Sunday, March 27th: Kurashiki here we come
For ease and simplicity we had breakfast in the hotel. $40 - ouch. We then hopped the train to Kurashiki, a nearby town with several preserved buildings. This town has an interesting history as a place where the middle class businessmen decided to rebel against tradition and built houses as fancy as the samurai. This was a serious case of the Jones's. We went into a wealthy merchants house, it was enormous by even current Japanese standards. There was an open courtyard separating the gate house from the main house, Storage buildings in the compound, and indoor plumbing (toilet and kitchen) even before the White House had indoor plumbing. There was both a Shinto and Buddhism shrine in the house (covering all bets) and at least two enclosed gardens that we found. The current layout isn't even the whole house, a part was removed to make a street and the portion of the house on the far side was obviously replaced by a modern house. This fellow was very wealthy.
We then took a stroll down the willow lined canal street with all it's medieval warehouses. Very quaint. Lots of shops and places to eat. We stopped at the Toy Museum, several rooms of toys using the old warehouse buildings - interesting architecture as well as fascinating toys. The simplest dolls were sticks with heads and paper or cloth wrapped around kimono style. The most elaborate were 2-3 foot tall fully articulated samurai and archer dolls - with removable armor and weapons. Kites of all sizes hung from the ceilings, one seemed large enough to lift a small child. Lots of animal dolls, mostly horses, tigers and chickens. There were some games we would not identify - a top marked dradel style (6 or 8 sides though) and cards of some kind. Dolls and figurines of animals ruled the toys by far. Down in the shop we picked up a few little things. We kept on shopping and walking. We visited the Ivy Square - which turns out to not be popular with the young folks on Sunday. We became the center of attention for one couple, who talked to us for a sec, and then offered to take our picture. I gave him my card, and he shot some snaps. He said he'd email them. We worked our way back to the canal and were walking along when the same fellow hailed us from across the canal. He took a couple more snaps, and some other Japanese decided the opportunity was perfect we became 'gai-jin on film'. We stopped for lunch at a popular place, we had to wait in line. The afternoon was wearing on so we went back to the train and back to the room for a nap. We slept in later than we wanted and did the simple thing of having sushi in the train station. Food in the station, unlike food on the train, is much fresher because commuters are shopping for snacks all the time. I'm just amazed at how many sweets the Japanese make, they seem obsessed. But they are not obese - must be all that walking.
Oh - a side note - Tower Records is not 24x7 in Japan ;(
We then took a stroll down the willow lined canal street with all it's medieval warehouses. Very quaint. Lots of shops and places to eat. We stopped at the Toy Museum, several rooms of toys using the old warehouse buildings - interesting architecture as well as fascinating toys. The simplest dolls were sticks with heads and paper or cloth wrapped around kimono style. The most elaborate were 2-3 foot tall fully articulated samurai and archer dolls - with removable armor and weapons. Kites of all sizes hung from the ceilings, one seemed large enough to lift a small child. Lots of animal dolls, mostly horses, tigers and chickens. There were some games we would not identify - a top marked dradel style (6 or 8 sides though) and cards of some kind. Dolls and figurines of animals ruled the toys by far. Down in the shop we picked up a few little things. We kept on shopping and walking. We visited the Ivy Square - which turns out to not be popular with the young folks on Sunday. We became the center of attention for one couple, who talked to us for a sec, and then offered to take our picture. I gave him my card, and he shot some snaps. He said he'd email them. We worked our way back to the canal and were walking along when the same fellow hailed us from across the canal. He took a couple more snaps, and some other Japanese decided the opportunity was perfect we became 'gai-jin on film'. We stopped for lunch at a popular place, we had to wait in line. The afternoon was wearing on so we went back to the train and back to the room for a nap. We slept in later than we wanted and did the simple thing of having sushi in the train station. Food in the station, unlike food on the train, is much fresher because commuters are shopping for snacks all the time. I'm just amazed at how many sweets the Japanese make, they seem obsessed. But they are not obese - must be all that walking.
Oh - a side note - Tower Records is not 24x7 in Japan ;(
