Japan Trip 2019, Day 22: The weather held out

Our plan for our three full days in Mito was concocted last night on the basis of the weather forecast, which was for a grey, inclement Tuesday (today), and mostly sunny for Wednesday and Thursday. In other words, our two big outdoor sights would not be today, making today Kōdōkan Hall, Mito Museum of Modern Art, and the Art Tower Mito complex.

Mito

First, though, some background. Mito has a long history going back to at least 4th century CE, but for our purposes I’m starting with Tokugawa Ieyasu’s taking the 12th century-built Mito Castle in 1603. We have come across Ieyasu before in our various Japanese travels, as he founded the Tokugawa Shogunate which ruled Japan from 1600 until the Meiji Restoration in 1868. His son Tokugawa Yorifusa was given Mito Castle, and it was his third son, Tokugawa Mitsukuni (or Mito Kōmon), who featured in the statue in yesterday’s pics. He instigated the compilation of the Dai Nihon-shi, a history of Japan, and inspired the Mito School/Mitology/Mitogaku, a Confucian school of thought which combined Japanese classics, Shintoism and Western learning. Without going into details – you can research it yourselves – it’s argued that they focused on the importance of taking a broad, national view of issues, rather than a feudal one. Mitology, says Mito city, played an important role in the Meiji Restoration and thus the formation of modern Japan. (One person described Mitogaku as providing “the psychological support for the Meiji Restoration”.) Not surprisingly, Mito prides itself on taking learning and education seriously.

Mitogaku

So, now, our day. It rained overnight, but the morning dawned dry albeit cloudy and damp feeling. We decided it was time to get walking, just in case the rain came later. It just so happened that during yesterday’s Mito reconnaissance, we noticed a street map for what looked like a walking tour. It wasn’t mentioned in any of the Japanese tourist sites for Mito, nor could l find any website for it, so we decided to wing it. As it turned out, the walk, which focused on the Mito Castle ruins and Kōdōkan, was very well signposted (in English and Japanese). Most of it followed a road Mito now calls Mitogaku. The road is home to many educational institutions, and was named Mitogaku in 2018, on the 150th anniversary of the Meiji Restoration. Most (all?) of this road is identified by its red surface.

We really enjoyed the walk which took us past some historic gates; statues of men (of course) who are significant to this history; the sole remnant of the Mito Castle (the Yakui-mon gate); a shrine; and Kōdōkan. It didn’t rain, and the temperature was really mild.

Kōdōkan

A major stop along this walk is Kōdōkan (which was described in one sign as “the origin of academics and decorum”!) It was founded in 1841 by Nariaki Tokugawa, the 9th lord. It educated feudal warriors (or, as our personal volunteer guide said, samurai) and their children. It was more like a university than a school, as we know them, and covered humanities, social science and natural science. Because its focus was lifelong learning, there was no graduation, and young and old studied together. The school was closed in 1872, not long after the establishment of the new Meiji government.

We were shown the main building – the President’s house – by a Japanese volunteer guide who had enough English to name the functions of the various rooms, including the bathroom with its clever drainage groove. It’s a beautiful beautiful building comprising multiple (mostly) large tatami mat rooms with those wonderful Japanese sliding doors and windows that make these rooms so flexible, as well as climate efficient.

Among various exhibits on display are a water-pump inspired by Dutch principles (our guide told us), some art works that he had trouble explaining, and an old edition of the Dai Nihon-shi.

But, Kōdōkan is also famous for its grounds. Nariaki Tokugawa loved Japanese plums (ume). Not only are their blossoms beautiful, but, the brochure says, pickled plums make great emergency food for military operations and famines! He had many plum trees planted. Today, there are 800 on the property. (There are also some sarusuberi or crape myrtles, which appealed to us!)

There’s also a shrine in the grounds, the Kashima Shrine, whose deity is Takemikazuchi-no-mikoto, the god of war. Near it is the Confucius Shrine, which we didn’t see but which of course commemorates studying. By placing them near each other, Nariaki expressed his ideal “to master both the arts of pen and sword”. Unfortunately, the original shrine was destroyed in an air-raid in 1945. The present shrine was re-constructed in 1974, a reconstruction that has its own significance.

Art Tower Mito

With the weather still holding, we stopped briefly for lunch in the city – Len having fried rice, and me a pork and ginger set lunch – before heading off to the Art Tower Mito. It’s an impressive arts complex that opened in 1990 during Mito’s centennial celebrations. It comprises a concert hall, theatre, contemporary art gallery (that was closed), and a 100-metre tall steel “landmark tower”. For the mathematicians among you, the tower’s design is based on the Boerdijk–Coxeter helix. (If this explanation doesn’t make sense to you, just look at the pretty picture below!) Arata Isozaki was the architect. (He apparently also designed MOCA in Los Angeles, and Bond University in Australia’s Gold Coast, among many other buildings.)

We found the buildings fascinating, though more bitsy than coherent outside, we thought. However, the huge foyer/hall, over which a large pipe organ presides, is a lovely space.

The Museum of Modern Art Ibaraki

And then it was our final sightseeing stop of the day, and to this, after walking our feet off, we decided to taxi. When I researched this museum – which has an English language option on its website – I loved reading that the museum was founded, in 1988, “in response to the wish of the people of Ibaraki for rich lives”. It is apparently working because they also say that “In recent years, due to the increase of the leisure hours and diverse life styles, the people of Japan show a strong tendency to seek richer and meaningful lives and the role of art museums in the society of life-long learning is greater than ever.” Go, art! Certainly, on this Tuesday afternoon, the museum was busy – not unpleasantly crowded by any means, but a good steady stream of people.

We decided to pay for the special exhibition as well as the permanent exhibition, and I think it was worth it, despite there being no English interpretation. All we could read on the labels were the dates. However, the exhibition title gave us a bit of a hint, “Yearning for Europe, Yumeji Takehisa”. Takehisa (1884-1934), says Wikipedia, painted in the Nihonga style, which you may remember is the style of the exhibition we saw in Matsumoto. Len and I discussed it, in fact, while we were looking at Takehisa’s work. Not that we are in any way experts on Nihonga!

Anyhow, even though we couldn’t read the labels, or the information panels, we could work out quite a bit about him. Indeed, it tested our art-viewing abilities because we had to rely on what we saw to make up our own story about him! It helped that the exhibition was chronological. It was interesting seeing some of his very early works from the early 1900s. They were quite primitive in technique but seemed to show an interest in what he saw, rather than in what was traditional to paint.

Some of the things I or we noticed or liked were:

• the preponderance of a particular facial type for many of his more traditional Japanese women paintings: these would, I’d say, be the Nihonga paintings.
• the mix of very Japanese pictures versus quite Western ones (showing figures in more relaxed, less formal poses).
• the sketches from his European travels (around 1931-1933), which were fascinating, partly for showing what a Japanese person travelling to Europe found interesting.
• the nudes (as I really haven’t seen many Japanese nudes, but then again, I haven’t seen a lot of Japanese art, particularly what I’d call representational art.)
• a rather pale picture of a woman drinking from a long glass, set in a frame with a wide border made of printed fabric featuring hot air balloons!
• a couple of works featuring Christian topics, including a little crucifixion – how at home we felt suddenly coming across recognisable iconography!

We also checked out the permanent exhibition, but, while some of the traditional Japanese paintings were lovely – Fuji, misty mountains, and so on – overall, these (including the more European style ones) were not as enjoyable or as interesting as the Takehisa exhibition. If you Google his name, and click on Images, you will get a very good sense of his work. No photos were allowed, except of the exhibition banner at the exhibition exit!

After this we walked back to our hotel, arriving around 4pm, having set off around 8.30am. It had been a long day. We ventured out later for a meal of, essentially, salad and yakitori, before returning to our room to rest our weary, weary feet. We have another day of walking tomorrow! Of course, eh?

Traps for young players (again)

A strange thing happened when I tried to book accommodation in Mito. It was the last place we booked because it was the last itinerary decision we made. That’s when the fun started. I had a hard time finding availability, and the prices seemed a little high. It didn’t really make sense, given Mito is not the first place on everyone’s lips – neither Japanese, to my knowledge, nor foreigners. However, eventually we settled for something, happy that at least we had somewhere to lay our heads.

Today, the penny dropped. All around the station are signs for the 2019 National Sports Festival of Japan – being held in Mito from 27 September until today 8 October! Would you believe!? In response to my earlier post on the Rugby World Cup, Lisa commented that she’d add checking out events and festivals when planning her future travel itineraries, which I agree is a good thing. I suspect, though, in many cases it’s probably easier said than done. Definitely worth doing what you can though!

And some Stills …

And some Movies …

Click here to view today’s video clips

Today’s Challenges …

• Coping with tourist maps on sign-boards, when, as you follow the route, the same map appears again, but with the main attractions renumbered. This means that the photo taken at the start is of no enduring use!! In addition, this same map can be north-south inverted from one version to the next, just to keep one’s spatial visualisation keen. (We’ve seen this before in Japan.)
• Visiting an art museum where there is only Kanji on the exhibit labels, and where our trusty Kanji reading software, Google Translate, isn’t available because iPhones and iPads are not permitted within the exhibits.