First Nations and Tight Accommodations

Another neat spot South of Sapporo is the Ainu museum, which, unfortunately, seems to be more of a large flea market of repetitive wood-carved souvenirs than an actual museum. They do, however, have some nice traditional huts on display and it is possible to learn a little about Hokkaido's native people, the Ainu.

The Ainu, before intermarrying and hiding their identity to avoid discrimination, were physically, linguistically and religiously completely different from the Japanese. Never great in number, estimates say that today roughly 50,000 people have two ethnically Ainu parents and several thousand more are of mixed lineage. The vast majority speak only Japanese, as Japan's rush to catch up with the Western democracies in the mid-18'th century brought in a wave of ethnocentric lawmaking. Only recently have Ainu begun to speak out about their heritage and gain rights and recognition.

Two side notes: 1) Many city names in Hokkaido derive from the Ainu language.
2) I had a really nice potato and salmon soup at the museum. I mention this because, well, I like salmon and that potato in my soup was probably the best potato I've had in Japan. The food in Hokkaido, in general, was some of the best I've had since coming here.
This hut is called, "The Next House". I've no idea why.
Changing the subject abruptly. Here are a couple pictures of the capsule hotel where I stayed during my last night in Sapporo. Each one of the capsules in the picture above is one bed for one person. Personal belongings are stored in a separate locker room. The picture below shows the inside of my capsule (the box in the corner is a television).
The capsule hotel really wasn't cheaper than staying in a youth hostel. In fact, it was a little bit more expensive. Why bother? Well, the capsule hotel also doubled as a spa with indoor/outdoor hot springs, saunas and cold springs. I spent probably at least 3 hours moving in and out of pools with Infectious Laughter, shooting the breeze about the relationships that have formed and deformed since coming here, the people who are staying another year, the people who are leaving in the summer, the people who spend too much time listening to tawdry Japanese pop-singers, the people who crack their eggs on the narrow side, the people who crack their eggs on the wide side and all things Fukui.

Turns out, most of the people who've appeared on this blog won't be on it at all next year. They're moving on with their lives, reconnecting with significant others and venturing beyond the confines of this little island we've come to call Fjet (Fukui JET).

Infectious laughter also taught me something about the US Presidential election. It seems the town where he's residing in the Fukui prefecture has a preferred candidate. Click here to read about whom the citizens of Obama, Japan would like to see elected.

One of the JETs there has made some videos and posted them on youtube. I haven't watched them yet, but, she seems much less objective than the article. "In Obama, for Obama" I believe is the catchphrase. Personally, I'm more of an "In Fukui City, for whomever won't cause the country to self-implode"

雪祭り：Snow Festival

Time to start posting photographs from 北海道 (Hokkaido), the northernmost of the major Japanese islands and proud home of nearly 6 months of winter weather annually.Every year in February, Sapporo, the capital and largest city of Hokkaido, hosts a Snow Festival. For one week, people pass through the city in droves to see the many snow and ice sculptures. The main section of sculptures took about 1-2 hours to see, but there were other smaller displays in other parts of the city.

International superstar Al Gore!
There were a dozen large sculptures like this one and many dozens more of smaller ones like the Al Gore above.

This one follows the design of Inuyama Castle, a national treasure not far from Nagoya.

Several of the large sculptures also featured a stage with entertainers or games.