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Anyone who has spent more than a week in Japan has probably been surprised at the lack of regard that cyclists here often show both for their own safety and for the safety of others. It is not uncommon to see housewives cycling with one child on a seat in front and one behind, or salarymen riding one-handed in order to hold an umbrella(even on windy days!), or even high school students steering with one hand while sending text messages on their mobile phones with the other. Unsurprisingly this type of irresponsible behaviour has led to a dramatic increase in the number of accidents involving bicycles, with the result that the National Police Agency has, on paper at least, begun to clamp down on dangerous cyclists. New laws governing cyclists have been passed that will come into full effect from the 16th of June, 2008. According to the new laws:

- footpaths may only be used for walking, except in the case of small children or where the road and traffic do not allow safe passage of a bicycle. In certain cases, there will be a bicycle lane provided on the footpath, in which case bicycles have right of way only in that section of the footpath (penalties of up to 50,000 yen)

- children under the age of 13 must wear a helmet, even if they are only a passenger on the bike.

- bikes must be ridden on the left hand side of the road (penalty of up to 50,000 yen)

- bicycles on the footpath must always give way to pedestrians, in particular to elderly people (penalty of 20,000 yen)

- you may never ride a bike under the influence of alcohol (penalty of up to 100,000 yen)

- “doubling” a person over the age of six is prohibited (penalty of up to 20,000 yen)

- riding in tandem with another bicycle is prohibited (penalty of up to 20,000 yen)

- riding at night without a light is prohibited (penalty of up to 20,000 yen)

- you must adhere to all traffic signals and stop signs (penalty of up to 50,000 yen)

- you may not use a cell phone while riding a bike

- you may not use an umbrella while riding a bike

An illustrated pamphlet describing the changes is available online, but only in Japanese. It will be interesting to see if the new laws have the desired effect of making Japan's streets safer for pedestrians, as well as for motorists who are unfairly blamed for collisions with reckless cyclists. I for one am not holding my breath.

Japan is among the world's most seismically active countries, which means that earthquakes are a relatively common occurence. Small tremors are usually felt in some part of the country everyday, and there have been several big quakes in the last few years, most recently in Kashiwazaki, Niigata Prefecture in July 2007. While there's no point in being too worried about an earthquake that may or may not hit while you are living in Japan, there's even less point in not being prepared for the eventuality. Although a major earthquake has not occurred in the Tokyo area since 1923, one is expected to strike in the near future, with the probability estimated at 50% during the next ten years, rising to 90% over the next thirty years.

With these facts in mind it is important to consider what you will do in the event of a large earthquake.

- Where is the safest place at home?
- Where are the emergency supplies at home?
- Do you have fire extinguishers in your home and where are they?
- Where is the nearest evacuation shelter and evacuation route?
- What are the responsibilities of each householder when evacuating?
- Decide how to contact family members, and about where to meet for both a daytime and nighttime earthquake scenario.
- Put personal effects and first aid kit in a place where they are easily accessable
- Learn how to use the NTT disaster emergency dial 171.
- Look into disaster information options from your mobile phone provider such as this one from Softbank, this one from au, or this one from docomo. Remember that in the event of a disaster different phones will work in different areas depending on which transmitters have been damaged.

Also, prepare the following items for emergency evacuation:

- By your bed: shoes (in case of broken glass), flashlight, whistle, glasses, medication
- Emergency survival bag (put in an easily accessable place known to all family members) : valuables such as cash including change, passports, foreign registration cards, credit cards, bank passbook, drivers licence.
- Radio, emergency food rations, bottled water, mobile phone.
- Clothes to be used in an emergency, including gloves and small towels.
- First aid kit including medicine, bandaids, tissue paper, small scissors, tape etc.
- The emergency bag must be as light as possible for ease of carrying.

In another place in the house known to all householders, stockpile the following items:

- Emergency food and bottled water for three full days
- Portable cooking stove and fuel (careful to check use-by dates and safe storage)
- rope
- disposable chopsticks
- blankets
- strong masking tape
- paper tableware and thick foil cooking plates (available from camping stores)
- People who camp - keep your camping goods updated and in good order, in an easily accessable place. Taking up camping as a hobby is one of the best earthquake preparations you can do!

Again, think about your responses as a household in the time of disaster:

- Learn about the location of evacuation shelters in your area.
- Learn about the provision of water in the case of an emergency.
- Read up on advice from the fire department.
- Find good guides to earthquake preparation on the internet - even if they are not for your area much of the information contained is useful. Use the guides like a checklist, be prepared.
- Read up on earthquake warning systems.

While there are no guarantees that being prepared will ensure your safety in the event of a major earthquake, it could potentially make a huge difference should the worst happen. Tokyu Hands, a wonderful store that sells everything you never knew you needed, is a good starting point.

Day Care (Hoikuen)
The day care system in Japan is very thorough, and there are many rules and regulations in place to ensure the highest quality of care for children whose mothers work or otherwise are unable to look after their children during the day.

To qualify for a place in the public day care system, the primary caregiver must be employed, be actively seeking employment (in this case you will need to submit extra paperwork to the City Hall or Ward Office as your job search continues), or be otherwise unable to look after your child (for example, in the case of physical or mental illness).

Daycare is charged according to the family income, and so requires a certain amount of paperwork to enrol. Also, you may be placed on a waiting list or encouraged to attend a hoikuen further away from home if there are too many applicants in any given area. This is most likely to happen in the case of younger children (the daycare system is in place for babies as young as 3 months) as child to teacher ratios are kept very low and there are less available spaces.

For more information on the hoikuen system near you, visit your local ward office or City Hall. Take your Japanese speaking friend with you, as there is a certain amount of red tape involved.

Kindergarten (Youchien)

The youchien or kindergarten system in Japan is for three years. These years are called “Nensho” (littlies), “Nenchuu” (middlies) and “Nencho” (biggies).

There are many different youchien and it can be difficult to choose. There are Montessori, Catholic and Buddhist... and each youchien will have its benefits and drawbacks in terms of teaching style, facilities and curriculum. The very best way to find a youchien you’re comfortable with is to ask around your friends, or if you haven’t met anyone yet, look on forums such as the one on the Japan with Kids website.

Finally, there are also options for you if you’re keen to give your child a start with an English education. Several little youchien around the place offer English immersion programs, and bigger International schools also offer pre-school programs. Here is a comprehensive list of international pre-schools in the Tokyo area.

If you’re looking to enrol at a regular Japanese university in an undergraduate program, you’ll want to look into special training for the Japanese Language Proficiency Test (JLPT) which is administered in four levels. To get into most universities, you’ll need to have passed the JLPT Level 1 (ikkyuu) in the previous five years before you apply for entry.

Studying for the JLPT will give you a good grounding in Japanese skills no matter whether you use it to gain entry to university or not. Levels 4 and 3 are relatively simple to pass if you’ve had some training in Japanese, but it is necessary to apply yourself to pass Level 2, and to a much greater extent Level 1. Here are the levels and what they mean:

For Level 1, you’ll have mastered grammar to a high level, know around 2,000 Kanji and 10,000 words, and has an integrated command of the language sufficient for life in Japanese society.
For Level 2, you have mastered grammar to a relatively high level, know around 1,000 Kanji and 6,000 words, and have the ability to converse, read, and write about matters of a general nature.
For Level 3, you have mastered grammar to a limited level, know around 300 Kanji and 1,500 words, and have the ability to take part in everyday conversation and to read and write simple sentences.
For Level 4, you must have mastered the basic elements of grammar, know around 100 Kanji and 800 words, and have the ability to engage in simple conversation and to read and write short, simple sentences.

The JLPT is multiple choice in format. Sections include writing/vocabulary, listening, and reading/grammar. The questions are quite similar in style from year to year, and the very best way to study is to practice on tests from previous years. Some language schools offer courses specifically geared to help you pass a certain level of the JLPT, and it can also be worth your time to hire a private tutor to take you through the material, piece by piece.

The test is usually administered in December of each year, and information for the current year is released on the website in March. You really need to start planning and preparing for the test around about now if you are going to sit for a level that is higher than where you currently are. Fail to prepare, and you truly are preparing to fail!

One lovely experience any expatriate family can have is to get a Japanese studio photograph. Many a little blonde child has been photographed in a real kimono in the very Japanese setting of a studio, making great gifts - prints, key rings and pendants for people at home.

Each photo studio has its own prices (the big chains tend to be a little cheaper) but all are very professional services, and any photo sitting is likely to take an hour or two while the "dressers" get your child's kimono and hair exactly perfect for the photo. The standards for each photo are very strict, so while all photographs will tend to be similar, it will be certainly different from what you've ever done before!

The price for the sitting should include kimono or dress rental, hair and makeup, so all you have to do is turn up! Bring bribes along for younger children, as the whole process can be very lengthy for less patient kiddies.

Studio Alice, is probably the largest chain of studios specialising in phtographing kids. There are smaller studios all around the country of course. This site is available only in Japanese so it is perhaps best to just show up, and negotiate price lists and make photo bookings in person, preferably having help from a Japanese speaking friend.

Some of us have been brought up on feet and inches, while the younger of us know only meters, centimeters and millimeters. However, if you live in Japan, you need to develop a “third sense” when it comes to measuring area. Japan has its own unique measuring system brought down from ancient times.

This starts with the Tatami Mat. Anyone who has been in Japan for a period of time knows about tatami (woven straw mats), and probably know that it is how Japanese people communicate space (or lack of it) in a house or an apartment. A 6-mat room or “roku-jo no heya” in Japanese, is the standard sized room; 4.5 mats would be considered small or slightly cramped, where as an 8-mat or 10-mat room is generally considered to be quite a large room. Contrastingly, an 8-10 mat room would probably the standard size of a bedroom in a western-style home. The tatami mat and its “counter” – jo, are not used only for bedrooms however, but for each individual room including the living / dining / kitchen (known as LDK). A 20-jo LDK would be considered very spacious in a Japanese apartment, where as the standard would probably be 10-15-jo.

You can easily see the use of tatami mats as a counter of room area by taking a look at the floor plans displayed at local real estate agents such as “Mini-Mini”, Apaman-shop, Nissho, etc. Quite often they are referenced by a “J” for the counter “-jo”. For example, the LDK might read 13.0J and the bedrooms 5.5J and 6.0J respectively.

So, how big is a one-jo (ichi-jo in correct Japanese!). Well, it depends where you live in Japan! The standard is close to 1.8 meters x 0.9 meters in a good part of Japan, but due to space constraints in cities such as Tokyo, often tatami are slightly smaller (and this is not an advertised fact- owners are very cunning in populate cities!). Standard Tatami sizes in Tokyo are 1.76 meters x 0.88 meters.

While tatami are used as the “size indicator” of rooms in Japan, it is not so typical to express the overall size of a particular apartment or house in “so-many tatami”. ie. It is not common to add up the tatami count of all the rooms to express the total size. Total size is expressed in either square meters or “tsubo”. Where does Tsubo come from you ask? Well, historically 2-jo = 1 tsubo.

Here is the second of my introduction to the various styles of fast but healthy Japanese style of fast foods

Donburi

A Donburi is anything that is heaped up on a big bowl of rice. This is what makes it so fast to serve - they literally just dish out the rice and then the topping. Beware of overeating!


Oyakodon

A form of donburi which gets its name ("Parent-Child Donburi") from its main ingredients, chicken and eggs. It's a good source of protein, but perhaps go easy on the rice.

Ten-don

Another form of donburi which heaps up vegetables and seafood (primarily) done in tempura batter. I find tempura very "hit and miss", in that well-made tempura will not leave you with a greasy feeling, but the bad stuff does go down very heavily. My recommendation would be to have expensive ten-don the first time you partake.

Oden

Oden is basically just a whole lot of ingredients (vegetables, eggs, chicken) boiled up in a broth waiting for the customer to come and pick out the bits he or she wants. You can get it at convenience stores during winter or at roadside stalls called yatai.

Yakitori

Everybody knows this Japanese chicken-on-a-stick contribution to the world cuisine. You don't have to stick to chicken, either. There are shops that specialize in "things on sticks", called kushiyaki and the stuff is ready very quickly as they don't take long to cook through.

Okonomiyaki

Sometimes referred to as "Japanese pizza", it's actually more like a Japanese pancake which is made of a floury mix, cabbage and eggs among other ingredients. Okonomiyaki is the meibutsu of both Osaka and Hiroshima, although each region cooks it differently.

Takoyaki

Related to okonomiyaki by the floury dough, these little balls have bits of octopus inside them making them instantly unpopular with people who don't like chewy bits in their dough. However, even though they are an acquired taste for some, they are a reasonbly healthy, reasonably priced and delicious fast food that go well with anything.

O-Bento

In a world where mothers more often go outside the home to work, packed dinner shops or bentoya have sprouted up all over Japan. You can get a well balanced meal in minutes! Hokka Hokka Tei is one of the most prolific bento chains, and you can probably find one in your neighbourhood for those nights you just can't face cooking.

Check out these links too for more information on fast food, Japanese style:

Popularity of Japanese Convenience Food
Budget Places to Eat

Hike Japan is "an independent tour operator and in-country agent specializing in guided walking holidays and tailor-made tours for individuals and small groups." Bob, Director and main guide at Hike Japan has one of the most enviable jobs I can think of. Bob spends his days guiding small groups of foreigners around places most of us long term residents of Japan have not even heard of let alone actually visited...and he is paid to do so!

Their upcoming 'Imperial Pilgrimage' tour, scheduled for May 4-18 is desicribed on the Hike Japan website as follows:

'Exploring the Kii mountains, a UNESCO World Heritage site, and walking part of the old pilgrimage route to the great Kumano shrines · Staying in Buddhist temples on Mount Koya and in Nachi · Accommodation in old hot spring villages · Staying in lovely old ryokan in the mountain top village of Yoshino and in Kyoto · Exploring the old capitals of Asuka and Nara · A country walk along the Yamanobe-no-michi · Kyoto highlights · Meeting friends and locals along the way.'

I just wish I could afford the time to take part. Some the Haiku (tradition Japanese poetry) composed by the participants of this tour last year are below:

Fresh green leaves through steam;
Hot spa water clouds my brain
Shall I sleep again?

Green temple garden
Thick grey clouds fill the sky then,
Wind from the mountains

Millions of children
The temple stands serenely
Japan 's Disneyland

There are few things that beat soaking in an outside bath (rotemburo) surrounded by the Japanese alps. It is essential to be aware of the etiquitte for using a public bath in Japan to save embarrassment. Public nudity is much less embarrassing when you adhere to certain rules, because despite being a foreigner, if you respect the rules you will not stick out from the crowd. Despite many an expat's fears, people tend NOT to stare in an onsen unless they are given a reason (for example, if you were washing your soapy towel in the clean onsen water you would have several sets of eyes on you immediately!).

Here's what you do:

1) Take off all your clothes in the changing room and place them into a basket together with your bath towel. Coin lockers for valuables are often available, but if they are not you'll be leaving your things in an open basket. Leave valuables like your watch in your room, and place your underwear discreetly at the bottom of the pile of loosely folded clothes.

2) Japanese hot springs are enjoyed naked. Swimming suits are not allowed in most places and you'll get many funny looks if you try and wear one. However, it is the custom to bring a small towel into the bathing area, with which you can enhance your privacy while outside of the water. Once you enter the bath, keep the towel out of the water. This is very important - never put your towel near the water or you will put impurities into the water.

3) Before entering the bath, rinse your body with water from either a tap or the bath using a washbowl provided in the bathing area. Just rinsing your body is usually sufficient unless you are excessively dirty, in which case you want to use soap. You can choose to wash your entire body now, especially if there are small shower areas... it is sometimes just easier to get the washing out of the way. Please remember though to keep any kind of soap away from the bath itself, and if using a shower be sure to direct the stream towards your body only as other people don't want to be splashed with your water. If you have small children, they will normally share your shower with you.

4) Enter the bath and soak for a while. Note that the bath water can be very hot (typical temperatures are 40 to 44 degrees). If it feels too hot, try to enter very slowly and move as little as possible. Some onsen have many different baths for you to try, some just have a few. Also, in each bath there are sometimes hot spots and cooler spots, so find a comfortable spot for yourself.

5) Talking in the onsen. Feel free to talk to people in the bath with you, but be sensitive to others in the bath. Do not talk in a loud voice or be excessively hilarious. Also, read the signs from the people around you - some people like to talk in the bath and some don't. If you don't like to talk in the bath, be polite and smile but move slightly away in the bath - this will give most people the idea that you're not in the mood for a chat. One word of advice though - don't avoid every conversation. Some very good conversations have been carried out in the bath, and if you don't join in to one conversation then how can you know what you'll be missing?

5) After soaking for a while, get out of the bath and wash your body with soap at a water tap (if you've not already done this before), while sitting on a stool. Soap and shampoo are provided in some baths. Like in private Japanese bathrooms, make sure that no soap gets into the bath water. Tidy up your space after you finished cleaning your body and never leave your own personal bath items in front of a tap (look around, you will see where others put their personal bath items)

6) Re-enter the bath and soak some more. You can enter the bath and get out as many times as you like, as the hot water affects you. However, never swim or splash about in onsen water - remember, it is not a pool.

7) After you finished soaking, do not rinse your body with tap water, for the minerals to have full effect on your body. If you like, you can sit on the side of the bath for a while for your body to dry off and cool down a bit before changing back into your clothes. This is particularly handy if you've visted an onsen ryokan that only provides you with a small hand-towel with which to dry yourself.



Hot Spring Vocabulary

rotemburo outside bath
daiyokujo main bath in an inn
hanare little house set apart from the rest of the inn
iwaburo bath made out of rock formation, natural or constructed
kazokuburo family baths, private baths that can be enjoyed by specific parties. If you are nervous about public nudity, a kazokuburo is a good thing to find.
konyoku mixed bathing, where men and women can bathe together. Often at these baths swimsuits are worn, either mandatory or optional. Check before you enter!
otokoburo men's bath - usually indicated with a blue cloth noren with the kanji for "male" or sometimes this kanji is used.
onnaburo women's bath - usually indicated with a red cloth noren with the kanji for "female". Sometimes the mens and women's bath changes daily so that everyone can experience different baths... the noren are just moved to a different door on different days.
takiyu a stream of hot water falling down from a height - lovely if you've got stiff shoulders but make sure not to splash others
yukata the light cotton robe in your inn's closet. The idea is to change into your yukata when you arrive at the inn and not change back into your clothes until you leave.
yunohana bits of sulphur and other minerals in the water that form together to look a bit like moss floating in the water. Yunohana are not a sign of dirtiness, they are welcomed by onsen lovers as they mean the water is full to brimming with wonderful elements.

One thing that is great about living in Japan is all the healthy fast food that is available. Stay away from heavily processed American fast food chains, and see what the Japanese streets have to offer! Just because it's fast does not mean it's not healthy.


Onigiri

The good old rice-ball usually covered with sea-weed, assembling one from the plastic wrap in the convenience store is always the first complicated task the expatriate has to master. However, if you have a choice then stay away from the ones in the convenience store and go for the hand-made (tezukuri) ones that you can buy in Mom-and-Pop shops or even specialty onigiri shops. The ingredients used are always that much fresher, and free of chemicals.

Gyudon

Not exactly the picture of health, it still beats a hamburger hands down because it's been freshly made from "real" ingredients. Add a raw egg and mix it around for great texture and extra protein. It's so cheap, too, so it's the staple food of many otherwise starving students and lower income workers.

Curry Rice

Japanese curry is very different from its Indian counterpart, but it's still chock full of great ingredients and there are several chains like Koko Ichiban that will serve you a plate of hot steaming curry rice in no time at all.

Kaitenzushi

Most westerners are already familiar with the little circular tracks that carry sushi around in front of customers who can pick out what they like. There are cheaper shops and more expensive ones, but one thing all the sushi shops have in common is that they serve healthy food, fast!

Mos Burger

This is the only large Japanese hamburger chain. Unlike its western counterparts, hamburgers are made from scratch each time they are ordered and so it takes more time than you're traditionally used to, and they're also more expensive than a western fast food chain. There are also funny and strange Japanese ways of combining ingredients - hamburgers made with rice, green tea thick shakes etc.

Ramen

Ramen noodles have a cult following, even overseas. If you want to become a member of this cult, check out the Japanese movie Tampopo for a serious education in the art of the ramen noodle! Ramen is popular late at night when people have been drinking, and one good benefit of it is that it kind of takes the edge off the alcohol and you get some nutrition before you sleep, making the next morning hopefully more bearable.

Udon

This white, thick, wheat-based noodle is a must know for the budget concious traveler. The soup is often fish based, and the ingredients are usually very healthy. A personal favourite is tsukimi udon (or "moon viewing udon"), which gets its name from the raw egg that is dropped in and cooks partially in the hot broth.

Soba

This thin noodle is darker in colour because it is made from buckwheat. It is on the shopping list of any serious dieter, because it is high in fibre and low in calories. It can be served hot or cold, or with vegetables, called sansai soba.

Zaru-Udon or Zaru-Soba

These cold noodles are a great summer lunch, both filling and refreshing at the same time. They are dipped into a soup, and you can add condiments such as ginger or wasabi to the dipping soup for flavour.

Yaki-Soba or Yaki-Udon

These noodles cooked on a hot plate are often sold at roadside stalls such as at festivals. Meat and vegetables mixed in with the noodles make these a good choice for nutrition, but watch how much oil is being used in the preparation before you buy.

Have you ever wanted to order a taxi to pick you up from your home, but you're unsure of your ability to speak Japanese on the phone to convey the correct address? There is a very easy system that many taxi companies employ for situations like this - a registration system whereby your phone number is displayed on their system, giving them your name and the address that you supplied at the time of your registration. You only then have to tell them what time you need the taxi to come to your house, and they will be there.

For Nihon Kotsu Taxi Group (the only taxi company offering English booking service over the phone) the registration number and also the number to call for ordering the taxi, is:

03-5755-2336

http://www.nihon-kotsu.co.jp/en/

For other taxi companies that may run locally in your neighbourhood, ask the taxi driver for a card when you next take a cab from your station home. Then you can get a Japanese-speaking friend to call and help you set up this very convenient system which allows you to get a cab any time you need one. This comes in very handy when you have heavy suitcases to take to the airport and don't want to drag them down to your local taxi rank.

Famous foods for any given area in Japan are called meibutsu. Osaka meibutsu is okonomiyaki (as is Hiroshima's meibutsu, but they have their own famous style of the same dish), and in the mountains of Nagano it is Shinshu Soba.

My favourite meibutsu of all is one of the meibutsu of Nagoya - Tebasaki, or fried chicken wings. They are wonderfully tasty and an fantastic companion to a beer (preferably a Dai-jokki...) The great tebasaki restaurants in Nagoya will greet you with a hearty "Nan-nin-mae desu ka?" ("How many servings do you want?") because they already know you are there for the chicken wings!

There are two really famous tebasaki chains that serve Nagoya. The older of the two is Furaibo, which spices its chicken wings in the traditional Nagoya way (see below). However, if you like a bit of spice in your life, there is a much more peppery version available at Sekai no Yama-chan, which has so many branches of its shop in the Kanayama area, that if one of their shops is full the waitress can literally walk you to another just around the corner.

There is a special way of eating tebasaki reminiscent of how a king at a banquet table might devour his fowl. You can see the process illustrated here on a blog that I found. Basically you want to break the wing in half, allowing you to scrape all the meat off one side with one strong swipe of your teeth!

You can find one of the many, many branches of Furaibo or Sekai no Yama-chan on their Japanese websites that will get you pointed in the right direction to tebasaki heaven! Furaibo has shops literally everywhere in central Nagoya as well as the suburbs, while Sekai no Yama-chan has many in the middle of town and then just one in Okazaki in the Nagoya area, but they also have stores in Tokyo, Sapporo and Kumamoto! Therefore, it's odds on that there will be a Furaibo somewhere nearby should you be in one of these locations and feel the urge for a feast of spicy, crunchy chicken and loads of beer. ( A Gaijin's delight!) Just look for the signs in the above links and you'll be able to spot the one nearby!

On the Japanese news media, you may or may not have heard about two products, both types of frozen gyoza or Chinese dumpling, which contained high levels of chemicals that caused a 5 year old girl to fall unconcious. The two frozen gyoza products in question are Co-op Tezukuri Gyoza (handmade dumplings) and Chuka de Gochiso Hitokuchi Gyoza (Delicious Chinese-style one-bite dumplings). These products imported by JT Foods from China have been recalled from supermarkets, along with other items (not just gyoza) purchased from the same Chinese company. Please, if you have frozen chinese food in your freezer, do not eat it. There is a list of the recalled products here where you can see pictures of the packages in question, however the list is not completely illustrated, so if you are unsure of any frozen food packages in your freezer, do not eat it.

One of my favourite cities in Japan, Takayama is particularly famous in the spring because the cherry blossoms really enhance the gorgeous old houses and small cobbled streets. You really need to book ahead if you are planning to travel around the busy times. A couple of friends however rolled up and were able to make themselves understood and were able to stay at the beautiful youth hostel housed in a temple, at very little notice last Obon.


http://www.takayamaryokan.jp/e_yado/75.htm

http://www.jyh.or.jp/yhguide/toukai/hidataka/index.html (Japanese only, but has map)

If you're wanting to stay in a Japanese guest house (anywhere, not just in Takayama), you might find this link useful:

http://www.japaneseguesthouses.com/db/takayama/index.htm

It takes a little more than two hours on the train from Nagoya, the nearest Major city, and about the same by car. It's certainly a very beautiful trip as well. From Takayama, there are endless possibilities for hot springs, most featuring outdoor baths that look up into the mountains.

Do you long for some peace, quiet and meditation? How about if you could detox your body at the same time? What if you could also lose weight and get great skin? What if all this was as easy as.. checking in to your local Ganbanyoku, or hot stone spa?

The process of Ganbanyoku (translated as "Bedrock Bath") involves lying on a mat, on top of hot stone, heated to about 40 to 45 degrees centigrade. It works with a combination of far-infrared radiation and minus ions, with health benefits including (but not limited to) improvement in circulation, regulation of blood pressure, detoxification of vital organs, improvement of skin tone, weight loss, relief from muscle tension/back/neck pain and relief from rheumatic symptoms. All this, and it is really, really relaxing too!

A female friend of mine is hooked on Ganbanyoku. She makes a point of going a couple of times a week, she says it is a wonderful way to start the day.

Points to remember:

Do not go for Gambanyoku if you are suffering from infectious disease, including infectious skin disease such as athlete's foot.
Do not go for Gambanyoku if you are pregnant, or suffer from extremely high or extremely low blood pressure.
If in doubt whether you should go for Ganbayoku, consult your doctor.
Always use the mat and clothing provided when you lie down. Bare skin directly on the hot rock can burn.
Do not drink alcohol or eat a big meal before going for Gambanyoku.
Do not take anything inside the hot area, that should not get wet, including jewelry.
You will do a lot of sweating - this is natural. The sweat is not smelly, it is good sweat!
Do not talk inside the hot area - the space is to be used for quiet relaxation.
Most Ganbanyoku do not allow smoking in any area.
Some Ganbanyoku are "women only". Make sure before you set out!
You will be given a bottle of water, but it is best to take another one as well. Make sure you keep yourself well hydrated.
Before you go in, you may be given a hot ginger or yuzu drink to increase the effect.
Start by lying on your stomach for 5 to 10 minutes, then on your back for 5 to 10 minutes. Then rest in the cooling off area, before starting the whole process again.
Do not lie for too long in the same position. If you feel bad at any time, do not push yourself.

My friend's recommended process for Gambanyoku (90 minutes):

1. Change into clothes provided (no underwear, no accessories) and take off makeup - 10 minutes
2. Go into bathing area and choose a space that has no mat - lay your own mat down, and lie on top of it, face down - 5 to 10 minutes.
3. Turn over on to your back for 5 - 10 minutes (Remember to keep yourself hydrated during this process)
4. Take a break in the "cooling off room" - 5 minutes
5. Return to the bathing area and repeat steps 2 and 3 - about 15 minutes
6. Return to cooling room. If this is your first time you might like to stop there. Rest about 5 minutes.
7. If you are feeling fine, return to the bathing area and repeat steps 2 and 3 - about 15 minutes.
8. Return to the resting area, then when you are ready, get changed and ready to leave - about 20 minutes

The Gambanyoku craze is taking over Japan, so salons can be found all over most major cities. The link below is to a company wesite with a chain of stores in popular expat areas in Tokyo, but I am sure a Japanese friend can advise outside of these areas.

http://www.olivespa.co.jp/english/top.html