31 August 2009

Emily had me up at 6.30, to another misty morning. She was not very good at breakfast and even refused toast with jam, which I was relying on if all else failed.

As we packed, we watched the Diet Lower House (Japanese equivalent to the House of Commons) election result. As polls had suggested, the opposition DPJ won by a significant margin, ousting the LDP who had been in power for the vast majority of the last 50 years. I must admit I was a bit surprised, as I had thought that voters would waiver at the last moment and lose the courage to make such a drastic change. Whether there will be any real change remains to be seen. Their politicians are cut from the same cloth as those of the LDP (indeed, one of their most influential leaders, Ozawa, used to be in the LDP, and was recently implicated in a bribery scandal that led him to give up his leadership of the DPJ).

We were not sure what to do until our train left at two, as a typhoon off south-east Honshu was expected to generate a lot of rain. We decided to drive up to Matsumoto and look at the famous castle there. We knew it would be a rush as we would only have three hours to get 30 miles each way and look at the castle too. However, it did prove to be worthwhile, and we had fine weather to boot. The 'black crow' castle as it is known (due to its sweeping 'wings'), is very picturesque, with an attractive red bridge across the moat, willows and pines in the grounds, and mountains as a backdrop.

It is one of very few castles in Japan in its original condition (many have been restored or are replicas).

There are about six levels to the castle joined by very steep wooden stairs, like going up into an attic, so Nick had to carry Emily, watching his head on the extremely low beams as he did so. There are displays of artefacts but no furnishings inside, so the shell seemed rather devoid of character. However, the thick beams and floors felt quite warm compared to the cold stone castles we have at home.

Emily slept on the drive back to Chino, but only for half an hour, waking just as we pulled in to the car hire centre. We ate in a cheap restaurant by the station; the noodles and beef lunch seemed to satisfy Emily, though my small bowl of mountain vegetables in a thin broth with noodles didn't keep me going for long. We topped up with icecream from the gelateria before hotfooting it to the station for our train.

It was so hard to amuse Emily for two hours, but it went fairly well and there was no major upset. As we travelled through the valleys between mountains the clouds looked amazing, long wisps of white boiling up out of deep valleys between soaring dark peaks. On arrival in Tokyo it was chucking it down, so the typhoon had hit after all. It was all over by 7pm though, as the storm veered away from Japan at the last minute. We got drenched just walking from Tamachi station to the apartment. With a large pack on my back and a smaller one on my front, covered with my big black rain cape, I must have looked really odd to the rush hour salarymen. Emily was dry as a bone in her covered kid carrier on Nick's back.