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Published: March 24th 2007
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It all started with a mail from an old colleague coming to know that I was working in Nagoya, he asked how Nagoya Castle was?And the fact that in spite of staying for 2 1/2 years in Nagoya I still haven't visited Nagoya castle hit me.
Though I have visited many places in and around Nagoya, been to Kyoto a million times and have been to much farther and less accessible places, but I have not really got around to Nagoya Castle.
There are reasons though.
First of all Nagoya castle is hardly 40 years old!!! Its true, the original castle(500 years old) was destroyed in the final stages of the 2nd World War. The fact that most castles are built out of wood didn't help much and all that is left is the stone base of the original castle.
Secondly it is located too much in the center of the city to be considered an excursion.
Thirdly I have seen castles which are made up of constipated spaces and narrow staircases to be any fun. The lords of the bygone eras were either really small in stature or liked living in discomfort too much, to live in such places.
For starters, the visitors area(where the feudal lord used to receive visitors) in the Inuyama castle is no bigger than the living room in my house.
My living room does not contain secret hiding spaces for bodyguards either(Inuyama does).
The staircases are too narrow and steep for comfortable climbing(Nagoya castle has an elevator!!!!).
So these are among the few reasons why I had not visited Nagoya Castle till now.
What did I reply to my colleague? "Still Standing" would have been cheeky, but when you consider that only the stony skeletons of the original castle remain, it is not appropriate.
I gave an answer which would have beaten that of the famous American President(" I did not have......")in terms if vagueness
The reason for all this background is that I am going to leave Nagoya soon and shift to Tokyo and I need to see all the unseen places in the shortest time possible.
Now to the main story, our journey started with lunch at the 'Indus' restaurant located in Sakae which serves one of the best stuffed Kulcha I have eaten in Japan. The manager of the restaurant is an affable Sikh named Mr. Goldy
Singh. And it is one of the rare Indian restaurants in Nagoya which is staffed by Indians. The rest are staffed by Nepalis , Pakistanis and Bangaldeshis.
The first act of kindness was by Goldy Singh, who not only threw in a lot of freebies with the meal, but also gave a decent discount. The fact that I speak Punjabi also helped.
(For those who are interested I currently speak in Punjabi in a Pakistani restaurant in Tokyo and get a free cup of tea everytime).
Indus is located near the TV tower next to ABC mart. I do recommend a visit.
It is spacious, the interiors are in Rajasthani style and, of course the staff is friendly.
The access to Nagoya Castle is pretty simple, take the Meijo line at Sakae and get down at Shiyakusho station.The Castle is around 10 minutes walk from the station.
Now for the second act of kindness: We reached Nagoya Castle and were preparing to buy the tickets priced at 500 Yen(approx $5), when an old couple approached and handed over a ticket me. The lady just said "Take, dont pay money". And I was baffled. But the couple had
limited English skills and just smiled a lot and handed over the ticket.So I saved 500 Yen.
The third act happened after entering the gate, a lady just came up and offered to take a photo of me and family. Maybe not a big deal elsewhere, but considering Japanese are shy by nature, it was unexpected.
Now to the Castle, built in the year 1612 by Tokugawa Ieyasu it rose in importance because of its positioning on the road that linked the two old capitals of Japan-Tokyo and Kyoto.
As was with many other castles in Japan, it too was burnt down in a war, but this one was more recent. The original castle was completely burnt during the final stages of the 2nd World War. The concrete building which stands now was built in 1959 and is more of a museum which depicts how the old castle looked like. It has air-conditioning, and as I mentioned earlier, elevators. The view is spectacular though. There is a moat surrounding, which does not have any water.Deer graze in the moat probably as an additional attraction.
And as I mentioned it is more of a museum than a
castle, each floor is dedicated to the exhibits,some of which survived the American bombing on May 14, 1945.
I visited the castle during the later part of March, with the first Sakura (Cherry Blossom) begining to bloom. The best time to visit would be a few weeks later when all the flowers have bloomed and the large castle grounds would look beautiful.
It is a tradition in Japan to go out and see the Sakura trees and comment on their beauty.
I am not much of a nature freak though, and enjoy the other tradition, where working colleagues sit under a tree drink beer and sing songs(after a few beers even the worst of singers is tolerable)
Noritake Garden is a ceramic shop with a garden attached.
It was the next place which I wanted to see.. It is important enough to feature as one of the attractions of Nagoya in tour books but difficult to understand why.
The web-site describes it as “symbolizing the history of western style dinner-ware in Japan”.
Is that a big deal? Would people visit a place to find out what kind of cutlery was used by the Japanese less
than hundred years ago? Is hundred years a relevant time-span for something which dates back to thousands of years?
The factory was built in 1904 and is where western dinnerware was first produced in Japan.
It is teapots and dinner plates for god's sake.
As I described before the place is a cutlery shop with a garden attached.
Then there are the remains of the old kiln.
A small gallery with actual artists painting the cutlry is another attraction.
You can also find people painting plates and cups
One would visit this place if one am really starved of excitement.
The shop sells overpriced stuff for those who have money and time to spend there.
I have neither so I bought a plastic plate(which was the only reasonable priced thing available).
If there are a few more disaffected people about, I can start selling T-shirts “ I went to Noritake and came out with a plastic plate”.
Do let me know if there are any buyers.
I have completed the blog quite late mainly due to laziness and also the fact that I moved to Tokyo. Nagoya was convenient, distances were small, people friendlier.
Tokyo is a typical
metro, crowded, indifferent people and a perpetual lack of time.
But there are more restaurants(I have heard that there is a South Indian restaurant serving Dosas),
the weather is better and it is more interesting(as of now).
Lets see, the next blog on life in Tokyo, maybe.
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Shubha
non-member comment
After a long time
Checked ur blog after a long time and was happy to see a new entry. It was good reading about places I had visited while in Japan.......for me it was nostalgic. Anyways, I would say Noritake Garden was a nice place and the paintings on the cutlery were too good, reflecting the perfection of japanese.