I’ve been fascinated by this beautiful and peculiar country for much of my life, but never took the opportunity to visit until now. In 1970, my grandfather took a year’s sabbatical in Tokyo, plucking my mum at 14 years old out of high school along with her two younger sisters and my grandmother, for what must have been quite the cultural experience. They have many incredible stories from this time, and an admiration for the land and culture persistent through to today.

Visiting Japan in 2024 is quite the culture shock; I can only imagine what it would have been like in 1970…

And from the stories, they had to really put in some work to fit into life in central Tokyo. As there weren’t English translations in the buses back then (though they generally did exist on the subway thankfully) my Mum took it on as a project to, as a solo 14 year old, travel on all the surrounding lines from their central Tokyo apartment, meticulously documenting various distinct features of each to assist with future travel.

Japan is famous for its shopping, but I’m not sure too many foreigners in history besides my grandfather managed the logistics of finding, inspecting, procuring, and freight shipping a 27 foot cruising sailboat in 1970 Tokyo, which became their second home exploring the coastal seas of BC for the subsequent decade.

It feels special to write this today, as I just had an emotional final conversation with that incredible man, my grandfather Doncaster Russell, still sharp as a tack at 95, as he prepares for his anticipated medically assisted in dying procedure this week. Guitar player, artist, world traveler, and obsessive computing scientist since the 1960s, I can recount many stories from him that over the years laid an inspirational foundation for my own life’s pursuits. Over the years he made many connections with incredible people across the world, and had a wonderful ethos about him, with a respect and appreciation for people across all walks of life.

In a post about Japan, it feels appropriate to write a Haiku in his memory. I’m far from a poet, but I’ll do my best, and include a classic Grandad-ism for good measure:

A curious mind
Care and compassion for all
Will it run Linux?

Thank you for all the great stories. You will be missed.

Sayonara, Doncaster-San

Japan has changed immensely since 1970. The history of this nation feels as wild and chaotic as the streets of Shinjuku, evidence of which is easily observed as you explore the sites and sounds that drastically vary from street to street. Modernity came to Japan fast and furious in the mid-19th century with the Meiji Restoration, and, in between a few significant interruptions and setbacks, continued at a frantic pace. The Tokugawa shogunate, a military government run by a single family for over 200 years from the early 17th to mid 19th century, enforced strict rule over a feudal system throughout the land, imposing a rigid social hierarchy and banning foreign influence and trade.

The Meiji Restoration in the mid-19th century, which saw the return of power to the emperor and advisors, the removal of the shogunate, reintroduction of relations and trade with the West, and significant shifts in social and economic frameworks and mindsets, lead to a rapid shift towards modernity, industrialization, and free market capitalism. Japan’s explosive growth during this period took it from it’s peasantry roots to a leading industrial economic power in an incredibly short period of time, fueled in no small part by some rather nasty imperialist tactics across East Asia.

World War II dealt a significant blow to Japan’s progress, through massive destruction of infrastructure, loss of life, and a collective national trauma. US efforts to curb the spread of Soviet influence including immense financial aid invested in Japan, lead the country to not only recover to pre-war output levels by the mid-1950s, but rapidly expanded into the world’s second largest economy by GDP after the US in the late 60s, remaining around that position until the end of the 20th century.

The 1980s saw another period of wild modernization and growth, until the major bubble and crash of the early 1990s lead to a crippling period of stagnation for 20 years, referred to as “the lost decades”. Though there are some serious warning signs about the future of Japanese economic growth, requiring some significant ideological shifts and progressive policies, currently the stock market and larger economy is finally ticking upwards again. The future looks to bring more challenges though, with a dwindling and ageing population, antiquated workplace culture, entrenched gender roles, and immigration policies, and Japan looks to require a significant overhaul to help drive the nation’s momentum through the 21st century.

Popular claustrophobic nightlife district Golden Gai in Shinjuku, with 17th century Hanazono Shrine behind

Parts of Tokyo feel straight out of a 1980s dystopian sci-fi movie, interspersed with beautiful 400 year old traditional Edo-era temples (rebuilt replications of the originals, as sadly not much has survived the many fires over the years , particularly WW2). Referred to as “The City of a Thousand Villages”, it makes for extremely satisfying exploration, as it seems every block is different than the last, mixing and blending many different styles into a smorgasbord of lights, colours, shapes, scents, and sounds.

Truly an experiential kaleidoscope, nearly overwhelming the senses.

Regardless of the past and the future of Japan, it is an incredible place to visit today. We absolutely loved it, and spent a significant amount of the trip planning our next visit. The people, the food, history and culture, ease of travel, not to mention the cherry on top for deep powder connoisseurs like ourselves with Hokkaido skiing, made for a magical time in the Land of the Rising Sun.

Our trip was loosely broken up into 3 phases, the first of which was an attempt to scratch the surface of at least a handful of the thousand villages of Tokyo, and explore relatively quaint and natural Kyoto. Giles and Ali joined us, maybe feeling a bit overwhelmed flying from the tiny town of Rossland to a city with the population of Canada. We then flew to Hokkaido, where the four of us squeezed into a rented RV exploring the Northeast of Japan’s winter-smashed island and powder skiing mecca, before finally migrating to a relative life of expansive living in an Airbnb house in Hokkaido’s more developed ski area of Niseko.

In Tokyo, we stayed in Asakusa, which we all felt worked out well. It was pretty far from some of the major modern Tokyo sites and sounds, and unfortunately some of the closer east Tokyo highlights such as the Imperial Palace gardens, and the museums at Ueno, were closed for the New Years holidays. But Asakusa has a chiller, older vibe, with a large temple complex at Senso-Ji that was definitely an experience on New Years Eve, where we visited at midnight to watch people queue up for their first blessing of the year. This is a significant event, called Hatsumode (literally “first shrine visit”) for many people, and it’s reported over 3 million people visit the shrine on the first few days of the year! The temporary food market at the temple was incredible, and we all regretted having bothered to eat a rare miss Izakaya dinner prior instead of gorging on the various random Japanese street food delicacies more.

Asakusa Street Art on a closed shopfront

Endless popular Izakayas (casual drinks/small plates) dotted the area around “Hoppy Street” in central Asakusa. They seemed very popular with college age Japanese.

There appeared to be a massive, quirky, and quintessentially Japanese “Don Quijote” department store in the all the popular Tokyo neighborhoods. Everything from snacks, liquor, pets, sex toys, and, apparently at the Akihabara location, a purpose built theatre for an 86 member J-Pop girl band named after the neighborhood, “AKB48”. Split into many “teams” to share the load of their insane schedule, they alternate performances at the “Donk”, touring, or fan meet and greets around the country.

After learning the hard way that the overwhelming quantity of restaurants can make for some challenging decision making at meal time, we settled on a random spot for our first proper Japanese meal, that turned out to be a bit of a Chinese fusion place, but still had a Japanese favorite of ours, delicious Takoyaki (flour and octopus balls).

Senso-Ji Temple is generally a beautiful enclave of peace and tranquility (except on New Years Eve/Day, or other major festivals) in amongst the chaos of larger Tokyo. Staying in Asakusa had the benefit of having this space very easily accessible, and we visited it multiple times during the trip. Senso-Ji is Tokyo’s oldest maintained temple, dating back to 625 AD. It is considered the most commonly visited religious site in the world, with 30 million visitors annually.

Buddhism came to Japan from China in the 6th century, and after brief conflict, became the dominant religion in the country ever since, leading Japan to become the third largest Buddhist country in the world, after China and Thailand. Somewhat confusingly, it is also home to a separate though often complementary religious practice of Shintoism, and shrines and temples commemorating both Buddhist and Shinto beliefs can be found interlaced throughout the country.

Shintoism is an amalgamation of ancient indigenous Japanese beliefs, and the term generally was used to distinguish itself with the newer doctrine of Buddhism. There is no known founder, core dogma, or central organization. It is considered a religion of nature, worshiping the beauty of the natural world.

Worshiping the natural world sounds like a practice I can get behind, and the care and attention to incorporating majestic gardens, ornate landscaping, amidst meandering pathways, was clearly evident in both the Buddhist and Shinto shrines we visited on the trip.

Charms for purchase to wish for good luck in a wide variety of topics and areas

Older Buddhist statues with the imposing Tokyo Skytree in the background

Beautiful water features surround Senso-Ji

We decided to see how the Gods were looking down upon us by contributing 100yen (~$1 Canadian) to receive a fortune. You put the coin in a slot and help yourself to a narrow stick you shake out of.a small cylinder. This provides a number for a drawer you open to retrieve you fortune.

What I wish I knew before engaging in this act, is that they also have “bad fortunes”. After more general wisdom on modesty and maintaining reasonable expectations, mine wrapped up with the following rapid fire bombardment across a wide swath of life’s primary concerns:

Your request will not be granted
The patient is hard to get well
The lost article will not be found
The person you wait for doesn’t come
Building a new house and removal are both bad
To start a trip is no good
Marriage of any kind or new employment are both bad

A bit harsh if you ask me, and some of these hit a bit too close to home… Couldn’t they have contained them to just one individual bad fortune each, not a barrage of an entire life of anxiety? What happened to all that Japanese kindness?

Thankfully, they have a system where supposedly all of these bad fortunes are negated by twist tying the paper around a kindly provided adjacent rack. I would have preferred to have skipped this part and instead received even a neutral fortune, but I am not one to allow my cultural naivete to judge foreign religious practices.

We ventured out on our first Tokyo subway mission (besides the uneventful trip from the Airport) towards the Tsukiji Fish Market. Though the entire system is dauntingly massive, we found it fairly straightforward to navigate once we had a few key pieces understood. In hindsight, we definitely should have found a station that sold a special day pass specific to tourists, that would have negated the need to awkwardly dig through our collective spare yen to come up with the required fare each time, but we learned too late.

Tsukiji was at times unbearably busy. Maybe due to it being the Christmas/New Years holidays, we’re not sure, but I wouldn’t recommend going there mid-day like we did. As with any popular tourist destination, the early bird gets the worm.

We were in bad need of a convenience store beverage and snacks after the chaos of the fish market, so we found a nice riverside park.

“The Future” - As we thought it would look like in 1985

We decided to stop into Akihabara on the way home to check out the “OG” Tokyo electronics/anime/manga district

A 1970 photo from my grandfather’s collection

Returning back to Asakusa, we walked across the river towards Skytree and the Asahi Building, complete with it’s “Golden Flame” art. You be the judge whether “golden flame” is the first thing that comes to mind… Behind is the Asahi Headquarters, and the gold building with the grey “head” at the top is supposed to look like a frothy pint…
Sure, why not?

Mandatory conveyor sushi stop. For the best sushi, go elsewhere, but sometimes it’s nice to have a simple option for efficient eating when on the go

Nightime in Asakusa. Tokyo Skytree towers above all.

We found a random bar on Google called “3wood” that looked like a nice spot for a cocktail to wind down. It was a cozy little space with all wood panelling and a great bartender who was excited to connect with us, but didn’t know any English, so he brought out his laptop and talked through Google Translate. We enjoyed some quality negronis and Japanese whiskeys.

Unfortunately much of Ueno park, which is a major attraction near Asakusa in East Tokyo, was closed. Home to a crazy urban zoo and some of the main museums and art galleries, it also has some nice trails and lakes, so Mary and I decided to go for a run to check it out. It was likely not the best idea to push it after a mediocre jetlagged sleep, straining the immune system, but I was just super excited about exploring and so we ran around some of the open areas of the park.

Our hotel, the APA Asakusa, even had rooftop baths/spa (you can’t technically call it an Onsen unless it is actually geothermal water), which was a nice touch to freshen up, and was a welcome escape from our comically minuscule hotel room.

After figuring out a decent breakfast, which was a surprising challenge in Japan (though admittedly were coffee snobs), we decided to venture towards one of the epicenters of Tokyo shopping insanity, Shibuya. Ali was keen to check out a crazy high end food mall at the Shibuya Station Food Show, which was a totally overwhelming smorgasboard of gourmet versions of all things Japanese (and European) cuisine.

The cool thing about Tokyo is that within just a few blocks, you move from one of the most dense urban experiences to quaint little side streets and surprisingly cute neighborhoods. We charged through the dense mega-shopping area of Shibuya to escape to the relative tranquility of Yoyogi Park and the surrounding neighborhoods, traveling along beautiful arcing narrow laneways. Adjacent Meiji Jingu is a Shinto Shrine dedicated to the Emperor Meiji (the same “Meiji” who was in charge during the Restoration), and is an enormous complex including long wide forest pathways separating the different components.

Ali had a desire for a specific food craving she had heard about in adjacent Harajuku, a shopping district popular for modern youth culture. We passed this oddly named donut shop that had a 50 person line around the corner as we first entered the neighbourhood, which I thought was likely a bad sign for Ali’s desires. Sadly, she did not find what she was looking for, but Mary and I did come across a Takoyaki shop directly adjacent to one of my bucket list items for the trip, a Japanese Crepe Parfait.

This ended up being a somwhat poor choice for what ended up being my lunch and dinner, as by the time we made it the one hour journey back to our hotel via the subway, I was absolutely wrecked from jetlag and the onset of a cold, that I ended up crashing at 4:30pm for the night.

The next day, I woke up feeling a bit better, and decided to try to move around away from crowds, and signed up for Luup, a bicycle share service. They ended up being super awesome in both Tokyo and Kyoto, and although the transit system there is incredible, getting around on two wheels will always be my preferred way to travel.

Mary and I visited the mostly closed Imperial Palace area during the day, before making our way to Odaiba, a strange man-made island now home to some enormous mega-malls and large attractions, and also home to the Teamlabs interactive art exhibit we had tickets to check out that evening.

“Tokyo Big Sight”, an enormous convention center in Odaiba

TeamLabs Interactive Art Exhibit

We returned to Asakusa to enjoy the final hours of 2023. The Hatsumode festival at Senso-Ji was a whirlwind of attendees of all ages and nationalities, winding through row upon row of temporary food stalls. The line for the shrine itself extended as far as you could see, as people excitedly awaited their first blessing of the New Year. The air was filled with the delicious aroma of a huge variety of Japanese street foods. Although completely full from dinner, Mary and I sampled some Japanese seafood savory crepe dishes, as this trip we tried to run on the principal to eat as much food as was physically possible, regardless of hunger levels.

As the clock struck 12, a roar arose from the crowd. As this was a religious site and not Times Square, the only notable celebratory activity was the ringing of a gong, and the forward momentum of a massive crowd of practicing Buddhists shuffling towards the Shrine to bless the upcoming 365 days with good fortune.

Since none of us were practicing Buddhists, had our fill of busy streets and lines, and were all completely bagged after a very full day, we headed back to the hotel, wrapping up the year, and an awesome time in Tokyo.

The next morning, our plan was to take the Shinkansen bullet train to Kyoto, for a more subdued and traditional flavour of Japanese culture.

Kaleidoscope Chronicles

Blog Gallery About

Kaleidoscope Chronicles

Elemental Kyoto

Winter 2023 Highlights

Blog Gallery About