Hokkaido diary: the 65th Sapporo Snow Festival

In one of the many cut-rate sci-fi adventure stories I read as a youth and continue to read to this day (this one was On Earth As It Is In Hell, an officially-licensed Hellboy novel by Brian Hodge), a defeated villain defiantly tells the hero: "Do you know why you'll always lose, in the end? Because what you consider victories are such small things."

Going to the Sapporo Snow Festival reminded me of that quip, for some reason. It just impressed me how something that started so small—a pack of enterprising Hokkaido University students building modest snow sculptures in Odori Park in central Sapporo—blossomed into an annual world-famous festival that attracts over two million foreign tourists per year.

This year I was one of them. Here's my diary entry for that day: 

2/5:

10:32 a.m. Nice long sleep-in. At Kita-12 jo waiting for the train. Hardly anybody here. Is it because I'm used to Seoul, which is always a zoo, or because of the festival? The 65th Sapporo Snow Festival starts today, and I am heading first to Odori Park and then to Susukino to take in two-thirds of it (the other third is up in Tsudome, near Asaba, way up north, but I'm prioritizing). 

It's STILL snowing. Must have snowed all night. Light snow, heavy snow, light snow again. The only time it hasn't snowed was the bright sunny first morning. Wow. Not sure how easy it'll be trying to wrangle an umbrella AND a camera in this weather, but I'll try.

1:07 p.m. What I was praying for happened. At 11 or so, 30 minutes after I arrived at Odori Park, the sky cleared. The snow stopped.

Hokkaido scallop, ¥500. Good deal. 

Crab soup, also five hundred yen. Three kinds of crab!

I got some great pics and then strolled south to Susukino to see the ice sculptures.

 

That there may be no speculation...those are real fish.

Now they're just making me hungry...

Now I'm standing outside of Sushizanmai (which looks packed to the gills) and memorizing the menu. I want the Uruoi Sushimori Special, which has herring roe, boiled prawn, salmon roe, red tuna, white stuff that could be squid or flounder, red snapper, and six other things besides. Great place—the waitresses bustle and flit about in blue blouses, white aprons, black stockings and buckled shoes, while the chefs flay away at the fish, egg, and seaweed with their long, thin knives, shouting hearty hellos, goodbyes and thank-yous to the patrons coming and going. The tea is hot and the atmosphere warm in more ways than one.

You could immediately tell the difference between this and any other cut-rate sushi joint—fresh, tender ginger, moist rice and succulent seaweed. Eating the herring roe was an interesting experience—it had the color and texture of an orange slice. The miso soup with prawn heads was a lovely counterpoint. The sea urchin roe had the consistency of apple butter. There was also sardine, sea eel, and albacore tuna, plus shellfish. One of the red fish—either mackerel or red tuna—simply melted in my mouth. A feast. 

3:00 p.m. Sitting in the Hokkaido University Museum. Made a brief but futile stop at the gift shop for souvenirs. Pole Town (an underground mall between Odori and Susukino Stations) was a bust, too. Speaking of busts, I'm going to go see William Clark's now.
"Boys, be ambitious!" 

3:41 p.m. Just sent off the postcard to my folks at Sapporo's big blocky grey post office, east of the station. I'm lucky everything is so close together in this town. I think I'll hit the station on the way back to the hotel in one last-ditch effort to find souvenirs. 

5:32 p.m. Darkness has fallen. My last day in Sapporo is over. I'm ready to be gone, but I am a bit sad. I found no souvenirs—not in the station, nor Tokyu Department Store, nor anywhere else. All that's left is to get some chicken kebabs (yakitori) and beer for dinner, pack my bags and go to bed early. 

7:28 p.m. ADDENDUM. I had a peek in the yakitori place and discovered it was actually an izakaya—and the prices weren't nice. So I stumped a bit further south and found something that wasn't crowded, noisy, or overpriced—Beer & Coffee Venison. The name isn't poetic license—they serve deer meat. So I went on in. The light was low, coming from a line of glass globes over the wooden bar, every other one of which had the names of various Scotch whiskies written on it in multicolored marker. Lots of dark wood and white stucco-like walls, interspersed with tables and chairs with cross-shaped holes in the back (plus fully-antlered deer skulls on the walls and old coffee grinders and tea tins on the shelves) completed the rustic ambience [sic]. Behind the bar were two men: one elderly and thin, severe in demeanor, wearing a tie and black waistcoat and apron, with a beige wool-knit cap which clung to his bald pate like a yarmulke. The other man was likewise in a dark suit (with a fleece jacket flung over it) but was young, handsome, and energetic. He drummed his fingers on the bar in time to the jazz playing on the stereo (Colin Stranahan and Lloyd Miller), and buzzed about snipping labels or sterilizing glasses. The place had a bewildering collection of empty beer bottles in the window and quite a few in the fridge, Negra Modelo, Old Tom, Stone IPA and Löwenbräu among them. The Scotch selection, though extensive, tended to favor Islay and Highlands single malts, I noted. 

I sat down and ordered some venison sausage and a ¥500 glass of Heartland (a European pale lager made by Kirin, with a fine flavor and a delicious creamy head). I nibbled on Hokkaido potato salad and sliced pickles (and later the sausage and some fresh fruit) while the younger barkeep and I attempted a conversation. His name was Kei, and he loved jazz. It was he who manned the Toshiba laptop above the bar and chose tune after syncopated tune. I sensed rather than knew—for he spoke as little English as I did Japanese—that he was a student at Hokkaido University and that this was his part-time job, and that he longed to escape from pulling pints and pouring whiskey and escape to Tokyo (or perhaps even New York) and found a jazz trio. We talked as much as we were able. I sipped beer. The old proprietor washed up or stared into space. I felt the weight of my impending departure weigh heavily upon me. It was an introspective moment—the old man in his wool cap behind the bar, arms folded, staring at the empty room; Kei drumming his fingers, nodding his head and gazing at the computer screen; and me with a cleaned plate and a sweating beer glass in front of me, eyeing the collection of whiskey bottles in their glass cabinets, thinking about getting up at 4 a.m. tomorrow and feeling simultaneously warm and content yet lonely and restless. 

I got up, paid, snapped some photos of the bar and its stewards, bowed low, and left. I bought a crap-ton of food at the convenience store for tomorrow's 18-hour journey—onigiri, bento, salad, coffee, beer, apples, and even something which looked suspiciously like kimchi. All I have to do now is pack my bags and await the dawn. 

30 Days to a Better Man, Day 25: start a debt-reduction plan

Whoo-ee. Yesterday's playtime went very well indeed. I got my tax stuff done, though I had to wait around and sip a coffee frappé while the T.A. finished his lunch. He was quite thorough and efficient, having done tax forms for several other professors before me. It took him just 30 minutes to fill in and print my forms. I was out of there by half past one.

I hopped Line 7 to Line 9, and thence to Yeouido Island. I strolled down Uisadang Boulevard and through the long, echoing pedestrian tunnels under Yeouido Park. A young couple was learning to skateboard down there, their skin jaundiced from the glow of beat-up incandescent lights. Despite signs warning him not to, a scooter driver zipped by as I walked along, filling the air with exhaust fumes. Upon emerging back into the diffused daylight, I found myself across an intersection from the National Assembly. Standing near the guardhouse at the gates were four cold, bored-looking policemen in black-and-yellow uniforms. The grounds seemed dead and shriveled under the muted sky, the grass brown and the fountains bone-dry. The National Assembly building itself, however, was magnificent. Apparently it's the largest building of its kind in all of Asia. I made a mental note to book a tour there with Miss H at some point.

Then the real fun began. Hungered by my walk, I hurried back down the boulevard to a tiny little mandu shop I'd noticed earlier. I sat down at a narrow red table (with recessed steel trays for kimchi and pickled yellow radish) and ordered the ₩3,500 assortment. It was delicious, though the last two dumplings were so spicy that I had to gulp down some water. I retreated back into the subway and took the geumhaeng (express) train to the last stop, Sinnonhyeon (New Nonhyeon), just a block or three north of Gangnam Station. I entered the enormous brown Kyobo Building, delved into its basement bookstore, and purchased a copy of The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka for ₩6,900. With the book between my knuckles I jogged across the road to the Urban Hive, which Miss H and I have nicknamed "the Swiss Cheese Building," and Take Urban, the coffee shop on its first floor. I sat down with a cup of Darjeeling and read Kafka's whole story, soup to nuts. It was fascinating, moving, grotesque, poignant, unexpected. I don't know why I didn't read it sooner.

I had intended to walk a few blocks north to the old Nonhyeon Station on Line 7 and catch a train for Gwangnaru and a little izakaya (Japanese-style pub) I knew near my apartment, but I got a call from Brant — you know, the fellow I brew beer with. A buddy of his, Marcus (born in Texas but attending college in Cairo, Egypt), was in town and the two were bumming around together. I'd challenged them to a game of billiards the previous evening. Brant told me to meet him and Marcus at Gangnam Station at eight o'clock. To while away the intervening hours I went to an old nemesis of mine, WaBar, a "western-style ice bar" and sipped their infamous saeng maekju (draft beer) for ₩4,000 a glass. To kill time I read Kafka's story "In the Penal Colony," which was even more disturbing and emotional than The Metamorphosis.

At 7:45 I wobbled down to Gangnam Station. Brant and Marcus showed up on time. We sipped Jack and Cokes for ₩6,000 apiece at a bar called Whiskey Weasel, jockeying for position amid a group of young foreign men and Korean girls having a language exchange. The three of us shot pool and eyed the sultry goings-on. Following my resounding victory, we adjourned to Woodstock, a nearby LP bar. We requested Red Hot Chili Peppers, The Who, Warren Zevon, Wolfmother, Led Zeppelin, George Thorogood, and many more. Bourbon, Scotch and at least four pitchers of beer were consumed. We went back to Whiskey Weasel and shot more pool, our aim now a great deal unsteadier. I vaguely remember getting into a cab at 2:30 in the morning and collapsing on my couch at three. Undoing the ramifications of this bender has been today's sole concern. 

Well, not my sole concern, truthfully. Today is Day 25.

I already have a debt-reduction plan. I fork over $114 every month to pay off my college loans, the total amount of which is now (thanks to years of hard work in South Korea) four figures and dropping fast. My first year at Sejong University was so remunerative that, a week ago, I paid off a whopping $1400 of my debt in one fell swoop just to expedite the process. For the sake of this challenge, I calculated that if I pay $500 a month into my loans, starting in February, I can be totally debt-free by this time next year.

...at least until I marry Miss H and take on all of her debt.

Whoopee. Welcome to married life, Postie.

Stump up for Day 26... 

a good day to be alive

Today was one of those days.

For starters, it was 34 frickin' degrees: right up my alley. The pale blue sky was filled with puffy clouds that scooted along with the icy wind, and the year's first lasting snow clung wetly to the pavement and frozen ground. I got up, ate a ham sandwich with steak sauce, saw my wife-to-be off to work, hit the gym, came home, showered, and ate a hearty lunch of baked beans, an apple and another bite or two of ham. Then I bundled up and walked to Sejong University. Three subway stops—about eight or nine blocks, I'd say. Up the hill that marks Gwangnaru's western border, where they're building this humongous bridge/tunnel thingy and the road's all torn up; through the winding, sinuous, tilted neighborhood of Achasan, with its wedding halls and stumpy office buildings and goshiwon and villas and mom-'n'-pop chicken shops, nestled in the foothills of the mountain of the same name; and into the brighter, more trendy neighborhood of Gunja, with its coffee shops and bakeries and upscale chicken joints and high-class brunch spots and the glass-fronted tower of the CGV Cinema looming over all. It was a good stretch of the legs, particularly with the ice on the sidewalk and the wind on my bare forehead. Glorious. I had "Levels" by Avicii and "Radioactive" by Imagine Dragons playing on a continuous loop on my iPod. I squinted in the bright winter sunlight, bundled up to my ears in a much-beloved, ridiculous-looking black-and-grey scarf.

Work breezed by. During my break I sat in the coffee shop in the student union and sipped chamomile tea. I was my usual goofy self for the students. Their reactions were all the more interesting since I have Chinese, Japanese and North Korean students in my extra classes. I stuck my stuff back in my cubicle at 5:30, bundled up again, and walked from Children's Grand Park to Gunja Station as the last of the purple light was dying from the sky, and the clouds were fading to a deep magenta. The wind was stronger than ever and the slush had turned to jagged ice. Avicii and Imagine Dragons kept me company once again as I rode the subway two stops home.

I felt like I'd had a productive day—smack dab in the middle of a productive week. On Monday I'd sent a Christmas package to my parents, as well as Christmas and birthday cards to my grandparents. On Tuesday, Brant, Joseph and I climbed into a thirteen-story building right across from the Gunja CGV, to a chicken-and-hof on the 12th floor. We had some of the best spicy chicken we'd ever tasted and two bottles of Cass lager apiece. Then we went to my place and bottled the gingery IPA that we'd cooked up a week ago. Eight tantalizing glass bottles of various sizes are now sitting on my kitchen shelf, carbonating themselves.

After Brant and Joseph had departed, I booked my entire trip to Hokkaido. A flight to Narita, a capsule hotel near Tokyo Station, another Japan Rail Pass, and three nights at the Sapporo Clark Hotel. I'm doing the Yuki Matsuri, folks—the Snow Festival. It's a world-famous snow-sculpting extravaganza held in Sapporo every February. I've always wanted to see it (that, and the ice festival they hold in Harbin, China). Then I'm taking various trains all the way down through the three Home Islands of Japan. My final destination is Hakata, there to catch the old JR Beetle to Busan, just like I did last August. There's another blowout in Busan the second weekend in February, and I wouldn't miss it for the world.

There's just something euphoric about having a trip booked. The knowledge that you'll be out on the road again soon just gets into your blood. I felt like skipping as I marched to Gunja Station, even though the winds of Thor, as Led Zeppelin sang, were blowin' cold. I was on Cloud 9, and still am. After I finish this post I'm going to type up some more of Novel #4 and then meet the wife-to-be for dinner at our favorite Korean barbecue joint...right next to our villa.

All is right with the world.

Of course, soon the madness will begin. My students' term papers are due on Thursday and Friday, and I'll have to grade 'em and quick, for the final exams start the following Monday and run until Wednesday. I'll have to come in on Thursday and Friday of next week to get everything done, I reckon, but after that...freedom. Two months of it. Part of it will be an odyssey of self-improvement (more about that later) and part of it will be Hokkaido.

Friggin' Hokkaido. In winter. Do you know how long I've waited for this?

I should really stop complaining and appreciate the life I've got. 

fires at midnight

I've spoken at length about this topic before, and I don't intend to repeat myself. But I'm going to say a few words in defense of my friend Jethro. 

Jethro Tull, that is.

I just downloaded their 1977 album Songs from the Wood from iTunes, and it is glorious.

Time was, I'd go to a music store (say Barnes & Noble, or Best Buy when they still had CDs). I'd pick a band I liked and listen to a few of the sample tunes on the provided headphones. If I found an album that had at least two songs I loved right away, I'd buy the album, take it home, and listen to it all the way through. Usually, on the second or third play-through, I'd start finding other tunes that I liked. Five or six of them, usually. Maybe I wouldn't like them as much as the original pair that had caught my ear, but they'd still be listenable. Customarily there'd be one or two tracks that I just couldn't stand, and I'd always skip over them on subsequent play-throughs.

I knew I had a winner in Songs from the Wood when every single solitary track tickled the pleasure centers in my brain. Every one. I've already gushed about this on Facebook, but every song on that album is a gem, unique and mellifluous and utterly addictive. It's only ten tracks, including the bonus items, but I've never spent $9.99 more wisely. I just can't get enough of that wonderful, wacky bard Ian Anderson and his restless flute. I was already familiar with the title track and "The Whistler," but they withstand the test of time. My particular favorites from the album are "Jack in the Green," "Cup of Wonder," "Fire at Midnight," and "Beltane."

"Fire at Midnight" is a particular love of mine due to its evocative lyrics. Listening to it, you can just feel the damp chill outside the door of your cottage, the warm crackle of the fire, the rich gold of the hot toddy on the mantlepiece, the soft rugs and wood floor beneath your feet. It just makes you think of cold spring nights and mist and quiet evenings and cheery conversations and delicious drinks and all the lovely intangibles that go with them.

Oh yes. I believe in fires at midnight. Here, I'll show you:

Yes, I added text to this picture, but the original image isn't mine. Boo-yah.

If you want my advice, go to YouTube (or better yet, iTunes) and look up that song. "Fire at Midnight" by Jethro Tull. Give it a listen. Click on the image I've provided (to expand it to full size) and stare at it while the music plays. You'll wonder why all your day's stress just vanished in smoke. I dare you not to make yourself a hot toddy or go stargazing or pen a few romantic verses afterward.

Double-dare you.

IT'S SUMMER!

the punsters were right

...Korea's got a lot of Seoul.

Okay, that was awful. I know. I'm not the first one to make that pun, either. And that's just my point.

Maybe it's the fact that I'm living in Korea's capital city. For the previous two years I was in the hinterlands. I was way down on the islands in 2008-2009, about as far from Seoul culturally as I was geographically. And in 2012 I was in Bucheon, which, even if it is part of the greater metropolitan area (barely), hardly counts as part of the big city. It was relatively quiet, laid-back and dull compared to this hoppin' metropolis.

Seems like everywhere I go in this town, every corner I turn, every street I walk down, every new neighborhood I explore, every event I attend, a new and surprising part of the Korean way of life jumps up and punches me in the nose.

Take the Sejong University Festival, for instance.

Technically it lasted from Tuesday to Thursday, May 14-16. I didn't get much of a glimpse on Tuesday because I had class all day, and I don't have any classes on Wednesday, so I wasn't even on campus. Thursday was my last shot. So after I finished up at two o'clock, I strolled around and snapped some photos.

 

  

 

 

Not much to speak of, right? Students were setting up tents and awnings. A few enterprising souls were already peddling cocktails for four bucks a pop. Some of the English department professors were rehearsing for their big show at 4:00 p.m. Knots of students were meandering here and there. Other than that, the campus was serene.

My friend and coworker Sam and his wife JB (whom I mentioned in my last post) invited Miss H and I to come back to campus at 9:00 and view the proceedings then. I didn't figure there'd be an appreciable difference, but I agreed. My girlfriend and I duly arrived at the appointed hour—halfway through it, anyway—and took a look around.

BOY, was there an appreciable difference.

Those awnings and tents that I had seen being set up earlier were packed with people—students. Soju, beer and cocktails flowed freely. Barbecue lines were everywhere. Snacks of every description were being fried and served to groups and couples at plastic chairs and tables. A famous female K-pop group was performing at the live stage in the middle of the dirt pitch, and dance music thumped from every speaker and amp on campus. Students danced in the streets and under the incandescent lights. Shouts, screams, and roars of laughter echoed and bounded from every darkened window and building. I tried to snap a few pictures, but nothing could encompass the joyous chaos. I'll leave that to your imagination. Sam, JB, Miss H and I sat and nibbled on fries for time, shooting soju, sipping beer from Dixie cups and taking the occasional gulp of baekseju, a Korean wine somewhere between potpourri and cough syrup. Then we got up and wandered around, snacking on chicken kebabs and having conversation when the noise level abated enough for us to be audible. We didn't stay on campus long, but we stayed long enough.

I remember being struck most of all by a feeling of gratitude. After riding my students like a slave master for nearly three months solid, it was nice to see them kicking back before a long four-day weekend. (I bumped into two of them during our wanderings through campus, and they looked like they were having fun.) But most of all, I was awed by the difference in the atmosphere. By day, Sejong University was a somber, venerable educational institution. During these few nights of festival week, however, it had donned a lighthearted and jovial guise, absolutely riotous, star-spangled and comical, infectious in its enthusiasm. A question occurred to me as we weaved through the happy milling crowd.

"Sam," I said, "what exactly is the point of this festival?"

This wasn't his first rodeo.

"It's like spring break," he replied, "but they don't go anywhere."

Well, there you have it. This was the Korean equivalent of spring break. With classes still on and nowhere to go, they threw a party on their school's own grounds. No wonder they were so enraptured. The weather had just turned lovely, the leaves were green and the flowers in bloom, summer was right around the corner, midterms were over and all was right with the world. I was catching a glimpse into a rare sight: Korean students kicking back in grand fashion during a lull in the academic war they'd been waging since grade school.

I felt ever so privileged to have that glimpse.