Leaving Joetsu-Myoko station on the shinkansen (bullet train), I’m treated to an early winter scene: the lush autumnal mountains which pent in Joetsu, are powdered with snow.
Before meeting up with friends in Tokyo for a few days, I took up the offer of a friend of mine I know through aikido, Mariko-san, to visit Kawagoe, in Saitama Prefecture, an hour or so north of the capital.
The shinkansen ticket to Omiya Station from Joetsu set me back 8000, which considering that prices remain static, regardless of whether one buys in advance online or not, is a fair price to pay- particularly given the space one is afforded- with my little legs, and sat upright, I can just about touch the seat in front- God only knows what first class is like…
Upon leaving the terminus, I fall to my knees, and kiss the ground (because it’s so God damn clean, and slightly lemon zesty in Japan), and scream:
CIVILISATION! SWEET CIVILISATION!
A department store towers over me, a new McDonalds with edgy furniture gleams with a globalised shimmer, and there are more people than I’ve scene in one place for months…
As much as I claim to ‘love nature’, truly, I’m a city boy at heart that loves being able to walk to 567 different kinds of coffee house within a mile.
Omiya Station is vast, with 22 platforms- if you look closely, you can see the concrete lungs of the city exhaling and inhaling.
It’s around 30 minutes on a local train to Kawagoe- I stand by the window as the train rattles along- under crisp blue skies (a strange, and yet omnipresent feature of my blogs) great swathes of rice paddies sweep off towards the Japanese Alps in the distance.
I’m excited. This is what the JET programme is all about- international exchanges!
As luck would have it, me and Mariko-san bump into one another on our way to the exit- from here we walk for five minutes to a nearby department store, where we take the elevator to the seventh floor-
‘It’s one of my favourites,’ she explains, ‘So I made us a reservation!’
I have a tonkatsu, breaded pork and rice, with miso soup, which, she kindly pays for.
Kawagoe centre is about 10 minutes in the car, and as we drive down the main boulevard, I’m treat to an Edo-era boulevard lined with black clay rooves with their curling eaves.
Our first stop is the Kawagoe Festival Museum, which if you’re in the area, is worth a visit, at a mere 300円- it even has an English pamphlet!
Snaking down a corridor that explains the history of the city’s festival floats, we emerge in a vaulted room, where two 15ft-20ft floats stand behind a pair of glass cages, which are rotated in and out of the full inventory of floats which stands at a whopping 29…
’29…for all of the prefecture?’ I asked the English volunteer guide.
He laughed.
‘No! 29 for Kawagoe!’
The festival takes place on the third Saturday and Sunday of October each year– it’s been running for about 370 years and many of the Edo-era floats are over 150 years old, and pulled by hundreds of locals.
If you’re visiting Tokyo then, it looks absolutely worthwhile!
Reeling over the scale of the floats, we wander around the backstreets, before coming across a rather splendid knife shop.
‘I come here every time in Kawagoe,’ explains Mariko-san, ‘It’s very expensive for me!’
If you only visit the Knife Shop MACHIKAN, your trip would still be worthwhile- this old black, clay brick building has been in Kawagoe sinc 1893, though the business itself began in 1842.
‘…he strove to master the knife technologyby putting razors and grindstones near his pillow every night. After long standing efforts, he discovered the the secrets of making high quality knives. Within several years, his excellent knives became known far and wide.’
The shop itself has single paned glass, placed between small, dark wooden frames- inside, is a square counter, surrounded on all four sides by warped, aged class with katanas and every manner of knife, as one might expect- I wasn’t allowed to take a picture inside, so the outside will have to suffice!
And man, oh man, are those bad boys sharp- Mariko-san asked the owner if I could try cutting a Japanese horseradish with a blade-…I’m suprised I did’t slice a hole in the space-time continuum.
Kawagoe’s landmark is Toki-no-kane, a bell tower that has been rebuilt several times since it’s initial construction in the 1600s.
Our final stop for the day is Kitain Temple, a 10 minute drive from Kawagoe’s main street, which has a history dating back to 830 A.D. .
I had a brilliant day with the incredibly lethal, Mariko-san who I look forward to seeing on the mat sometime in the near future!
Japan and Me 