72 hours in Japan

Tokyo

The present capital of Japan is a palimpsest of old and new; travellers with time on their side could spend days on end exploring. But, if you have just a few hours to spare and are travelling with shopaholics, hyperactive kids or foodies, the seaport district of Odaiba, a man-made island in the Tokyo Bay, has much to offer. Before you get caught up in a frenzy of shopping or eating, look out for the Statue of Liberty, whose origin can be traced back to ‘The French Year of Japan’ 1998-99. We shop till we’re all out of yen and satisfy our sushi cravings at a sushi-go-round called Yoshimarusuisan, on the sixth floor of Aqua City. It’s only after a loopy ride on a driverless train to get a closer look of the Rainbow Bridge (which some locals think ought to have had a Japanese name), that we’re ready to call it it a night, albeit reluctantly. All the sights and sounds we missed are bound to haunt us until we visit again.
 

Kyoto
In the valley nightingales are singing, and under the edge of eaves plum blossoms are beginning to flower—this verse accompanies my fortune, which is “Good” according to Written Oracle No.31, that a slot machine popped out for me, at Kiyomizu-dera, a Buddhist temple complex in Eastern Kyoto. If only we had visited the temple before our trip to Gion this morning; perhaps we’d have met some real geiko (Gion’s word for geisha), instead of tourists masquerading as geisha. At the Jishu Jinja shrine, I stop to watch a group of school kids try to navigate their way between two stones placed 20 feet apart with their eyes closed, in the hope that they will find true love. This leaves no time to catch and drink from the three channels of water, pouring down the Otowa-no-taki waterfall, that promise health, long life and success. Our last stop before we board Nozomi 29, one of the fastest trains on the Tokaido Shinkansen to Hiroshima, is Kinkaku-ji (Temple of the Golden Pavilion) which survived years of earthquakes only to be burnt down by a troubled monk in 1950.
 

Hiroshima
Hiroshima appears to have made peace with its past and is determined to convince the world to steer clear of war. As we walk through the Peace Memorial Museum and Park before heading to the A-bomb Dome, left in memory of the devastation that a nuclear weapon can cause, we are awed by the resilience and dignity of
the Japanese.
Dinner is pure bliss. It features Hiroshima’s okonomiyaki, “cook it how you like it”, a pancake of sorts delicately layered with egg, chopped vegetables, meat and seafood, accompanied by a sweet and savoury sauce; this is our first taste of authentic Japan. Wait a minute, that’s not quite true I forgot about the sumptuous gyoza we had in Gion during our post-dinner wanderings. Stuffed as we are, we can’t help but order sea urchin, just in case we don’t make it to Tsukiji in Tokyo. Needless to say, it’s delicious.
As the door of a restaurant across the road swivels open we catch a glimpse of a beautiful white wedding dress bidding her guests farewell. It seems the Japanese are pretty liberal when it comes to faith–they follow the Shinto birth rituals, the Catholic wedding rites (if only so that the bride can wear a beautiful white gown) and the Buddhist burial rites (if only because the Shinto beliefs don’t accommodate life after death).
A street car rolls past, heading in the opposite direction. As tempting as it is to to hop on, we decide to just go as far as our legs can carry us, which is back to the hotel where we’ll be spending the night.
As we take the ferry to Miyajima the next morning, catch a glimpse of a torii (gate) regarded as one of the nihon sankei (three great views of Japan). Apparently, when the tide is out you can actually walk through this gate to Itsukushima, the Shinto Shrine built over the water during the 12th century. No burials are permitted on this island, where deer roam freely; Miyajima is even more beautiful in cherry blossom season.
 

Osaka
Twice the capital of Japan, this city has kept pace with time. The chords of Bryan Adams’ All for Love waft towards us as we make our way towards the Osaka Castle that was restored to it’s former Edo-period glory, equipped with a lift, and converted into a museum in the late ‘90s. An observation deck on the eight floor offers a 360-degree view of the city and the large grass-covered swatch of the palace grounds currently playing host to a musical event. We walk past screens depicting the seasonal wars that took place in Japan, battlefield dioramas, historically significant scrolls, people dressing up for a photo-op in the battle gear available for lease... We could spend a whole day here, but our rather unreasonable itinerary demands that we hurry back to our brooding fellow travellers and the bus which rolls along to the Dotonbori canal just as the sun starts to sink, lending the waters a golden glow. The streets of Dotonbori are starting to flood with dogs taking their human masters for a walk, cyclists of all ages, students breaking into random dance steps as they attempt to agree on a sequence that works well, arty plastic-food window displays... There’s so much to look at that despite the mouth-watering aromas of Japanese street food, I forget to buy something to eat.