Narrative Disorder… in Japan!

This was our one really touristy outing - we really only had one day to ourselves. I have had various pictures of Nagoya Castle as my desktop for months so it was magical to be able to be there in person and take my own!

The original castle was a small castle built in 1525 but was only occupied briefly. In 1610 Tokogawa Ieyasu (the first Shogun of the Tokogawa shogunate) had a larger castle built on the site. Tragically, the old castle was destroyed by American bombs and the resulting fire on May 14, 1945 (it was targeted as a district army headquarters and POW camp.) The building we see now is a replica of the donjon (the keep) only which was built in the 1950s - the palace itself has not been rebuilt though there are plans for it.

The Entrance proper, to the right of the ticket booth (above)

As you enter, the castle peeks at you over the trees, ah wonderful, blessed, green trees …

As I mentioned in an earlier post, the castle is surrounded by an impressive moat which is actually what cuts through the city looking like a river from Google Maps …

But right up at the base of the castle the moat is currently dry and a haven for other inhabitants…

The path around the castle takes you around the moat and gives some magnificent views…

(BTW above on the right is Superman and in the middle is his colleague, Duc, who is also transferring with the project. )

At last we come to a small entrance across the moat of this fort…

The forecourt is now rather like a school quadrangle with a few ranger cars and some benches and tables in front of a cafe - I’d love to know what this area would have been filled with when this castle was the hub of life in the early Edo period. This is the ramp up into the castle.

No photography is allowed inside but there wasn’t much I’d have taken anyway. There is no sense of what it would have been like to live in the castle, the first 6 floors have simply been made into museum rooms - the displays are lovely but, again because of destruction, many of the displays are "examples" either from other areas or complete reconstructions from modern times.

The 7th story of the castle has been turned into a viewing room with windows all round (and a shop full of touristy bits and pieces including Disney in Nagoya things - very odd.) From this vantage point you can see how vast and sprawling is the city we will soon be calling home and why the lush and beautiful gardens are a haven from the concrete city surrounding it.

All over the gardens and castle there were signs first in Japanese then with white English translations beneath - except for this ancient little hut opposite the castle, just over the internal moat. The sign you see is Japanese only and I so wish I could find out what this little thing is but I could find noone to ask. If anyone knows an answer to my little mystery, please email me and I will post when I find out.

Requisite vending machine shot - yes that’s canned hot coffee in some of those

Dotted all over Nagoya are what look like slot machine parlors and are filled to the brim with suit-and-tie salarymen at all hours of the day…

in fact they are called ’slots’ on many of the windows…

But gambling is illegal in Japan, right? Well, yes. But these "pachinko" machines are, essentially, vertical pinball machines and it’s NOT illegal to play them and win extra metal balls for high scores, NEITHER is it illegal to trade said balls in for prizes NOR is it illegal to take said prizes to various, totally independent, stores around Nagoya which buy them from you - for cash. Apparently it is also not illegal to perpetuate ear-destroying noise in these places - seriously don’t go in if you value your hearing!

We spent a good part of our time in electronics stores checking out solutions for bringing our computers and peripherals to the different voltage of Japan. These cord ties for keeping your under-desk spaghetti neat demonstrate the attention to detail as well as the love affair with customization in Japan. Gone will be our rubbish bin ties for colour coordinated, padded ties…

And if that’s too boring for us well, there’s always these cuties…

And speaking of attention to detail and cute, I bought some aspirin for the trip home and got a fix for my tins and boxes addiction…

No longer will I endure the indignity of having a loose slide of aspirin floating around in my bag hehe. I think I’m going to fit in juuust fine! 

Down on the streets in Nagoya it is mostly a lovely modern city with beautiful street art… This one you already know…

I particularly loved this one outside an entrance to Toyota Midland Square building (Superman will occasionally have meetings here but will be working further down the street) Inside there are uber expensive designer boutiques and some wonderful restaurants (the Shanghai restaurant was Chinese food like we’ve never had before but look forward to trying again - particularly the Vanilla Ice cream with Chinese Vinegar - trust me it’s incredible!!)

The newest building on the skyline is gorgeous and perfectly suitable for the art and design school it apparently houses… (that’s Superman at the bottom left of the shot btw )

So, Nagoya is like many cities around the world, could almost be anywhere but every now and then, right next to the skyscrapers…

And even…

So, we landed in Sydney at about 8 am local to find ourselves shivering in a 9 degree morning! It was somewhat of a relief though, since planes are always a little stuffy and the Hong Kong airport responds to the 28 degree evenings by having the air con at about 26 degrees (I’m told this is a practice in Japan, too, to avoid chest colds due to extreme temp changes) so it was nice to feel actual cold for the first time in a week. Of course we are prepared for Nagoya to be hotter and wetter after we return as the typhoon season will be hot on our heels!!

I promised pictures of our new digs when we returned but I haven’t yet worked out how to download and edit video from our camera (and I have a feeling my film was frankly dreadful beyond editing) so there will be some more wait on that note. I have, however, managed to download the stills we took so here begins the slide show. I should note though, we were so focused on getting our arrangements made that there wasn’t much tourist time, we have more pictures of furniture we might want to lease than great tourist shots, so call these a down payment on more interesting stuff when we have more time there. 

Nagoya Midland Circle - This is the view from our hotel right on top of Nagoya Station. Had to take this shot as I’d been looking at the similar one that Mike McKinlay took for ages as the first real view of Nagoya that I found.

View of Nagoya from our hotel room - there is a definite haze over the city which is called fog or mist but looks pollution-esque to us. Nevertheless the air is clean and fresh though quite damp at this time of year so perhaps it is moisture.

Zooming in on the same view - Nagoya Castle is beautiful in the afternoon light.

And further in the golden dolphin on the peaks of the roof just visible. Believe it or not, the city you see stretching beyond the castle with it’s multi storey buildings for miles are considered Nagoya’s suburbia - we found it kind of hard to tell when the city ended and suburbia began.

Well our flights are booked for our first sojourn to Japan! Superman’s company is flying us out to have a week’s orientation in Nagoya after which we will return for about a month before we head off for the long term. We will be met in Nagoya by our relocation consultant who will show us around the city in general but more specifically she will show us rental properties for our stay. She is having trouble finding places which will allow our cat - in Japan many rental properties are "pets negotiable" but the convention is that this means dogs!  Apparently they are considered preferable - exactly the opposite to Australia, who’d have thunk it? I’m a little worried about living in a "pets negotiable" apartment complex if it is filled with yappy pups, I hope the walls are sound proofed!

Brigid doesn’t know it yet but her journey to japan begins on Monday with the first of her round of vaccinations, her international chip implant and pet passport certificate! She did well coming here to Sydney (for a very nervous cat) and she has definitely mellowed a little up here but I have to admit I’m concerned about a 14 hr plane flight for her. Luckily Australia is a rabies-free certified nation so she will only have to stay in quarantine for 12 days instead of 2 months.

We will be flying via Hong Kong and landing in Nagoya airport which, once again courtesy of Mike McKinley at his blog, I am now aware is actually on an island off Nagoya which is man-made for the purpose - this is it on google maps. Very anime futuristic, don’t you think?

It is a 9 hour flight to Hong Kong and then another 5 or so hours to Nagoya so with the one hour stop to stretch on Hong Kong as well as flying business class I’m sure we will arrive at least in as good shape as I did after the 14hr non-stop to LA in ‘05 which really wasn’t so bad at all. What’s more we will be arriving on Sunday evening and so will be able to get a good night’s sleep at the hotel before the week begins. Anonymous-car-manufacturing-concern certainly looks after their people!

I’m looking forward to posting my own pictures from Nagoya but for now here’s another from Mike MacKinlay’s blog taken from above Nagoya Central station. This will be Superman’s station for getting to work and I’m not sure but from the research I’ve done, the shadow cast across the city in this shot may actually be Superman’s building - if not it’s definitely close.