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.

A free visit to Ueno zoological park, Tokyo

The weather was suitable for an outing today with moderate cold and sun. It helped us not to change our previous plan to visit Ueno zoological park. The drive to visit the zoo was our daughter’s demand to see the animal characters which she had imagined while hearing bed-time stories.

For us, telling Panchatantra stories to children is a way of imparting moral values too. Children imbibe social values and importance of team work, social life etc through stories of animals. Originally written by Vishnusharma centuries ago, Panchatantra stories are very popular in India even today. Bed time stories help children to grow their visualization and imagination process, thereby help to ignite their hidden passions for creativity.

To our surprise, when we reached at the gate by exiting through JR-line, it was written in big red words that the “ADMISSION IS FREE”. Good! In English too. Once more I confirmed by asking the staff at the gate of Ueno zoo that admission is free today. In fact we were unaware of this fact. I have read in some of the Japan tour website that admission to the zoo on the foundation day of the zoo, probably on March of every year, on Greenery day and on October 1st etc are free, but never expected to be free today. The ticket fare for an adult is 600 Japanese yen on normal days.

There really are a lot to see in Ueno zoological park. It is one of the favored tourist spots in Tokyo and foreigners also prefer to visit on their short visit to Tokyo. If we search for some of the must see places in Tokyo, name of Ueno zoo also will appear in the search results. I got the same when I did a google search last year to make a list of places to see in Tokyo.

Ueno zoological park is wide and the exact geographical details may be available at the zoo official website. We entered the Ueno zoo through the Main gate which comes from the JR Ueno station. Right at the entrance, we can see Pandas. On the right side of the entrance we can see a variety of pheasants and pigeons including Japanese pigeon. The red panda is one of the famous attractions of Ueno zoo. Unfortunately the Panda region of the park is missing the giant panda. There we could see a notice that the giant panda was died on April 2008.

We walked to show elephants and monkeys. On the way, we could see the Thai pavilion, which was donated by Royal Thai government. Elephant forest section is one of the popular sections of the zoo. For us, we have seen many elephants in the past and elephants are part of the social life for people hail from Kerala. The elephants at Ueno zoo could not bring any nostalgia to me!

There are Japanese cranes and birds on the left side of the entrance. After taking our lunch we proceeded towards the mono-rail that goes to the West Garden. The monorail starts from East garden. Ueno zoo has two areas. One is West garden and the second one is East Garden. This separation is easier to make plan for visitors according to their preference to see animals.

The main attractions on the West garden are Kangaroos, Vivarium, Giraffe, Okapis, Alligators, Snakes, Frogs, Turtles, Penguins, Rhinoceroses, Zebra (which is one of the favorite characters in my daughter’s bed-time stories), Hippopotamuses and Flamingos etc. It was an eye-catching scene flamingos stand on single foot.

The attractions in the East garden are Lion, Tiger, Gorilla, Lama, Polar bear, varieties of birds apart from the elephants, pandas and monkeys.

The zoo is well maintained by the staff and rest rooms are located at the right places for the convenience of visitors. Food items are also available at major junctions and enough numbers of benches and tables are also properly set. Ueno zoo, with cafeteria, free rest rooms, rental strollers, baby stations, nursery room, first aid station etc., is an ideal place for outing with kids.

I strongly recommend visit Ueno zoo if you are making a trip to Tokyo with or without your family. It is a place to see in Tokyo.

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!

Indian International School in Japan - IISJ Morishita, Tokyo

For almost eight months from now, I have been thinking of writing about the Indian International School Japan, having their campuses at Morishita and Yokohama. On March 2009 I went to Indian school to inquire on the admission procedures for my elder daughter. After talking to the staff at the school office, I got the opportunity to talk to Mrs. Nirmal Jain, The Director of the Indian international school Japan.

Indian international school Japan is popularly known as IISJ in Japan. It is located in Morishita, in Koto-ku ward of Tokyo prefecture. There are two Indian international schools in Japan. The second one is Global Indian School, the campus of which is at Mizue.

It is a great service being done by Indian international school Japan authorities, especially by Mrs. Jain at Japan for the Indian community. Some years before, for Indian people living in Japan with family and kids, education was a major problem. I came to know from friends that their kids go to other international schools in Tokyo. For Indians, curriculum based on Indian syllabus is important as most of the Indians are here for a short stay.

When I met Mrs. Jain I conveyed my admiration towards the service they do to the Indian community in Japan. Far away from India, giving children an atmosphere of International curriculum yet based on Indian values and syllabus is not a simple thing. That is one of the objectives of Indian international school in Japan. To make the coming generations of Indians living in Tokyo global citizens, it is a must to impart values and habits suitable to live in an international community, also by keeping traditional Indian values and customs.

The positive attitude and values Mrs. Jain keeps to impart knowledge to the new generations is impressive. Indian International school in Japan is a co-educational institution that is affiliated to the CBSE (Central board of secondary education, New Delhi, India. Interestingly, there are students belonging to other countries also studying in IISJ, Morishita. Recently, some of the Japanese parents have been attracted to the Indian curriculum.

The development of mathematics in India is amazing. Though India still bear the images of a poor country with almost half of the population under darkness of illiteracy and lower living standards, the mathematics has got a place in Indian society. Indian vedic mathematics is an amazing product of India with which complex arithmetic calculation becomes too simple, that does not need a calculator.

I have learned some basic vedic mathematics from a teacher when I was in India and when I showed the easy way of calculating complex numbers to some of my Japanese colleagues, they were astonished virtually. On my last trip to India, some of my colleagues requested to bring vedic mathematics books.

Due to the popularity of Indian mathematics and the English language medium of education, Indian schools have students from other countries including Japan. My daughter is studying in the upper kindergarten. Indian International School in Japan has got trained and qualified teachers.

For more information, please visit the official site of Indian International School in Japan – IISJ Morishita

Revisiting Tokyo Tower on a sunny day with family

There was news that cold wind from Siberia will hit Japan and the mercury will dip further from 14 degree Celsius to 7 degree Celsius suddenly. We could feel the signs of that cold wind from yesterday evening onwards. Today the temperature in Tokyo is 7 degree Celsius. The coming days are going to be chilled ones.

The vendor machines will serve hot coffee and tea along with other hot drinks. Even though the night temperature has come down the day was much clearer than previous days. Morning we got a clear sky. Today, November 3rd is a holiday in Japan. November 3rd is a national holiday in Japan. The holiday is called cultural day or Bunka no hi in Japanese language. Japanese people celebrate bunka no hi as a day for promoting culture and love of freedom and peace. Government institutions will award selected individuals for their contribution and achievement in the cultural field.

Anyway, it is just a holiday for foreigners in Japan. Holidays like this coming in between the weekends are good to plan for an outing with family. Since the day was clear we planned to visit Tokyo tower. It was my third visit to Tokyo tower! We will get a good view of the surroundings from the top of the Tokyo tower on a sunny day.

The best transfer point for us from Higashi Ojima (Toei Shinjuku line) to reach Tokyo tower is Morishita. After getting down at Morishita we need to change to Toei Oedo line that goes to Akabanebashi. I had a bit confusion on the places in Tokyo since some of the names pronounce similar. There is one more place called Akebonobashi in Toei Shinjuku line. The Tokyo tower is near to the Akabanebashi in Toei Oedo line. After the exit, we need to walk 5 minutes to reach Tokyo tower.

When we entered to the complex, we saw a crowd clapping and dancing to the tunes of the singer and performer on the stage in front of the ticket counter. There were food stalls temporarily arranged for the audience. Such street shows are common in Japan and the performers can sell their albums and can reach to more customers.

Since the day was clear we got a good view of Mount Fuji, which I missed on the last two occasions. The night view of Tokyo Tower is also very exciting. Tokyo tower is the tallest steel structure in the world with 333 meters height. The weight is 4000 tons. The Eiffel Tower of Paris is 320 meters high, but has 7000 tons weight. Tokyo tower is made of light weight steel structure but still can handle more shocks and vibrations.

Tokyo tower has many attractions for children and adults like Wax museum, Space Museum, Aquarium and its gallery, Guinness book of world records museum etc to mention a few apart from many gift shops. Gift shops sell miniature structure of Tokyo tower. The Aquarium has many rare varieties of fishes and sea creatures that I could never see before.

In front of the Aquarium ticket counter , which is also place for exit from the aquarium, there are several fish and sea creatures toys, big and small, high price and low price available to attract children. After visiting an exciting place like Aquarium, naturally children will be thrilled to buy toys of creatures whatever they have seen inside. This is one of the interesting marketing techniques I have observed in front of the museums, parks, zoo, historical places, public tourist spots etc. It is good to buy and keep something related to that place to remind our visit to that place. That will make our memories alive.

The ticket to aquarium for an adult is 1000 Yen and for children more than 4 years old, it is 500 Yen. It is worth visiting the aquarium with children. This place will surely boost up their imagination and knowledge about our planet and its creatures. Our children were joyful to play around at the R floor. My daughter had a bagfull of doubts on what she saw in the aquarium on our back home. The shape and variety of sea creatures will surely increase the imaginary inner world of children. This is one of the prime objective of going for outing with children too. Tokyo and surrounding Japan have many such places which is especially useful for children to grow their curiosity. Igniting the curiosity will turn on the hidden interests in children that will drive them to know more.

View of Tokyo tower at night is beautiful. I could not wait on the last two occassions till it become dark to get an illuminated view of Tokyo tower. Since the day is short on winter season, it was already dark at 5:15PM when we came out of the aquarium. We searched for the turkish food stall that was temporarily built on the tower complex. Unfortunately the turkish food stall was closed and they were packing up to leave the place. The stage show was over and the crowd was reduced.

With thousands of lights illuminating the tall steel giant stood proudly with its head high as a symbol of Tokyo and Japan. The wind was cold to shiver us and forced us to reach home faster. The Bunka no hi, the holiday on November 3rd is thus finished with some treasured memoires

Indian and Japanese influence in Indonesian culture and language

Indonesia shares many common things with India, from culture, language, diversity and people’s attitude etc. For me, Indonesia was all about Mustain-san. Our friendship in Tokyo lasted more than one year in Tokyo.

While Mustain-san was in Tokyo, we used to go to Indian restaurants and Indonesian restaurants. Both of us had trouble to cope with local food on all days. Once in a while Japanese food is OK, but for all the days, both of us found it a bit self torturing. We visited Indonesian Surabaya hotel and ‘One coin curry’ and ‘Namaste India’

Indonesian culture is a mix of many cultures. Indonesia was ruled by British, French, Dutch, Portugal and finally Japan. I heard Japan conquered Indonesia to get petroleum products when European and American countries denied petroleum to Japan during Second World War. I may have to do a google search on the events that happened during world war II to know more historical facts.

The news paper I got on the board carried strange news that Western Indonesian state will implement a ban on the tight jeans for ladies. I thought I was entering to a religiously fundamentalist country, but the experiences in Jakarta showed a different picture of Indonesia.

Indonesian language is originated from Sanskrit and is then influenced by Chinese, Malaysian, Portugese, Arabic etc. I could hear many Sanskrit words while talking to Indonesian people. Bahasa is colloquial slang of Bhasha in Sanskrit or any other Indian language meaning ‘Language’. Bhoomi stands for ‘Earth’, Putra for ‘Son’ and Putri for ‘Daughter’, Guna for ‘Quality’. Pura stands for ‘Temple’. These are some of the words I just recollect immediately.

Starting of my own name ‘Jaya’ means success or victory in Sanskrit. Jaya is one of the popular word in Indonesian language used for names as well as for company names.

Indonesian cuisines are influenced by Indian, Chinese, Japanese, Dutch and Arabic cuisines. Indonesian food is tasty with many sea foods. I could taste crab and smoked duck for the first time in Indonesia. Indonesians use coconut milk in almost all curry they prepare. Nasi goreng is fried rice and is a popular Indonesian dish. Prawns and a wide variety of fish dishes are also part of Indonesian food.

Tender coconut water is popular in Indonesia along with other soft drinks. Coconut is called Kelapa in Indonesian language. Indonesian cuisines are rich in their varieties like Indian dishes. Indonesian dishes are spicy and they commonly use red hot chilli. Rice is the main food in Indonesia.

Japan’s influence in Indonesia is still visible after many decades of Japanese invasion of the Indonesian archipelago. All kind of invasions have some sort of aggression and that will reflect in the administration of the invaded geography. For many of the Asian leaders, Japanese occupation was more tolerant than the occupation of the European colonial forces. The influence of Dutch was discarded by Japanese rule in Indonesia, but some forms of influences in the food preparation are still visible.

Bali in Indonesia is a place where Hindus live apart from India and Nepal. Bali is a favorite tourist in Indonesia where the prakriti (nature) and bhoomi (earth) are still in harmony with the Atma (soul). Visit to Bali will be a life experience, which we should not miss while planning a trip to Indonesia.

Indonesian people admire the economical growth of Japan and its technological advancement. They perceive the whole Japan as a high-tech city. Normally Indonesian people are interested to know how Japan could achieve such a high level of growth.

Apa kabar? (How are you?) was the only Indonesian word I was familiar with by buying the Apa kabar international telephone calling card available in Japan. Terima khisi means ‘thank you’ and I said this to the driver who dropped me at Soekarno-Hatta international airport.