Solar eclipse in Tokyo – a rare celestial meeting

From our balcony it was clearly visible – the celestial meeting that occurred after 173 years in Tokyo – the solar eclipse. For kids it was a wonderful experience; they were as happy as if the sun, moon, and earth came out of their textbooks.

It seems that many people in Japan prepared themselves to watch this rare eclipse that started early in the morning. As per newspaper reports, it started at 6 in the morning, but the moon’s travel to the sun’s center started at around 7:29 AM.

The sky was cloudy, but the sun was bright and powerful as usual on a summer morning. After 7 o'clock, shadows of clouds started becoming darker, giving a feeling that it might rain at any moment. We woke children up from sleeping to show the rare celestial event. The school had announced a two-hour late opening, but Japanese schools were working as usual.

Japanese way of redesigning the nature and its resources

God (not in the institutionalized form but in an absolute sense) might have His own plans, but human beings have their own plans. Both may not necessarily be the same. When it contradicts there is a conflict, which may result in catastrophes. We call them man-made disasters.

Some fifteen years before while going through a magazine article captioned ‘Future wars will be for water” I was prompted to think to redesign the natural resources so that such conflicts could be reduced. Thoughts of redesigning the natural water resources had its seed from the news on diverting the rivers through the water-scarce regions of Rajasthan state in India. India’s ever powerful lady prime minister Mrs. Indira Gandhi was ruling at that time. She had a great vision to redesign India and redefine the life. She did many attempts to achieve those goals, which the predecessors could not carry forward.

The reason why I started writing this post is not the current fight between two southern states in India for water which is in the headlines of Indian newspapers recently. While walking from Indian School in Nishi Ojima to our apartment at Higashi Ojima by the river side, we could see some construction work in progress on the river banks. Also I heard from Japanese teacher that the kyu-nakagawa river, which is visible from our apartment’s front side veranda is an artificial branch of the Arakawa river.

Revisit to Showa Kinen Koen

The word ‘Déjà vu’ might be an exaggerated expression of feelings that aroused when reached at Tachikawa again. It was a revisit to Showa kinen koen to observe the autumn leaves. Indeed, this time the looks of Showa kinen koen were different from the one we observed in the last spring.

Personally for me and for this blog, the Showa Kinen Koen played a crucial role in the preceding months. Tachikawa was the place where I was compelled to put a stop to the blog writing almost more than six months from now. It was the peak of spring in Tachikawa during the last weeks of April. An unexpected impairment, followed by the doctor’s advise kept me away from sitting long hours in front of computer. As you know well, blogging needs a lot dedication and I was unable to commit that loyalty to this blog. Last spring, we walked a lot inside Showa Kinen Koen.

The photo posted above was taken by Mr. Jayaraj. The beauty of the nature and photo shows the skills of photographer too, though I have taken this photo from his Picasa album without his permission!

For sure, I must express my sincere apology for not able to reply to the queries that I received. I could read some of the comments in this blog and those appeared in expat-blog. Frankly I do admit my failure to do justice to those comments.

With the autumn season presents itself to the nature and people charming and pleasant memoirs, I feel as if the mind is filled with renewed energy. It took almost a season to come out of life’s tremor.

Now the blog is back! It might be a coincidence that I do restart blogging from where I stopped – Showa Kinen Koen. The life is all about coincidences. Some of us believe in super-natural powers. We like to believe those coincidences as miracles of God. If it gives a sort of comfort, it is fine. For a few, unwilling to accept those super natural miracles, the life is a flow of repetitive experiences.

Decision to revisit Tachikawa was sudden followed by a call from family friends who were already reached at Showa Kinen Koen. I had just finished the Japanese language class and was heading home for the lunch. Recently, I have been attending the Japanese language classes taken by Mana Suzuki-san who conducts classes at Komatsugawa. I may write more about these new Japanese lessons separately.

We got around one hour to walk around Showa Kinen Koen. It was not enough to imbibe the nature’s marvels. In the rush, we forgot to take the camera too. The photos in this blog are received from friends. The bonsai tree leaves were also turned to red, pink and yellow.

The Japanese garden was especially beautiful and was the only place we could visit and take photos during this visit. For those who plan to visit Showa Kinen Park the area guide will be useful to plan before starting from home. Showa Kinen Koen Area Guide

Showa Kinen Park needs a full day. For those who enjoy the nature, it needs many days and still a revisit will give a different experience. We were also literally surprised to see another face of Showa Kinen Koen during the autumn season. During spring, the garden was clad with flowers, Tulips to say more specifically.

(Another masterpiece from Jayaraj's camera)The nature refills the life’s energy or in other sense the nature has abundant energy that any living being can absorb. Showa Kinen Koen is one of such beautiful part of nature where we can take renewed energy and fill the mind with tranquilizing landscapes.

Photos copyright to Mr. Jayaraj and Mr. Eldho

What is Japan?

Kenichi Tanaka-san’s blog video ‘Japan – The strange country’ prompted me to write this post. Tanaka-san did translate successfully and humorously his observations about his own country to 11:21 minutes movie. While Japanese people are known for their generalizations, Tanaka-san stands different and looks in to the facts with a distinctive perception.

That might be the fifth grade when the science teacher told about cold countries. Probably there was a country name Japan. Almost 29 years, during the 1980s, I was fond of Soviet Union. Our text books were protected by the thick pages of Soviet Nadu (Soviet land), the magazine which we received free of cost to home during our childhood. My father was an Indian National Congress leader during those years who was involved in the active politics with ex-chief minister of Kerala, K. Karunakaran. Even then he did not show any hesitation to receive the magazine from Soviet Union, which boasted the achievements of communism in Soviet Union.

Soviet Union was powerful in those days and influenced Indian political brains, while hard core communist leaders and followers dreamt on the thunder sounds of spring in India that will come from China or Soviet Union. Japan was not known to me at that time. Japan came through electronic products such as Sony, Panasonic, Mitsubishi, and Hitachi and through the Suzuki motors. Japanese automobile companies influenced India much more than the electronic products in terms of cost.

In upper primary schools, we learned about volcanoes and Japanese earthquakes. We heard that Japanese people make light weight roof to their houses, in order to reduce casualties in case of earth quakes. We heard about the intelligence of Japanese people. We learned Japan's victory over China and Russia.

Japan returned to our study corners during high school days, when we learned about Second World War. That was first time I really admired Japan. More than any Japanese electronic products or Suzuki’s joint venture to produce Maruti to the Indian streets, Japan’s help to Indian freedom fighters during the war impressed me. That was a topic of discussion in our friends circle. That was one of the rare subjects where all friends reached to a common agreement! Japan – an Asian country dared to stand alone and fight the European colonial forces in Asia. Japan might have tried to colonize some Asian countries, but the Japanese military helped S.C Bose, popularly known in India as Netaji to form Indian National Army (INA). Indian National Army along with Japanese military fought against British East India Company and advanced through Eastern India. They could form the first Independent India Government in Andaman Nicobar Islands under the leadership of Netaji. Unlike many of the South East Asian countries, I believe, Indian people supported Japan and wished for its success. We were so depressed to learn Japan’s surrender in the war.

Somewhere in the mind, there was a desire to visit Hiroshima and Nagasaki at least once in life. During our high school days, Japan was almost a model country. A country with dedicated work force, a country with educated, healthy, disciplined and polite people live, stood as a role model to our generation. Teachers taught us to learn from Japan’s experience, Japan’s return to the world’s economy like a phoenix bird. History teacher Mrs. Rathi compared the phoenix bird and Japan’s waking up from the ashes of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

The desire to visit the land of Phoenix birds were heaping up. Internet and access to the information was not so popular on those days. I searched the encyclopedia pages to read about Japan. I could see pictures of beautiful women with colorful umbrellas and hand-fan. Japan remained a mystery in the mind. People are different, their faces are different, eyes are small and after all Japanese people believed the manufacturing technology ‘Small is beautiful’. Japan makes everything small.

Japanese workaholic nature is famous all over the world. One of my colleagues recollected his professor’s visiting experience to one of the Japanese company, where he could see an operator with a black badge on his uniform. While inquired about this, he was informed that the operator and his union were in strike against the management. I am not sure of the truth behind this story, but such kind of stories surfaced in our discussions during tea breaks when I was working in India. This was an extraordinary incident as the strikes in India have never been gentle.

Japanese management style has become popular in India. The collective responsibility and treatment of all people in all grades with equal respect has been some what different from the one, Indian companies and institutions inherited from the colonial British system. When working in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, one of the Pakistani friends, who worked in Japan, used to tell his observations on Japan. The discrimination in the society is not so open and severe in Japan based on the nature of job of a person compared to India or Pakistan.

Japanese product quality and quality implementation systems are famous around the world. There is a significant section of the Indian society believing in ‘brand Japan’ image. Japan is a brand for quality products.

My first encounter with a Japanese national dated back to 1996 April 11 when I was on a short business tour to Geneva and visited United Nations office. During business meetings there were chances to meet people from Japan. While talking with them, I have not tried to hide the veneration towards Japan.

There is no intention to assess the present living experiences with that of the old imaginations right now. I may do it on another occasion. It is always better to keep imaginations to our heart. Practical experiences may differ from person to person and can not be weighed and criticized with imaginations. I have tried to recall maximum possible images of Japan before I came to Japan. Now it will be interesting to watch what is Japan in Tanaka-san’s video.

Japan - The Strange Country (Japanese ver.) from Kenichi on Vimeo.

Melancholic pages of my life in Japan – departure of Remus-san

It was raining today in Tokyo. The rain added more cold to the already cold climate. The rain, which is used as a symbol in literature and movies, it seemed to me, was not merely coincide. Film directors have used rain, to express the pain of separation, death, miseries and depressed thoughts. While coming back from Narita airport today after sending off Remus-san, I was thinking of some of movie scenes where the rain symbolized the pain of separation.

Every departure is painful, but departure of some people, who are close to our heart, makes us depressed. The life amalgamated with pleasures and sorrows will not wait even a single moment for anybody’s consolation. I do not intend to search for the roots of sorrow or pleasure here. Today is one of the saddest days I have ever experienced after mother’s departure from Japan.

Today may not be a suitable day to write all the thoughts into this blog about the departure of Remus-san. As planned, Remus-san left Tokyo today. For sure, it is not just a departure for me. Remus said goodbye to Japan and I am just back home from the airport. Though I feel that today, it may not be a good day to write about his departure, I am unable to resist from sharing those painful moments of departure.

Either the otherwise crowded subway station was empty or I might not have noticed it. The mind was so preoccupied with thoughts of a good friendship which was started almost two years before. I have written about Remus before also in this blog when we friends gathered for a party at his apartment. Japanese language friends reunion

The friendship started from Sakura, when I was on a short transfer from the head office. We used to dine out some days at the Indian restaurant near the JR Sakura station. When Remus was moved to the head office, I was happy to get a companion.

Remus helped me a lot to set up my family, before they come to Japan. He was the one guided me and even purchased for me most of the house-hold items. Since I am not good at selecting the things, I followed his selection. He booked the flight tickets and helped me recharge the PASMO card and the list of things goes on……. I know well that friendship can not be listed out on a piece of paper or blog. What is coming out here is just the plain thoughts from my mind, when I am trying to console myself.

Remus was my lunch partner too at McDonalds and KFC. We shared our thoughts, fears, ambitions, plans and future. We shared the knowledge and discussed things of common interest. For my kids, he was Remus uncle. They loved to play with him during his visits to our home.

A true friendship, which can not be expressed by words, is something we cherish, is something we keep close to our hearts always. The life with many physical departures of beloved friends keeps on going with out waiting for us to recover from the twinge. The time will heal………this is what Remus told at the airport and I agreed.

The life in Japan, away from the home country, with good friends like Remus, was smooth and prolific. The voids created by the physical separation may not be filled up easily. I considered myself rather strong willed and unshaken. At the final moments in front of the departure gate, I noticed my words tremble and vision smudge as the eyes started filling……..

The end of this post is without any conclusion as this is one of the melancholic pages of my life in Japan.

Thy spirit walks abroad and turns our swords in our own proper entrails

Suicide is a cry for help. When one feels that the door of the last hope is also closed, and there is nothing left with for them to live in this earth, they, being carried away with uncontrolled emotions may decide to say goodbye to this world. This is how almost all of the suicides happen in Japan too as in any other parts of the world. Academically, this explanation may be enough to start the answer to the related question. In the real world, individual life situations and complex mental processes changes from country to country.

When I read the report on CNN.com on March 2009, "Desperate Japanese head to 'suicide forest'", I related the phenomenon as part of the existing Japanese psyche. In fact, I was reading the book, Bushido at that time and was on an impression that the news appeared in CNN.com/asia is not a new social issue to be discussed with much importance this year only.

For sure, the ever increasing rate of suicide is a social issue in Japan, which needs to be thoroughly analyzed and prevented. Some people in every country may commit suicide and the social and personal reasons behind those acts of self killings changes according to the country. The last two years, we have enough reasons while reading the increased number of suicides.

I read somewhere in the middle of December 2009, that the suicide deaths in Japan has reached around 30198 by the end of November 2009 itself. That is pretty much a huge figure and a figure of concern for the social scientists. Since, 1997, the suicide deaths have crossed the border of 22,000 suicide deaths per year. Since then it has been continuing with a figure some thing around 30,000. It was horrible to hear that the death rate has crossed the 30,000 limit also.

I would like to recollect, some of my life experiences connected with the suicide in Japan. When I was waiting for the train in the morning to head towards the work place, I heard some strange announcements in Japanese language and on those days, the train comes too late, sometimes more than half an hour. Without knowing the actual reasons for the delay of trains, in order to reach the office I would choose to walk from the nearest exit of the station. As I could not understand the full meaning of the announcement in Japanese, some of my friends advised me to look into the display board where the message for the reason of delay will be displayed. If the kanji for personal accident is displayed, it might be a suicide case, and the train will be delayed more. Last year, I have walked at least 4 times as I have seen that message in the display board.

Every time I walk I used to remember the book ‘Bushido’ written by Inazo Nitobe-san. Suicide is institutionalized in Japan! Those institutionalized suicides known as Seppuku or Kappuku commonly called Hara-kiri were different from the ones happening now a days. Still the suicide rate in Japan is one of the highest in the world. For Japan, a country having almost everything to identify with a self pride, a country with the second strongest economy in the world, a country, which is a model to other nations on how to protect citizens rights, a country having a fairly good distribution of wealth system, suicide remains a scar, we need to agree.

I am not competitive at this stage to write analytical reasons behind this tendency of self killing. But one thing is sure that suicide is neither a matter of pride nor a way to escape from the personal defeats as observed in the Samurai period. In all countries, suicides happen, but when it happens more in a country like Japan, there may be reasons apart from merely economical as that mentioned in CNN.com/asia and it becomes a matter of concern.

It may not be the spirits walking around and turns the swords to their own proper entrails. There may be reasons that spread to the victim’s helplessness to deal with minute fluctuations in the external world that affect the internal world too. Education that focus on self manifestation, apart from simple school syllabus will help to a good extent to reinforce the positive life motivating elements in new generation. That will help to realize when the spirits start walking abroad and turns the sword to one’s own bowels.

What happens if somebody visits Hiroshima?

Recently, the newspapers, websites and news blogs were full of analyses of Obama’s proposed visit to Hiroshima. When some of my friends told about the plan of the president to visit there, I was skeptic and told them that it will not happen. The proposed visit had some thing to do with our high school physics book.

Neither politics is a subject to ignite ideas for blog posts here nor do I intend to criticize the diplomacy of politicians. Criticism, especially negative will not yield any positive result.

The equation we learned in our physics class was e = mc2. Our physics teacher, Girijan Master explained the meaning of each component in the equation. Girijan Master was not simply a teacher for me. We at high schools used to listen to him as if we hear an interesting story when he teaches complex theories of physics. It was thus we heard more about the city of Hiroshima, far away from our home town and country, in Japan.

By the time we reached High school, we had enough general knowledge about Japan and its importance in the technology products supplying to other nations. Moreover, we heard from our history teacher regarding the heroic acts of Japanese military that triumphed over European and American power axis during World War II. The history teachers were not so serious to tell us what went wrong with the war at last.

What happened before sixty or seventy years before may not be interesting to the younger generations, but when it still can influence the lives, we have to listen to the history. Looking back more seriously to what Girijan master told us when he explained the miseries of human beings at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, I can now realize that the energy equals mass multiplied by square of speed of light has many things to do with politics, human sufferings, power shift, alignment of nations, trade and business.

History is not written with golden letters always. Many times it is written with a knife that has the stain of blood of many innocents. Revisiting the history needs much more political will and compassion to those innocents. It may not always come with the determination of a political group that depends on the support of  majority. It is here Bertrand Russel proves himself true in saying that truth is not always absolutely true, but is what the authority or majority says. Then the chances for truth are fifty percent in the present day society. It may not be always the truth we hear as the truth is decided by the majority.

War is a crime, whoever is responsible for it. It is also true that no present-day generation can be blamed for what had happened in the past. What we can do is to learn from the past and take caution not to repeat the same mistakes that happened once in our history.

Girijan master taught us the famous energy equation on an August. That may be purely coincidence. The test ground of energy equation waited for the president which never happened. What happened in the past must not be willingly important to the present generations especially when it involves many complicated self-disgusting historical facts. We may not be able to wipe out the energy equation getting realized in many countries, but at least a caution is required to save our future generations.

This post does not attempt to find fault with anybody, but just wanted to reiterate what Girijan master taught us in our High school class. The ‘e’ that stands for energy can stand for emotion also. Then the mc (mass x velocity of light) can stand for man’s common-sense (mc). Emotions of hundreds of thousands of innocents are in the hands of common-sense of our political leaders.

Emotion recollected in tranquility!

There might be a Wordsworth walking in the tile paved streets. He might have written thousands of praising words and poems on his solitude about the colorful leaves that falls on the street. On his way back to home through this street, he might have spent more of his unconstrained time on one of the wooden benches on the garden imbibing the beauty of the nature.

It is thus the poetry takes birth. The beauty of nature here in autumn season will inspire even a monster! Emotions could be recollected in this tranquility, thanks to Wordsworth for putting all those words to make a meaningful definition for poetry.

Life in Japan is more beautiful than before with the start of autumn season. Life becomes colorful when the nature around us makes up herself in colorful wardrobe. During autumn season, leaves change their color, thus making the whole panorama more scenic.

This photo is taken from the balcony of our apartment. The street down was not visible with the densely packed green leaves till some days back, now turned to be visible from top. The green leaves also turned into different colors.

This street that goes to the Higashi Ojima station looks enticing with yellow, orange, green, orange, dark brown and red leaves intermingles each other. Ideal place to spend time during day time if we are free!

The trees near the river bank also turned their leaves colorful, making the river more attractive than ever before.

Respecting the nature is a traditional way of Japanese culture!

Enjoy the nature and tradition just 50 minutes from Shinjuku station!

This is the advertisement caption on which I get something to stare while riding on Toei Shinjuku trains to and from Higashi Ojima on weekdays. Most often this advertisement shown on the Toei Shinjuku line trains or Keio line trains that goes to Keio-tama center is the one that has caption in English. Indeed, advertized to attract foreigners, Mount Takao is a place to visit especially during the season of color change of leaves on November second week.

By repeatedly seeing the advertisement inside the trains, we decided to make a trip to Mount Takao today. We are just back from Mount Takao, which is just one and half an hour away from our house at Higashi Ojima.

The ideal visiting season is November when the trees change the colors. Mount Takao looks gorgeous with trees bearing colored leaves in a varying mix of red, yellow, green, pink, orange, dark brown and grey. The winter is near and the trees will prepare themselves to shed the leaves. During autumn season, maple leaves change color which is known as momiji in Japanese. もみじ momiji is romantic season in Japan and we could see many young couples making their trip to the top of mount Takao.

Mount Takao is 599 meters tall in the city of HachiOji. HachiOji is in Tokyo prefecture and for me HachiOji is particularly important as one of the initial visitors to this blog Mr. Hashimoto was from this place. Mount Takao is a popular hiking spot for Tokyo people.

To reach Takao-san, take a keio line train that goes to Kitano and then change to Keio Takao line to reach Takaosanguchi. Alternatively, from Shinjuku, we will get express train to Takaosanguchi. Pasmo or suica card holders do not need to buy separate tickets to reach Takaosanguchi.

From the basement of Mount Takao known as Takaosanguchi, where the Keio trains stops, we need to walk around 5 minutes to reach the cable car station. We had two option to reach at the top of Mount Takao. One is by using Cable car and another one is by lift chair. Lift chair will be an open air atmosphere and as we were with small kids and strollers did not opt to use. Cable car was pulled by giant high strength ropes that was operated from the station at the top of the mount Takao. The cable car have two cars and the travelers are well controlled by the staff at the entrance. The round trip by cable car costs 900 Japanese yen for adults and for children below 6 years old it is free.

It took around 3 and half minutes to reach the station at the top of Mount Takao. We could see the Tokyo city far away with skyscrapers looking like match boxes piled one over one. The observatory hall built on the mountain has telescopes that operate by inserting 100 Yen to view the far away places.

Walking further through the forest, enjoying the nature and tradition as the advertisement says, we could see many sculptures on the way to Yakuoin Buddhist temple. The temple built with the traditional Buddhist style have influence of Chinese architecture.

Though not so far away from busy Tokyo city, Mount Takao is rich in wildlife with more than 1200 species of plants, bushes and diverse species of insects, birds and animals.

The temples in Japan as per my experience goes is a mix of Buddhist and Shinto cultures and almost all of them I have visited have Buddha and other Shinto Gods. The Gods co-exist in good harmony in all the temples. We could see many Gods in the temple and too many sculptures of Buddha everywhere on the way to the temple. We learned that visitors to Yakuoin temple pray to mountain Gods (tengu) for their better future and good fortune.

One of the photo shown in the advertisement inside the trains is of such a God having long nose with an angry face. We could see many statues of Gods with long nose and another with a crow beak in the Yakuoin temple premise.

It was 5 in the evening, but was dark when we got inside the cable car to come down to Takaosanguchi. The journey was too memorable and all of us enjoyed, with plans of revisiting as we could not cover all of the attractions on the top of Mount Takao. Probably we need one more day to plan the journey properly.

Mount Takao, Takaosan as Japanese people say with respect, is one of the best examples of traditional Japanese culture of respecting nature and living things equally. Behind all those sculptures, the shapes we saw on the way to Yakuoin temple, the customs being followed in the temple, we could realize that it is a tradition in Japan to respect the nature!

Change of seasons in Japan and its impact on life

The rain brought more cold to Tokyo during the last two days and it is predicted to have rain tomorrow also. The rain started yesterday evening around 15:00 hours, when we were just went out of house on our way to Kameido shopping center.

Japan is getting on her autumn dress looking gorgeous all around. The winter is yet to come. The trees started shedding the yellow leaves and it is a hard work for the ward office staff to clean the whole street with full of leaves in the morning. Especially when it is raining, the leaves stick to the ground.

The color change to the leaves will happen at the beginning of November, it is expected this year in Tokyo. Trees at Komatsugawa park will also to discard the leaves thus preparing themselves to face the winter. Last subsequent two years had mild snowfall during second month of the years.

The cold wind is blowing today in Tokyo. The temperature has not gone down to make the climate cold. It may be due to the rain we feel cold. The temperature is around 14 degree Celsius now and it is considered to be hot in Japan. The real winter during December and January will show the mercury down to zero.

The dipping down of mercury will not freeze the life in Japan. It won’t bring any immobility to the usual things happening here. In fact the changes of seasons are warmly welcomed in Japan. People arrange festivals, get-together parties, Season welcome drinking parties, Season good-bye parties and the likes.

There will be discount offers by shopping centers during the season change in Japan. The cloths suitable for October and November are more available in the market now. During the second week of November, winter cloths will start appearing. The impact of economic recession on the textile industry was more in the US than in the Japan. One of the peculiar characteristics of Japanese people is their obsession towards the brand items in the market. They don’t mind to spend to get a branded cloth or costume.

The color changing of leaves during October and November is one of the beautiful natural phenomena in Japan. Japanese people like to talk about the minute changes in the weather and its mysterious beauty. They are so careful to observe and comment on the deviation of even a single day here and there for a climate change from the expected date. So is the weather reporting system in Japan. It is an accurate prediction almost 99.99% of the cases and we can rely on it and plan our activities accordingly.

Since we did not log into see the climate, we planned our outing to Kameido shopping center. For us, living in Higashi Ojima, Kameido shopping center is near if we get down at Nishi Ojima Toei Shinjuku subway, take a straight road walk in front of Daiei that goes to the back of Kameido shopping center.

The biggest attraction of Kameido shopping center is the ToysRus, which is a dream world for children. The sunstreet Rambling Market at Kameido is great place for spending evenings with children. Sometimes there will be stage shows. I will write about Kameido shopping center and ToysRus on a separate post.

It is cold outside and inside the house it is noisy with children playing and thus making the room heated. Children may not feel this cold as they are interested in playing on holidays. They may feel cold on week-days before going to school!

The shedding of leaves and changing colors are part of human life too. Without change the life is dull. Things should be in a state of flux to make the life exciting. The changes in the nature brought out by 4 distinct seasons are much visible in Japan. The life is not monotonous if we keep on changing the physical activities keeping the inner world intact as the nature herself does!

The silence before and after a tempest - the typhoon Melor battered life in Japan

The morning was very calm today and it provoked to think about the calmness before the storm. Before and after a tempest the nature is calm and peaceful. The silence sometimes is interpreted as the silence before a tempest. There were reports that the typhoon Melor will hit Tokyo today.

Today morning I got the message in mobile from the school where my daughter studies that the ‘School closed due to typhoon’. It was then I got the seriousness of the Typhoon that has already started hitting Japan landfall.

The typhoon named Melor brought heavy rain and wind to the Japan mainland. When viewed the movement of the typhoon at 7 a.m in the morning today, the typhoon was around 200km away from Tokyo. My colleagues had informed me that effect of Melor will not be so serious in Tokyo compared to the other parts of Japan. And this was the reason I got up as usual and became ready to go to office. We were little bit worried about sending our daughter to school and now by receiving the message from school that worry was also cleared. However small the typhoon will be, it is not safe for the children to go to schools.

There was heavy rain when I stepped out of the apartment and I could not open the umbrella. Since the Komatsugawa exit of Higashi Ojima, Toei Shinjuku line is only a half minute walking distance away from our apartment, I could manage without opening the umbrella though it was raining.

One thing I like to repeat about the admirable attitude of Japanese people is that almost all of them do not fear to go out even during the heavy wind. I have noticed this attitude before also. Japanese people are well trained on how to respond to the natural calamities like earthquake and typhoon it seems. The houses are connected to a centralized alarm system that will announce the danger during or at least in advance of the natural calamities.

There may be much damage and disaster at different parts of Japan. There were reports of death and some 64 people injured in the evening. The typhoon Melor had destroyed many houses, many thatched roofs were collapsed, disrupted life partially in the busy parts of Tokyo.

Some of my friends were trapped in railway stations for hours in the morning. Many trains were cancelled and many of them were running slow and late than scheduled. Some offices and companies declared holiday. Somehow I could manage to reach upto Monzen Nakacho by Toei Shinjuku train and then Toei Oedo line.

There was a huge crowd waiting at the Tozai platform of Monzen Nakacho. I stood at the behind and waited for the train to come. It took around 12 minutes for the train to come. Usually Tozai trains will be arriving at this station at every 3 to 4 minutes during morning. Train was already packed and the driver pushed me from outside in order to close the door. I have written about pushing people into the train in this blog before also. It really helps us to reach at offices in time.

Typhoon Melor is now moved to the northern region of Japan. Melor did harm the normal life at the central parts of Japan. Flights were cancelled and businesses were affected. It was reported that around 315 flights were cancelled and thousands of people were evacuated to reduce the casualties.

The sky was cleared by 11 p.m and there was only wind blowing with moderate speed in the evening. Internet newspapers were full of news that Japan battered by typhoon.

I was interested to know the meaning of Melor and found it is a Malay (Malaysian language) word meaning ‘Jasmine’. Some sites suggests that the word Melor in the West has its roots in Russia. Melor in Russia is an abbreviated form of Marx Engels Lenin October Revolution. Since the typhoon came on October the name Melor suits, though it did not bring any revolution, except some disaster!

What are the places to see in Tokyo? – places to visit in and around Tokyo

Tokyo is an incredible place to visit! This is what I read in many sites when I searched for ‘Places to see in Tokyo’ in google and Yahoo. It is almost 10 days since my brother landed in Japan. We visited around 15 places in and around Tokyo. The visiting schedule is hectic and he has 3 more days in Japan.

I asked some of my friends for their recommendations. Most of them suggested places like Tokyo Tower, Yokohama China Town, Kamakura, Asakusa Sensoji temple, Ginza, Harajuku Meiji Jingu Shinto shrine, Shinjuku, Shibuya, Mount Fuji, Five lakes, Hakone, Akihabara Electric city, Odaiba, Ueno Gardens and Zoological park etc. We could complete our schedules one by one except the Mount Fuji Trip. There is no point in travelling all the way to Mount Fuji only to view the mountain. Mount Fuji is open for climbing on July and August.

A first time visitor will definitely get excited by seeing Tokyo and its surroundings. The technological development Japan could achieve is amazing and significant. A short time visitor will be interested to watch the Japanese discipline and obedience to the law. The pin-drop silence at many of the crowded railway stations is another noticeable thing in Japan that a first time visitor will get astonished. Japanese people are silent due to the disciplined nature at public places like railway stations and bus-stops. They are even silent inside the train also. Most of the times we later realize people talking inside train and public places are foreigners!

Visiting Japan itself is an experience for foreigners! Probably we can not see a place like this at any other part of the world except here! Let me confirm once more that Japanese people are unique! We have many things to learn from Japan. The places we visited are not many, but everywhere we could observe some of the common things like discipline, silence, Obedience, Politeness, Smiling faces etc.

Today, we are planning to go to Imperial Palace. Tokyo Imperial palace is a great place to visit in Tokyo and it is the residence of Japan royal family. Imperial palace was built during the 250 years long Tokugawa Shoguns rule at the center of Tokyo as a fortress for protection. East Gardens of the Imperial palace is open to public daily except on Mondays, Fridays and on national holidays and this is the only par to the palace that is open for visit. For a visit to the imperial palace, we need to book in advance. If you plan your visit to Imperial palace click on this link and book in advance. Imperial Household Agency Homepage

Now, I can suggest some of the places to visit in Tokyo during your short trip next time.

1. Tokyo Tower

2. Mount Fuji

3. Hakone – Gora – Sounzan – Togendai – Ashi Lake trip

4. Odaiba

5. Kamakura

6. Ueno

7. Shinjuku

8. Shibuya for shopping

9. Akihabara Electric city

10. Yokohama China Town

11. Tokyo Disneyland and Disney Sea

12. Asakusa Sensoji Temple

13. Harajuku

14. Tokyo Imperial Palace

15. Ginza

The list goes without ending here with just 15 places, but I have just listed some of the major attractions in and around Tokyo, which we have visited with the advices of our friends. Just do searches in google or yahoo. They will give you more insights about the places to visit in Tokyo. However, I think, the above places in Tokyo cover a good trip to Tokyo.

Tokyo is a unique and wonderful tourist destination. Tokyo is not only to be read, but also a place to be experienced by walking and riding throughout the length and breadth. It is curious to learn how the ancient Japanese culture transforms slowly to modern technological advancements.

Vibrant Harajuku and Meiji Jingu Shinto shrine in Tokyo

It was a huge crowd outside Harajuku station when we came out. The crowd was moving slowly but gently. The purpose of the visit was uncertain when we started from Higashi Ojima. I did a google search for ‘Places to see in Tokyo’. Some of the search results guided me to see Fuji mountain, Kamakura, Tokyo Tower, Shinjuku, Odaiba, Ueno Park and zoo, Ginza, Yokohama China town etc.

Even by repeating the searches in Yahoo and other search engines I got the same places in the search results. I was eager to get something different from general search engine recommendations. The same thing happened for the first few pages of search resuslts, when I changed the search keywords to ‘Must see places in Tokyo’, but this time I got a place ‘Harajuku’ in the list recommended by an American tourist who had visited this place on his trip to Tokyo.

That was the motivation to visit Harajuku today. We could see live animation characters outside the station, lesbians and some groups of gays. I am not sure whether this is the normal view of Harajuku station. There were groups of young Japanese girls and boys sitting on the nearby stone benches which seemed to me as a mere casual meeting.

I have been taking my brother to different places in Tokyo now a days on his short trip to Tokyo. We walked to the direction of the crowd. It helps many times in life when we move with the trend. There will be always something towards which the crowd goes. The psychology of the mass or crowd is also motivated by the determination of those who move on the front. When we turned left, right after the Harajuku Yamanote line station, we could see a forest, virtually more beautiful than the real forest and a historical style entrance.

Before entering, we could collect leaflets that described about the place and its importance. To our surprise, it was ‘Meiji Jingu’ which is a Shinto shrine. Shinto is Japan’s religion, which has no founder, no holy book and no concepts of traditional religions. Shinto is a way of Japanese living with high values respecting the nature and living things. The Shinto shrine which we visited accidently is dedicated to the souls of Japanese emperor ‘Meiji’ and his consort empress ‘Shoken’. It was interesting to know that their tomb is in Kyoto.

This forest was made by Japanese people by donating trees from different parts of Japan and from all over the world. It is now the history that there are 100,000 tress total in the forest and it was established on November 1920. The artificial forest in the middle of concrete forest looked more than the natural forest.

We could see a collection of rice wine barrels on the side of the path towards the shrine. The visitors were eager to take snaps of the traditional Japanese customs and architectures around the main shrine. In Shinto religion, divinity or diving spirit is known as ‘Kami’. Unlike Christian religion which talks about one spirit, Shinto religions has no limit in the number of divine spirits or Kami. There are unlimited number of kami. Kami can be observed in Nature, mythology or in human beings. It is said that from times unknown Japanese people have felt awe and gratitude towards such Kami (divine spirit) and have built shrines to such Kami.

This kind of belief is similar to the believes in Hindu religion, the most widely practiced religion in India. In fact in India, these divine spirits became Gods over a period of time and they also got one or several shrines according to their popularity.

We could see Japanese traditional style marriage being held inside the shrine premise. Many visitors were taking photographs of the ceremonies. Meiji Jingu Gardens or Gyoen was the part of Meiji Jingu Shrine that has been existing long before building the Meiji Jingu. Emperor Meiji designed this iris garden, small paths and fishing spot for Empress Shoken.

“Although we may feel Overworked and burdened,

Our human hearts should go on remaining filled with an open calmness” is the Waka poetry written by Empress Shoken. The wisdom of Emperor Meiji and Empress Shoken were handed over to the generations next through these Waka poems. Visitors can draw a poem from 30 selected poems from the ‘Omikuji’ box, which exists in front of the main shrine.

Now not exaggerated to say, our visit to Harajuku was really worth. It took us to a different world in the middle of modern Tokyo. I can strongly recommend now to visit Meiji Jingu and Harajuku for those who plan a short visit to Tokyo along with their visit to Shinjuku. It is just two stations away from Shinjuku station on the JR Yamnote line. Harjuku is also a place for fashion and we can see many live animated models walking on the road! Have a nice trip to Harajuku!

An evening trip to Funabori Tower, Tokyo

We heard about Funabori Tower from one of the friends last week. Funabori is just a two minutes by Toei Shinjuku line from Higashi Ojima. Yesterday, we went to visit Funabori tower with two friends.

Funabori tower, an integral part and main attraction of Tower hall Funabori, is also a place of conference, wedding parties, meetings, events and hotels. Calm and quiet Funabori station is just less than a minute walk from the tower hall Funabori.

Funabori Tower got its name from the place name Funabori. Funabori is near to Higashi Ojima and Ichinoe in Toei Shinjuku line. Funabori tower is approximately 7 minutes from Yawata/Motoyawata when we come from Narita Airport in Keisei line. A 7 minute walk from Keisei Yawata is required to reach Motoyawata in Toei Shinjuku line. It is recommendable to burn the extra fat accumulated! Japanese people are health conscious to the extent that they purposely make some of the destinations reachable by walking only!

It was around 6:30 PM when we started from Higashi Ojima with kids. Kids like to play outside and such journeys are ideal occasion to impart knowledge on them by talking about what the elders know about the place and history. Unfortunately I was not much informed on the importance of Tower hall Funabori.

Funabori tower is named after the tall tower, which is 115 meters tall and location, Funabori. At the entrance place there were wooden sculptures of musicians with violin in their hands. When we entered the Tower hall building, the first thing I noticed is a Japanese girl clad in black suit with a black hat coming walking to the reception area. Our friend approached the reception to ask how to access the tower. They explained how to go to the top of the tower.

We could see model statues of bride and groom on the first ground floor (First floor in Japan).Tower Hall Funabori is an ideal venue for holding events that ranges from expos to conferences to weddings. Funabori tower hall also have a bridal salon, restaurant and cinema. Funabori tower hall have a big hall, small hall, Banquette room, Event hall and Shop & Service room. Parking lot, Movie Theater, Exclusive service yard etc makes the Funabori tower hall a unique place for events.

The staff at the ground floor guided us to the elevator (Erabeta in Japanese) which took us to the seventh floor. Came out of the elevator at the seventh floor, we walked on the corridor which is long that reached to the end of the building. There another staff guided to us to one of elevator. Baby strollers are allowed to take up to this point only.

We entered to the elevator to reach the top of the Funabori tower. The digital display inside the lift showed the distance we covered in meters. When the display showed 105 meters, the lift stopped. Conveying our Arigato gozaimasu to the lift operator, we entered to the observation tower area. It is built in a square shape allowing 360 degree view of the surrounding Tokyo city and skyscrapers.

The night view of Tokyo is exciting! The extreme engineering skills manifested through the construction of attractive tall structures illuminated with electric bulbs are a feast to the eyes.

We saw Tokyo Tower from the observation tower in dim light, Sky scrapers in Odaiba was also visible. The photos taken from the top of the Funabori Tower at night were not so clear.


The view of vehicles moving not so far away on the bridge along with Arakawa river was really amazing. Another attraction was the view of trains moving on Toei Shinjuku line from the top of the tower.


We spent more than one hour at the tower top. There were no crowd and the observation area was silent, except our children made some noise when they played. Funabori Tower in the Tower hall Funabori is a recommendable place to visit in Tokyo.

Funabori tower is free to visit. To reach Funabori Tower the following link have a pdf file showing the nearby places and approximate time to reach the tower from Narita Airport and Keisei line.

How to reach Funabori Tower and Tower Hall Funabori? Click here

For those who are interested to contact the Tower hall Funabori for any kind of events, conference, the following address and website address will help. The site is in Japanese language;

Tower Hall Funabori
4-1-1 Funabori
Tokyo, Japan
phone: +81 3 5676 2211
fax: +81 3 5676 2501
Funabori Tower Hall

Again on the living expenses for a foreigner family in Tokyo

On March 22nd I wrote a simple article on living expenses for a foreigner in Tokyo. As I told in this blog and other discussion forums, cost of living in Tokyo is much higher compared to other East Asian and European nations. When I was writing that post in this blog on March, I was living alone and my family was in India. Almost three weeks after writing that post, they joined with me along with my mother.

It will be interesting to compare the cost of living in Tokyo for a bachelor and for a family, especially for foreign people. I think this will be a helpful hint for at least some of the Asians planning to come to Japan for work.

In order to tell how big the difference in expenses will be for a family in Tokyo when compared to the bachelor life, I would like to narrate the real incident. One day in May, I got a phone call from my wife saying that, one of the Japanese woman has come to our home telling something. As my wife was new to Japan, she could not understand even a single word, but could guess it is something related to the bill for gas.

As I also did not have confidence to speak in Japanese especially over phone, I requested help from one of my Japanese colleagues. My Japanese colleague after talking over phone explained to me that the Gas bill has suddenly shoot up to 13340 Japanese Yen (JPY) for the last month. Compared to the March month’s bill of 1600 JPY, that was more than 8 times high! The Japanese staff from the Tokyo Gas company was surprised and doubted for some leakages inside home. She wanted to enter the home and check! When I heard from my colleague, I thought of the promptness and alertness of Tokyo Gas company’s staff. It is really appreciable. They are not only for billing the customer, but also to educate and alert them of a sudden change in the billing amount.

My colleague explained that my family has joined with me from last month and that was the reason for sudden change. Taking the high cost of living in Tokyo with family, we could control the Gas bill for the subsequent months by putting restriction on the usage of gas heaters and water heating system.

The same thing happened to the Electricity bill during summer seasons, when we switch on the air conditioners almost throughout the day. Compared to the bachelor life, the bills for Gas, Electricity, Water and sewage, has more than tippled on average. Yahoo BB bill is same and there is no much change. The Softbank mobile bill has increased a little to reach something around 3600 JPY per month. Putting all the bills together, it comes around 30,000 JPY per month for Water and Sewage, Gas, Electricity, Mobile, Internet connection, Cable TV etc.

The drastic increase in expense is on the education. The school fee and the bus fee for children is the biggest contributor to the high cost of living for foreigners. The education is free in Japanese schools. The fee in international schools in Tokyo is too high for an average paid foreigner especially in Japanese companies. Japanese companies mostly have no separate rules for giving special allowance to support the education of children of foreign staff.

We are paying 60,000 JPY per month for the kid’s fee and 15,000 JPY for school bus. The miscellaneous expenses for the children relating to education may vary from 10,000 JPY depending on the schools. Since my kid is going to Indian International School in Tokyo (Morishita), she has to go by school bus.

To summarize, the living expense for one month on an average for a simple living family will be around 300,000 Japanese Yen. This expense does not include the House rent, tax and other deductions. Including the house rent, travelling expenses, the expense will be around 450,000 JPY per month if the whole amount of house rent is to be paid by us. Many Japanese companies pay 70 to 80% of the house rent to their employees. This is a great support for employees. Since the tax depends on the basic pay, I don’t want to make a comment here.

In short, living in Tokyo is not simple! There are very few chances in Tokyo to live simple and save a lot of money from our salary, compared to many other major cities. This makes Tokyo unique. One of the biggest cities in the world, where more than 12 million people reside at the heart of the city and more than 30 million people including the surrounding areas. The cash flow in Tokyo is high…….and still Japan has been the second strongest economy in the world!

Reflections of exotic stones, greenery and Japanese history in a pond

Her tears fell in to the pacific and there arose a group of islands called Japan. There are many myths associated with old Japanese culture. The Goddess behind the creation of Japan may be a myth, but when I read the pamphlet distributed at the entrance gate of Kiyosumi gardens, I recollected the mythical story.

The artistic and beautiful stones laid around the pond in the Kiyosumi gardens were being collected from all over Japan. Thus while stepping on each stone, I could feel that I walk all around Japan! It is an imaginative feeling I shared with my family when we visited the Kiyosumi gardens on a Sunday.

Kiyosumi gardens located near to the Sumidagawa river in the Shitamachi area of Tokyo is very near to Monzen Nackacho. The Kiyosumi gardens is just a few minutes walk from the Kiyosumi shirakawa station in the Toei Oedo line. For us coming from Higashi Ojima, there is one transfer from Toei Shinjuku line to Toei Oedo line at Morishita.

There were groups of people lead by a guide, but we opted to be independent as understanding Japanese was still on the half way for all of us. The pond has three islands and a building where we saw some people practicing meditation. It reminded us of the Buddhist monasteries at some remote village. But the information written on the English leaflet says the building is a tea ceremony space architecture.

Rainwater is used for pond at present, but in old days water from Sumidagawa river was brought into the gardens. Thanks to the Iwasaki family who took the pain to collect all those beautiful stones from all over the Japan and brought them here in this part of Japan by steamships. Those exotic stones now decorate the pond and the surroundings. For that reason the Kiyosumi gardens may look like a stone garden. The tea ceremony building mentioned earlier is known as Ryotei in Japanese. Ryotei was builit as a guesthouse for the visit of British military personality Lord Kichener.

My kids could enjoy the fishes and the tortoises and the ducks in the pond. There were pigeons as well sitting on the stones. We walked towards the Ryotei building stepping on the stones laid in the pond. We could see a big stone monument in which a poem was inscribed. Sitting on a nearby chair we could recognize that the poem tells about a frog who jumped into an old pond. The monument stone was originally located on the banks of Sumidagawa, but was moved to the Kiyosumi gardens when the protection walls were constructed along the Sumidagawa river bank.

The shallow parts of the pond have stepping stone pathways that looked amazing for my kids. They enjoyed the scene of fishes and tortoises while crossing the pond and found the reflections of trees in the water. After walking a while we took rest and gave food to our kids. The climate was ideal for an outing with family with low sun but clear sky.

The tallest hill in Kiyosumi gardens is known as Fuji-san, resembling the name of Fuji mountain. There were Crape myrtle flowers in the garden. We were not tired after walking one round around the pond. On our way back to the exit gate which also the entrance gate, we could meet warm-heated Japanese people greeting while passing on the way. The garden was built by a business magnate Kinokuniya Bunzaemon, who lived in the Edo period.


The entrance ticket charge is JPY 150 per adult and for children, admission is free. It is a place recommended to be visited in Tokyo and which is worth to visit as we can recollect some part of the history of Japan while walking through a typical Japanese garden. Kiyosumi gardens is designated as “Scenic Park” by the Tokyo Metropolitan Government. The pond inside the Kiyosumi gardens reflects the history of Japan along the with the reflections of the exotic stones and the trees.