Hey, guys, guess what I'm doing!

本指令の中で、「国家神道」という用語の意味は、日本政府の法令によって、「宗派神道」や「教派神道」という宗教と区別されて、「国家神道」や「神社神道」という、非宗教の国家的宗派として類別された神道の一派を指す。

That's your hint!

Here's another hint:

The term State Shinto within the meaning of this directive will refer to that branch of Shinto (Kokka Shintō or Jinja Shintō ) which by official acts of the Japanese Government has been differentiated from the religion of Sect Shinto (Shūha Shintō or Kyōha Shintō) and has been classified a non-religious national cult commonly known as State Shinto, National Shinto or Shrine Shinto.

...if you speak Japanese, you can probably tell how horribly butchered my translation is.  OH WELL.

...also, it bothers me so much that there aren't any quotation marks in that entire passage.  I totally inserted them in my translation, because I am a terrible person.

FACT: I steal all my O's with lines over them from the Wikipedia article on Tokyo and all my U's from the Wikipedia article on Kyushu.  Yeeeeeeeeeeep.

Links, links, links

(This post is basically entirely links.  Yay?)

Hey, remember when I submitted an article to The Fulbrighter a million years ago?  Well, it's finally been posted online!  You can now read it in all its glorious snark gloriousness.

In other news, writing continues...slowly...excruciatingly slowly...buh...

In other other news, our Tuesday Japanese classes are now all student-taught (I unfortunately don't get to teach a week, 'cause the typhoon screwed up our schedule), and this week we learned how to make this Taiwanese dish call Oachen (at least, that's how you write it in Japanese, which means it's probably nothing like that in Chinese), which is kind of like...a gelatinous omelet?  Or a wiggly okonomiyaki?  It's tasty, but has SUCH a strange texture.

In final news, I was Googling my name for kicks (which was how I found out that my article was finally online) and found out that there are pictures of me presenting at the Chubu Fulbright meeting.  I basically look like a giant dork while presenting.  What is even happening with my right hand?  I'd also like to note that this is the picture they took of Austin.  He looks like an actually competent human being, who isn't trying to do some sort of firebending.  I am just glad that I have already been accepted to graduate school, because it would be really sad if some grad school was going to accept me, Googled my name, and then was like, "...nope, we want someone who presents with six thousand percent less energy and random hand shapes."

...back to writing now, I guess...

Another typhoon, kimono fashion show, and the Shinto Directive for the millionth time

So, let's see, what exciting stuff have I been up to?

On Tuesday we had a typhoon, which was honestly kind of lame.  I mean, I guess it got kind of interesting in the evening, but the morning was alternating between lame gusts of wind and occasional drippy rain.  Laaaaaaaaaame.  Oh, and then there was this weird five minute time period when it was hailing.  I don't even know.  Anyway, class was cancelled, but I didn't find this out until I was running toward class through the rain and got hailed by the guard at the gate.  OH WELL.

On Thursday Nellie invited me over to the Furukawa Art Museum (where I'd never been) because she was participating in a kimono fashion show as one of the models!  I had a little bit of trouble getting in, 'cause apparently my name didn't wind up on the invite list SOMEHOW and they were convinced Nellie's name was "Tin-Tin" (what), but eventually it was cleared up and I got in.  The show was actually a joint fashion show/concert, which I was pretty cool with.  They had a guy playing a really old version of the koto, which apparently no one in Japan knows how to play, so they had to bring him in from China.  It's considered one of the hardest instruments to play IN THE WORLD because there are no frets on the neck of the instrument, which means that you have to have crazy perfect pitch and know exactly where to place your fingers.  I can honestly say it was some of the most beautiful music I have ever heard, and DANG, that guy was talented, and was making sounds that I didn't know you could make with a koto.  There was also a guy playing a kind of flute that's normally used as accompaniment to the really-old-koto, who was also very good.
It was kind of funny to compare the two musicians, because the koto player* was IN THE ZONE and didn't pay attention to anyone else and had literally one facial expression, and the flutist was flirting with all the ladies and making all these "oh yeah, I know I'm awesome" faces as he was playing his flute and just generally showing off his mad skills.
Also, the songs they were playing had the craziest names.  I understand that Chinese is an incredibly compact language, but each song they were playing had a roughly four syllable title in Chinese, and in Japanese they were called:
"Dragon flying through the sky and the sea" (okay, I can see how this could be compressed into four characters)
"Drinking with friends, getting drunk, and reading poetry" (...whatever shakes your boat, I guess)
"It is winter and it is cold and the river is frozen and a person is standing there looking at the winter scenery and feels lonely" (...wait, what)
"You leave your hometown to cross the desert to the east and night falls and you climb a hill and turn back to look at the stars over your hometown and you feel nostalgic and sad and lonely" (okay, now I am pretty sure you are just making stuff up)

Anyway, after the concert they had the kimono show!  It was showcasing kimono from Arimatsu which had been dyed using shibori technique, which Nellie could tell you a whole lot about, but it basically involves dyeing the fabric by twisting, folding, or sewing, sort of like tie-dye!  There were a whole lot of lovely kimono (and some of the obi were TO DIE FOR**), and Nellie was looking ridiculously elegant and poised.  (Although, when she came on stage the woman next to me started swatting at her friend and hissing, "IT'S A GAIJIN," because, you know, maybe it wasn't obvious?  I don't even know.)  Unfortunately I didn't get the chance to talk to Nellie afterwards, 'cause I had to leave for class and she was stuck upstairs to prepare for the next show anyway, but it was a really neat experience, and I got to see some gorgeous clothes and hear some beautiful music.

On Friday, we were reading The Shinto Directive in class (again; I swear, I'm going to spend the rest of my life reading that document), and I finally got a chance to be useful, because Sensei asked us to compare the wording in the English document with the wording into the Japanese document, and I am the only person in my group who is even close to being bilingual.  YAY.  We have to write out a translation in modern Japanese based off of the English document for next week, so we'll see how that goes.

On Saturday morning, Yiyi and I went down to the farmer's market at Kawahara and bought SO MUCH FOOD.  Summer apparently means EVERYTHING IS IN SEASON, or at least many things are, which means SO MANY FOODS TO EAT.  Also, an old dude hit on me creepily and made a pun on my name ('cause "deina" sounds like "ee na"; dude, I love puns, but NO, and also PLEASE move out of my personal space).

Otherwise, not much to report.  I'm reading about how some people wanted to turn Japan into a Christian nation so that it could be modernized (this was during the Meiji Restoration) and working on my paper and dying in the heat and eating ice cream.

*Koto-ist?  Koto-er?

**There was an obi with a flowering tree stitched across the back and it was beautiful and I swooned a little.

Mt. Koya adventures

(If you want to see Steven's way better pictures, you should click here.)


(...why is this highlighted?)


So I headed over to Kyoto on Friday, met up with Steven and Michele, and grabbed really good Thai curry for dinner!  (I may be way too into curry.)  Afterwards I crashed at Steven's apartment on his really nice spare futon.


Saturday, Steven and I woke up Really Early to begin our wild adventure to Mt. Koya!  We took a train to a train to a train to another train to the same train (...we had to move to a different car halfway through the journey, because it turned out that only half the cars were going to Koya) to a cable car to a bus!  Phew.  It took about 3 1/2 hours to get to Mt. Koya, at which point we discovered that it was POURING RAIN.  Yaaaaaaaaaay.  Also, the wind was blowing all the raindrops under our umbrellas.  GREAT.


Anyway, our first stop was Kongoubuji, also known as the head temple of the Shingon sect of Buddhism!  We bought our Mt. Koya pass there, which was 2,000 yen and let us into a bunch of different temples/museums/other random things in the area.  We were joking that Mt. Koya is like Buddhism Disneyland, and our pass was like a park hopper ticket.  (Also, I was definitely waiting for some of the priests who were showing us around to tell us, "Keep your hands and arms inside the vehicle at all times, and, please, watch your children.")


Anyway, Kongoubuji!

It was very wet.

But it had nice rock gardens.

And some nice wood carvings.

Oh, and rooms that depicted the life and journeys of Kuukai (the founder of Shingon Buddhism in Japan).  But we couldn't take pictures of those.
There were also some spectacularly awkward translations of signs, which accidentally killed the parents of everyone reading them.*

It was raining pretty hard, as you can probably tell!

DRAGONS.

MUD.

Looking out from the main gate!

More wood carvings!

Here's the other side of the gate.

...I don't even know.

Stop idling, you guys.

Also, I think that's a monkey, a pig, and a kappa????

So then we went over to a different building (the Daishi Kyoukai) to receive jukai, which is actually a pleonasm, because "jukai" means "receive the precepts," but apparently the people who made all the English-language materials didn't really care about that!  Anyway, the precepts are the ten laypeople's Buddhist precepts, which are, in order:

1. I will not kill or harm any living beings.
2. I will not take what is not given to me.
3. I will not engage in harmful sexual conduct.
4. I will not lie.
5. I will not speak improperly.
6. I will not speak harshly.
7. I will not speak divisively.
8. I will not be covetous.
9. I will not have ill will.
10. I will not hold wrong views.

(At least, that's how the bilingual pamphlet we were given translates them.**)

Anybody can do jukai, regardless of their professed religion, so we got to sit in on a short ceremony and repeat the precepts and a couple of mantras, and Steven discovered the joys of powdered incense (which you put on your hands so your hands smell like cinnamon for the rest of the day).
...I think I have already broken some of the precepts, because I definitely beat a cockroach to death with a frying pan, and unless it was a zombie cockroach, that probably breaks #1.
OOPS.

Anyway, we then went over to the Houreikan, which is a big museum of artifacts from Mt. Koya.  And since Kongoubuji is roughly 1200 years old, there are a lot of artifacts!  We got to see some Buddhist statues with ATTITUDE and some really old calligraphy and some interestingly shaped rocks, because apparently some people at Mt. Koya are as into interestingly shaped rocks as I am!

By the time we got out of the museum, pretty much everything else on Mt. Koya was closed, so we headed over to Henjoukouin, where we were doing our temple stay!  A temple stay is literally spending the night at a temple, which was pretty cool.

This was the view of the garden from my room.

FUTON.

Garden, again.

...because why not?

GARDEN.

(There were frogs in the pond.  They woke me up at 3 a.m.  It was exciting.)

These little cranes were scattered throughout the room.

Anyway, we got dinner and breakfast included in our temple stay.  Because it was a temple, everything was vegetarian (and I think everything might have been vegan as well, but I'm not entirely sure), which means that I had no idea what I was eating.  But it was all delicious, so all was well.

There was also a morning service at 6:30 that everyone doing the temple stay was invited to, but I woke up at 6:21 and decided that I probably couldn't get ready in 9 minutes, so I wound up skipping it.  Steven went, though, and said it was interesting.

Anyway, after breakfast we headed out for more adventures.

This, by the way, is the main gate of Henjoukouin, where we were staying.

Aaaaand here's the front.

It had (thankfully) stopped pouring rain, although it was SUPER FOGGY.

Our first stop of the day was Okunoin, which is Kuukai's mausoleum/temple*** surrounded by a huuuuuuuuuge graveyard.

There was also a cool tree.

Their hand-washing station was kind of lacking in majesty, though.

This is a Navy memorial.

LOOK AT THESE STAIRS.
THESE STAIRS ARE DRUNK.

There's a lot of Sanskrit on Mt. Koya, which made an interesting change.

COMPLETELY INEBRIATED STAIRS.

There was a question about the bibs a million years back, which I think I forgot to answer.  The bibs are offerings from visitors to the shrine/temple, and they're tied around statues of deities/spirits to give them comfort.  Sort of like giving them a coat!  Some people will write their names and addresses on the bibs as well.

Some of these people also wrote the things they were wishing for.

I am pretty sure this is a mizuko memorial, because they appear to be holding fetuses.
(I see dead babies EVERYWHERE.)

More Sanskrit!

It looks so INTERESTING.

...well, this is apparently a grave for Subaru.

Yes, the car company.

TREE.

...and this is a grave for Panasonic.

...and this is one for Kubota.

Um.

...and this is a fugu.

It is a grave to perform services for fugu.

The grave is owned by a restaurant, which, presumably, serves fugu.

Let's take a second to think about this.

THIS IS A FUGU.

Oh, hey, we finally made it to the temple!

(That little guy to the right of the entrance is the mascot of Mt. Koya.)

(There he is again.)

These people were pouring water onto statues of various Buddhist deities.

Unfortunately, we weren't allowed to take any pictures near the mausoleum, but there was this amazing room that was filled with rows and rows and rows of lanterns.  Definitely one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen.

Here, have a picture of a waterfall instead.

(These are the statues from before.)

Temple for the glorious war dead!

Yes, that is a rocket.

So then we decided to hike alllllllllll the way to the other end of Mt. Koya, to see the daimon (literally "big gate").

Did I mention that it was foggy?

This is the best possible bench.

FOG.

SO MUCH FOG.

It's weird, but my camera could "see" more of the fog than I could.

So that was the Daimon!

Then we headed over to a cluster of small temples called the Daigaran on the way back...

This is the Daitou, or the "giant pagoda."

So that was that!

We then picked up some omiyage (well, I picked up omiyage and Steven picked up a really nice copy of the heart sutra), wandered around the mountain a bit more, and stumbled upon this temple:

It was a temple for temple stays, so it wasn't terribly big.

But it did have an interesting pagoda!

So, yeah!  Then we headed back toward the station, but on the way we stopped at the Tokugawa Mausoleum.

 The actual shrines were behind these fences, which made it difficult to make pictures.

But I took sneaky pictures through the fence.

And then we headed over to where female pilgrims used to stay when women weren't allowed up the mountain (because they would defile everything with their femaleness; no, I am not making this up).

The name of the temple is literally "lady person hall," which is what Steven and I were calling it, because we are mature people.

There was also this Buddha across the road.

Anyway, then we took the bus back to the station to catch the...

Cable car!  (Not pictured: Cable car.  Pictured: Scary stairs to the cable car station.)

And then we took a train to a train to a train to a train, and we met Michele and one of her friends for dinner, and had the best tonkatsu of our LIVES.

And then Steven and I headed back to his place and crashed!

And then we woke up!

And then I headed back to Nagoya!

And then I beat a cockroach to death with a frying pan!

And then everyone freaked out over a pretty weak typhoon!

THE END.

*Basically, the sign in Japanese said "the cry of the mourning dove reminds the listener of his/her natsukashii parents," where "natsukashii" means "causing nostalgia" or "nostalgic," sort of?  (I guess "invoking strong emotions because of past associations"?)  And the English sign said "the cry of the mourning dove reminds the listener of his/her dearly departed parents," which is NOT THE SAME AT ALL.

**I have my own translation based off of the Japanese, which is...um...less majestic sounding.  For example, "I will not speak harshly" is literally "no bad mouth."  And "I will not speak divisively" is literally "no double tongue."  And "I will not engage in harmful sexual conduct" is either "no evil sex" or "no evil semen."  HMMMMMM.

***Kuukai isn't actually believed to be dead; he's supposedly in "eternal meditation."