Sayonara 747-San

I'd already written about the legacy of the Boeing 747 and what it means to me personally. This time however, a couple of things caught my eye that I found more than a little interesting. The first is the coverage given to the Air France A380 collision at JFK with a Comair (Delta) regional jet. Ground collisions happen all the time but this one marks the first official "accident" involving the massive plane at an airport re-jiggered specifically to make room for the great beast. Lots of investigating will take place regarding taxi clearance, which plane might have been out of position, whether or not the ground controller should have cleared the A380 and so on and so on.

When the 747 came on to the scene JFK and other major airports around the world were caught in a similar quandary and that was how to handle the monster on the ground given the current alignment of taxiways, runways and ramp space at the gates. It wasn't so much the width of the fuselage but the height of the access panels, cargo compartments and passenger doors to say nothing of the huge, nearly 200 foot wing span. Moving all of that on the ground gracefully meant considerable investment in upgraded infrastructure, money most airport and airline managers have long since forgotten about and considered worth every penny.

Here comes the A380 with the same issues all over again and the almost Tonka toy treatment it gave to the hapless commuter plane unfortunate enough to be in the way. Were the preparations and improvements sufficient or is more work needed especially around crunch time with more traffic on the ground than was originally planned? We'll find out soon enough. The other interesting tidbit I discovered, getting back to the 747 itself, is a recent small article announcing the last revenue operation of the 747 by Japan Airlines in February.

Not even the domestic "-SR" version remains in the JAL fleet, simply a flabbergasting revelation. Japan Airlines once owned the largest 747 fleet in the world, at one point operating more of this type than any other aircraft in their system. The great plane represented strength, stability, even status to the lay passenger who appreciated and expected the latest in technology along with maximum comfort. The rest of the world was amazed in the early days that a 747 custom built for short-haul sectors in Japan could regularly carry 500+ passengers on a flight so short as that between Tokyo/Haneda and Osaka/Itami, hardly an hour in the air from start to finish. Others still remember the tragic loss of one such 747 operating JAL #123 on that exact route in August of 1985.

The other great Japanese airline, All Nippon, has also pulled its international models but will retain the domestic 747 fleet for a few more years, until 2015 according to the article I read. My one experience with the 747 on a Japanese carrier was a roundtrip flight on All Nippon between Tokyo/Haneda and Okinawa. Coach service both ways, a light snack on board and nothing special other than simply being on the plane which flew smooth and true in both directions.

The 747 was built for heavy international lifting and specifically for extremely dense markets, plenty of which happened to be within Japan itself. There will be 747s over the skies of this island nation for a few more years but the fact that none will be in the home colors is nothing short of astounding.

Gotta go.

What Did He Say?

I'm old enough to remember when the Godzilla movies were first run in the theaters. Not the first one, mind you, but the later versions that got gleefully campier with each new edition to the franchise. The special effects even then were cheesy beyond reason but at the ripe old age of eight it was all great fun. I may have mentioned previously that I never could figure out how they managed to rebuild Tokyo so quickly after one of the big guy's walks through the center of town.

What made it more palatable to my young ears and certainly to larger audiences of the time was the fact that all of the dialogue was dubbed in English. At the time we kids were too young to care that the words didn't match the movement of the mouth supposedly uttering the dialogue. Nor did we concern ourselves too much with the fact that the American accents were no match for how the language WOULD sound if the Japanese actors had in fact been speaking English in the first place. None of that was the point. Godzilla was the point! Or whatever other foreign film, French, German, Italian, Brazilian, whatever was being watched by whoever was watching it.

I'm older now. And I've traveled a bit. Few things delight me so much as the sound of a language complete different from my own. It matters not that I understand precious little if any of the sounds I am hearing, I simply enjoy the rhythm and cadence of the language in its natural form. The rapid fire, almost hurried staccato delivery of Japanese or the smooth as silk but equally fast sound of French in full voice is part of the fun of being overseas. Why shouldn't it be THE only soundtrack available in a foreign film?

On business recently in Los Angeles I flipped through the channels until I found the NHK Network, the Japanese channel that broadcasts much of its programming in that language. Couldn't understand a word of it but I used to also travel to Japan for business and, now that I live in Texas, rarely if ever hear the language in these here parts! I didn't need or want sub-titles, I just wanted to hear the language. In a foreign film I get distracted if I hear some disconnected language and accent that has nothing to do with the setting of the story. I prefer subtitles!

Don't get me wrong...I enjoy foreign films quite a lot but admit that I need to be in the mood to devote up to two hours in the dark to reading while rapidly shifting my eyes to the action on the screen so I can put the two together. I felt, however, that the experience was richer to watch "Y Tu Mama Tambien" in the original Spanish or "Central Station" in Brazilian Portuguese than waste time wondering if the voice-over talent hailed from the accent neutral environs of Nebraska! Hearing the language simply makes me want to know more about the language, the culture and the country, to go there one day if I haven't already gone and long to go back.

"Das Boot" in German? It flat out would not have had the same impact in its initial release if the U-Boat crews were speaking the Queen's English, I'm sorry.

So, having seen films in Japanese, Mandarin, German, Xhosa, Portuguese and Spanish, are there any good films in Russian or Arabic out there that I should know about?

Gotta go.

Globe Trotting Around the World

I had to go to Hong Kong on business one day and then from there on to India for an exploratory session with the new service team my company had installed at Delhi. Was I up for it, they asked? I kept telling them they didn't need to ask twice much less the first time. And I even sweetened the pot by offering to schedule a longish layover in London on the way back to do a drop-in on our offices there. I was going around the world, from Chicago to Chicago, for the first time in my life. This time the journey itself was the destination.

It would be 747s all the way as the first great bird lifted off the runway for Tokyo. Changing from there to Hong Kong we came down over southern Japan where I noticed a very large and active volcano softly belching white steam in to the atmosphere, a major city built up in every direction around it. The AirMap informed me that this was Kagoshima at the very southern tip of Kyushu Island and a "Sister City" to Miami. Mt. Sakurajima pops off with almost boring regularity, apparently, as evidenced by the densely packed villages all around the island on which it sits in the middle of the bay.

Leaving out of Hong Kong was disappointing in that the service operated in the evening with an arrival in to Delhi along the order of Midnight. Still, I hoped for a moonlit sky that might offer a unique view of Mt. Everest directly on our flight path in to the Indian capital city. No such luck. It fogged up around the mountains to the point that I was hoping the instruments would keep us well abeam the mountain and not heading directly for it. We landed safely in Delhi without further adieu.

Mosquitoes in baggage claim, mosquitoes at the check-in counter a few days later, mosquitoes in the boarding lounge and one or two brave ones actually on the plane sums up the experience at Indira Ghandi International Airport. We closed the door, the flight attendants hit the aisles with bug spray and we launched in to the night sky for London at around 3AM. The captain informed us of our flying route that would deliberately avoid Iraqi airspace, news we all accepted with relief. He went on to explain we would be flying over the heart of Iran instead.

I hoped to sleep all the way to London considering the hour of the night and the eight hours of flying time. I woke some three hours out right over downtown Tehran, noticed how brown absolutely everything was and dozed off for the hop over Turkey and across the Black Sea in to Bulgarian air space and central Europe on a beeline to London Heathrow.

Seven hours on the ground in London and back in the air again I was, now headed home for Chicago on the fifth 747 of the journey. This time there was something spectacular to capture the moment following the view of Mt. Sakurajima in southern Japan. I wish pilots would call out traffic in the area even if it is a competitor's airplane. If I hadn't been seated on the left side of my plane I would have missed this. We were bigger, higher and faster but that just made it perfect to capture the ice floes and bergs all around this magnificent moment in time.

Pan Am used to fly a Round the World Service offering the same flight number in each direction though sometimes there might have been a change of aircraft for scheduling reasons. After Pan Am folded United Airlines tried it a couple of times only to discontinue the service for the last time shortly after September 11, 2001. I was able to make the trip twice, once in each direction before it was all over.

I'd do it all over again tomorrow.

Gotta go.

Miyajima's Meaning

In the course of one day in the Hiroshima Headlands I was to discover a lot more than unfortunate military history. I had wrapped up touring Hiroshima itself and had the rest of the afternoon to explore the waters around this infamous Japanese city. Starting off from the local pier under blue azure skies, the mountains rose green and forested from the deep blue waters themselves. It amazed me to see how the water still remained blue in tone despite the hive of industrial activity all around the area.

Kure, Japan was not too far away, where much Japanese commercial and military shipping was and still is built and maintained. Mazda was and remains headquartered in the area while the Japanese Naval Academy, Etajima, still operates from the storied island at the center of the bay.

Car carriers floated benignly in the deep waters as my ferry carried us away from Hiroshima Harbour, instantly and easily evoking the thoughts of what the full might of the Imperial Japanese Navy aircraft carriers that once sailed these waters must have looked like to locals and tourists alike, imposing, towering above the waves, bristling with firepower, majestic and intimidating to one and all alike. Maybe 20 minutes later our little boat pulled in to the harbor of Miyajima Island, my last and final destination of the day.

The first thing to greet tourists alighting from the mainland is a herd of miniature deer. Sort of domesticated ambassadors to the island, they come up placidly looking for hand outs and patiently enduring children on their backs as adoring parents angle for cute pictures to take back home. If the deer had any ticks no one seemed overly concerned. When they saw there was no hand out action from me the moved on and I made my way towards the UNESCO World Heritage site that is the Itsukushima Shrine.

At first I didn't even know this classic Japanese landmark was in the same area. After finishing my tour of Hiroshima I stumbled across a brochure of tours around the harbor that included Miyajima and the shrine. Sold. And when I got there, breathtaking.

The shrine itself is not the draw, as important as it is to the Shinto faithful. The complex is a cluster of traditional Japanese wooden architecture with pathways and bridges connecting buildings and meditative gardens filled with lilies and ponds of Japanese carp to each other, blending beautifully and aesthetically in to the mountain finery behind it. All standard issue minimalist beauty but the catch in the throat, "Oh my God" moment comes in seeing the Torii Gate standing to the west in the waters just off shore.

Other than Mt. Fuji itself very few landmarks, natural or manmade are as instantly identifiable with Japan as the "Torii" gate marking the presence of a Shinto shrine and symbolizing the transition between sacred and common ground. This massive example has existed in various forms since 1168 with the current iteration being built in 1875. It is made of wood from the evergreen camphor tree, painted an orange-red honoring the rising sun and standing about 200 meters off shore. With the entire complex built in an island alcove the only approach to the shrine was by sea, making the location of the gate at the mouth of the small bay perfectly logical as well as characteristically stunning in aesthetic beauty and setting.

When the tide is low it can be walked to where locals insert coins in the cracks of the trunks for good luck. Otherwise it seems merely to float upon the active waters squeezed between Miyajima and the nearby "mainland" of Honshu. Sailors to this day pray as their ships passed for good fortune while the faithful come to the island offering devotions to the three daughters of Susano-O, the Japanese God of Storms and the Sea. Makes sense to a nation still dependent upon good weather and calm seas for much of its livelihood.

Outlanders like me come to meekly attempt a feeling of the very essence of a proud and deeply spiritual culture while trying to capture that one quintessential picture image before the day is done. Standing over 50 feet high from its base, this gate, the blue sea and the high green mountains all around combine in a singular way to say that this is the heart, the soul of the real Japan. Shinto or not in individual faith, few ever leave this shrine without feeling the spirit buoyed and uplifted as serenely as the upward curve of the gate itself.

I have yet to feel more in tune with the core meaning of Japan.

Gotta go.

The Peace Museum of Hiroshima

Honestly, if walking through the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park is particularly disturbing then you will not be ready for the actual Peace Museum just to the south. You've come this far, however, so go all the way but steel yourself well before going inside.

The museum, a flat slab of a building suspended two stories above a huge expanse of undeveloped land is where artifacts and recreations from the first atomic bomb attack are kept along with models of the city before and after the attack. I don't know if this was the intent but the barren expanse to me evoked what it looked like after the attack, pebbled rubble and pulverized stone. Where the grounds were barren, after paying a nominal entrance fee and heading up to the exhibit level was going in to the throat of hell itself.

Decorum and sheer awe prevented all but the most desensitized individuals from taking pictures of every little thing on display. There were two three-dimensional recreations of the city at the time, the "Before" and the "After." Where the "Before" showed a densely built and thickly populated metropolis like any other would be in the country, the "After" grabs the throat and tightens its grip with each second of staring. The first thought in my mind was to get oriented to where I was standing in relation to the map, to find the "T-Bridge" that was the target of the bomb.

That was easy, really, since it was right under the huge red ball suspended in the air above the city, the relative position of the bomb when it exploded. Maybe a dozen large structures are seen at ground level, the only ones to survive the blast. All else is a street grid of incineration in every direction. Eighty thousand died instantly and nearly double that over the course of time from the direct after effects. Things were only just beginning.

Brooding darkly in a corner and above the visitors is a full scale replica of "Little Boy," the atomic bomb delivered by the B-29 "Enola Gay" that fateful morning. It is primitive compared to the sleek, needle nosed warheads of today, looking as if Lego had designed a kit for a six year old but without a doubt the most sinister thing in the room. The next few exhibits depicted the results of "the little gadget."

One was a set of concrete steps that flashed white from the blast. In the center of the top step was the shadowed outline of a human bottom, marking the spot where a woman sat waiting to hear from her daughter when the bomb went off and incinerating her. A display case contained a wrist watch with the hands frozen at 8:15AM, the moment the bomb exploded over the city. Near to that some glass panels that did not shattered were nonetheless covered with long, thin vertical streaks of what looked like black soot.

It was rain. "Black rain" created from the pressure effects of the mushroom cloud over the city that included rain water and the soot and ash from the destruction sucked up in to the boiling cloud. Even with that it was hard to tell if the photos or the recreated models were the worse to look at. One famous photo shows the back of a women with the pattern of her dressed burned in to her flesh. A model showed a young mother with children walking the streets, hair off to one side, flesh melting off her forearm and fingers in droplets on to the ground beneath her exposed feet.

They had no idea what was coming or what had hit them. Winds up to 1000 miles per hour were recorded along with a blast temperature exceeding one million degrees Celsius. Communications to Tokyo were cut, what help was available was slow in coming. Leukemia slowly killed thousands of survivors over the years after while physical disfigurement and emotional scars took care of the rest.

I will not use this forum to debate whether Hiroshima or Nagasaki should have been attacked in such fashion. I will say that it is impossible to come away from such images of destruction and not ask why it had to happen in the first place.

No man or country is weak for wanting peace. Neither are they absolved if they have engaged in wrong-doing.

Gotta go.

The Hiroshima Memorial Peace Park

This part of Hiroshima was once where the upper class lived. It was the center of a thriving city at the northeastern headwaters of the Inland "Seto" Sea; everybody who was or wanted to be anybody in pre-war Hiroshima society lived, worked and shopped here. To most of Western Civilization Hiroshima did not even exist before that fateful day in August of 1945. It's been around since the late 1500s, first as the stronghold of a regional warlord who built for himself the Hiroshima Castle at the center of town. After the Shogun and Imperial periods and the switch to heavy industry, Hiroshima found itself to be a densely packed and buzzing urban metropolis of roughly 350,000 people.

I stepped off the T-Bridge crossing the Ota River and on to the first contemporary "Ground Zero," an island at the Ota River Delta with the Inland Sea just to the south. The clang of the streetcars behind me seemed to dim by half while the birds themselves hushed in favor of a slight breeze whistling through the trees around me. As any tourist would I looked up in to the blue sky above and tried to imagine what a resident might have thought had they seen the formation of three B-29s high overhead with no fighter escort and, more ominously, no fighter protection racing to meet them. Few in the immediate area lived to describe the sound of the explosion some 1500 feet above at 8:15am so for me, the dead calm teleported the senses to that morning of August 6th.

It would have been rush hour; crowded streets, clanging trolleys, lots of bicycles; few cars since by then what little oil made it to Japan was largely reserved for defense and government ministries. It would have been hot and sticky as any Japanese late summer day would be. It was definitely crowded as people started their day weaving in and around each other and through the city itself, some 90% of which was made of wood.

Hiroshima was first on the list as an alternate in part because the weather was supposed to be perfect for "delivering the device." The intended target city was Kyoto but heated debate in the U.S. government saved the cultural capital of the country. Despite a leaflet and broadcast campaign prior to the attack the people of Hiroshima never knew what was coming. Other Japanese cities were bombed with regularity; Hiroshima was to be left untouched, the better to measure the effects of the bomb.

As I walked through the Hiroshima Memorial Peace Park, fashioned from the wasteland created by the attack, new grass, young trees and landscaped grounds were on all sides.

In nearly every nook, crook and cranny was a memorial. This one was for the minority Koreans who would have lived had their country not been brutally colonized and cheap labor imported for menial work on the Japanese home islands. Another one, the center of great ceremony every August, is the Memorial Cenotaph which contains the names of all identified victims of the attack. A mound nearby contains their collected ashes, all 70,000 of them. That one over there, at the entrance to the park, featured a "Peace Bell" which visitors are encouraged to ring with feeling for an end to all wars. The "Industrial Promotion Hall" is across the river but it is easily still the centerpiece of the park, it's skeletal dome still standing and looking as it did the day of the attack.

While the "A-Bomb Dome" draws the tourists in, the Children's Peace Memorial leaves one and all flat cold. Sadako Sasaki contracted leukemia as an after effect of the bomb. Swearing she could beat the disease through faith and hard work, she pledged to fashion 1,000 paper cranes by hand in offering to the gods who would grant her wish to be cured.

The story goes that she only made it to Number 644 and thus inspired all Japanese children since to make paper cranes in her honor and place them at the memorial in Hiroshima. This memorial is never without small children visiting and paper cranes laid all around.

Little Sadako is at the top, her arms flung wide as if launching the crane above her to the heavens.

Gotta go.

Hailing Hiroshima

I was staying over the weekend in Japan while on an extended business trip in the capital city and decided it was a golden opportunity to explore a different part of the country outside of Tokyo. Many in the office recommended Kyoto, an easy day trip by train just south of Osaka while others suggested Mt. Fuji if the weather was good. There was really only one choice for me, however, and that was Hiroshima.

Leaving out of Tokyo Haneda the domestic flight took about an hour and fifteen minutes, maybe as far as between Chicago and Omaha and in the same general southwesterly direction. Upon landing a shuttle bus took me downtown and dropped me off not far from my destination, the "Peace Memorial Park" at the heart of the city.

My first impression of the city was amazement as it was completely built up and clean, looking for all the world as if nothing spectacular had ever happened here in the first place. I truly did not know what to expect over 50 years after the attack, wondering if some parts of the city remained a smoldering ruin with people still digging out after all this time.

I found nothing of the kind but instead a large, vibrant metropolitan area of nearly three million people. I had heard, however, of news reports about cancer rates in the area that are still higher than the national average and wondered about the very air itself, looking up to the sky and walking in circles as if trying to see the top of a skyscraper deep in a canyon of steel and concrete. My insides didn't tingle and I heard no buzzing sound in the air as if a swarm of locusts had passed by. I felt fine and the sky was blue and beautiful.

I set off for the most famous bridge in the world that few can remember the name of, The Aioi Bridge, a unique, T-shaped bridge spanning the Ota River and linking both banks to an island in the center and immediately to the south. This was the aiming point for the "Little Boy" device that at 8:15AM would wipe out nearly 80,000 people quite literally in a flash. Of the many cruel ironies I was to discover this day, the bridge lay just to the south of the Genbaku baseball stadium, home field of the Hiroshima Carp (Goldfish).

The bridge today is wide with six lanes of traffic, pedestrian sidewalks and tracks for several tram lines. Not only did it mark the center of town but from the air it was easy to see by the spotter. Standing on this bridge it was equally easy to imagine a similar scene on August 6th, 1945, with people going about their daily business, doubtlessly aware of the stressful situation their country was in but equally unaware of what was flying towards them from the south at high altitude.

It all made sense to me right then and there. Standing on that bridge, I finally understood in living color the culmination of The "Pacific Island Hopping" campaign of the Second World War, starting with the Philippines, the Marianas, Iwo Jima and finally Okinawa; it all came together in one long, bloody but logical sequence. As tragic as the atomic deployments were, this day in this city was the result of so much prior sacrifice.

The Philippines was a political move to appease MacArthur but also did much to cut off Japan's supply of oil and raw materials from the Dutch East Indies (Indonesia and Borneo). The Marianas Islands, Guam, Tinian and Saipan, were taken to neutralize Japanese strength in the Mid-Pacific and also because they were within range of Japan for American long-range bombers. Iwo Jima was (and still is) considered a part of Tokyo, some 600 miles to the north and lay directly under the flight path from the Tinian Airfield which until secured was used by Japanese air defenses to pick off bombers heading to the home islands. Finally, the Battle of Okinawa proved to many American planners that invading Japan would cost far more lives on both sides than a couple of experimental nuclear warheads which might also serve to end the war a lot faster than a conventional ground assault.

So they hoped. A streetcar clanged merrily behind me as I looked up to the sky, searching for three B-29s flying high in formation above the city. They weren't there so I cast my gaze down to the island lying to the south of me about 100 meters away. To my left I saw the shell of a large building that survived the blast, still standing, the lattice-work support of its dome mimicking a skeleton exposed under flesh incinerated from the very bones.

I walked down the stem of the T-bridge to start my tour as an American. I was heading towards a completely new, universal and unimaginable reality.

Gotta go.

Magnum Soapus

"Soap is soap, as long as it's cheap and you're clean" say the masses and this is the very statement that has kept Ivory in business for 125 years. My family staple has always been Dial, the preferred brand of my mother but others have snuck in to the rotation from time to time. I don't recall resisting bath time too much growing up, any more than I gave Mom a hard time over dinner as long as she didn't serve lima beans or liver. It was a particular delight to soak in a tub of hot water and absorb the different fragrances in to my skin.

I love soap. Don't ask me why, I just do. My earliest fascination was reading about the legend of the Titanic and the level of service provided on this magnificent ship during her fateful maiden voyage. The article highlighted Vinolia Otto Toilet Soap as being exclusively offered to First Class passengers. I wasn't thinking whether or not soap of any kind was offered to Second or Third Class on the boat - I only knew that from the picture it bore a resemblance to the rounded oval I was using at the time by the makers of Vel. My left-brained imagination simply allowed that I was using the same product.

In my professional life I have worked as a day laborer moving furniture, fast food and field sales, jobs where the end of the day can't get there fast enough for the chance to unwind under some water and lather the day's troubles away. On those days when I was particularly grimy from dirt, grease, soot or had really stunk up the joint there was nothing I wanted more than a long, cleansing shower and a full bar of soap of which half would be used before I finally felt human again. During cold weather I'd come home with frozen feet, ice in my goatee, numb skin and tingling fingers, all wrapped in two to three layers clothing and socks that were equally soaked through. Oi, the sounds of ecstasy that came from my shower on those days....

While traveling around the world there came a natural curiosity with what kinds of toiletries were used in other countries. As a child growing up in Germany "Fa" was a sentimental old favorite and I also came to enjoy Yardley's Oatmeal and Almond. From Italy comes the Alchimia Soap line which features natural ingredients infused with essences of rich florals such as Hydrangea, Cornflower and Tuber Rose. I don't bathe with those so much as use them for air fresheners in clothing drawers and for the car.

Friends in New Zealand think I'm mental because I have been known to ship home boxes of Knight's Castille as a durable every day soap over the domestic brands. They remain equally as perplexed when I said that soap from a different country serves me like food in reminding me of good times from another corner of the world.

I felt that I had hit the jackpot when I discovered Roger & Gallet's Oat Milk from France but that was before I went to Japan and was introduced to Kao White. Kao is as every day in Japan as Dial is the United States but I have never come across another bar of soap that seemingly lathers at the mere suggestion of water. Thick, billowing clouds of the stuff all around me with a mild fragrance that lingers long in to the day. The fastidious Japanese are known for multiple soap and rinse cycles in their daily toilet and with Kao at their ready disposal I can easily understand why.

Imagine my delight when in Paris I discovered the high end toiletry counter where "triple French milled" really meant something. Oh my God. I didn't know where to begin but I knew where I would end up once I saw those prices; hey, clearance merchandise in Paris still beats off the shelf back home! I wonder what they use in Russia.

I'll spare you the discovery of liquid body wash but I've often wondered what happened to Vinolia Soap from the Titanic? It is still made and sold in the United Kingdom today. Hmmmmm....

Gotta go.

Oh No, Godzilla!

The great 747 lifted in to the air from Chicago O'Hare, pulled an S-turn over downtown as if in salute to the hometown before pointing its nose to the northwest on a direct track to Tokyo, Japan. There was no more excited passenger on that airplane than myself, guaranteed. The First Class cabin was virtually empty save for myself, my traveling companion and maybe two others but the reason for my barely contained delight was the fact that this was my first trip ever to Japan. Land of the Rising Sun, nothing - in 12 short hours I was about to set foot in the Land of the Monsters!

When I was coming up Godzilla was a camp superhero, a man in a lizard suit doing a Samurai Samba through a miniaturized recreation of Tokyo in a studio back lot. My ability to suspend all belief, however, was such that I could never figure out how they managed to rebuild Tokyo so darned fast only to have the great lizard wipe the floor all over again with Monster X, Rodan, King Ghidorah, Mothra and the rest of the gang.

How did Gamera the prehistoric turtle never get dizzy from flying in circles with the four leg openings serving as both propulsion units and exhaust ports? Didn't matter. Nothing thrilled me to the Nth degree like seeing Godzilla light up the landscape and night sky with a brilliant electric blue blast of nuclear halitosis.

I loved Godzilla. I was scared to death of Gargantua, a far more sinister creature from the deep, just as big, just as compelling but intent on human consumption instead of a playful, fire-breathing jig through the Ginza. Consumed in a fight with his more agreeable brother in the caldera of a (conveniently) new volcano, it would be years after this film before I could even look at a map of Japan and not instantly shiver and avert my eyes.

The coastline of Japan crept over the horizon announcing the end of our journey and the real beginning of my anticipation. A green patchwork of farms and golf courses spread beneath us as we crossed the beach on final approach in to Narita. The countryside looked exactly as I had remembered it from the films, a sense of compactness from the small, tightly packed houses and winding roads that enhanced both the scale of this first trip and the unimaginable size of the big guy himself.

As a full grown man I knew that monsters never existed, at least none like the contract players from Toho Studios. I was here to take care of the company's business and be sharp about it. The main gear bumped, the nose gear thudded and the reverse thrust of the engines roared our welcome to Japan. It was a beautiful Spring afternoon outside and I couldn't wait to make that all important first impression upon my Japanese hosts.

Just one last check out the window before deplaning to make sure there weren't any visible T-Rex tracks on the ground, though.

Gotta go.

Tsukiji, Tokyo

Tokyo used to be the largest city in the world. There is no denying upon first sight that the place defies both logic and the imagination. An ancient capital festooned with one-way streets to confuse the emperor's enemies, a third of it was destroyed in the war but to them the logical thing to do was to rebuild it exactly as it was before. There is no zoning in the city so it is not at all unusual to see a single-family home made of wood and cross beams directly across the street from some of the tallest office towers in the country.

What Tokyo does have is the largest wholesale fish market in the world and that is "Tsukiji (Skee-gee)." Under one massive room comes marine life from across the planet in volumes to provide some 95% of the seafood enjoyed by the nearly 13 million good people of Greater Tokyo. It's not for early riser or the squeamish and is certainly not a tourist attraction in any way, shape or form but it is tolerant of the curious who respect the rules and rhythm of the place, mainly to not touch the products and absolutely to stay out of the way of the trading.

The liveliest action is when the tuna catch arrives between 1AM and four in the morning. Massive flash-frozen carcasses are carted hither and yon to bidding rooms where the callers put any auctioneer in Britain or New York to complete shame. The Japanese language is tricky enough, usually spoken at a rapid and staccato clip but speed that up by a factor of 20 and throw in fish jargon on top of that? Oi.
After the buzz and sing-song of the tuna auction though there remains more than a million varieties of aquatic life to ogle, gag and gawk over. Most of the stalls are family owned and typically staffed by a husband-wife team, he doing the legwork and cleaning while she manages the till and keeps the books.

As can be expected many are handed down through the generations so there seems hardly a shortage of young and older sons learning the trade and, of course, doing the harder chores while the old man teaches and protects from the shadier traders on the floor.

The amount and variety of seafood passing through on a daily basis is beyond normal comprehension. Some are frozen, others are gutted on the spot while more than a few types are kept alive for transport to the display tanks of restaurants and retail markets around the city. It seems of all the varieties of squid in the ocean only the giant and the Humboldt squids are not served at the Japanese dinner table - seemingly every other type was there, waiting for the ginger and wasabi. As can be expected there are more than a few sushi bars and restaurants lining the road to the market where the freshest of the fresh can be sampled "day of catch."

All ya gotta do is get up at the crack of or before dawn, find your way to the "Hibiya" metro line and wear clothes that can be destroyed as soon as you leave the place. The smell of fish, fish guts and oils gets in to everything and everyone on the subway, in the streets and back at the hotel will smell you coming just as you can smell the market long before it comes in to view.

By all means stay out of the way. If you don't speak Japanese bring someone who does or at least has been before. They don't have time to deal with tourists and while they tolerate visitors are not there for your amusement or to serve as some kind of information counter. Whether or not you ever eat another piece of fish after that is entirely up to you!

Gotta go.

Vacation Rhythm

In Japan there are three major domestic holiday periods that significantly set the rhythm of the nation: New Years', "Golden Week" in early May and the month of August.

Japanese culture reveres the first sunrise of the new year as an omen for prosperity so the entire country picks a favorite hilltop or other vantage point to park themselves before dawn to watch the (Land of the Rising) Sun come up. Unlike their European brethren who simply take August to bake on the beaches of Florida, Spain, Greece and Northern Africa, the Japanese celebrate "O-bon," the Buddhist festival of paying respects to the ancestors. All flights and trains are booked solid and the highways are bumper to bumper as the entire nation picks up as a single body and sorts itself out at familial places of birth across every inch of the island country.

"Golden Week" includes holidays on May 3rd, 4th and 5th as well as April 29th should any given year dial up that date in the same calendar week. This one week celebrates everything from Hirohito's birthday to the promulgation of their post-war constitution. Of the three, this one is "at your leisure" meaning they are not hide bound to climb a mountain or go "down home" to fix up the family graveyards; they're free to travel wherever their means and desires carry them.

These are the moments when all of Japan is "out of the office." I learned of this rhythm, which also includes skewing most national holidays to a "Happy Monday" schedule, while traveling there on business and it caused me to reflect on the rhythm of my own country and in particular when I personally like to be "out of the office."

The major holiday season for the United States is largely considered to begin in September over the Labor Day weekend, ironically right around the beginning of the school year. The kids are back in school and "Opening Weekend" for the National Football League is more on the minds of Americans than the reason behind the holiday, even among the workers it is intended to honor. After that each holiday is fairly evenly spaced from one to the next, including the non-official "holiday" of Halloween but all are merely opening acts to Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Corporations start wrapping up next year's budget, major projects typically get tabled until January and people start to think towards travel, turkey and (snow) tires. This is the season that I like to schedule my own major vacations. Where some like to take time off early in the year in way that extends the holidays from the previous year, by January I'm ready mentally to get back to work and set up the bulk of the year for professional achievement and success. By the end of the year I like to look back, reflect on accomplishments, focus on missed opportunities and celebrate a lot of hard work with a good long paid leave of absence, preferably overseas.

Over my history I traveled to Greece in November and experienced Australia, Egypt, Israel and New Zealand in October. Not only did I spend all year looking forward to these wonderful opportunities but I learned to appreciate carefully planned shoulder- and low-season travel savings as well! The one major exception to that pattern was visiting Thailand in July (also low season) but that was entirely because I was a retail store manager; nobody in retail has a life of their own from October to January which was a Top Five reason for me quitting that industry.

I'll get a little bit more in to what I actually consider a vacation and the types of vacations I like to take a bit later. Let's just say that I enjoy good weather, limited crowds and a good bargain!
Now if only the U.S. would guarantee three-day weekends for its major holidays. Happy Friday, y'all!

Gotta go!

The Subway Zombies of Tokyo

My first day in Tokyo on business found me nervous about trying to remember the basics of making a good impression in Japan. Co-workers who had been before showed me how to purchase the correct joint ticket for our connecting journey using the two independent operators of the massive Tokyo Metro system. What my colleagues failed to inform me of as part of the experience was the show that was about to begin as soon as the train left the station.

The Suitengumae subway station is directly below our hotel, the Royal Park which featured a cross-walk connecting it to the Tokyo City Air Terminal. From there we transferred at Jimbocho for the rest of our trip to Kasuga where our offices were, a few blocks north of the Tokyo Dome, home of the Giants baseball club. As the train pulled out a stream of passengers began shuffling single file thru the car, making their way deeper in to the belly of the snake slithering beneath the teeming city above.

At first I was confused. There was plenty of open seating and hand grips yet they marched steadily onward. Subway Zombies. I then wondered if they didn’t want to sit next to the “gaikokujin” (foreigner) or worse, if my three scrubbings in the shower that morning was one scrubbing short for the famously fastidious Japanese.

We slowly learned that each train stops at precisely the same location at every station, all of which are served by several access points to the street above. Instead of fighting thru crowded platforms to the car closest to their preferred exit they peacefully, robotically walked the length of the open-ended train while in transit.

No one pushed or shoved. Indeed, on our routing we did not see any of the famous platform “Pushers” who intimately squeeze more riders on board before the doors closed. Once they reached their preferred car each zombie would peel off in stride, stepping out of the way for the others to wordlessly continue unabated. Those already set knew to keep the center clear so the Zombies could find their place as we wound our way across town. Polite, respectful, efficient. Sleepy.

We never made being a Subway Zombie work for us but the show wasn’t over yet. Tokyo revealed a whole new kind of endless commute which included some riders needing two subways, two trains, some buses and three hours each way to get to and from work.

Back at Suitengumae on the way home, bleary eyed riders would wake up, look around and realize that they had slept thru their connecting station somewhere back up the line. As we made our way up stairs and elevators to the sanctuary of our rooms, the Subway Zombies of Tokyo sighed their weary sighs below, trudged across the platform to the next train heading in the other direction, took a seat and, hoping for better timing, promptly fell asleep again.

Gotta go!

The Optimist Bucket List - Item 2

In the first installment of my own personal “Bucket List” I mentioned the desire to travel with the presidential entourage on Air Force One. Also, that in creating this list of ten achievements I devised a validity test of at least three of five attributes that each quest must satisfy. In the second of the ten items on my list I would like to witness the discovery of the "Kido Butai," the Japanese fighting force of six aircraft carriers of the "Combined Fleet" that attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7th, 1941.

The story of Pearl Harbor and the outcome of the Second World War has been told and in many ways is still unfolding. The hole left in this story, however, is why no effort has been made to find these historical vessels. Their combined and individual exploits under the Imperial Chrysanthemum shown above have likewise been well documented; what is not documented is exactly where each vessel rests.

Why not?

A National Geographic documentary highlighting the discovery of the USS "Yorktown" included two Japanese survivors of the Battle of Midway who were on board in case “Kaga,” their home carrier was also discovered. I remember most chillingly from the video that a 30,000 ton aircraft carrier would look like a single grain of rice on the radar screen from three miles down! "Kaga" was not found but the emotions felt by these gentlemen once again sailing on the waters of battle were palpable.

It occurred to me from this documentary and also thru time spent in Japan that this is a people deeply in touch with their ancestors and strongly desirous in seeking to ensure those forebears are able to rest peacefully. Four of the six were infamously lost in one day while the last was sunk nearly a year before the final end of the war.

"Akagi," lost at the Battle of Midway by dive bombers, June 4, 1942. 267 men lost
"Kaga," lost at the Battle of Midway by dive bombers, June 4, 1942. 811 men lost.
"Soryu," lost at the Battle of Midway by dive bombers, June 4, 1942. 711 men lost.
"Hiryu," lost at the Battle of Midway by dive bombers, June 4, 1942. 392 men lost.
"Shokaku," lost at the Battle of the Philippine Sea by submarine attack, June 19, 1944. 1, 272 men lost.
"Zuikaku," lost at the Battle of Cape Enganao by torpedoes and bombs, October 25, 1944. 843 men lost.

The "Titanic," "Bismarck" and "Yorktown" were each found and by the same man leading the way, Dr. Robert Ballard. Surely the families of nearly 4,300 men deserve similar closure over 65 years later?

Gotta go.