Dying arts, gardens and zen

The theme of our visit to Kanazawa was dying arts (no pun intended).  At our first stop, the Gold Museum, the docent explained the entire process of making and applying gold leaf.   Gold bars are pressed into thin sheets about a millimeter thick.  Each gold sheet is placed between two sheets of a special paper made out of rice straw and mulberry fibers.  A stack of a thousand sheets is then continuously compressed until the gold is less than .0001 millimeters thick.  This is the gold leaf that is then used in various arts such as painting and pottery, and even sprinkled over food.  Why is this a dying art since there is a fair amount of gold in the world?  The process for making the paper takes a month and the supply of artisans who know how to make the paper is disappearing.  They have tried using carbon paper and something like onionskin, but the result is inferior.  So the world is running out of gold leaf.

In the afternoon, we visited National Treasure Suzanne Ross.  That is how she has listed but I don't know who decides that you are a National Treasure.   Suzanne is singlehandedly trying to keep the art of lacquering alive.  I learned last week at the museum in Shanghai that lacquer comes from the sap of the lacquer tree.  I had trouble believing that, but it is true.  Lacquer comes from the urushi tree which only grows in Japan and China (slightly different varieties.)  The process of gathering the sap is very slow as it takes twelve years for each tree to mature and then each tree produces about a cup of sap that must then be processed producing an even smaller amount.  Despite Susan's efforts, urushi forests are disappearing since no one can make enough money growing and taking care of the trees.  By the way, Susan moved to her current location outside Kanazawa after a large earthquake (followed by flooding and fire) in 2023 destroyed her previous home and studio where she had been for over thirty years.

We had another ten course banquet in the evening.  Every few minutes they bring us a small plate with three or four bites of something that is often completely unrecognizable.  We take a guess, then we take a bite, and we are still not sure what we are eating.  The variety of food beyond the sushi that Americans know is staggering.  And I don't think I have seen tempura at all.

The next day we visited a (restored) samurai house.  The samurai period lasted for centuries, and the samurai were not just fighters, and certainly were not ninjas.  Rather, there was a hierarchy of samurai from the shogun (leader) to low level functionaries.  The size and height of each person's house reflected the level of the samurai within that hierarchy.

The floor of each room is comprised of tatami mats, each about three by six feet.  To this day, the Japanese do not measure room size by square feet but rather the number of tatamis, such as a six tatami room or a ten tatami room (very large).  In such small houses and rooms, there is little furniture (thus sitting on the floor), and everything must serve several purposes.  No need for a dresser; a kimono is folded and stored in a box.

In the afternoon, we visited Kenroku-en which is officially one of the three greatest traditional gardens in Japan.  It is a beautiful and peaceful Japanese garden.  We happened to be there when the workers were installing these tent-like frames (along with reporters and cameramen from several stations who were covering the installation).  Why?  These tents protect the trees from the heavy snow that falls in the winter.

We made a quick visit to another restored house, this time a Geisha House, and learned a bit about the music and other talents of the Geisha girls.  The main attraction in the afternoon was the workshop of Toshioka Kosen at his Kutani Kosen Kiln.  Toshioka is a fifth generation pottery maker, one of the few remaining traditional pottery makers in the area.  He walked us through the several stages of making pottery, a process that takes several months and at least five firings.  At his workshop, they still use wood burning ovens.  He thought about switching to gas, but decided that the old way was still the best way.  

One of the most interesting things I learned at the museum in Tokyo last week ... when Japan opened to the West in the late nineteenth century, the Europeans were totally unimpressed with the beautiful pottery and lacquered bowls (it's just decorative art), and the painted screens and lacquered chests (it's just furniture.)  So Japan sent artists to study Western art.  The first artists used watercolors, creating images similar to painted screens.  Water color?  Western experts turned up their noses again.  Apparently, unless it is oil painting on canvas, it is not "fine art."

Today we drove from Kanazawa to Fukui where we visited the Eihei-ji Temple which was described as "a Soto-zen monastery built in 1244 for austere meditation."  Monks live here for a year, meditating and praying for world peace, apparently undaunted that their prayers have not (yet) been answered.  After a year's training, they return to their home temples where the practice of monking is quite profitable.  Our guide insisted that they all drive BMW's.  Monks in Japan also marry and have families.  Not quite the same as Christian or even Laotian Buddhist monks.

Next, the Ichijodani Asakura Clan Ruins are one of the few ancient ruins and reconstructions that we have seen, although these ruins are only from the sixteenth century.  There is a lot of destruction in Japan - from wars, earthquakes, and tsunamis - but the Japanese just keep rebuilding.  Also, buildings were traditionally made out of wood and are easily destroyed in an earthquake or war.  So there are surprisingly few ancient sites for such an ancient people.  For the most part, the only shrines are Shinto, not relics of times past.

And finally, we visited another lovely garden with a "mansion" on a lake.  But the original mansion burned to the ground in an air raid during WWII, so we were in a lovely reconstruction.

A few observations about Japan ...

We had parked directly across the street from the Gold Museum but had to walk to the light at the corner to cross the street.  The guide told us that no one jaywalks in Japan.  Imagine a country where you can say that no one jaywalks.  

Also, there are no garbage cans anywhere.  I don't want to litter, but when I finish my Coke Zero, there is no place to throw away the bottle.  When I asked the guide, she said that some people carry a garbage bag with them and throw it away when they get home.  The lack of garbage cans even extends to public bathrooms where there are no paper towels for drying your hands.  You have to carry a small hand towel with you.