Chinatown in Yokohama.
Nihei Haruto-san, with the biggest catch of the day down at the Honmoku Sea Fishing Park on Sunday.
An amusement park in Minatomirai, Yokohama. The ferris wheel puts on a great light show at night.
A group of about 300 protesters demonstrating against a proposal for local suffrage for permanent foreign residents in Shibuya. Many of the signs read "No Voting Rights for Foreigners" or "Suffrage for Foreigners Violates the Constitution." The blue sign on the right says "We Will Stop It! No Local Voting Rights for Foreigners."Hey all... updates from my trip to Thailand-Cambodia are forthcoming, but I wanted to post pt. II first for... chronological reasons.
The evening of the 30th of January, I was not in the best of spirits. Still feeling a little hungover, and grappling with the fresh necessity of expensive major dental surgery, I began walking slowly towards Fabien's apartment in Gotanda. He was throwing his 21st birthday party later that evening, and I was having a hard time deciding whether or not I should actually show up and contaminate the party atmosphere with my new snaggletoothed melancholy.
On the way there I passed by a stack of several dozen coffee cans next to a vending machine. On closer inspection, I realized they were all full and unexpired. Drugged up on pain-pills and full of venomous self-loathing, I slipped five or six of the cans into my backpack and walked away.
I did my best to be cheerful at the party, but my heart wasn't in it. Sorry, Fabien! The cheese was delicious, though, and there were more than a dozen people there more inclined to party than I was, so it was fun in the end.
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The next morning, Daniel texted me to say that he had become violently ill the night before, hadn't slept, and wouldn't be able to make it out fishing. And that was his last day in Tokyo! Alas!
After debating our options for a little while, Haruto and I decided to go fishing together anyway, despite not knowing one-another at all. He took the train to Sakuragi-cho station in Yokohama, and then a bus from there to the Honmoku sea-fishing park.
I rode my bike for 30 confusing, distracting, dangerous urban kilometers. I got lost five times, at one point passing through a long, desolate stretch of superhighway overpasses and coastal heavy industry. It was Sunday afternoon, so cawing seagulls were just about the only life evident in those vast industrial parks. It was the bleakest scenery I've ever seen in Japan- a sea of concrete slabs and factories and warehouses. And it was cold. Then at last, and nearly at the end of hope, I found the true eastern coast of Japan. I felt as if I had come to the end of the earth. The factories dropped away on either side of me and I was looking out over the Pacific Ocean.
The Honmoku Sea-Fishing Park is a series of latticed metal gangways stretching out into the Pacific Ocean. Evidence of shipping and industry is all around- the coast for miles in either direction is crammed with silos and factory stacks and shipping cranes. The water is peppered as far as the eye can see with ships of all sizes- fishing vessels, tugs, and gargantuan freighters plowing slowly through the distant whitecaps.
Haruto came to meet me in the lobby (where you can rent fishing equipment, get something to eat, or buy some bait prior to heading out to the breakwater). I was expecting things to be a bit awkward, but the inherent serenity of fishing seemed to absorb all of my tension. It helped that Haruto's girlfriend, Ayako, had come along at the last moment.
The piers were packed with people, and all of us, it seemed, were equally unsuccessful at fishing. Then around 3:30pm, as the sun was beginning to slant across the water, we started catching these little silver fish. Not edible of course, but it was fun to catch something. Someone nearby pulled in some sort of tasty-looking flatfish. In the end, I went home empty-handed, but I suppose don't mind. It was just nice to see the ocean.
On the way back I impulsively hooked up with a group of a dozen or so professional-looking bicyclists, and managed to keep pace with them for over ten kilometers, despite my woefully shabby equipment. I'm not sure what they made of the sudden addition to their team, but I kept with them until we hit the Tsurumi River, which I followed home through the deepening dusk.
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Monday, Misaki-sensei invited me out to a dinner with two of the students who weren't able to make it to the first farewell party. She said it would be "lonely" if it were just the three of them... hee hee. It was a relief to sit down at the table and get warm, since outside was all freezing rain and sleet. The menu was very traditional Japanese, written in cursive brush (and thus almost totally illegible to us foreigners). Thankfully, Misaki-sensei took care of all the ordering. I hadn't even heard of about half the dishes she ordered and I couldn't tell you what I ate, but it was beautifully prepared and expensive. I think one of the dishes included fish testicle gelatin. It was a tremendous learning experience.
Sensei made certain to ask us our sincere opinion of the course, and we had a good discussion about what worked and what didn't. She really cares about teaching well, and I respect that very much.
Misaki-sensei footed about half the bill this time, but made it very clear that we were to invite her out and treat her "next time."
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Tuesday was Maya's birthday! Honestly, I wasn't looking forward to yet another dinner out- but I couldn't help having fun. The venue was far less terrifying than Daniel's- an izakaya called Watami. Dishes were small, delicious, and reasonably priced. Fun was had by all, although my favorite part of the night was watching shows on my computer with Maya afterwards. I think next time we watch something together, though, we'll go to her place. After all, she has a TV now :3 .
I think I can post soon about my crazy adventures in Thailand and Cambodia, since I have an 11 hour layover in the Philippines tonight and nothing else to do!
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