Contrasts Of Japan

Auckland Star, Volume LXVIII, Issue 300, 18 December 1937, Page 16 (Supplement)

Contrasts Of Japan

ByT., Tradie Porter

THE pastoral beauty of the Japanese countryside, the unspoiled and ancient musical traditions of the people and the delicacy of their olden art form a background of intriguing contrast to the lives of a race so modern that they have adopted and improved upon some of the very latest developments of Western life.

The great factory cities rnb elbows with temple towns and the countryside •f peaceful and ancient shrines; incredible phenomenon of a country which has assumed the modernistic mantle oi business and industrial efficiency, yet wears just beneath, Sim and gorgeous, She vestments of its history.

Ultra-modernism, •• regard* the cities, dominates all phases of life. Kobe, Tokyo, Yokohama, are splendidly laid•ut western cities. The streets an fcroad, clean, often tree-lined; the buildings are of modern architecture-; the parks are beautiful and well eared for; tths hotels are very modern, well run* with quick and excellent service, emtr-

desy and good cuisine. They even present (their guests with a toothbrush and comb wrapped in cellophane in the rooms; a clean kimono and sandals are placed »n the bed ready for use.

The shops are stocked with well-cat European clothes, shoes, stockings, Hooks, furniture—in fact, take the people out of the picture and one could imagine oneself in a very modern European city.

Their trams are most up-to-date, uheap, and efficiently driven. Taxis are everywhere. Streamlined private cars, driven by charming Japanese men and women, attired in the smartest of European clothes, fly about the city. Their traffic control is excellent. The cinemas are mostly air-conditioned and have svery modern equipment. Gone Are Kimono And One Toe Shoe Schoolgirls are seen in white blouses and blue gym. dresses, with black shoes and stockings and hair shingled like our girls. Gone are the kimono and one toe shoe, gone is the beautiful Japanese hair-dress. The modern youth of Japan scorns old customs and habits. They must be Western. The average girl in the street is dressed in the smartest of European clothes; her hair, too, is shingled and often permanently waved. The women in Japan are certainly well represented in the working world. The conductors on the trams are girls, often quite young. They are efficient, work eight hours a day and receive an average of 35 yen a month (equal to about £2 12/6 in New Zealand money). In hotels the waitresses/ elevator attendants and housemaids are all girls, very courteous as they smilingly give the charming Japanese bow. In the house the domestic is well trained. She receives 12 yen (18/) a month, including her house kimono and clogs. We went through one of the largest silk factories in Japan where they employed about 900 employees, mostly girls. Their average wage is about 4 to 4J yen (0/ to 6/9) a day for skilled workers and 2 to 2J yen (3/ to 3/9) for unskilled "workers. The girls were clad in black and white check skirts, white blouses and white bands round their heads. The working conditions in the factory were excellent and scrupulously clean. I noticed fine drinking fountains and up-to-date washing conveniences everywhere. The girls seemed happy and smiling. It is the women of Japan who are responsible for the silk industry. In She little houses in the villages one sees She bamboo trays covered with mulberry leaves on which tiny silkworms feed greedily. One also sees women weaving and spinning, quaint wooden water-wheels, worked by the water channels in the village streets, driving their rather primitive machines. The women work hard in the rice fields, weeding, harvesting, carrying the heavy loads of rice sheaves; also loads of wood and water, which they carry on each end of a bamboo pole, the pole across their shoulders. And when married they are splendid mothers and have many babies. I have never seen so many healthy, happy babies in my life as I saw in Japan. It is most amusing to •*ee a Japanese father and mother, dressed in their national costume, and the children in European trousers and shirts. Japanese love their children an.l like to show thein off to tourists.

Industry Keynote Of Their Success The Japanese arc hard workers. Industry is the keynote of their success. Every bit of work in the cultivation of rice is done by human labour except the ploughing, which is done* by the patienteyed, slow-moving caribous and buffaloes. w It is wonderful to watch a Japanese Agriculturist at work in the country, 'their fields are poetically beautiful. The •ice terraces are accurately built, some ■>nly three to four feet wide. Every flat foot of ground is utilised. Japan must eed over (10 million people with an in--rease of practically a million a year in lopulation. I believe 75 million yen worth n . rice . ' 3 produced in Japan. The rice irrigations are noteworthy feats of and must be seen for one ° 'cal'se the wonder of them. But if you really want to see a little r > the old Japan with the people in their, national dreßs, white stockings and clone you must take a car and go into the' •nuntry. The little villages are delightful The houses .in- mostly made of bamboo >l uttered with mud to look like plaster: Millie me made of wood. The fronts of ■lie limine* me shutters made of bamboo and, in the winter, of wood. Inside, th« Moors are covered with Japanese matting; the nitui'e is a cushion for the acad ana quilt for covering at night.

Sometimes one sees a tiny stool where the tea cups arc placed. In the centre of the floor is a shallow well where charcoal is burnt to boil the tea kettle, also to heat the house in winter. Mostly a tiny shrine is in a corner. The houses are scrupulously clean and tidy.

The tiny shops are open-fronted; food and other ware are displayed oil boards laced on trestles. The restaurants are quaint and we often stopped and had a drink of tea, the people ever smiling, bowing and courteous. The cobblers, matting weavers and makers of the many Japanese crafts sit inside their little houses on the floor, busy as bees, bowing as one goes past.

Narrow, swift-running canals are on both sides of the road of the villages, where one sees men, women and children washing in the evening. The Japanese are moral but not modest to our way of thinking. It is nothing unusual to see men or women bathing in these channels. They do not mind if you look at them, but only smile at one as one drives past. One sees little boys and old men fishing in the channels, and when I asked what they caught, our guide showed me a fish very much like one of our sprats. I was told that the villagers are very .orderly in their behaviour. No police are needed in the country. If a person is bad or lives wrongly he is chased out of the village, and as news travels he finds it difficult to live anywhere else. He therefore finds it wiser to be decent.

The Japanese are Buddhists and Shintoists. Most of the people are both. One sees the temples of each in the same grounds, and in houses they have a shrine for each. Shintoism is a cult embraces nature and ancestor worship; the underlying principle in a Shinto service is that of purity and purification. Buddhism is a religion with priests and festivals and temple dancers.

The temples of Japan are numerous and beautiful. Exquisite lacquer work of vivid colours predominates. It took two hours and a half to walk over the famous Toshogu temples at Nikko, and each shrine was a work of exquisite craftsman/ship and delight. Fifty-three provinces lieiped to make the Nikko shrine the thing of beauty that it is by their magnificent contributions. One

province even planted twenty-three miles of cryptomeria trees in a wonderful avenue, so that pilgrims making the pilgrimage might have shade on the last of their journey.

We saw the thous«uid-year-old Buddha statue at Kamakura, Yokohama. Forty feet high he stands, serenely gazing down under the blue sky, surrounded by lovely green trees. Shrines and temples, some very old, others more modern, are in every village.

April and May is the best time to visit Japan. Then the cherry blossom blooms, even though it is only for a very short time. Those interested in theatrical performances will rejoice at the -gorgeous Kabuki dramas, cherry dance, and many others given by the Geisha girls of Kyoto, Osaka, Tokyo and other cities; the precious mural paintings in the Golden Hall of Horyuji Temple, open for public inspection; in Nara, the Buddhistic Flower Parade, to commemorate the birth of Buddha; the Shinto Festival; the Imperial garden party, to view the cherry blossom; the Kauko Day demonstration of tourist industry—a national campaign for the promotion of tourist industry in Japan, in which all travel and transportation organisations, including hotels, participate; and all are held in Tokyo.

The Insect Hearing Festival is another picturesque rite which has come from the feudal days. Singing insects are dear to the hearts of the Japanese. Okl and young foregather, carrying their tiny cages, in chosen spots in gardens and parks, where, after the ceremony of worship is over, the people liberate the captives. Then, breathlessly, the liberators wait for the insects to reaiise their freedom and send forth their rejoicings in sibilant song. It is a most sentimental and moving ceremony.

In Nikko the Toshogu shrine gives many festivals, both interesting and inspiring. And so Japan indulges in her old traditions, in spite of ultra-inodern inventions and developments.

The scenery in Japan is interesting and beautiful with its mountains, rivers, forests and the ever tree-lined roads. We stayed at the lovely hotel, Fuji View, situated at the foot of the sacred mountain Fujiyama, 12,305 ft high, a wonderful place, with the sun

rising over the lovely lake K&wagwftvi, and setting behind Fujiyama—a place in which to dream and forget the world. The magnificent Fujiya Hotel ait Mayanoshite in the Fuji-Hakone National Park is supposed to be the wonder hotel of the East- It has hot springs, open air swimming pools, tiny bridges spanning mountain streams, delightful lawns on which white peacocks show off their fine feathers; pagodas of every size which prove to be little tea houses when yon peep inside; hot-houses containing marvellous

orchids; bedrooms from where one gets delightful views of mountains and valleys; cool lounges; a cuisine that tempts the appetite and makes slimming an impossibility; here, also, is to be found the Tasa fowl with a tail 24 ft long. These curious and ornamental birds have been bred during the past 100 years by crossing the common barnyard fowl with green, copper and golden pheasants and other birds. They are very rare.

Then there is Lakeside Hotel at the top of Nantai Mountain, 8300 ft high. The road is a marvellous piece of engineering. It has 31 curves and a perfect surface, with concrete fences to prevent accidents over the side. The waterfall near the hotel, with a fall of 325 ft, is very beautiful. We saw the falls from the top, and were then taken in a lift built through the rock to the bottom of the falls—32sft in one minute was very thrilling. Yes, Japan is well worth a visit.

Mr. Nomura, of Yokohama, who travelled through New Zealand recently, told me that every western idea possible is applied to the Japanese educational system. Their universities and schools are certainly very fine. Mr. Nomura himself fills in his leisure hours in the evenings l>v being a director and teacher of a night school for learning English. Our Japanese guide, who spoke English very well, was one of his pupils. Mr. Nomura also told me that qne of his proudest possessions was a photo of our Premier, Mr. Savage, and himself, which hangs in a prominent position in his famous antique shop in the Sumarai Shokai.

Yes, Japan is attractive and treats Tier tourists with every courtesy and friendliness.