Research Really Means Collecting Paper and Having to Pay for It

Sure, I came to Tokyo for the conference; that was the impetus for this trip. And then I decided to skip 4 days of class because it’s a chance to see Tokyo. But I figured that while I was up here, might as well check out the National Diet Library – now that totally legitimizes me skipped 4 days of class and letting my teachers think I had a 6 day conference, Uh huh, riiiiiiight.

In short, the National Diet Library is really easy to use – so long as you prepare beforehand and read Japanese. However, they do give user guides in English, which is really sweet for when I want to use the Kansai branch (which is closer to me, as Kyoto is in Kansai) I can request materials online and from the Tokyo branch.

I came in using the visitors entrance and formally registered which makes things run a lot more smoothly; after an initial “WTF? I don’t know this computer system” I got the ball rolling on collecting materials. In two mornings I looked at 5 books, 4 of which were actually from the 19th century and on microfilm. Copying is damn expensive! That is one reason why I didn’t look at all 30 of the books that I initially looked up – first it takes a while to request them since you are only allowed 3 books out at a time (different from NYPL where you can request 3 books, but every 5 minutes you can request another 3), and second the copying is expensive and third I didn’t have much time. So, I just looked up the stuff that was important for my presentation in the next few weeks and some stuff on Heian Jingu for the KCJS class in the fall.

It was raining all day. Today was also when I was going to meet Jessica, Kukhee and Jessica’s research assistant in Shinjuku for dinner, so I decided to check out the Imperial Palace a bit while I had some time to kill. I slowly discovered that I do not like to travel alone; it gets lonely and in spite of all the itineraries, you do run out of things to do. Also, I felt like I didn’t have enough time to check out museums such as the main museum in Ueno Park. So off to Imperial Palace.

Because of the rain, I didn’t walk around so much. I got a look at Ote-Mon and the weather was so dreary that I decided to head back inside to the Maru Biru (“biru” = “building”), find a Starbucks and sit down. I actually brought some of the classical Japanese homework for my advisor so I actually did some of it while sitting amongst the suits. In spite of the café latte (I decided to splurge a bit) I was getting sleepy; I then walked around Maru Biru a bit. According to the floor guide they had the Mochi Cream that I ate a few days before! Yum yum…I got Sakura, Café Latte and Apple cream – wasn’t too thrilled by the Sakura. I discovered “Mochi Cream” in the food floor of the Ginza Matsuya my first day here - it’s mochi but filled with something like flavored ice cream and they have like 20 different flavors – and thank god they have shops in Kyoto, I would have been very sad otherwise. So far, I have tried Café Latte, Peach, Sakura, Chocolate, Matcha and Apple. Liked all of them except for the Sakura (cherry blossom) and Matcha - go figure that is ironic given that this stuff is mochi. Best keep the traditional flavors in their places, then.