Nagano

We all know that Japanese do a lot of bowing, and how deep you bow matters, but also, it seems, Japanese do a lot of pointing. It took me a couple of days to cotton on, but then I started noticing. Train drivers before they pull away from any station look out their front window and point ahead (as if the train had a choice of where to go). Train guards when they pull up at a station, stick their head out their guard’s window and point at the number on the platform to show that they have pulled up at the right place. Platform staff waiting for the train, stand on the platform as the train approaches and point each way along the line. Presumably, this is all about a visual cue to make sure they have checked that everything is clear. However, it is so habitual that they actually point without actually looking. But I suppose doing the right thing is important.

So to today’s imponderable Japanese question. I noticed when I bought a chocolate bar that, instead of being one large bar, each piece of chocolate is individually wrapped in foil. All of these pieces are neatly arranged on a plastic tray. The plastic tray is inserted inside a cardboard packet. The cardboard packet is enclosed in a cellophane wrapper. So there are four levels of packaging for one poor piece of chocolate. So here’s the question. If everything is so well wrapped (and everything is), what the heck are you meant to do with all of the rubbish? Why are there no rubbish bins anywhere? And by anywhere, I mean anyway. Rubbish bins don’t exist on railway platforms, in shopping centres, local parks, national parks, outside convenient stores, anywhere really. Presumably, everybody carries their own rubbish bag and takes it home to put it in the burnable pile. But if you are like us, and out for the day, and we’ve had two coffees and a reasonable lunch, you end up with wet, dripping, coffee cups and sticky plastic wrapping stuck in your bag for the whole of the day. I guess in Japan they figure that if there are no rubbish bins, nobody will litter. In Australia, they figured they better put out rubbish bins to stop people littering.

Took the mid morning train from Kofu, changed trains in Matsumoto, and arrived in Nagano by lunchtime. Our hotel is right next to the train station which means we were much too early to check in, so we cloaked our bags and headed out to walk to the big attraction in the city – the Zenkoji Temple. Shinto has shrines, and Buddhism has temples, so that tells you the flavour of Zenkoji. Didn’t have that one in my memory bank. However the Nagano temple is an unusual beast. It also has solar panels on the roof, and a full size ceramic cow and calf standing in the gardens.

The history of Zenkoji temple started in 642, when Yoshimitsu Honda enshrined a Buddhist image at the present site to protect it from the feudal wars raging around the country. At the time Nagano wasn’t even a town, just a secluded hill in the country, but a town has of course grown up around the temple, culminating in half the world arriving for the Winter Olympic Games in 1998. The main image was completely hidden from the people in 654, and since then no one has ever been allowed to see it, so it’s a long walk to be disappointed.

Other than that, it is a very impressive temple with huge gates, but just to hedge an each way bet, there is also a Shinto Shrine, a museum, fortune tellers, and of course a Starbucks in the grounds.

At the fortune tellers you pay money to select an envelope containing your fortune, and you can choose to know your personal future, your business future, and a few other variations. Of course, nearly all of the fortunes foretell of health, wealth and happiness. People wouldn’t keep buying them if they foretold bad luck, but if you happen to get one that’s not to your liking, you tie the piece of paper to a strategically placed wire line, and leave it all behind.

The whole neighbourhood seems to have been redeveloped for the Olympics. The train station, the long road to the temple, all the shops in the strip, the parks, the restaurants and cafes all seem to be newish with multi-lingual signage and toilets – a giveaway for a tourist strip. Even our hotel has an Olympic plaque outside, so we must be sleeping in the bed of somebody famous. Had dinner at a yakitori restaurant close to the Olympic medal park.

Courtland Hotel, Nagano