The sun rises very early this time of the year in Japan. Since there is no daylight savings time, the sun was coming up at about 4:30 AM. Having forgotten to close my room-darkening curtains, I awoke early and was up and moving around by about 7:30. I watched some television and then got ready to go out. Eric and I walked over to the Mr. Donut behind Jusco and had coffee and donuts for our first breakfast in Japan. I highly recommend Mr. Donut’s donuts as they are light and much tastier than the typical donut fare in the States. From there, we headed out into the misty morning air to look around town.
Our first stop was the D2 home center store. It’s a great place to purchase jika tabi (rubber-soled split toe “shoes” that we wear for outdoor training). They have all kinds – even the steel reinforced toe! I quickly picked up a pair of Riki-O tabi for 1,550 yen as Eric looked at the huge selection of shoes made with gardening and outdoor use in mind. We perused the rest of the store admiring the large selection of interesting tools and home products. I could have dropped some serious cash in that place, but I held back and just picked up a slightly larger pair of indoor slippers for use at Azusa (the ones provided by the inn – and most other public places in Japan – are waaaay too small for my feet) for a couple hundred yen.
From there, we headed over to an electronics store not unlike Circuit City here in the US so that Eric could look for a replacement for the headphones for his MP3 player. There was nothing particularly unusual in the store besides a huge assortment of rice cookers. They came in all shapes and sizes with varying levels of automation and prices from 8,000 yen to 39,999. From what I could tell, the shape of a grain of cooked rice is very important to the Japanese consumer. I was also surprised by the number of health-related items that were available. There were tons of little gadgets designed to monitor your heartrate, temperature, nutrient levels, weight, body fat, etc, etc. Some of them seemed kind of cool, but they were all expensive.
Eric purchased his new headphones and we walked back toward Atago station via the main road in Noda. It was pretty busy and the rain was starting to fall a little harder so we turned back towards the hotel. As we walked along, we ran into the Toys R Us and Sports Authority that cohabitate in a single building just up the street from Jusco. We walked around the Sports Authority for a while looking for high quality toe socks and Japan-specific sportswear. Amazingly, the US baseball teams seem to sell a LOT more gear in Japanese Sports Authority stores than do Japanese teams. I wasn’t able to find any interesting Japanese team hats. Eric, however, was intrigued by the exapnsive offerings in the camping section – especially the collapsible titanium chopsticks! Very 007.
After returning to our rooms, we exchanged our heavier and now slightly soggy clothing for more appropriate to the now mostly sunny skies. Once again, we left the hotel and walked to Eric’s favorite soba (noodle) shop near Hatsumi sensei’s office. On the way, I had Eric take the obligatory photo of me in front of the building.
The [url=http://japanesefood.about.com/od/beef/a/aboutsukiyaki.htm]sukiyaki[/url] at the sobaya came well recommended and was indeed very tasty! When we first entered the establishment (“irrashaimase!”), there were no western-style tables available, so we were seated on the raised tatami area. Unfortunately, we had to sit cross-legged with our legs under the table. After the previous day’s long flight and walking around town all morning, this was not the most comfortable seat in the house. Luckily, soon after we sat, one of the other customers left and I asked the waitress if we could move to a table where we could better enjoy our luch.
From there, we stopped at a stationary store to pick up some calligraphy paper in hopes that Sensei would be offering his art at class. Then it was on to the famous tabi shop just down the street. I could spend a lot of cash in this place, but I held myself in check and got only what I needed – some 30cm tabi for myself and a pair of size 26 for Geo. They also carried some very cute children’s [i]jikatabi[/i] that I was tempted to pick up for our unborn twins, but the thought of trying to jam their little feet into these tabi made me think better of it.
Next stop was [url=http://simonf.fotopic.net/c270087.html]Atago shrine[/url] (click the link for someone else’s photos) in the center of Noda to look around and take some photos. It’s a nice temple/shrine, but I found that it looked a little run down and unkept. I guess maybe it’s not as well supported as it has been in the past. I am pretty sure that Stephen Hayes used to suit up in his training uniform and take photos around this temple because a lot of the spaces looked familiar to me the first time I came here in ’97.
After paying our respects, we walked back to Azusa and both Eric and I decided that we needed some sleep. I cranked up the air conditioning and sacked out for a couple of hours until it was time to get my stuff together for training with Hatsumi sensei at the Honbu dojo. Later, we walked over to Jusco to grab some food and then back to the inn where we dined outside. The weather had turned drier with a nice breeze and the sky cleared.
Soon, we were on our way over to the dojo. There were, of course, a large number of people in attendance mainly due to a group of about 20 people from Italy who sat in seiza along one entire side of the dojo. I recognized and said hello to a few people and chatted with [url=http://www.arizonabujinkan.org]Peter Crocoll[/url] (from Arizona) for a bit before settling in and stretching out a bit. As 7pm approached, I started to feel a bit ill (maybe that dinner was too much?) and the closeness and heat of the dojo didn’t seem to help much, but as Sensei entered and class began, I felt okay.
Souke started off with some [i]suwariwaza[/i] (seated techniques) from Shinden Fudou Ryuu and I found myself training with a Spanish gentleman who didn’t seem to speak any English, so our communication was in Japanese! heheheheh. Of course, within the first 15 minutes of class, we had done 3 or 4 different techniques. Now my stomach was starting to hurt again….The only thing running through my mind was “I have to get to the bathroom…stat!” And then my thoughts turned to the fact that I didn’t want to stink up the bathroom at Honbu or miss a bunch of Souke’s class. Once Hatsumi sensei had shown his next point and shouted “Play!” I excused myself from my training partner and made my way through the crowd (past Oguri sensei, Noguchi sensei, Shiraishi sensei, Pedro Fleitas, etc) and to the small bathroom. I did my business in the most ninja-like fashion (quietly) and timed my flushes to the noise outside in the dojo.
Feeling much better, I emerged (how could a small dojo packed with 80 people feel so much cooler than that bathroom?), washed my hands and quietly headed back to training. I found my training partner and we continued with class. I was much more focused on training now. The rest of the class went quickly and was thoroughly enjoyable.
Towards the end of training, Souke had Senou sensei demonstrate a series of movements. First empty-handed, then with [i]shukou[/i] (hand claws) and finally Sensei handed Senou a tea cup and said “now do it with this.” The shihan did the same movement with the cup as a weapon and Hatsumi sensei said “okay” and took the cup back. As he was talking about being able to use anything as a weapon, he deftly rolled the cup down his arm, popped it up off of his elbow and back into his hand like he had spent hours practicing this. In addition, he showed how one could hold the cup to easily spray one’s opponent with hot liquid. Continuing to talk as he faced the entrance to the dojo, Souke suddenly threw the cup behind him towards one of the seated students in the rear corner of the dojo. As the cup spun on its seemingly missile-like trajectory towards this guy’s face, it was caught by Yabunaka-san less than two feet before striking its target.
Yabunaka-san looked very surprised that he had managed to catch the cup in time and the dojo fell silent for a few seconds before erupting into laughs. I think there was certainly a lesson in both the throw and the catch.
After class, I called Robyn from the payphone at Atago station and walked back to Azusa. After taking a bath and trying to jot down some notes, I quickly fell asleep.