The Hitch-Hikers’ Guide to Sado Island (Akita → Yamagata → Niigata → Sado and back!)

Thanks to Respect for the Aged Day (aka Old People’s Day!!), this weekend was a three-day one. Christy and I decided to take advantage of it and go somewhere kind of far away. We picked Niigata and Sado-ga-shima, which are two prefecture’s south of here (about 7hrs of driving). This was a go-with-the-flow kind of relaxing weekend, so we left early Saturday morning and headed to Dewa Sanzan in Yamagata-ken (the prefecture directly south). Dewa Sanzan is an area that includes these three mountains and a lot of sacred places. This was Christy’s fourth time going, she likes it that much. And, after going myself, I can see why!

First we went to Hagurosan Mountain where there’s a beautiful 5-story pagoda near the base
and a temple complex at the summit. Despite the heat, and what I can only assume was 100% humidity (aka we were ridiculously sweaty and sticky and it was hard to breathe), we remembered our youth and hiked the 2,446 [steep] steps to the top of the mountain. They were several points where I thought I was just going to pass out from the humidity and intense stairs. But, thankfully, I made it up. After the climb, I would have been impressed by anything, but the temple complex actually was impressive. ☺ On the way back down, I got a certificate saying I’d completed the climb (yay!), and we met some people from Maryland who are studying at Akita International University. I don’t know if it was weirder that we ran into fellow Akitans or fellow Americans, but either way, we said hello and swapped email addresses.

The climb down was almost worse than the way up because my legs were shaking so badly, I was terrified I would just tumble down all 2,446 stairs… I didn’t. I didn’t even fall once (going up or down). ☺

Back at the base, we returned to my car and headed to the next mountain. This place was so beautiful, you’ll have to look at my pictures for the full effect. We hiked up to this sacred orange rock and were blessed by a Shinto priest. The rock is orange because sulfurous hot water pours over it and it’s considered a really, really sacred place. Before you get the rock, you have to take off your shoes and get blessed by the priest. After that you walk over to the rock, and actually climb up on top of it. It kind of hurts because there’s hot water running over it, but it’s a cool experience. Then, on the way out, you can sit and put your feet in a bath of the magical sulfur water, so we did, and they did feel magically better. ☺

When we got down, it was already 4pm, and we hadn’t eaten since our McDonald’s breakfast around 8am, so we headed towards Sakata (the big city in Yamagata-ken) where we were to meet our friend Paula at the train station at five (she’s an Irish ALT from Akita City). On the way there, the car started making squealy noises when I braked (and for a long time, even when I wasn’t braking), so I was getting a little worried. We picked Paula up and went to a restaurant near the station. I don’t know if it was because we were really hungry or if the food was actually that good, but it was like food heaven, and we ate a ton (fortunately, it ended up only being about $10 each!). After dinner, we decided to get the funny car noise checked out before we continued to Niigata, so I pulled into the nearest gas station (they all have little shops attached for like oil/tire changes, etc) and explained the brake noise. The attendant told me it was probably that my brake pads were all worn down and we were hearing the scraping of the metal on metal (he brought out a sample break/break pad to explain so I would understand!). Unfortunately, as it was now 6:30, the mechanic had already gone home. We tried a couple of other places, but all their mechanics were gone, too. We decided the noise wasn’t that bad, so we’d continue to Niigata and get it checked in the morning.

After a quick pit stop for McFlurries, we hit the road. We stopped at an onsen (hot spring/public bath) to clean off and get ready for bed. Then we drove until about 11, and decided to stop about 26km from Niigata because Christy saw a sign for a park and decided we should camp there for the night. In Japan, it’s legal to camp pretty much anywhere, and we had been planning to just go to a beach, but the park was more convenient, so we found a grassy area and pitched our tent. We were totally exhausted, so we passed out, and despite be woken up at 2am and 5:30am by carousing teenagers in the park, had a fine night’s sleep. We hit the road around 7, made it to Niigata, and pulled into the nearest gas station. That attendant regretfully informed us they don’t have a mechanic on Sundays, but directed us to the Toyota dealer down the street. At the Toyota place, they told me they had mechanics, but probably no appointments, but asked me to wait while they checked away. Finally this mechanic came out, and I told him the problem. He said they didn’t really have any appointments, but when I explained that we were planning to drive back to Akita the next day (which they were going to be closed for anyway), he seemed to think it was important enough to take a look at. They ran diagnostic tests and told me, indeed, it was my brake pads, and asked if I wanted to wait an hour for them to get fixed. Christy and Paula seemed to think it was a good idea, so we left the car in their hands and went to a grocery store to get breakfast and lunch. An hour (and $210) later, we headed over to catch the ferry to Sado Island.

A bit of a later start than we had originally planned, but we caught the 1pm ferry, and enjoyed the 2hr ride with some ice cream and a nap. Once on the island, we caught the bus to the Green Village Youth Hostel, where, as it turned out, Maggie and her friend were staying as well. The “youth hostel” was really more like a cute bed and breakfast. The owner/manager lady had been expecting us since Maggie had told her we were coming, so she promptly drove us to meet up with them at a nearby temple. The famous monk Nichiren founded this temple, Konponji, during the period when he was exiled from the capital – and it was VERY cool. We planned to take the bus to the next temple, but it wasn’t going to come for a while, so someone suggested we hitchhike. Jokingly, a couple of the girls stuck out their thumbs, and before we knew what was happening, this lady in a minivan had stopped and was inviting us for a ride! She had her poor bewildered 3 year old daughter in back seat, so we decided she was safe enough, and all climbed in! She dropped us off right in front of the temple with a smile and a wave. This place had a pagoda, but after seeing the one at Hagurosan, it wasn’t that impressive. We headed back to the main road to catch the bus to the nearby village so we could get dinner, but we saw the bus coming as we were heading down the hill, and no matter how fast we ran, we couldn’t catch it. We figured well, the hitchhiking had worked so well last time, why not give it another shot. A minute later, we were hopping into a van and asking the couple to take us to a good restaurant. The restaurant was, indeed, good, and the waiter spoke some English so the other girls were happy. Afterwards, we were trying to decide what to do, because Christy and Paula wanted to go to another onsen, but because of the bus schedule we couldn’t really go to the one close to that city. We asked the waiter (as it turns out, he’s also the manager) if there was one closer to our hostel. He said there was, and insisted that he drive us!

So, into another van we went, and Itou-san took us to the onsen. Christy had a US dollar in her wallet, so we all signed it and gave it to him as a thank you, and he seemed really grateful and gave us all his card. ☺ The onsen was really nice and we relaxed in the bath for about an hour. We took a taxi back to the hostel, and asked the lady if there were any karaoke places nearby. She said not really, but wanted to take us to this bar that has karaoke, and since we couldn’t really say no, we went the local bar, and the owner set up karaoke for us. We provided some high class entertainment for the one other table of people and the old men at the bar. One of the old men serenaded Christy, which was pretty comical.

The next morning, we wanted to go check out the gold mine on the island, so the hostel manager lady insisted on taking us (we paid her for gas this time). The mine was really cool! First of all, the tunnels are impressive on their own, but to top it off, there are animatronic robot miners that continue to “work” down there. It was like being in a Disneyland ride… but cooler! We had a good time there, and then the lady drove us to catch the ferry.

The return trip was relatively uneventful, but good. Maggie’s friend took the train home, and she rode with the three of us back up. We got back to Akita around 10, so it was too late for her to take the train from Akita City to Kakunodate, so we had to drop her off, which meant I didn’t get home until 1:23am. Lucky for us, while we were having humidity and sunshine, apparently up in Akita it poured the whole weekend (which we caught the tail end of last night/this morning).

So, Dewa Sanzan was AMAZING, and Sado-ga-shima, while not having a whole lot of exciting sites, was totally worth the trip just to interact with all of the warm, friendly locals. I would definitely call this first road trip a success (even with the car trouble)!

Kakunodate Festival (9/8)

On the 8th, I went to friend Maggie’s town for a crazy festival. It lasts 3 days (Friday, Saturday, Sunday), with the biggest events on the last night. Since it’s two hours away, I couldn’t stay for Sunday night, but Saturday was more than enough to get a taste of the festival. So, for this one, each neighborhood builds a huge floats on a big wooden cart, and then everyone in the neighborhood helps pull it around the town for all three days. As they go through the different neighborhoods, they have to stop at certain check-points and ceremoniously ask permission to continue through the area. Also, since the streets are really narrow, and the carts are really big, occasionally two neighborhoods would come to an impasse. In that case, the heads of the two floats would meet and negotiate for position, though I didn’t really understand why they did that because, more often then not, they would just decide to crash into each other. They would basically ram into each other until one of them gave way! The first two days, the crashes are orchestrated for the tourists (so you can go to a certain block at a certain time to see one), but I guess, on the Sunday it’s more of a demolition derby free for all. In case it doesn’t sound crazy enough, apparently there have been deaths at this festival before…

When I got to Kakunodate that Saturday, Maggie took me to her friend’s house, and the lady helped me get dressed up in festival clothes (Maggie already had hers on). Once I was all set to go, Maggie and I joined her neighborhood’s float, and we helped pull it around town! It was kind of fun, but a lot of work. It was amazing how EVERYONE in the town turned out for this thing (even people who have moved away come back for it) and was willing to spend three days working together for their neighborhood. The best part was getting to pull the giant float down the tiny streets, but, I guess since they do it day/night for three days, they only pulled it for like 100ft, and then would take a break for one reason or another (like a check-point or negotiation).

Later in the evening, JETs from all over started to show up, so we all helped out Maggie’s neighborhood and walked around and saw the festival. At one point when we were walking, this man (with wife and small boy) stopped us on the street and asked us to speak English to his son. Since I was the only JET who can understand Japanese (and therefore what the man asked), I bent down and said hello to the little boy. He’s three years old and could understand “What’s your name,” “How are you,” “How old are you,” etc. It was really impressive! The dad was really excited to meet all of us (and, I must admit, we were an eclectic bunch of foreigners – two Americas, a Canadian, an Australia, an Englishman, and a Jamaican), and I ended up talking to him there on the street for a good 20min. It was funny because he was really nice and normal and what-not, so we were just talking about regular stuff, so I forgot that none of the other people I was with had the slightest clue what we were talking about! Kind of weird.

Anyway, it was a crazy time (we even got interviewed for the festival website – so there’s video of us somewhere out there on the web, but I haven’t been able to find it), and we finally saw a big crash at midnight. After that, I was exhausted, so I went back to Maggie’s and went to bed. She and Phil were out pulling the float around until 3:30am!!

I really liked hanging out with such an international crowd of people. (I learned a lot about Canada and Jamaica that night. ☺) In the end, I thought it was a ridiculous festival, but really fun, and I enjoyed getting to actually be a part of it.

Tazawako and Oga

I'm posting up pictures from the last two weekends. The first bunch includes my trip to visit Maggie in Kakunodate (about 2hrs away). You'll see pictures of Lake Tazawako, Japan's deepest lake, and the places we stopped at on our little tour around the lake. Also, there are pictures of the old samurai houses in Kakunodate. The second bunch are from my daytrip to Oga Peninsula and the Namahage Museum.

Check them out!

Heeeey Macarena!

Oh yes, that's the right, the famed dance of '96-'97. Why mention it now, you might ask? Well, because, tonight, in the company of about 25 middle aged women, I Macarena'd it up in a gym in Gojome, Akita-ken, Japan. By far the strangest, most surreal experience since I arrived! haha

Let's back-track for a moment. So, I got invited to go watch/dance with this Yosakoi dance team in the next town over. I had my suspicions as to the nature of this dance troupe (i.e. middle aged women doing aerobics rather than young people performing energetic modern folk dances), but I decided to check it out anyway. I did some Yosakoi dancing at Berkeley, and I'm anxious to continue to learn while I'm here because it's really fun! So I get to the gym where the team will practice, and my first tip off that this wasn't quite what I'd hoped for, was that 3 women told me they have daughters my age... Anyway, I joined in for the warm-up and stretching, and then we did part of the dance that I guess they (and maybe me also now) will perform at the National Sports Competition in Oct.

Oh, I don't know if I've mentioned it here yet, but the sport competition is like the Olympics of Japan (i.e. competitors from all the prefectures gather for a competition in all kinds of sports - think summer Olympics). This year it's being hosted in Akita, so many cities are hosting different events (my town is volleyball and basketball). Side note: the mascot for Akita Prefecture for the games is a cedar tree character named Sugichi.

Okay, so we did the Sugichi dance, which, yes, included imitating a cedar tree. Pretty silly, but I liked it. Afterwards, they practiced a bunch of dances and I watched. Honestly, it looked to me like an 80s or early 90s aerobics class, and I half expected Olivia Newton John to come in a commend them for getting physical. They even did a dance to that "Venus" song. I was trying so hard not to just burst out laughing! I mean, they were pretty good, and these ladies could definitely move, but the whole situation was so ridiculous! And then, they turned to me, and were like "Macarena? Do you know Macarena?"

So, with flashbacks to Gina Wells' birthday party in '96, I channeled my 10year old self, and lead the ladies in the Macarena! hahahaha I couldn't hold it in anymore, so I was laughing and macarena-ing at the same time (tiring!), and just when I thought it couldn't get anymore ridiculous, the teacher decided to put on a sped up version of the song (like for aerobics class!)!! Alright, now picture this, me and 25 Japanese ladies twice or more my age doing a speedy Macarena in a small-town gym in The Middle of Nowhere, Japan.
Ahahahaha!!! Yep, it was as hilarious as it sounds! =D

Anyway, I don't think I'm going really join their team (especially since their practices conflict with karate), but I am going again next week with Christy. The dance instructor asked me to teach the Yosakoi dance I did at Berkeley, so I will do that next week, and I'm looking forward to it. That, and the Sugichi dance! haha I don't know if I'll be able to Macarena again... I might die of laugher...