Today, the band traveled to Kamakura. We first stopped at The Great Buddha, the second tallest bronze Buddha statue in Japan. Then we went to Komachi-dori, a shopping street which is said to be the heart of Kamakura. It is near the Tsurugaoka Hachimangu shrine. This is the most important Shinto shrine in Kamakura. It is in the very center of the city, both geographically and culturally. For most of its history, it was not only a Shinto shrine, but it was also a Buddhist temple, which explains its layout that is typical of most temples.

There were many food vendors along the path leading to the shrine that we got our lunch from. I tried chicken skin with cabbage and kimchi, and I really enjoyed it.

After lunch, my buddy and I explored the shrine briefly. There was a wedding happening, so we got to catch a glimpse of what a traditional Shinto wedding looked like. After we were done exploring the shrine, we set off to do some shopping on Komachi-dori. As previously mentioned, this street is said to be the heart of Kamakura. It was absolutely packed with so many different shops and food stands. The shops ranged from clothing to kitchen utensils to jewelry. The food vendors also had a wide variety of treats to choose from, like bubble tea, crepes, and green tea ice cream.

One of the things I really enjoyed was exploring all the shops and seeing all the different products that were offered. I was able to find gifts for people back home very easily. I also really enjoyed seeing the shrine. It was really cool to see a piece of traditional Japanese culture so close to a very modern shopping district. There were also a couple of small happenings that I really enjoyed. The first happened when my buddy and I were finding something for dessert. She went up to a stand to pay for a piece of pineapple and the vendor asked to play Rock Paper Scissors with her, the stakes being an extra, free piece of pineapple. The vendor won, unfortunately. The second one happened while we were standing in line to get lemonade. There was remixed Disney music playing at this stand and two Japanese girls in line behind us were singing and dancing along. Overall, this was one of my favorite stops on tour so far, but we have so much more to do and experience and I can’t wait to enjoy everything single thing that comes our way!

Tonight was QUITE the adventure for a few of us! A group of us decided to visit Akihabara, a city know for its electronics, computer games, and its otaku or “nerds.” In Japanese, otaku “refers to anyone unusually enthusiastic about, knowledgeable about and focused on a particular thing or topic. However, otaku is usually used in the context of those with a love and exhaustive knowledge of comic books, or novels in pictures, and animated cartoons or computer graphics and the characters who portray them (Cancino).” Needless to say, we definitely had a few otaku in our group!

Akihabara was not the city’s original name; during the Edo period (1603-1868), this area was called Aioi. The lower class samurais resided here and it “was known for regular fires and brawls (Cancino).” In 1870, a shrine was built in the city and dedicated to the deity Akiba-daigongen who was known for protecting those against fires. When the shrine was built, people began

calling the city of Aioi to Akihabara. The city’s name was then officially changed in 1890 when its first railway station was built.

When you walk down the streets of Akihabara, you instantly feel like you are in some type of Nintendo game! Every store window is dedicated to some type of video game, such as Super Mario or Pokemon! We visited a store that had three floors of “old school” games, with the first floor having a Mario theme, the second being a PlayStation theme, and the third being an arcade theme. While I am not an otaku when it comes to video games, it was still super cool to walk around and peruse the games, while also seeing our fellow band otaku stare wide eyed and with their jaws lying on the floor.

After walking through the store, we walked a few blocks down to a restaurant called Gundam where we ate dinner! The restaurant’s theme was based off of the tv series Gundam, which feature giant robots. While eating dinner, we listened to the tv show’s soundtrack and watched scenes from the episodes! The restaurant was quite small, so our group of 11 people had to divide ourselves amongst three different tables! The menu consisted of both American and Japanese dishes accompanied with some super yummy drinks!

Following dinner, a few of us decided to head back to the hotel while the others went in search for some ice cream! This is the point in our journey where we were truly tested on figuring out how to work Japan’s train station…

For those going back to the hotel, we walked to the station to grab our train that would take us to Ikebukuro. As we were walking down the stairs, we saw that our train was there and ran to squeeze inside among the other passengers. Unfortunately, not all of us made it on and half of us were left back in Akihabara Station. Not wanting our friends to get lost, those who made it on the train got off at the next stop and waited for the others to meet us. Thankfully, we were able to get in contact with them and tell them that we were waiting at the next stop.

BUT THEN, as we were waiting on the platform, everyone on the train we had just exited started to leave the train as well; instead of leaving, the train was stopped and was leaving its doors open. We were able to ask one of the passengers what was happening and were saddened to hear that there was an accident that had occurred on the line we were supposed to take and that they had temporarily stopped all movement of that line.

We all looked at each other with tired and worried looks etched on our faces. How the heck were we going to get back?? Everything around us was in Japanese and for the most part, everyone around us only spoke Japanese…for a minute, we thought we would be walking back to our hotel! HOWEVER! We quickly put our heads together and found an alternate route that would take us back to where we needed to be. All of us had taken the train yesterday during our tours around Tokyo and recognized some of the cities within the alternate route that we decided to take. It was a very long and tiring trip, and doubled the time it would have originally taken us to get back to the hotel.

Thankfully, we ended up at the correct station that was near our hotel safe and sound. Personally, it was kind of scary seeing everyone abandon the line we were planning on taking, not being able to understand a word the conductor was saying, and not having consistent WiFi to use to find alternate routes to get back to the hotel, or to use to contact someone if we had needed help. Being in a foreign country can be very nerve-racking and scary. However, if you remain calm, think things through, and always travel with a group, everything will end up just fine. So far, Japan has been quite the experience; and we’ve only been here for three days! I am so excited to explore the rest of Japan and play some beautiful music with some amazing people!

Reference: https://www.japanvisitor.com/tokyo/tokyo-area-guides/akihabara

Today on our second day in Tokyo, we got the opportunity to experience something we had heard a lot about coming into the trip, but few if any of us had actually been a part of: taiko drumming. Taiko drumming is a traditional percussion style of the Japanese. The wind ensemble broke into two classes in order to properly become taiko masters.

We descended into the basement building where the taiko class was located and removed our shoes. My taiko classroom was filled with about twenty large taiko drums. The drums we played on weren’t as large as some taiko drums can be, but were still about waist high and produced a deep, rich sound that reverberated off the walls and mirror of the small classroom.

Our taiko instructor wasted no time, providing our class of twenty with two bachi sticks each. The bachi seemed quite large as far as drumsticks go, about a foot long and thick to properly produce the rich taiko sound when the drum was struck. Our instructor and class spent the next hour familiarizing ourselves with the techniques and trades of a taiko drum master. First, our stances had to be wide, quite a bit so as taiko drumming takes a lot of power and energy and uses the entire body. Having a wide stance makes that easier. Next, our arms needed to hit the taiko hard to make the correct sounds, so we couldn’t drum like normal percussionists. Our arms were held high and usually extended far above our head. Striking the drum then allowed gravity to do the work as we brought our bachi down from high above our heads to hit the drum, making the booming noise.

Our taiko lesson lasted only an hour, but felt both so much longer and so much shorter. Time flew, blisters grew, sweat shined, and bachi were broken. After our hour of learning, my class had a mini concert where groups performed the piece we’d spent time learning for each other.

After we were done, we were treated to a performance from our instructor, who’d been playing taiko for over twenty-five years. Too soon, we left the room, put our shoes back on, and were done with taiko drumming and on to our next activity in the day. It was an exhausting exercise but worth it for what we learned about this style of music and piece of Japanese culture.

Today, after spending free time with other members of the band, the entire group reconvened to go on a few educational outings. Our first experience was learning and performing Taiko drums. After that we learned about paper lanterns and got to paint our own.
Paper lanterns have been around for centuries. On these lanterns, people write kanji characters for hopes/wishes of the future. Each of us selected one character to paint on our lantern: good luck, happiness, sound, dream, or smile. For my lantern I decided to do dream. Our instructor explained that the characters are made up of different characters to represent the idea reflected. In dream, it is made up of the characters for grass, four, eye, roof, and katakana. These show a person lying down and dreaming.
First, we wrote our character down on a test paper. After this, we drew the character on the lantern in pencil. We then went over the pencil with black paint. The lines had to be thick in order to make the character legible. After we completed our character, we used stencils or freee hand designing on the paper lantern. On my lantern, I put cherry blossoms in various colors.
I loved this experience!! I love doing artistic things, and I found the painting to be relaxing. It was also really cool seeing how each person designed and created their lantern. After spending so much time learning about the Japanese culture, getting to experience it is amazing!!! I can’t wait to see what the rest of this trip has in store.

One of my friends made me a book of devos for my time in Japan, and I thought that the one for today was very appropriate. It was about failures. I know that sounds harsh, but with being in a new culture, mistakes are inevitable. Sometimes it’s been hard to figure out how to flush a toilet or how to communicate with others who speak a different language. I haven’t made any major mistakes, yet, though!

Today, we split into groups to wander around Tokyo with a guide. My group had a guide named Romiko; she was very nice and helpful.

First, we took the train to the National Museum of Japan. We spent most of our time there in the To-ji Temple special exhibit. The museum included a variety of art and other treasures primarily pertaining to Buddhist traditions and rituals. This exhibit was divided into four chapters. The first focused on a special ceremony called Goshuchinchi Mishiho. The ceremony requires many objects including a platform, trays, altar posts, and much more. Next was a chapter on esoteric Buddhist art. There were many tapestries, texts, and mandalas in this section.

The third and fourth chapters were more interesting to me. The third section was about the religious practices and history of the To-ji Temple. It was full of intricate masks depicting devas and old documents from the priests of the temple. Some statues emphasizing females were also in this area, which the museum noted as unique. There was a small gong and bronze cymbals, too.

Finally, the fourth section explored the world of mandalas. These mandalas are not what we normally think of. They have images of different deities on them in geometric patterns. The first mandala was cool because it was large and meant to go on an altar. A priest would toss a flower onto it to decide a person’s deity. This area was marked by fifteen statues. The museum noted that these statues were influenced by Hinduism because of the many heads and limbs on the deities. I thought that this was quite interesting how the two religions converged.

After we finished going through the museum, we spent some time in the gardens outside. The flowers and foliage were so pretty and green compared to the cold of home! We asked Romiko a lot of questions about Japan. Yes, they do have mosquitos, just not yet. And no, they don’t have “mean” bugs like wasps.

Later, we got some ramen and dipping noodles for lunch. It was interesting to order food from a machine. We discovered that eating noodles the right way, by slurping them, is very messy, so Romiko gave us some bibs that the restaurant provided.

We rounded out the day by visiting Meiji Jingu. It was a very peaceful place, which was welcome after all the walking we did. I made a wish at the shrine and got a fortune. It was cool to be able to participate in a totally different belief system like that. There were two weddings going on while I was there, so I got to see a bit of what that ritual is like.

Overall, it was a fun and exhausting day. It was wonderful to explore Tokyo in such a personalized manner and learn how to get around on my own. I’ve been so excited to get involved in this different culture, and today I finally got to. I’m ready to do even more new things in the next few weeks!

After some much needed sleep, day one for my group started off at the Shinto shrine, Meji Jingu. The shrine is dedicated to the divine souls of Emperor Meiji and his wife Empress Shoken. It was completed in 1920 which was just shortly after the Emperor and Empress had died. It was destroyed in World War II but was rebuilt shortly after that. The entrance is marked with a big torii gate and contains over 100,000 trees that were donated from all over the world.

(Meji Jingu Torii Gate)

 Meiji Jingu shrine is very popular around the New Year’s Holiday because there are usually over three million people who visit during the holiday to have their first prayer of the year there. The shrine is also a very popular place for typical Shinto weddings are performed.

When you first walk into the shrine, you head to the chozuya where you wash both hands and your mouth before you go pray to the gods.

(Band president Robby Newell doing chozuya)

There are a couple different ways you can pray. You can go and physically pray, you can purchase an ema that you can write your hopes and dreams on, or they have pieces of paper that you can write your hopes and dreams on and then drop it in a box.

(Ema) 

At the shrine, there is also the opportunity to get a fortune for 100yen. They have a whole little box of fortunes that are written in English which was nice for those of us that don’t speak Japanese. My favorite item that I purchased was an omamori which is a little protection charm. There are all different things that it could protect from health/ well-being of family to help finding a good spouse.

What I loved about this shrine was how peaceful it was. All of the trees and nature were just so calming and to have something like that right in the middle of a really busy city is mind-blowing to me. Another really cool part about our experience was getting to see a traditional Shinto wedding professional. It was fun to see the bride in her wedding kimono and the rest of the family also dressed up for the occasion.

(Wedding Processional)

Overall, I think my favorite part of today was finally getting to be immersed into the Japanese culture that we’ve been talking about since day one of rehearsal. With the shrines, the shopping, and the food, it was all different then what I’m used to but it was definitely a good kind of different. I’m looking forward to continuing to experience different aspects of Japanese Culture.

Sources:

https://www.japan-guide.com/e/e3002.html

After a long night of much needed sleep, the day began for our group at 9:30 where we met in previously decided groups to spend our first full day in Japan exploring Tokyo. Each group had its own list of adventures and ideas of what they wanted to see when they went out and the group I was in decided the first stop was going to be Asakusa.

Asakusa is a shopping district in Tokyo containing the Buddhist temple Sensō-ji. The first thing we saw when approaching the temple was the initial ‘thunder gate’ called the Kaminarimon. The Kaminarimon boasted a large paper lantern that visitors of the shrine would walk under to enter the next part of the temple grounds, the Nakamise-dori. Nakamise-dori is the path that leads visitors to the temple of Sensō-ji, the focal point of the area, and is littered with shops that sell a variety of items. These items included traditional items such as kimonos, fans, and paper lanterns to tourist trap items such as phone cases and figurines.

If you managed to make it past the shops in the Nakamise-dori you were greeted by another large gate hoisting ornate paper lanterns that marked the entrance to the temple. Immediately to the left after passing the gate was the five story pagoda topped with a golden spire. Walking toward the temple we were greeted by a large pot of burning incense that attracted people toward it to use the smoke emitted to cleanse and heal themselves. I personally saw people wafting the smoke all over their bodies, from head to toe, I chose to only let the smoke touch my head like many of the other people visiting before moving on to the main temple.

Walking into the main temple people would pause at the top of the steps to say a prayer and offer a gift. The inside of the temple contained a beautiful display containing figures crafted in what looked to be gold and brass surrounded by carved wooden figures and flora to create what was truly a spectacular sight but unfortunately photos were prohibited inside the temple out of respect for those who are there to practice their religion. However, it was possible to get your fortune read or purchase charms for your travels at small corner shops within the temple as a way to commemorate the visit.

Everything about visiting Asakusa was exceptional. The oriental architecture of the grounds that juxtaposed the modern skyscrapers that surrounded the area. And the people, including a variety of tourists and local people that flocked to the temple, that all came to the same place for purely tourist or religious reasons. Everything seen today at Asakusa added up to a wonderful experience that has us looking forward to the rest of the 2019 tour of Japan.

Tokyo is the largest City in Japan with around 37 million people, which is about a 3rd of the total population. Key exports include machinery, vehicles, and manufactured goods. Tokyo was formerly called Edo until the capital moved from Kyoto (capitol city) to Tokyo (East Capital) in 1868 immediately following the end of the Tokugawa regime. (Wiki) Today Tokyo is one of the largest cities in the world. Our afternoon in Tokyo was spent taking a nap in the hotel, since the time is so different (14 hour time difference).

Our arrival to Tokyo was preceded by a 12 hour flight. Now, if you have ever been on a flight, or have not, that is a long time. It was actually really enjoyable due to the comfortable seats, the leg room, the screens to watch movies and play games, the members of the Wind Ensemble were generally close together, so we had each other’s company as well. I sat by Sofia Bouffard and messaged some of my percussion friends that graduated last year. They wish they could be here and wished us a safe trip. I was able to do some reading, watched a few movies, took a 3-4 hour nap as well. We were served two meals on the trip, and a snack. I had a steak stir fry for one meal and scrambled eggs with sausage for another meal. They had a lot of variety for other portions of the meal as well such as kiwi and potatoes. For the snack, we had some flatbread pizza and ice cream. We flew from Minneapolis and flew over Canada, Alaska, and then flew over Eastern Russia and then flew to Japan. The ride was quite smooth. After a long flight, we were finally in Japan, the moment we had been waiting for around 8 months!

After we settled in the hotel, we went to supper. On our way there, we got to see a little bit of the city. The restaurant was only a few blocks away, but on the way there, I noticed a lot of different city smells. They weren’t anything like the typical smells we encounter in the midwest, but it did have a city smell that was not always great, but for the most part, it was not bad. They have much smaller streets and many streets that go in different directions and intersect at strange angles. They drive on the other side of the road, and a lot of the time, it was hard to tell if the paths that we were on were either walkways or roads. Every once in a while, there were stairs where the sidewalks were, and they would typically have a ramp to be able to walk a bike up and down as well.

Sunset on the way to dinner. Art in Hotel Metropolitan Lobby

At night, we grabbed supper with one of our hands on travel agents, Kiyoshi Yamamoto. We ate at a traditional Japanese restaurant and had all you can eat Sukiyaki. The dining experience was quite different because there was a wooden bench that went all the way around the table. Before sitting down, we took our shoes off before getting on the bench. We would then walk a short way on the bench before sitting down. We actually were able to make our food in a communal setting. We had a dish that we would load up that was on a flame. The Japanese use broths in their food quite often, so there was the broth and then a mixture of meats, onions, tofu, mushrooms and several other vegetables. There was a salad bar as well. When getting food from the salad bar, we would get out of benches, put on slippers that the restaurant provided and then sat back down.

After that, several of us went to a nearby arcade, where there were a lot of games to play and a lot of gamers as well! The arcade was 5 stories tall plus 2 more stories, one for the basement, and another for a cafe at the top. The arcade had crane games, games like Dance Dance Revolution, and other rhythm and coordination games like that. We got there around 9 p.m. and there were hundreds of people inside, and the rows were packed. I did not play anything, but I watched my friends Jami Goetz and Jamie Flanegan play a taiko drum game, which was fun to watch. One day of Japan, and it’s been really exciting so far!

I never thought I would actually make it to Japan a few years ago. It has been a journey to actually get to this trip, but it has been worth it, and the trip has just begun. Some personal takeaways and observations that I have had so far are: try all of the food, it is probably better than you think (Sukiyaki was really good), their culture is much quieter than ours (in the airport, I could hear what the staff were saying from a ways away), and keep your eyes open because there is always something to learn.

It all started on a charter bus, waiting impatiently to hear news from our fearless leaders: the amazing Doc, the talented Dr. Wachmann, the goofy Robby, the bubbly Sofia, and the kind Payton.

The wind ensemble had been long awaiting the time, the time where they would finally fulfill their destinies and board the plane bound for Tokyo, Japan for their 2019 international tour. The week leading up to this takeoff had been long, tenuous, and full of hurry up and wait and get ready as they prepared for this trip of a lifetime. After all the preparations, the fundraising, the practicing…. it had all paid off… they were finally doing it. They were going to Japan.

After a very long wait through baggage check and security, the group waited impatiently to board the large aircraft that had more than 60 rows, 9 chairs a row. While they waited to board, many members stopped for a quick bite, coffee, and one last bathroom break. With water bottles filled and excitement and anxiety at a high, the 55 members of the wind ensemble 2019 tour departed for their destination.

Flight DL 121 from delta carried the group along with many others. To help ease the length of the flight, the courteous flight attendants offered ample beverages, snacks, delicious meals, and in flight entertainment. Encouraged to sleep as much as possible, many members slumbered while the plane edged closer to Tokyo. Some of the band are experienced flyers, some are new flyers. Some are lovers of flights and some are haters. I for one could feel the tension and excitement as we took off, flying high into the sky. Immense excitement swelled in me to experience my first time out of the US and only my second flight in my life, both with my band family.

For some; this flight and trip might be one of many, and for some it may be one of the few they take in their life. Experiencing this amazing culture and way of life as a band family is something that will forever change the entire wind ensemble, and Doc and Dr. Wachmann are leading the way, sharing what they know with the band. The majority of the flight is a lot of relax, eat, watch a movie, walk around, and let the excitement come to you as the hours tick by. A new understanding and respect for such a beautiful culture that is so different from ours will allow all the members to have times to be humble, to learn, to share, and so much more.

Upon the flight’s landing, the members will unboard the plane in the Tokyo airport. The wind ensemble will go through customs with sheets filed out provided by the flight attendants with various information, and be off on this life changing adventure. The ride is smooth so far and I am so excited the closer and closer we get to Japan.

The whole crew landed safe and sound in Japan around 1:30pm! We are on our way to an amazing three weeks. It still hasn’t really hit me that we’re in Japan… but I’m sure it will soon and I am so excited that I have the opportunity to grow and learn from this once in a lifetime experience! Here are a few pictures of the flight and our group when we were in the Tokyo airport!!

Our last day in the United States was significantly less hectic. We ate breakfast and said goodbye to our host families and met at Roland-Story High School early in the morning. There, we gave our families our traditional farewell blessing by singing The Lord Bless You and Keep You and Wartburg’s Loyalty song. Then, we were off to Owatonna, Minnesota!

Our first stop in Owatonna was the Wenger factory, which we were able to tour. This was really neat considering Wenger makes so many products we use in our very own band room including chairs, lockers, and even the auditorium sound system.

First, we were taken through the production facility to see how the products we use daily are made. We then got to tour the showroom, where they keep samples of their finished products. The highlight for me was getting to try out the acoustic systems in the practice rooms that make the room sound like you’re playing anywhere from a chapel to an empty 10,000 seat stadium! We finished off the tour in the acoustics lab, where they demonstrated how they test how all of their products affect the acoustics of a room.

After the amazing tour, we took a break for lunch and last-minute shopping at Wal-mart, since our flight is tomorrow!! After our break, we were headed to St. John’s Lutheran Church to unload and rehearse.

Before our concert, we were fortunate enough to share a dinner with students from Owatonna High School, who we were sharing our concert with. It was really great to interact with the students– namely when I got to talk with the students about the song Riften Wed that they were performing, since I have played it in the past. It was really great to share similarities in how the piece was performed, and to hear their excitement about the piccolo player playing from the balcony, which my band had also done in the past.

The concert went on splendidly and the seats were packed! The crowd was very excited to hear us play, which always makes the performances feel even more special. This was the perfect end to our “Pre-Tour Tour” and last night in the United States and I could not be more excited to fly to Japan tomorrow with my WCCB family!