Jean and I were in Japan from Sept 23-Oct 7. I work for a Japanese company in the video games business and the first few days of this was a trip that I do every year to go to the Tokyo Games Show (TGS). TGS is where Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo and just about everyone in the games business show off there latest games and gadgets and where, over the years, I've learned the meaning of Cosplay, Otaku, Anime and Manga. Through TGS and my work in the games business I've had a chance to be immersed in modern Japanese geek culture and to learn how the average Japanese person thinks about Nichiren specifically, Buddhism a little less specifically, and religion generally. (For the most part they don't think about any of those things at all except in terms of formality and family obligations, but of course that's a gross generalization).
All the times that I've been to Tokyo for work though, I've never done any sightseeing in Tokyo let alone seeing anything outside of Tokyo. It's always just a few days packed with meetings and dinners. No complaints form me though, some of the dinners have been spectacular and I wouldn't have traded them for anything. When I was planning this trip though, my boss suggested that I should take some time after the show to go see Kyoto and temples and such since he knows that I'm a buddhist and interested in such things, and that I should take Jean with me so we could have a nice vacation after my work was done. Not being one to argue with my boss, that's what we did.
I am obviously incredibly fortunate to have had a boss who encouraged me to take this trip, to have had and assistant in my office who was willing to help me figure out where to go and where to stay and who could make arrangements in Japanese at the hotels in out of the way places that don't see alot of western visitors, someone who could put together a train itinerary for us that was so detailed that at any place we were I could just point to some japanese writing which said "I want to take the train to xyz place, we want to get 2 tickets, and tell us what time and what platforms we should go to, kudasai. " It was truly amazing and allowed for a relatively stress free trip without having to be tied to any kind of tours.
We felt like locals the way we got around on all the trains and subways. Though with our giant luggage and bags of all sorts hanging off our shoulders we certainly didn't look like locals. Otherwise I'm sure we would have fit right in. NOT! :)
I also have to thank my wonderful wife. Jean puts up with alot. We got to Tokyo on Wednesday night Sept 23rd. Thursday, Friday and Saturday she was almost completely on her own day and night as I had meetings and dinners to go to. She was thrilled to be in Japan and made the most of it without me. When we were together I was cranky, not used to having someone else I had to think about while on a business trip. She made it easy and forgave me quickly when I was a jerk, which was often. Then saturday night she joined me with a bunch of game developers who speak mostly Japanese for a Sukiyaki dinner unlike any Sukiyaki we've ever had before. After that meal Jean said that she doesn't see how our meals are going to get any better than that. And while that was great it certainly wasn't the best. Food was an important part of this trip.
Anyway, that was the last work related thing I had to do. Then, on Sunday, my vacation began. It was the only day the two of us had in Tokyo together. I was so sick of Tokyo by that point and really didn't care what we did. We had talked about going to the SGI Headquarters in Shinjuku and then to Honmonji Temple in Ikegami where Nichiren died, but we hadn't actually planned anything. So in the morning I really wasn't sure what we'd do.
Before getting into the details of the the trip let me just say that this was not a pilgrimage, it was not planned primarily to visit various Nichiren sites. It was planned as a trip to visit and experience Japan. About the only thing we did specifically to visit a Nichiren related site was that we scheduled two days in the little town of Minobu so that we could visit Kuon-ji Temple on Mt. Minobu where Nichiren spent the last few years of his life. I found a little hotel outside the town which had a hotspring, but it was just a place to stay so we could go to the temple. I wasn't looking for anything special in terms of lodging. And while the experience at Kuon-ji was great, our experience at Shimobe Onsen Hotel was unexpectedly wonderful and turned out to be great training for the full on Ryokan experience on the Izu Peninsula in the little town of Shuzenji which came about a week later.
That's it for now. I'll start getting into the details of the trip as I have time.
Jean and I have been in Japan for the past two weeks (we got back today), my oldest son Joshua was in Italy for two weeks, my middle son Bryan is in Shanghai for the next 8 months in a study abroad program through the University of California, and so for a period of one week we had Ankers from our immediate family on three continents and 4 countries. While Jean, me, Josh and Bryan were off on our far flung adventures, our youngest son Sam, was happily holding down the home front, exploring the 18 year old joys of having a house completely to himself for a week, of which I doubt we'll be getting a lot of detail and if we did, I doubt very much we'd be wanting to share them with you, the public.
On the other hand, Bryan sent us a message from Shanghai with detailed info about a day he had which I'd love to share. It's certainly appropriate given the title of my blog and the content shows a spirit of adventure, flexibility, openess and respect which makes me proud as his Dad and reflects the sort of spirit I'd hoped this blog would be all about. It's kind of long, but I hope you'll enjoy a first hand account of my son's adventures with new friends in a new land.
What a Day!: by Bryan Anker
So this past weekend, we had a UC excursion to the island of Pu Tuo Shan. It was really an amazing trip. The island is a famous pilgrimage for Buddhists, and there are Buddhist temples and monks all around the island. It is mainly dedicated to the bodhisattva Guan Yin a well respected bodhisattva in most of East Asia (considered as the goddess of mercy in Chinese mythology.) There is a gigantic statue of the bodhisattva, but it was built in 1997, so it’s somewhat superficial.
The first day we went around looking at different temples, observing the searching monks, and the worshipping locals. Some of us lit incense and participated in prayers with the locals. We also got to see the beach and some of the beautiful scenery of the island. We were all pretty tired from traveling though, so we soon went back to the hotel to eat and chill. Then me, and a few other kids, went up a little trail and found some rocks to climb up. My friends Jill, Kai, and I just hung out there for a few hours gazing at the stars.
The next day, Saturday, was easily one of the best days of my life. We started the day off going down to the beach. Several of us rented some quads and were riding around the beach. We were only suppose to go to the end of the beach (about 10 minute ride), but us being obnoxious Americans had to push the limits. We were riding around in circles chasing each other, nearly crashing into each other…and then we went up this little grass hill at the end of the beach and came tumbling down. MAN WAS THE CHINESE GUY PISSED!!! That’s probably why it was so fun. I don’t feel too bad though because they were trying to hustle us anyways. We talked to some locals, and they said 40 kuai should get you a quad for the whole afternoon, instead we were only allowed to ride for 10 minutes. (I rode for about 25 minutes.) Than some of the other kids went exploring around the beach, and me and my buddy Keith went to go check it out. But again, we weren’t supposed to be over there, and we saw a security guard sprinting to chase down the other kids. At that point, Keith and I immediately ran to the other side of the beach to do some exploring on our. We hiked up a lush trail up to a Pagoda, and out to some rocks right over the ocean. There were these huge beach cockroaches and some cool looking lizards. We did all this in about 25 minutes (it was a speed hike), making it back just in time to go to our next destination with the group.
After eating lunch, the 1,000 step trail was next for our tour group. After walking up less than a quarter of a distance, I saw another set of stairs that diverged away from the main trail. My friends Jill and Kai were immediately ready to go exploring again. Another friend, Sara, also joined us. So it was just us 4 on our own. These steps seemed to be much less traveled, and there were green luscious plants all around. We eventually made it up to some old somewhat eerie structures. It was obvious that people had once/were currently living there but we didn’t see any people. We went into these dark dark structures and found a chained door that seemed to be covered in blood at first (it was just rust and mud). Man was it spooky! Sara decided to close the door on us as a joke. And we all came running out screaming (we have video.) We were already kind of spooked by the whole area, and had been making haunting jokes the whole time. We then did some more exploring and found an amazingly picturesque view of the island, including the pagoda I had previously hiked too. After sitting in awe for a little bit, we explored some more, and found some sand bags. We then started making assumptions about what kind of area we were exploring. I thought it was probably an old army barracks of some kind, probably to defend off the Japanese during wartimes. Finally we got up this somewhat ominous looking field. An old mysterious lady came out of a little cave and hesitantly greeted us. The girls were immediately ready to turn back, but Kai began to speak to her in Chinese. She explained that this place had been an old army barracks, but it was now used by monks. She had been there performing prayers and tiding up. She seemed to be very nice and saw us off with a smile. The trail eventually made it back to the main trail, and we finally met up with the tour group.
After being with the tour group for no more than 40 minutes, Kai says to me, “You want to go search for a cave around here?” (Another UC kid had a map that showed there was a cave relatively near by.) So ten of us (including Kai, Keith, Jill, Sara, and I) went searching for the trail that was supposed to lead to the cave. We immediately ran into a road block. There was a military building, with guards standing by, which seemed to be blocking our path. At first they told us there was no path, but after Kai talked to them for a little bit (in Chinese) they finally explained where the path was. They said they don’t usually tell tourists about it, because they do not want them to get lost. However, Kai had convinced them to tell us. So off we went…The trail had obviously not been traveled on much. There were overgrown plants making it hard to distinguish the trail. Also, there were other trails that diverged away from the path to the cave. So we just kept heading east. Along the way we saw some HHUUGGEE green spiders (I almost walked right into their webs a few times), some cool caterpillars, beautiful butterflies, some large decaying preying mantis’s, battling hornets, and wild mushrooms. Eventually we made it to a little monastery, where two monks had been living. One of the monks was extremely excited to see us…he explained to Kai that he had been living there for 20 years with 2 other monks and had rarely seen any people, especially not any foreigners. So we got some pictures with the monk, did a few prayers, and just hung out for a little bit. Apparently we had diverged away from the correct trail, so the monk physically showed us where the correct path was. He seemed thrilled to point us in the right direction. After we all sincerely thanked him, we were again on our way.
We finally made it to the beach, and the cave was supposed to be nearby. All we saw was a large brand new temple, which was still in construction. We talked to one of the monks, and they explained that the cave is at the center of the temple. It was a natural cave that they turned into a shrine hundreds of years ago. They were now building a brand new temple around the shrine. The monks, generously, let us go into the temple and check out the shrine/cave. In the cave, there was a sculpture of Siddhartha, Guan Yin, and one other person I did not know. You could really feel the energy in the cave. Keith and I did some prayers. After spending some time at the temple, we decided to go back to the beach. Sadly, the beach was very very dirty. There was trash all washed up on shore, and we even saw a washed up needle. So I decided against going in the water. Some of the other kids, however, jumped right in. They said the water was really warm. It was now around 6 o clock and time to get back to the hotel. Dinner was at 7. Unfortunately, the last public bus stopped running at 6, so we missed it. We had to call our hotel to send us a bus. Just as we were talking to the hotel, a bus drove by explaining that they were actually headed to the hotel we were going to. It was a bus for the kitchen, and they were not supposed to have any passengers. However, we all paid them 10 kuai and they gave us a ride back. (We would have had to pay 15 kuai each if we went on the bus the hotel was sending.) So we made a grand entrance into the dining hall, just in time to eat dinner. The food had just come out. It was pretty awesome!
After dinner, a few of us all went down to the beach again (including Keith, Jill, Sara, and I.) We were all chilling out on the beach, when Kai started talking to a Kung-Fu artist. He started teaching us some Kung-fu. Then we had a little fun, playing some beach games, and swimming in the ocean. The water was really warm, and there was bioluminescence everywhere. It was spectacular. Jill, Kai, the Kung-fu artist, and I hung out on the beach till 3 in the mourning. The Kung-fu guy explained that he was an orphan raised by the Shao-Lin temple. His master’s death had saddened him greatly. He further explained that he had been kicked out of the temple for accidentally burning scripture. We all felt sympathetic towards him, especially Kai, who seemed to really bond with him. The kung-fu artist came back to our hotel to shower and clean up…and well lets just say he is currently living with Kai in shanghai. (I’ll save that storey for another time.) Anyways the WHOLE DAY was really quite surreal. Definitely one of the best experiences of my life!
Today is Thursday October 1st here in Kyoto. Jean and I have been in Japan for a little over a week. We've been to the SGI Headquarters in Shinjuku, to Honmonji Temple in Ikegami, where nichiren died, to Kuon-ji Temple at Mt. Minobu and to Taisekiji in Fujinomiya. We are about to go out to do some laundry here in Kyoto and to resume our adventure. Having satisfied our interest in major Nichiren sites for this trip, we will now begin to absorb the flavor of traditional Japanese culture and spirituality contained within this beautiful city.
I will write about my initial reactions to our stops at the various Nichiren sites, and my thoughts about those reactions after having had a chance to contemplate them a bit. But that will be later. The day is moving on, we have laundry to do, the skies have cleared after raining all day yesterday and the tiles of the old Zen, Jodo, Shingon and Shinto temples, stupas and shrines glitter in the sunlight below us.
Will write more later.
Bill