About a month ago my seminar went to the Liberty Memorial and WWI Museum in Kansas City. This was my third trip to the museum and memorial, but I'm always struck by the lovely view of Union Station from the memorial, as seen above. I apologize for the tiny photos, they are from my cell phone, but you get the idea.
We toured the exhibits of the Museum, housed underground beneath the Memorial, which is seen above. The interior of the original Memorial exhibit hall is below. The Liberty Memorial was built in the 1920s and the WWI Museum was opened within the past decade.
- Generally we have a side salad with our dinner each night, but this week we had extra cucumbers from the CSA and needed to figure out what to do with our bounty of produce. Enter the juicer. We juiced half a cucumber, half a head of romaine lettuce, a handful of spinach, and two pears, and in about five minutes we had a beautiful, inexpensive, and tasty way to get a few servings of veggies in on a Saturday afternoon. The salad juice was smooth and had a nice balance of sweet from the pear and zip from the cucumber. Apparently our countrymen could use to learn a few lessons in eating veggies, as yesterday's paper reported that only one in four Americans eats three or more servings of vegetables a day. Eesh. My advice- buy a juicer, it's fast and so yummmmmmyyyyyy!
- - For the first time in my life I have a U.S. style commute. By this I mean by car and about 45 minutes each way. While I decidedly prefer public transportation (and really, given the option who wouldn't?) or my former ten minute commute by moped, I have been making due and trying to find the upsides of my situation. Perhaps the best part is that I don't have to drive through a crowded metro area, but rather I drive between a metro area and a small town, crossing an idyllic Midwestern landscape. At this time of year that means hundreds of thousands of sunflowers, farm fields turning from green to gold, and rolls of hay dotting fields of cattle. The above photo is from the Ernie Miller Nature Center, which I pass each day and which is fairly representative of the scenery through which I drive. Below is one of my favorite paintings from the Spencer Museum of Art, Near Sundown by Grant Wood, which I am reminded of each day that I cruise along K-10, listening to the news on NPR in the morning and music on my iPod in the afternoon, soaking up the prairie scenery. -
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - We got a wealth of pumpkins and squashes from our CSA a few weeks back. I didn't get a photo of the pile of beautiful veggies, but I did remember to get a photo as we were working to freeze them. We cut up the squash, blanched it in a few batches, and put it into huge freezer bags, so now we have a few pounds of squash ready to go for the fall season, some like the acorn pictured here, but most of it being Delicata. I'm thinking about Ricotta, Red Onion and Squash Pizza, Squash Ravioli, and Squash Rissotto....
After a near three month silence, I think I am ready to get back to the blogging.
The last time I posted we were in the midst of packing up our Yokohama apartment at the end of two wonderful years in Japan, and now I sit in Kansas, close to the point from which we departed for our journey. The readjustment period took longer than I expected and was surprisingly disorienting and emotional at times. In the two years that we were gone we had many adventures, traveled all over Asia, learned Japanese, made wonderful friends, had a baby, and generally enjoyed a fantastic time of life when we felt very free. After returning to Chicago and visiting with family for about a week we came down to the Kansas City-Lawrence area and in many ways it felt like nothing changed at all, our two year life-changing adventure was a dream.
In some ways it has been very comfortable and easy to be back. Daily interactions are in English. I understand how things work (like how to rent an apartment or purchase a car). It’s been wonderful to see family and friends and to be reunited with our dog and cats.
In other ways it has been an uncomfortable and difficult experience. We have to drive everywhere. The carts at the grocery store are disgustingly large, as are the products and the cars into which people load their commercial bounty. American politics makes my blood pressure rise. People are rude.
The past few months have had their ups and downs, and we have done a few really fun things. We saw fireworks on the Fourth of July. We went to a baseball game and watched the Kansas City Royals play the Oakland A’s. We went camping in the Flint Hills with the dog and the baby. We joined a CSA. The list goes on. After this long period of adjustment, I finally feel like I am wholly back. I miss Japan dearly, and I look forward to going back, but for now it feels good to be fully in one place.
I hope that in the next few months I can find some time to post now and again, either about daily life, the experience of working on a PhD in Art History, cooking, travels in the U.S., or just general thoughts.
I have completely broken my pledge to everyday blogging, and for that I apologize. We only have a few more days left before we move back to the U.S., and during the last week of IUC hanging out with friends was top priority, followed closely by the many tasks involved with moving. As I begin to think about the many boxes of belongings that await my return, I've been thinking alot about the many kitchen appliances that I have missed over the past two years, and the one kitchen appliance that has gained a spot in my heart while in Japan, my rice cooker. We eat rice on a daily basis here, and I have come to love the perfectly cooked grains that are produced by a quality rice cooker. When we lived in Ono, and before we purchased a rice cooker, we had a friend over for dinner and cooked rice on a pot on top of the stove. I will never forget the look of astonishment on her face when she saw how we were cooking rice, and now that I have used a proper cooker for nearly two years I understand where that look came from. Simply put, rice cooker rice is just better. In Lawrence we had a cheap under $20 cooker that always burnt the rice on the bottom layer, an appliance that I fully plan to jettison when we return and replace with a more upscale model (I'm thinking about this one). Here, we generally purchase a 5 kilo bag of unwashed short grain white rice, which lasts us about a month. Above is our copper pot with the small rice strainer that allows us to drain the rice easily when washing it, below I am draining the rice. While I prefer brown rice for health and taste reasons, white rice is the prefered grain here, so the brown variety is generally more expensive and a bit more difficult to find.
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The rice cooker at the end of the cooking cycle, which generally takes about 35 minutes for two cups, enough to make two large rice-bowl meals or two sides of rice with leftovers.
Today I gave my final presentation for the IUC, a 15 minute public presentation in Japanese on the research project I've been working on for the past three months.
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Above and below are two examples of the late 19th century images that I examined for my project.
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The abstract of my paper that appeared in the program for the final presentations:
And in English:
During the early Meiji period Japanese women assumed new societal roles and acted as active producers in Japan’s rapidly developing industrial economy, yet they were simultaneously denied basic political freedoms and rights. Using the Tomioka Silk Mill as a point of departure, this paper examines how images of Meiji women reflected Japanese societal values and concerns of the 1870s and 1880s.
Images of the Tomioka Silk Mill range from multi-color woodblock prints that celebrate the technological achievements of the mill to softly painted Nihonga representing the Meiji Empress’ visit to the site. By investigating the breadth of visual material referencing the Tomioka Silk Mill in the cultural context of the late nineteenth century this paper will shed light on Meiji period women’s roles as they were condoned and promoted by the government.
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As part of my research, a few weeks ago I took a day trip out to the Tomioka Silk Mill in Gunma prefecture, about three hours away by local train.
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The train from Takasaki to Tomioka was a true inaka (rural) train, departing once an hour. Tickets were stamped by hand, not machine. I purchased the combination train and site visit ticket.
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The slow and rickety train to Tomioka.
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The walking route from the Tomioka train station to the silk mill was marked by a green line along the road with occasional signs indicating the distance to the mill.
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The entry gate to the mill.
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Above and below are photos of the silk spinning building, where thread was taken from the silk cocoons after dipping them into hot water to kill the worm. These weren't the original 19th century machines, but I'm not sure when they date from. The factory was in operation until about 1985, so they were from sometime in the 20th century.
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The building where the cocoons were processed and sorted. The architectural style is a combination of traditional Japanese methods in the wood framing, and 19th century European methods in the brick construction.
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The mill was run by the Japanese government from 1873 to 1893 with assistance from overseas workers. Paul Brunat, the first foreign manager, lived in this house. The conditions experienced by the teenage women who worked at the mill were considerably less luxurious.
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The view from the cliff that the silk mill sits atop.
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Back at Tomioka Station, 125.2 km to Tokyo Station, 20.2 km to Takasaki Station.
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The newspaper stand at the station was on the honor system.
We spent a lovely Sunday afternoon with our friend Lola strolling around the grounds at Hasedera in Kamakura viewing the many varieties of hydrangeas in bloom.
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The hillside was covered with blossoms, and the breeze from the nearby seaside was lovely.
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A view of the temple buildings from the hillside.
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... and the Benzaiten area of the cave. People can purchase the tiny devotional sculptures and place them in this room devoted to the deity.
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和みっこ (wamiko?). Hasedera is known for the many Jizo that are located there (I posted photos of these from our last visit in fall of 2008- click here), but I'm not sure what this particular version of Jizo does. Generally Jizo will rescue people from hell and is a patron of children and the unborn who pass away too soon, as well as travelers and pilgrims.
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To get to Hasedera we transfer to the Enoshima Dentetsu at Kamakura Station. The Enoden is a funky little toy train that runs along the coast near Kamakura, and has its own special Hello Kitty, complete with a surfboard.
Today started with an amazing optional bonus class- Offensive Expressions for Japanese Interaction, a play on the title of one of our textbooks (Formal Expressions for Japanese Interaction). Indeed, we learned how to swear! While I don' t plan on using these expressions myself, I'm happy to be able to understand them if anyone uses them in my vacinity. The afternoon consisted of errands including the post office, ward office, and the grocery store. There are three grocery stores near our apartment, but the biggest one is Inageya, about a half mile away. The Yokohamaya has slightly better prices on veggies, but they don't have much selection in other goods, and My Basket is only two blocks away, but is relatively small so we mostly go there for quick pick ups. Above is the store, located on the first floor of a large apartment building. A yakitori cart (grilled chicken) is usually parked out front, and a small post box is at the left foreground.
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Above is the produce section, below some cabbage, lotus root, daikon and carrots.
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