Silver White Winters

It's already been snowing in Hokkaido, the northern most island in Japan. Snow usually greets those Japanese who live in Hokkaido before many others are visited in other regions of the country. Currently it's about fifty degrees in Tokyo. Something I would take any day compared to Iowa's negative ten degree wind chills. Many areas in Japan have special winter itineraries that allow a tourist to view all that winter has to offer in Japan. These include resort stays, skiing, and snowy sight seeing.

Many places in Japan have light festivals called "Winter Illumination." These light festivals, like fall colors and snow sculptures, are viewed by millions. With new technological updates, many people are looking into Projection Mapping or 3D Mapping to really enhance their showing. Many historical places have their own light shows as well as ordinary homes and work places.

Seasonal illuminations around Christmas have become a popular attraction in cities across Japan. Illuminations are typically displayed from around November to around Christmas or New Year, while a few are kept up until Valentine's Day in February. Among Japan's first and most spectacular light show, Kobe's Luminarie, ended yesterday. It started after the disastrous earthquake in 1995, the Kobe Luminarie is an Italian designed tunnel consisting of millions of lights. Shinjuku hosts a long winter light festival. Illumination displays are found spread around the Shinjuku Terrace City, but especially on the Shinjuku Southern Terrace, south of JR Shinjuku Station. Some illuminations will be held through Valentine's Day.

WINTER VOCAB
Winter brings extreme cold to Japan.
The word cold in Japanese is
さむい　
sa mu i
(sah-moo-ee)

With winter comes Christmas
Merry Christmas in Japanese is
メリークリスマス
me rii ku ri su ma su
(meh-ree-koo-ree-soo-mah-soo)

Snow Country

Snow country refers to areas in Japan characterized by heavy, long-lasting snowfalls.

The snow country is located on the north side of Japan's main island, Honshu and the area encompassed by the Japanese Alps. It also includes Sado Island and Hokkaido. Blizzards become torential as they turn from flurries to a full on white outs in a matter of seconds. 

Areas in the snow country have to struggle with the mass exodus of the snow that falls so they can keep the prefectures running. Snow makes a lot of daily tasks hard to do, like driving to work or school. Schools can be cancelled for weeks on account of the massive amounts of snow falling. Frequently snow is so deep in some places that buildings have a special entrance on their second story; people must remove snow from their roofs to prevent its weight from crushing their homes, and special care is taken to protect trees from the snow's weight. In some towns, people used to tunnel paths to one another's homes, and streets were lined with covered sidewalks to ensure that people could get around. Today in areas where temperatures are high enough to make it practical, many roads are equipped with sprinklers using warm ground water to keep them passable by melting the snow.

The heavy snowfalls of Japan's snow country are caused by moisture-laden clouds bumping up against the mountains along the backbone of Honshu and releasing their moisture under the influence of easterly winds blowing off the continent or down from Siberia. As a result, the region includes some of the world's snowiest spots at the same latitudes, many localities are also frequently visited by avalanches. The most recent record snows were brought by the blizzards of December 2005–February 2006, when well over 3 meters (almost 10 feet) of snow accumulated in many rural areas.

A more positive thing about Japan's abundance of snow is that the Japanese participate in amazing snow sculpting contests and festivals. One held in Sapporo, Japan brings in nearly 2 million people from all around the world. The Sapporo Snow Festival, one of Japan's largest winter events, has attractions that line Odori Park, the grounds at Community Dome Tsudome, and the main street in Susukino.

For one weeks in February, these unique statues and sculptures (both large and small) turn Sapporo into a winter dreamland of crystal-like ice and white snow.

Christmastime in Japan

Despite Christmas being a mainly Christian holiday, the Japanese still celebrate it though with some twists of their own.

Christmas in Japan is a bit different from America. Despite the major religions in Japan being Buddhism and Shinto, Christmas is held as more of a commercial event rather than a religious holiday with the main celebration happening around Christmas Eve and not Christmas Day.

It is common to give Christmas presents in Japan, and Santa Claus is known to visit the children as confirmed by the NORAD Santa Tracker. Within the family, parents give presents to their children, but the children do not give presents to the parents. As in America, the reason for this is that only Santa brings presents, so once the child no longer believes in Santa, the presents are no longer given.

Most Japanese families do have a Christmas tree and it is becoming increasingly common to have Christmas light displays on the outside of houses like in some Western countries. KFC also takes part in the holiday. Thanks to KFC and Japan's lack of turkeys, fried chicken has become a traditional Japanese Christmas dinner. It is almost impossible to get into a KFC restaurant on Christmas Eve and many families will order their chicken ahead so that they can eat at the earliest convenience.

Christmas is also considered a very romantic holiday and lovers are supposed to spend the evening together doing couple activities. It is really crucial for single women in Japan to have someone to spend Christmas Eve with (kind of like Valentine's Day in America). It is also really important where they spend Christmas Eve and what present they receive. The whole evening has to be very special, elaborate and romantic. Japanese women who have a boyfriend tend to show off, so women who are single are not happy to talk about the topic.

There is also a traditional joke that compares Christmas to a woman's age. Cake shops throughout Japan always try to sell all their Christmas cakes before Christmas Eve. Any cakes left after Christmas are seen to be very old or out of date. Unmarried women over 25 years old used to be called 'unsold Christmas Cake'. Since the average age for marriage has changed, with people marrying older and older, and cakes are delicious, this joke is falling out of use, to the pleasure of most single women.

Us and Them. A Comparison. Japanese High Schools.

Both American and Japanese schools have the same scheduled layout, however in America students are offered more freedom chances and in Japan they have set schedules that don't usually change. In America, a lot of high school students drive to and from class or school activities. This is a freedom that Japanese students don't have because the train or a bike is a much more efficient way of travel for a lot of the kids. In America, students are automatically accepted into the high school according to where they live in relation to the school whereas in Japan, you have to test into the high school that you want to go to. What that means is during a kid's middle school career they have to take an entry test to see where they will end up in high school. Some kids don't take the test and instead decide not to go to school, but rather work instead. Usually, in a Japanese high school, the vice principal will do most of the work that American principals do instead of the principal doing it themselves. Rather than the students moving from class to class, the teachers do. The students sit in the same room while each teacher rotates and teaches their subject. Because the students don't move, a Japanese school doesn't have a cafeteria like in America.

I mentioned before that the students in Japan who chose not to enter high school work. The kids that are in high school do not have jobs, unlike in America, because they focus on education and extra-curricular activities as being most important. In America, students can enter in many different extra-curricular activities and try more out to see what they like, but in Japan students choose one activities. These activities range from band club to baseball and students decide where they want to invest all of their time before they enter the high school. Kids rarely move from one activity to another because of the bonds that they have made with the friends in that group. If they were to switch, they would be looked upon as a bizarre outsider who doesn't have a place because they weren't bonded originally with that new group.

American schools have summer break, spring break, and winter break. In Japanese schools, they have all of the same breaks, but they are spread out at different times. Japanese students advance to the next grade during spring break that lasts about three weeks, instead of summer break in America.  

The Bullet Train

Japan's main islands of Honshu and Kyushu are served by a network of high speed train lines that connect Tokyo with most of the country's major cities. Japan's high speed trains (bullet trains) are called shinkansen (新幹線) and are operated by Japan Railways (JR).  Running at speeds of up to 320 km/h, the shinkansen is known for punctuality (most trains depart on time to the second), comfort (relatively silent cars with spacious, always forward facing seats), safety (no fatal accidents in its history) and efficiency. Thanks to the Japan Rail Pass, the shinkansen can also be a very cost effective means of travel.  The shinkansen network consists of multiple lines, among which the Tokaido Shinkansen (Tokyo - Nagoya - Kyoto - Osaka) is the oldest and most popular. All shinkansen lines (except the Akita and Yamagata Shinkansen) run on tracks that are exclusively built for and used by shinkansen trains. Most lines are served by multiple train categories, ranging from the fastest category that stops only at major stations to the slowest category that stops at every station along the way.

The shinkansen provides a very unique experience. Complete with facilities, the train offers a virtually short trip. Traveling across the country by car could take up to six or seven hours, but the shinkansen nearly cuts that time in half. When I was on the train, it felt like we weren't moving up to 320 km/h, but rather that times was just moving very quickly. It was as if we were just in a long, narrow room that was moving very quickly. Some seats were able to turn all the way around so a group of us could sit and play a card game with each other. I also found that the shinkansen was a great place to sleep and many utilize its wondrous stability while moving at fast speeds. A lot of tired men coming from their workplaces would be asleep or else drifting off. At each stop, as with any train in Japan, there would be an automated voice recording that would say where we were and it was always interesting to experience that bit of Japanese culture.

So, if you're looking for a comfortable way to cross the country of Japan without having to deal with a regular train's starts and stops, I would recommend the shinkansen because of its speed, facilities, and passenger accommodations.