A Sense of Place
It has now been 116 days since we arrived in Japan. Since then the sweltering Japanese Summer has given way to a much welcome cooler and drier Autumn, we've settled into our place and have been slowly acclimating to our environment and Japan in general. So, what's it been like so far?
We moved into our apartment in Sakae-ku, Kosugaya, 1 Chome on 21 July. The building in which we live is a mid-Showa era (1925 - 1989) building called a 'danshi' or a tower block, the exterior decor of which I have jokingly referred to as either 'prison block' or 'Soviet-era' chic.
Our apartment is on the 14th of 15-floors and has east-facing windows that afford us a nice view of Kosugaya, the name of the area in which we live. Though our apartment is only 45 square meters (~480 square feet) it is well-appointed and comfortable for us.
Our home is also well located; the train station and bus stop are across the street, and there are two supermarkets, a bakery, two vegetable stores, two fish markets, and a meat shop around the ground floor of our danshi and by the station. Along with all that, there are a few izakayas (tapas-style restaurants) a ramen-ya, and two fast food joints. Sounds great, doesn't it? Well, there is more...
The Itachigawa (Itachi River. (An itachi is a weasel, btw) runs east from neighboring Konandai to westerly Ofuna. At Ofuna the Itachigawa empties into the Kashiogawa and from there flows into the Pacific at Enoshima. We often walk along the Itachigawa to reach the aforementioned places and the scenery, especially towards Konandai, is quite lovely.
About a 45-minute walk to the south are the old towns of Kita-Kamakura and Kamakura, the latter being the ancient Imperial capital. Both of these towns have an abundance of beautiful Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples, many of which are hundreds of years old. In every direction, there are multiple hills, mountains, copses of woods, parks shrines, and temples, all of which we frequently walk to. In fact, we average 10 to 18 kilometers (6 to 11 miles a day) walking from here to there and back again. You can get an overview of Ofuna, Kamakura, and the surrounding area in this vid: A Bird's Eye View
My point in relating all of this is to paint a picture of the area in which we live in order to contrast it with my sense of place here. By that, I mean that although I live in Japan, I don't feel as though I belong here. Now, you might well say, "Chris, you've only been living in Japan for a few months, just give yourself some time", and you could well be right. However, Ikuko, a Japanese native, feels similarly. None of this means we don't like it here, we do, but at the moment we feel like 'strangers in a strange land'. More on this as it unfolds...
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-Pat