no kidding, it's been like this for a week now, 33-37C (about 93-100F) and 100% humidity, everyday. The air is so thick and you can cut it with a knife!
This makes it really difficult to go about your routines and even try to lead a normal life. You just can't think. And this alone makes the days completely unbearable.

I'm still bummed with this. This weather makes it even worse, the heart that usually forgives finds it really hard these days. My sister will always advice that something is a big deal because we make it one, so I definitely should switch my state of mind to make it a no deal at all.

I have to say it's hard, though. The heat and humidity really isn't helping. So, last night I made a list on what 100-times-better things to do than seething in grudges:

1. Taiko drumming, of course!

Oh I am so looking forward to my taiko practice on Sunday and the Earth Celebration next week!! There is nothing in the world like drumming that never fails to pick up my mood to the 7th heaven. You can give so much to taiko and guaranteed it will give you back the equal amount of energy. It's always funny with musical instruments, you get back as much as you give them.
Not to sound melancholic or cheesy, but there was a time when I had to go through a really terrible unfortunate situation. Details unimportant, but it involved a lot of unhappiness.
The following morning after the most horrible situation took place, I went to my taiko class, thinking that beating on the drums would take my mind off it. It was one of the most intense meditative experience that I have had with the drums, I laughed when the song was joyful, cried when the song was sad, bopped around as the song went funny, cried out with ridicule when everybody made mistakes during the songs. After very intense 4 hours, I left the practice feeling deadly exhausted physically but the heart felt a great deal lighter and I was able to smile again.

Yes, taiko is my other life. Indeed it is, I feel a lot better already now thinking about it.

2. Eat chocolate cake.

I want to eat chocolate cake. I want to eat a LOT of chocolate cake. The fudge one.

3. Bake the chocolate cake so it can be eaten

I am going to cook Nigella Lawson's chocolate cake. It looks really good in her cookbook!

4. Be a couch potato in an air-conditioned room.

Watch a whole bunch of DVDs that my sister sent me on some TV series that I like, ranging from Desperate Housewives, CSI: Las Vegas season 7, Grey's Anatomy, and Ugly Betty. This will be fun

5. Piddle with Antonio Sanchez la guitarra mi corazón!

Yes, teacher M gave me a couple of homeworks that she will test on me on Monday. She said that if I could keep up until level 5 exams songs, she'll have a chat with the school's guitar orchestra and see if I can take an apprenticeship training with them. I'm giddy with joy just to have that prospect. FUN!

6. Thank goodness it's Friday!

The weekend is coming up tomorrow! YEAH! Finally, a full real weekend. I forgot what it's like to have a real weekend. How fun it is to be able to sleep in, go to the gym, or I can also NOT do anything at all whatsoever.

7. Daydream about Earth Celebration 2007

This event is my annual pilgrimage. I go and join the celebration every year and schedule all of my work in August around this event. Ah, days and nights of fun, happiness, drumming, laughing, swimming, outdoors concert, camping, road trips, foods. Words truly can't explain just how fun it is to be there at the celebration. Believe me, I've tried so many times, you just have to go there and experience it yourself!

Ah.... there are indeed many things that are 100-times-better than the thing-I-thought-about when I started this post. Better dedicate energy to those! It's now long forgotten.

Please excuse me, now I need to continue my daydream about Earth Celebration 2007.

Earth Celebration 2007, Waraku Daiko and summer stuff of sorts!

Today is another monsoon day. The day is raining and spirits are destroyed. And my sad laundry will need to be hauled to the laundromat for a proper drying.

All had been blue until a cheerful phone call from O.Div arrived. Waraku Daiko's performance time had been confirmed for the much anticipated Earth Celebration 2007!

Excerpting from my post last year:
For those who don't know, Earth Celebration is an art/music festival hosted by world's best (my own opinion) taiko drumming group Kodo at their home island, Sado.
Every summer, musicians from all over Japan and the world gather for the three days of musical fun. Please visit the link above for more details. There are way too much fun things in the list. It is simply impossible to sum it up in a short blog entry.

That being said, per usual, my taiko group Waraku Daiko will perform at the fringe show on August 19, 2007 (Sunday). The venue is at Kisaki-shrine. It is by the Ogi port, a very short walk from the information center.
We will be on stage at 1:15 PM.



This year's Eearth Celebration is observing the 20th anniversary of Earth Celebration. Along side Kodo, there will be world-known tabla player Zakir Hussain from India, Puerto Rican percussionist Giovanni Hidalgo, French Guinean tap dancer Tamango (he was also guest performer for EC 2007), and a few more celebrated Japanese musicians.

Well, there's nothing much else to say, except for... SEE YOU THERE!!! (especially on Sunday August 19 at 1:15 pm KISAKI SHRINE).

Taiko-ly yours,
Taiko Tari -071207

Sendai: Day 2

Day 2 started with Traveling Circus Girl aka MirPir (from this point forward will be refered to as TCG) having to get ready for her Japanese class. I chose to continue sleeping while TCG got ready and departed from the hotel.

I finally walked the 15 minutes walk towards the Japanese class as indicated in the map TCG left me, while stopping around at several book stores and started the day with a hot bread, fresh out of the oven, while reading McCall Smith's "Portuguese Irregular Verbs".
I don't know whether it is a combination of having the right set of holiday mind, or having a delicious hot bread, or being utterly fascinated by the dry humor of Professor Dr. Moritz-Maria von Igelfeld's absurd little life, or I-don't-know-what - but I started giggling uncontrollably in the middle of Cafe de Crie Sendai. Two elderly ladies who were sitting three tables away from my table looked up, puzzled and then started smiling at me. And then the store clerks also looked at me and started laughing. I looked at them a little disoriented for 2 seconds and then started laughing along with them. I like these people of Sendai, they're very friendly.
You see, in Tokyo, normally if I suddenly have a giggling fit (which, to be perfectly honest, happens quite often; especially when I'm reading a rather comical book), people around me will be disturbed by a sudden unusual outburst, and in trains some people might actually poke me and say, "Sssshhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!"
Not in Sendai! Ah, I like Sendai people. I do!

Then it came the time to pick TCG up from her Japanese class. I was a little early, so I wandered into the recycle shop nearby. Ole ole ole! That day was indeed my lucky day. I walked into a display of an open-heart necklace that I lost some years ago. About 14 years ago, my J-mum in Niigata gave me a valentine day's gift in a form of a Tiffany silver necklace. It is a very simple pendant, but I loved it very much. About 7 years ago, the chain broke, and thus I stopped wearing it. I finally got a replacement leather chain, but I have searched and searched, the pendant disappeared.
Until that fateful Friday when I walked into the recycle shop. I saw that they had that pendant with the chain, and it costed only 5,000 yen (about US$45)! My heart skipped a beat, and then I walked right to the shop lady and said, "Excuse me, I'd like to buy that necklace."
She said, "Do you know why we're selling it cheaply? The chain is a little dirty, but I'm sure you can get it cleaned."
I said firmly, "I'd like to buy it. Could you wrap it, please, thank you."
I was a 10 times happier girl when I left the store. Finally, I found it again!!! (FYI, this necklace if bought new would cost US$215 before tax)

Friday was such a beautiful day. TCG and I decided to go on a McDonald's picnic by the river on the way to visit Aoba Castle. Sendai is indeed a very beautiful green city. The water at the river was so clear. After we finished our burgers and took some photos, we decided to do a bit more exploring.

Interracial ducks couple

Don't you think it looks like we're sitting somewhere in Europe?

We walked up to Aoba Castle. The hike up was a little steep, but fun nonetheless. The castle was a little overrated, I have to say. Predominantly because there is no castle on site. It was demolished during the war time (WWII). So what we found were merely the foundation walls where the castle once was. The view from the top was still breathtaking, though!

TCG posing with the one-eyed dragon dude (Sendai's shogunate mascot)

TCG had to go back to get ready for the circus that evening, while I still have a few hours to kill and decided to visit Miyagi Museum or Art . With the 'steep' entrance fee of 300 yen, I gained admission to several nice exhibition by artists from the Miyagi prefecture area.

Of course it's nothing like The MET or MoMA, but still the collection is quite varied and sporadic.
If you do go to visit the museum, please don't forget to check out Churyo Sato's gallery. Mr. Sato is known to be Japan's greatest concrete sculptors. His works is similar to that of Rodin's. Mr. Sato is also known to be the first Japanese artist to ever having exhibited at Musee Rodin in Paris.

After that I went back to TCG's hotel and got ready for another privileged circus performance. TCG had organized a seat for me with the circus band in the pit for that evening. Let me tell you, I've sat at every possible wing and seat available, from the cheapest seat, to those very special seats where I could literally touch the stage. Whilst all those were very special, it doesn't get anymore special than to be amongst the inner circle. This experience deserves a special post, so I will leave the details to another day.

I think this recapped the brilliant second day of my visit in Sendai. Along with the especially delicious memory of the exquisite gyu-tan (beef tongue) meal at Rikkyu. Not only the meal was delicious and moderately priced, they deserve a special mention for their display of true customer service: admitting us in when we're 10 minutes past last order time, and left us to eat in peace until midnight, when the restaurant actually closes at 11 PM. Domo arigato gozaimashita, gochisosamadeshita from the bottom of our heart!

Sendai: Day 1

So... Sendai was FUN!

As I said, I went up north to visit the traveling circus girl and see what Sendai is all about. The last time I was there, it was in 1998 for a student conference. The schedule was very hectic and predominantly spent indoors, hence I don't remember seeing anything particularly memorable.

I got into Sendai at 11 AM, promptly met by MirPir at the station, so we could immediately catch the senseki line to visit one of Japan's top 3 most beautiful spot, Matsushima. We road the train all the way to Hon-Shiogoma, the port city and caught the boat going through the 260 islets of Matsushima archipelago. The day was quite hazey, so misty that we couldn't see that far in the horizon; however the 50 minutes boat ride was very pleasant.
Getting into Matsushima, we were not quite sure of what to expect. I had expected Matsushima to be the main island, since the name bears the meaning of an 'island' (the ~shima part of the name means an island). But after a long search, I couldn't find the isle of Matsu, and when I prompted the inquiry to the nice young man at the tourist counter, he politely answered, "Well, there is no island that is called 'Matsushima' per se in this archipelago of Matsushima, but it is a bay area that contains of 260 islands. But, you might want to check out the three islands with the temples right by this port, the biggest island is called Fukuurashima. Yes, madam, the biggest island in Matsushima is Honshu the mainland, or Fukuurashima, not Matsushima."


Ah, too much information too early in the day. MirPir and I decided to go explore the few islands that were connected to Honshu mainland with red bridges. Our first stop is the tiny islet where Godaido is located.
We came, we walked and we saw. We concluded that Godaido is, in fact, a very tiny island - if we can even call it that. The temple has four walls and is only open once every 30 years (which I think is quite a marketing blurp to kind of sell the island so it can always have constant visitors). Other than that, there is nothing extraordinarily special about that island, I must say. And we were still on the quest of finding what the WOW factor is of Matsushima.

Onto the next quest, we walked the coast towards the largest island at the bay, Fukuurashima. The bridge that took us there was long and red. Quite impressive. We had to pay 200 yen to go in. The minute we stepped foot on the island, we immediately felt the lushness of the surrounding. It was beautiful! Everything was so green. The island, as it turns out, is a small botanical garden, we had a pleasant walk around it and found a nice hidden little secret passage that took us to the beach. It was so peaceful and nice and we spent a good hour just laying there and chatted the afternoon away. I remembered thinking then, "Gosh, it was only 4 hours before I went through the craziness of Shinjuku station in Tokyo, and now I'm here, surrounded by all this nature and peacefulness. It is so... Zen." This thought then brought the biggest smile to my face.


After we left the island, we walked back to the mainland on a food quest. We found some shop selling the local delicacy kamaboko. Kamaboko is like a fish cake, that you put on a stick (like kebab) and then you grill on top of some hot charcoal. Yummm!


We also discovered a very nice Zen temple grounds. It was very mesmerizing to be in there, the Buddhist statues that they have there were quite unique, they even looked somewhat Indian. It was already 5 PM when we got there, so we couldn't gain admission to the temple area, but the surrounding was good enough to explore.




The day then progressed and we were trying to decide what we wanted to do for the evening. We went up to the station area and found an onsen to get ourselves relaxed and cleaned up before we embarked to have dinner back in town.

MirPir wanted to take me to a restaurant that is owned by her friend Mariko's family out in Tagajo. We finally showed up at around 7 PM. When we walked into the doors of "Kuishinbo", we were very warmly greeted by a very lovely lady clad in Japanese kimono. Later we discovered that it was Mariko's mother. Shortly after that, a very kind-faced authoritative gentleman showed up and introduced himself, "I am Papa!" Of course, who else could he be?! The evening went on very pleasantly. The food that we ate were traditional Japanese izakaya food. It's first sashimi, and then radish salad, and then grilled fish, and then yakitori, and then... I can't even remember anymore, there were so many beautiful food coming our way and we overate them. haha!
The highlight of the evening was to have the pleasant opportunity to learn about calligraphy from Mariko's expert calligrapher of a mother, discussing about kimonos and the art of wearing it, as well as learning about the tricks on sake from Mariko's gregarious father.




After 3.5 hours at the restaurant, MirPir, Taiko Tari, and the Dralion technician duo bowed Kuishinbo good night. Gochisousamadeshita!

What a perfectly enjoyable day 1!

p.s: oh, this is ONLY of day 1, I will post again on the brilliant day 2 soon!