Tokyo and Shanghai, November 2005

Tokyo noodles

Day 1 in Tokyo, bad jetlag, Anna goes off to work (Alan still in Sydney so still haven't seen him), flight to Shanghai that evening, several hours to kill.

So I go off in search of soup noodles, to Alan's favourite place. It isn't till I get there that the full force of the 'foreign-ness' that everyone talks about in Japan hits me.

I wait in the entry way (conveniently the little flags that hang down in the doorway are right in face - designed for an altogether different body architecture from mine). Soon a salaryman gets up and leaves and I take his seat. The waitress comes to me and says something. I say 'curry udon', hopefully. Apparently that is not this place's thing. So I gesture wildly and, I hope, meaningfully, at my table mat, trying to convey 'bring me whatever you want to bring me'. This causes yet more puzzlement in the waitresses face, soon moving to consternation as the crazy foreigner continues his wild gesticulations. 'He might start throwing things soon', she is no doubt thinking, 'Perhaps if I nod a lot he will go away'.

Then she is struck with a brainwave - she points towards the window (out of my line of sight) where there are lovely plastic mockups of the food. Lightbulb goes off in my own head, and I almost shout 'Number 3'. Of course, I have no idea which number 3 is, but am anxious to put us both out of our misery, and as I rightly surmise, even a non-English speaker is able to figure out what I am saying.

Number 3 arrives a few minutes later. Bliss! It is scrummy, delicious, wonderful and lovely. I slurp noodles and soup like an expert (or is it hungry person?)

The salaryman next to me gets up and leaves, a quarter of his soup bowl still glistening with a rather more spicy looking brew than mine. I look at it wistfully, wondering just how rude it would be for me to turn to his food and try that as well (apparently, quite rude).

It has been 18 months since my last real trip, and the travel bug is now coursing through my vains as surely as the warmth from the soup flows through my digestive system.

Shanghai
It's been twenty years since I was last in Shanghai. Even then it was on its way to becoming the biggest city in the world, but it has exploded since then, and more to the point has gone from looking like the lovely 1930's city that most people associate with Shanghai, to a futuristic mixture of Miami, Las Vegas and the Jetsons. The old French Concession and the Bund (the strip of UK built banks) are the same, of course, but Pudong, the new district across the river, now springs up where before there was swamp land, and everywhere skyscrapers are being built. Large swathes of the city are unchanged, though, and you can walk down little alleyways where people cook, wash, and chat with their neighbours, across the street from a high rise. It felt a little to me like a teenager with his brand new duds - but still with acne, and oh, he forgot to take off the white socks. Much of the conversation seems to be about why Shanghai is so much better, cooler, more with it that Beijing (which I can well believe). There is an energy about the place - the newest place, the best restaurant, the new gallery. Reminds me of some of the people I know in New York, except that here it really is new - the building probably wasn't there a year ago, let alone the restaurant or bar.

One of the highlights is Louise taking me for lunch for my birthday at Jean Georges, where Tommes is a sous chef. Jean Georges is on the Bund in one of the gutted and renovated bank buildings, along with a number of other high end restaurants. Another is going to the hotel where I stayed 20 years ago - then, one of those 'decayed splendour' places that I love to find - huge bedrooms, stuffed (in my case) with six beds, dormitory style. As well as the bed occupants, I also shared the room with a rat back then. I remember eating a meal in the enourmous dining room and watching as someone wheeled some heavy machinery across the equisite parquet floor, leaving track marks on it. These days the Chinese set a bit more value on the past, if only for the financial draw of tourism, and the hotel has, after a brief stint as the Shanghai Stock Exchange (believe it or not), been restored to something like what it looked like when it was called the Astor Hotel in the 30's. All of the important building on the Bund, and around Shanghai, have little plaques commemorating what the building once was, in English and Chinese.

Vignette

On the plane back to Tokyo, I slump into seat 23G. Across the aisle in 23H is an American, 2 along from him in 23K is a Japanese, and a Chinese sits heavily into 22H. He immediately reclines his seat so that his head is almost in the American's lap.
Pandemonium then ensues as the American uncomfortably tries to move the seat; the Japanese starts whacking the back of the seat with his hand and doing a 'take off' gesture with other hand, and the Chinese turns around and tries to figure out what everyone's problem is; he glances contemptously at the Japanese, then turns round again and stays as he is. This goes on for a couple of minutes.

The American would normally be irreverent of rules as long as they don't inconvenince him; the Chinese, if he is vaguely aware that there is a rule that seatbacks need to be in the upright position for takeoff, doesn't give a damn, and the Japanese is appalled that a 'ruru' has been broken, and even more so that the normally discrete cough he could have emmitted to a fellow Japanese to let him know he was not fitting in, will not work with the Chinese, cementing his long held belief that they are all barbarians anyway.

Tokyo Redux

In the part of Toyko I have been in so far, there are definite 'uniforms'. Most of them are the salarymen in their blue or black suits. But the younger men seem to be walking around in quite a different outfit. Good for them, I think, but, do they really all have to wear the same? They have the baggy trousers of the ghetto look, along with a bandanna tied around their heads. All of them. So much for individuality. Then I spot the paint on one guy's trowsers and realise that this is the attire of the manual labourer.

The most popular brand name for taxicabs is Cedric. Beats me how they came up with that one. Just doesn't have the same ring as 'Testarossa' or 'Lincoln Town Car'

If Shanghai is a teenager, Tokyo is definitely an adult - confident, self-sufficient, mostly unaware that you are even there. The best analogy I can think of is of a western city plopped in the middle of Japan - and then populated entirely by Martians. That is what it feels like to be a foreigner there. Most cities I have been a tourist in want something from me - specifically, my money. Therefore, there are people who will find ways to communicate with me - want a taxi? Sure, we'll just jack up the price a bit for you. Water? Definitely, here it is, $3 a bottle. Room? We have those for foreigners, no probs.

Not so in Tokyo. Yes, some things are signposted. Wandering around Tokyo train to get the Narita Express, I follow the trail of little signs in English. Then at some point the breadcrums run out and I am alone in the forest of 5'2" bodies running around past me. That's what it feels like. It's also when you realise quite how dependent we are on text - In Vietnam, in Egypt, in Brazil, in Germany, I can make out what the signs say and figure out where to go. Even in Shanghai all the signs are in English too. There is text EVERYWHERE in Tokyo, but none of it means anything to me.

Something Fishy

On the morning of my birthday I wake with a start at 4. So I get up and head to the fishmarket to find the famous tuna auction, armed with the Japanese for 'auction' (Kyobai) that Anna had given me the day before.

The place is huge - literally many street blocks - and I have to weave through the forklift trucks playing dodgems all over the place. It's clear that I could really go in any direction from where I came in, and that without guidance I'm not going to get very far. So I go up to a man directiong traffic, and confidently say 'Sumimasen, kyobai kudasai'.

A look of incomprehension passes over his face. I have clearly mispronounced the word and he's wondering why the crazy foreigner has asked for a ball of string or a bikini wax. Meanwhile I too am perplexed, since there can't be too many explanations as to why a gaijin would be wondering around in the dark in a fishmarket, a few hundred feet from a world famous fish aution that is considerered one of the must-sees of Tokyo - something that has clearly not crossed his mind until I pull out my guide book and show him a picture. Immediately he says 'Ah, auction-o' followed by a bunch of Japanese punctuated by 'righto's and 'refto's which would be his interpretation of directions in English.

The auction is fascinating - but best described by the pictures. (see the link below)

After that I wonder around the hole-in-the-wall foodshops. Sushi at 6:30 in the morning - a fitting start for my birthday. And what sushi! I can virtually feel it still flapping around in my mouth.

Crowds and concepts of time.

Whereas in New York everyone is in a hurry, this doesn't seem to be the case in Tokyo. An interesting example is traffic lights, and walk signs - also a good example of the 'ruru' in action. There can be no cars coming at all, yet everyone waits patiently until the light turns green. Fine. But I was surprised that Anna and Alan also waited for the lights to turn. I asked them about this - apparently once one person starts moving, everyone does - somehow they trust the crowd more than they do the lights. So they don't want to be responsible for killing a half dozen Japanese just to get to the other side of the street (I feel a chicken crossing the road joke in the making).

An even better illustration of time and travel... I'm standing in the overground train, waiting for the doors to close. A girl, nose buried in a book, walks towards the doors - which close in her face. She doesn't look up, doesn't bat an eyelid. The doors open again, she starts walking - still nose in book. The doors close again (she took her own sweet time starting to move); the doors open and she walks in. Doesn't look up from the book the whole time - no concern whatsoever about missing the train.

Then again, trains in Tokyo are very frequent and timely. But somehow I like better the theory that time doesn't matter to her, than that she feels there is another train right behind this one.

Amateur Udon Lover

Always been a curry udon fan, which I mention to Alan. He takes me to the 'best' curry udon place. You may have noticed by now that Japanese restaurants are heavily specialised. You might get a bit of sashimi as a first course in 'fusion' restaurants, but otherwise, if you want sushi, you go to a sushi restaurant; tepanyaki, at a tepanyaki place. Naturally, there is a chain that specialises in curry udon. Not just udon, but curried. You can, of course, get different topings. But that's the extent of the menu.

And it is the best curry udon I have ever had. Ever. It's so good I contemplate ordering another bowl, throwing out the udon and slurping down the thick, spicy soup.

I love the waiting system for Japanese restaurants. You don't put your name down, you put your behind down, on one of the row of seats outside the door. As people get seated, everyone moves up the appropriate number of places. How appropriate, how civilised. How conformant to the 'rurus'

The person who founded the curry udon chain felt the need to engrave an enscription, in English, on the glass walls of one of his shops. It reads something like 'Want to be forever an udon lover. I am an amateur udon lover. Under my spirit of enquiries, the curry udon was born in my kitchen. Have been dreamed it must be superficially delicious if curry and udon eaten at home get together with. Foundatinos or professionalism isn't the matter in the cooking. Maker of the curry udon is the amateur. Udon lover's creativity and the sensitive tongue. Believe a delicious crosses the border. I am the cook naming Udon Lover."

Quite.

Levels

Tokyo seems to operate on levels. (see some of the last pics), at least near where I was staying. You can be a story up from the street and then look down 3 stories to a sub-basement level, or look up and see trains whizzing by two levels up, with cars passing by one level below that.
Which might explain a bizzare monument. Alan took me to see the Nihonbashi, the 'Japan Bridge'. This is apparently so important, so central to Japanese culture, that all distances in Japan are measured from there. There has been a bridge there for centuries, althought he current one is very late 19C.

And, there is a flyover just above. Trucks driving over a national treasure. Not to mention spoiling the view.

And this is my theory. Since it is possible for things to exist comfortably in the same space, just on different planes, then maybe there is no conflict in the flyover over the bridge - because, since it occupies a different vertical space, doesn't, in fact, occupy the same space at all, nor obstruct the view. The flyover is, to all intents and purposes, not there, when you are considering the bridge from the ground level. A comforting thought, maybe, if only one could learn to filter out other extraneous information all of the time.

pictures: http://picasaweb.google.com/justin.woddis/TokyoShanghai2005