If you live in Tokyo or if you plan to visit, this is what you have to do: Buy a Grutt Pass. For 2,000yen (or about $18) you can buy a booklet that gives you a discount or free entrance to 56 museums, zoos and aquariums. You’ve got two months to use it. If, like me, you love museums, then it’d be easy to get more than your money’s worth.
I used the Grutt Pass for the first time yesterday at the Tokyo Metropolitan Art Museum, and attended the latest exhibit, titled “Louvre”. Continue reading
Of all the interesting temples in the Angkor area, Ta Phrom is the coolest. Known for the giant trees that have grown out of the stone ruins, it’s probably one of the most photographed as well. It was built by the prolific Khmer king Jayavarman VII as a Buddhist monastery and university. Since it has been largely left as it was found, with the trees intact, it really does feel like a newly discovered ruins.
At its peak, 80,000 people lived in and around the temple. When we visited, there were just a handful of tourists, lost and wandering around in awe. Because of its ‘natural’ state, there were upturned blocks of stone and protruding tree roots to trip you up. It also kept many tourists out of the maze-like central enclosures. At one point we couldn’t find our way out. But I wouldn’t have minded staying there all day, among the doorways opening into nowhere, and the trees growing high into nothingness.
You can tell which country is doing well by the number of tourists that come from within its borders and travel around the world. For instance, during the 80’s when Japan was supposedly poised to overtake the U.S. in wealth and the yen was like gold, there were Japanese tourists everywhere with their Nikons and Minoltas. Then in the 90’s the world was inundated with the newly rich Germans and their camcorders. Of course, Americans have wandered the globe widely since the 50’s. The Brits and the French have also been globe-crawling mainstays. Continue reading
On the trains here there are small TV screens above the doors that display the status of other train lines. Today there were seven lines that were delayed due to “wind”. I’d never seen that as a cause of delay. Usually it’s an ‘accident’ which is a euphemism for a suicide, and sometimes it’s an earthquake, or a typhoon. The winds were quite strong today but I wouldn’t call them delay-worthy. It has been extremely cold, however, and the wind just makes it absolutely arctic. Yesterday morning I woke up to snow. It was the first snow for the first time in two years. Awesome. The best thing about snow is how it sucks up all the sound, and chases all the people indoors. Then there’s nothing left but snow and silence. Continue reading
“I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. That is why right, temporarily defeated, is stronger than evil triumphant.” -Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
When I was a teenager, navigating the indignities of racism in America and trying to articulate the frustrations of my experiences, I watched a great documentary series about the American Civil Rights Movement on PBS (the U.S.’s underfunded version of NHK or BBC). I learned about the courageous heroes and heroines that struggled and prevailed against the oppression of segregation, discrimination, and violence. Preeminent among them of course is Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. January 15th was Dr. King’s birthday and it’s celebrated as a national holiday in the U.S. That the holiday even exists is remarkable, since during his life he was vilified by the government, and mercilessly harassed by the FBI. Continue reading
