Taj Mahal Closed to Tourists

by Justin Glow on

When I was in India, the only time I ever felt even a little bit unsafe was in Agra, on our way to see the Taj Mahal. We had just heard on the news that morning that Saddam Hussein had been hung, and the citizens of Agra, many of whom are Muslim, were reacting to the news as we pulled into town.

“What’s going on over there there?” I asked our local fixer, pointing at a large gathering of people. “Some sort of festival?”

The scene was chaotic, but having been in India for a few weeks at this point, I knew that “chaotic” was a daily thing, and rarely a sign of danger. “They are burning an effigy of Mr. Bush,” he replied nonchalantly, as if burning an effigy of the President of the United States was a regular thing in Agra. Maybe it was. Even then — being the only white person within rock-throwing distance — I felt relatively little danger. We drove on and watched the sun set behind the Taj Mahal.

By the next day we were out of Agra and onto Jaipur, but the news that night told me that a small-scale riot had broken out in Agra and a tourist van had been attacked. I gasped when they showed the footage, because the van on the television looked exactly like ours, but this one had shattered windows and screaming tourists fleeing from it.

It came with little surprise today that I read the Taj Mahal has been closed to tourists. Apparently four members of the Indian Muslim community were hit by a lorry (large truck) after returning from “Shab-e-Barat or the ‘night of forgiveness or atonement,’ when Muslims pray for the dead,” and an angry crowd responded, according to Reuters. No word on how long it will be closed, but a curfew is in effect for many parts of the city.

(Thanks, Scott!)

Big in Japan: Hello Kitty and the Culture of Cute

by Matthew Firestone on

Let’s start today’s column with a warm-up exercise. Ready to waken up that brain?

Name the first five things that come to mind when you think about Japan.

Ready. Set. Go!

??????????????????????????Zero.

Need more time? Sorry – I’m working with a limited amount of space here! So, did you come up with sushi? Sumo wrestling? Cherry blossoms? Rock gardens?

How about Hello Kitty?

Easily one of the Japan’s most recognizable cartoon characters, Har? Kiti (Hello Kitty, ??????????????????) is known and loved the world over. From Hello Kitty bento boxes and chopsticks to cell phone straps and designer tennis shoes, Hello Kitty is a global trademark that appeals to virtually all age groups and both sexes. According to estimates, Hello Kitty adorns over 22,000 products worldwide, and earns almost a billion dollars a year in revenue for the Sanrio Company of Japan.

Hello Kitty was created in 1974 by Sanrio – the very first product was a clear vinyl coin purse bearing the face of Hello Kitty, which sold for 240 yen or approximately two dollars. Surprisingly, Hello Kitty was intended to be named ‘Kitty White’ after one of Alice’s cats in the Lewis Carroll classic Through the Looking-Glass. At the time, British culture was the height of fashion amongst Japanese girls, and Hello Kitty was never intended to have any appeal beyond the pre-adolescent female market.

Of course, the designers at Sanrio failed to fully appreciate the Japanese obsession with all things cute.

One of the first words foreigners learn upon arriving in Japan is the all-important catch phrase kawaii (cute, 可愛い). The favorite three syllables of most women in Japan, cuteness is a cultural obsession that few foreigners completely understand. While Western beauty and fashion stresses the importance of women looking sexy, a large percentage of Japanese females strive to attain the highest possible level of kawaisa (cuteness, 可愛さ). Incorporating everything from brightly colored hair-extensions and fluorescent eye make-up to knee-high socks and flowery dresses, Japanese fashion can simultaneously shock your senses and melt your heart.

With that said, cute culture extends far beyond the realms of beauty and fashion, and it’s by no means limited to the female segment of the population. If you look for it, kawaisa appears virtually everywhere in Japan, even in places that Westerners would consider juvenile. For instance, the Japanese think nothing of using cartoon characters and random bits of cuteness for public service announcements, office memos, government letters and even police notices.

So, it should come as no surprise that Hello Kitty is a marketing phenomenon unlike no other. Greying salarymen think nothing of dangling a hot pink Hello Kitty strap from their cell phone, while middle-aged housewives swear that the Hello Kitty toaster is the best on the market.

(And, truth be told, I’ve been known to rock out some Hello Kitty chopsticks from time to time).

Tune in tomorrow for Part II of Hello Kitty and Culture of Cute.

** Special thanks for Flickr users ♥ Cherie♥ (cute girl), ChaTox (Lolita Girl) and Seiya235 (Umbrella Girl) **

Crossing the Street in Vietnam

by Catherine Bodry on

It was in Europe where I first discovered that people in the rest of the world don’t wait for green signals before they cross streets. There, people actually crossed streets if the light was red! I couldn’t believe these jaywalkers; so bold! so brazen! Weren’t they worried about getting a ticket? Then I realized that people are usually smarter than streetlights when it comes to crossing intersections, and I was soon gleefully rebelling against my rigid American upbringing by crossing streets against lights.

But when I was on a walking tour in Rome, our guide told us to just step into traffic. The drivers will adjust to you, he said. The first time I crossed that street I was bulging with adrenaline. Now I was a real rebel.

Then I went to Vietnam. There, the streets are clogged with motorbikes chugging through city streets. As in Rome, when crossing the street you don’t wait for a break in traffic — you just go. Drivers anticipate you, and the worst thing you could ever do is hesitate. Hesitation gets you hit, because traffic flows around you.

I knew this as I was walking back to my guesthouse after dinner one night. I’d been in the country only a day or two, and as I stepped off the curb and into the stream of traffic, I freaked. I paused, and knew with sudden certainty that I was a goner. Suddenly someone clutched my arm and practically pulled me across the street. When we were safely across, I looked down to see a tiny old woman, less than 5 feet tall and with none of her teeth left. She still had my right arm hooked in her left, and with her right hand she patted my forearm and murmured comfortingly although incomprehensibly.

She kept hold of my arm as we wove in and out of traffic, across streets and down bright alleys. After a couple of minutes we parted ways, but from then on I never hesitated.

Thanks to RawSun on Flickr for the photograph of a different woman, but who reminds me of the woman who helped me.

Big in Japan: A Look Inside Capsule Hotels

by Matthew Firestone on

Ever wonder what it’s like to sleep in a coffin? Perhaps you should consider spending a night in one of Japan’s wholly unique (and utterly bizarre) capsule hotels (capseru hoteru, ?????????????????????).

To Western eyes, Japan can at times be a strange place, though perhaps nothing is weirder to us than the idea of sleeping in what appears to be an enormous morgue. For those of you who have never heard about capsule hotels, the idea is simple.

Rather than spending your hard-earned cash on a pricey hotel room, you can save some yen by simply renting a capsule for a night. If all you need is a few hours shut-eye, you don’t mind sharing a hotel with a few thousand strangers and (most importantly) you’re not claustrophobic, then a capsule hotel is all you need.

Although Japanese travelers view capsule hotels as the last viable option (some even prefer sleeping in internet cafés), foreign travelers (myself included) can’t seem to get enough of them. They’re cheap (between US$20 and US$45 per night), surprisingly comfortable and about as authentically Japanese as you can get.

Plus, how many times in your life can you bed down in what is essentially a glorified coffin?

Capsule hotels are typically located in large cities near a train station, and cater primarily to Japanese salarymen who miss the last train home. In terms of style and cleanliness, they run the gamut from 1960s-inspired concrete and exposed beam monstrosities to ultra-modern steel and glass masterpieces of design. As with everything else in life, it pays to shop around and compare, and capsule hotels are no exception.

Ultimately, your experience really depends on the particular hotel. For instance, the first capsule hotel I ever stayed in was located in a somewhat dodgy part of Tokyo on the outskirts of the Red Light district. My fellow capsule mates were mostly loners, drifters, vagrants and the few odd foreigners like myself, who clearly had no idea where we are or what we doing. That night, I thrashed my legs against the sides of the capsule trying to find a comfortable position, hit my head on the ceiling more times than I can remember, and am pretty sure that I slept on bedding that hadn’t been changed in months.

Of course, if you’re ever in the city of Kobe, don’t miss their brand-spanking new capsule hotel. Upon entering, you will be handed a freshly pressed yukata (cotton robe, ゆかた), and escorted up to what can only be described as a ‘man spa.’ After an hour or two of soaking your travel-worn bones in a variety of hot and cold baths, you can retire to the dining room where you can choose from fresh sashimi, bowls of ramen or filets of Kobe beef, all of which can be washed down with ample pints of Kirin lager. When you’ve had your fill, you can rest soundly in the deluxe capsules, which come complete with personal television sets, mood lighting and a full library of Western and Japanese music.

Don’t believe me – those are my stinky feet in the picture!

Related: New capsule hotel in Gatwick gets mixed reviews, Japan’s Capsule Hotels

Big in Japan: Making Biofuel Out of Used Chopsticks

by Matthew Firestone on

Today’s ten-million yen trivia question is this:

How many disposable, wooden chopsticks are used each year in Japan?

Give up?

The answer is approximately 90,000 tons (81,646,000 kilograms) or approximately two-hundred pairs per person per year. Needless to say, the Japanese aren’t exactly the world’s greatest environmentalists!

Indeed, one of the biggest culture shocks foreigners experience upon arrival is the incredible amount of trash that the Japanese generate. For example, if you go to the convenience store to buy a bento or lunch box, it’ll be skillfully double or even triple bagged by the clerk. After unwrapping the endless layers of your bento, inside you’ll sometimes find as many as three pairs of chopsticks- just in case you feel like sharing your lunch with a few friends.

So, what can be done you ask – how about making biofuel?

Earlier this week, the Japanese Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fishery announced plans to allocate funds to support nationwide chopstick recycling programs. The aim of the program is two-fold: the first is to raise public awareness about the need to conserve resources, particularly items that are a daily fixture in people’s lives. The second aim is to support projects by businesses and local governments to turn disposable chopsticks into biofuel.

Currently, used chopsticks are simply discarded in the burnable rubbish bin (one credit to the Japanese is that they routinely separate burnable and non-burnable garbage). In a country obsessed with hygiene and cleanliness, the idea of reusing chopsticks is unheard of, especially with the fear of pandemic illness on the rise such as SARS and avian flu. Indeed, environmentally conscious foreigners like myself who carry our own chopsticks around with us are usually the subject of intense ridicule!

However, the current plan is to install boxes to collect used chopsticks outside restaurants and convenience stores. Private contractors will then transport these boxes to special facilities where the chopsticks will be ground up and compressed into wooden pellets, which can be used as a high-energy fuel.

Typically, wooden pellets are formed using heat and pressure to compact sawdust and paper, though disposable chopsticks are clearly a more abundant resource. There is also hope that disposable chopsticks can be converted into ethanol, which is becoming an increasingly important additive to gasoline. Currently, there are approximately thirty facilities producing wooden pellets across the country, as well as ethanol-producing facilities in Osaka and Okayama.

The Ministry is hopeful that the program will also help raise consciousness about the social responsibility of large corporations across the country. This is particularly relevant as global climate will be a major topic on the agenda at the Group of Eight (G8) industrialized nations’ economic summit scheduled for June of 2008 in Hokkaido.

Furthermore, I think I can speak for everyone here in Tokyo that after suffering through one of the hottest summers on the book (I’m tired of sweating through everything I own), stepping up the fight against global warming is something all of us can agree on.

Japan may have sparkling whale-free seas, but at least there’s hope for the forests.

PS As a disclaimer, I am by no means knowledgeable on the process of making biofuel, so please feel free to comment on the efficacy of this program!

** Special thanks to Flickr users Rick (Chinese Lunch), MShades (Bento Box) and View-Askew (Pollution) **