I've been back in my other home town of Osaka, Japan for about a week now and as usual a mix of feelings hit me whenever I walk the streets here: lavicious thoughts of the mainly gorgeous women, the inherent humour of the Osakan attitude and the accompanying (and often bewildering for those that don't know it) Osaka-ben that everyone speaks.My trips back to Japan often descend in a mad rush to see nostalgic places and to catch up with friends and family as efficiently as possible. I've mostly succeeded so far, though there is a particular place on the stairs by the main entrance to the temple of Horyuji (which I used to live quite close to) that I used to pause at, sit and reflect upon life that will have to wait until my next trip.
I lived in Japan for two years - living in an apartment in Horyuji which is a small suburb just outside of Nara and worked in Osaka teaching English. Although travelling times were long, I always found the arrangement to provide a great mix of old and new.
I have a couple of days left here in Osaka before I move on to Miyazaki and then Tokyo. A visit yesterday to Kyoto to see my brother in law reminded me how snobbish the people there can be sometimes (not my brother-in-law!).
I suspect it would be rude to remind them that Nara was the capital of Japan prior to Kyoto - but still the urge takes me when people look down their noses at us Osakans!
Still, they know how to construct an effective stone garden. The above picture was taken at Ryoanji, one of the more famous places dotted around the city. The contrasts of the angular black and straight sandstone tiles provide the perfect border to the garden itself, as does the wall a solid backdrop.
It is the play on the unconscious that really sets these things off.
Time to move - I am sure there will be more to come.
1 comment:
I wouldn't get into the Nara-before-Kyoto thing.
Both pre-date not only our country but the country from whose colonies our country began.
A parable on the significance of the memories and quiet reflections of individuals:
In 1893 a man by the name of Henry L. Stimson visited Kyoto on his honeymoon. Like anyone of any sensitivity and taste, he never forgot it.
Much much later the American military were putting forward Kyoto as the target of the first A-bomb.
They felt that the inhabitants were better educated than other Japanese and therefore better able to understand the significance of the new weapon - presumably after they had just been vaporised, which somehow doesn't make sense to me.
The cultural significance of the place of course meant nothing to them.
Anyway... Stimson - now a senior statesman and overseer of the Manhatten Project - took Kyoto off the list, for its cultural significance, and so all that sublime architecture and timeless beauty is still there.
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