Kawagoe Tour

Today is the first time I am actually going to post something that happened that day! I was very kindly escorted on a tour of Kawagoe, a city not far from my own here in Saitama Prefecture. At my welcome party I met Kobayashi-san and Hikaru-san who are both students at my school and chatted to them a lot, late into the evening at the second party (the non-official one). Kobayashi-san lives in Kawagoe and she offered to take Hikaru and I on a tour. We were both keen but schedules were full and I thought it might turn into one of those ideas that never happens. Luckily, Kobayashi was keen and a few weeks ago at school she told me the date for the tour! So this morning she drove over here to Niiza with Hikaru and picked me up and then drove us to Kawagoe. It was really wet and the traffic was bad and I think we got lost a few times but eventually we made it.

Kawagoe is known as Little Edo because many of the buildings in one part of town date from the Edo period. Most of the Ed0 period architecture in Tokyo proper was destroyed either in the Great Kanto Earthquake or subsequently during the Second World War and so Kawagoe is one of the few places one can see buildings from this period. The area was very touristy and despite the rain there were many people wandering from souvenir shop to souvenir shop. The buildings were indeed very old and interesting and there was a big bell tower which at one time would have provided the townsfolk with their only timepiece. We had lunch at a place that specialises in sweet potato, a famous local product. Every dish contained sweet potato! including sweet potato croquets, sweet potato udon gratin, sweet potato miso soup, agedashi sweet potato, sweet potato salad and various other concoctions. Desert was some kind of sweet potato mouse served with a piece of grilled sweet potato on top. It was a very interesting and beautifully presented meal. A big part of travel for Japanese people is sampling the local 名物 (specialty goods). This is great because I find sight-seeing only interests me up to a certain point. Being able to eat something unusual like a smorgasbord of sweet potato definitely adds interest. We later had some sweet potato soft serve ice cream too!

After tramping around the beautiful old buildings in the rain we drove over to visit Kitain, a famous old temple of the Tendai sect. We parked illegally in the temple grounds as the car park was already closed and wandered about the beautiful wet gardens. Everything was closing for the day but I managed to slip into the main temple before it closed completely and have a look. We went into the small, fenced Gohayku-Rakan sculpture garden and looked at the 538 stone statues of disciples of Buddha. By this time the rain was really starting to pour adding to the beauty of the gardens. The temple grounds were also playing host to an installation, a part of the Kawagoe Live Art 2008 art festival, which consisted of numerous white cutouts of children playing. The overall effect was actualy a little creepy in the dark, rainy afternoon light. A bit like those outlines of dead people that they make at murder scenes.

Having concluded our sightseeing tour we returned to the important business of food and drove back to Niiza to eat at a Korean BBQ restaurant. True to Kobayashi-san's word the food was delicious. Meat barbequed over charcoal really is one of the tastiest foods there is. The first dish they ordered, which they had been discussing in the car was liver sashimi. Yes, that is sliced raw liver. I tried it and it wasn't too bad but I just couldn't get the idea that I was eating raw liver out of my head! We also enjoyed intestines and tongue as well as more 'conventional' cuts of meat all of which were supremely delicious. The conversation took an interesting turn when Kobayashi and Hikaru started talking about how much effort one should put into work as compared with the rest of life. I was having a bit of trouble following the Japanese at this point but I'm pretty sure that the balance was decided in the right direction: life first. Luckily I was spared from giving my own opinion! Well stuffed we had complimentary ice-cream and tea and talked about our next adventure - a trip to Chichibu (where I went to the Brainbusters party) appears to be in the offing. I couldn't have asked for kinder or more considerate hosts for my trip to Kawagoe. More than sightseeing and even eating it is meeting nice people like this that makes being here worthwhile.

Here are the photos:

Kawagoe Tour 24 August 2008