Inuyama Ukai: Night Fishing

Japanese Required: Moderate

Inuyama is quaint castle village and a prime example of old school Japan. While I haven’t yet made it to the castle, I have visited Inuyama several times and always with a group of different friends with different interests. I ride the meitetsu to Inuyama from Kanayama which costs 1180 yen round trip. A word of warning: the meitetsu can be very confusing, even if you understand Japanese. Always make sure to remember the time and platform number of your train. I have forgotten to do this and ended up getting on a train headed the opposite direction from my destination. This trip, I met up with a large group of friends and we wandered the streets of Inuyama before heading over to the docks.

The closer you are to the castle entrance, the more novelty shops you’ll find. The streets of Inuyama are wide and all look pretty much the same, so I suggest going with at least one person that can read Kanji or has been there before. It's a good thing I like to roam around because it is fairly easy to get lost. Getting lost in Inuyama is half the fun: it is so small that it is next to impossible to stay lost for long. If all else fails, you can always find your way back to the castle information center and ask for a map. They don’t speak any English but are quite used to lost foreigners.

Using the map and my powers of navigation, I was able to find my way to the dock in plenty of time to catch our boat. Ukai is cormorant fishing, a traditional Japanese fishing method. The ukai viewing requires reservation, and each boat seats about 16 people. The boats are spacious and allowed us to talk amongst ourselves quite comfortably as we headed out to the fishing spot. We spent around five to ten minutes just riding in the boat and looking at Inuyama's night-time lighting before we actually arrived.

 When we arrived at the fishing spot, I was very excited at the thought of seeing the birds dramatically swooping and diving to catch large amounts of fish. I was surprised that it was actually very calm and not visually dynamic. The torches lit up the area over the water, but I could not see the birds once they dove. The closer you are to the boat, the easier it is to see the birds deliver the fish they have caught.


 

It was a very relaxing and an enjoyable trip. While I’m not sure if I would go again, I definitely recommend the experience to anyone interested in learning about Japanese culture. Ukai fishing in Inuyama is a nice, comfortable cultural outing that makes you feel connected to old Japan.

Yokiso International Cultural Exchange

Japanese Required: A lot

At Yokiso, there's an annual international cultural exchange which involves a variety of different cultural performances that differs from year to year. When I went, there was a mix of Japanese and foreign people aside from my group of friends. The location was beautiful with many things worth viewing even without the cultural exchange. The first thing that we got to see was a traditional Japanese tea ceremony.

I enjoyed the ceremony a lot, and I ended up speaking with one of my Japanese friends quite a bit about the traditional ways of being a guest for a tea ceremony. He taught me a little bit of new information, but I knew most of the formalities already. After the tea was made, they served a small bowl of it to everyone. Along with the tea came some small sugar candies and a green tea rice cake filled with bean paste. The ceremony was pleasant, if surprisingly short.

After the ceremony, we got to watch a traditional Myanmar dance performed by two Japanese women. If I hadn't met one of the dancers on the way, I wouldn't have believed that they were actually Japanese. Their dancing was amazing, and I enjoyed the show the entire way through. It makes me a bit sad to think that the dancing changes from event to event, so I probably won't be able to see them again.

 I would definitely recommend going to one of these cultural exchange events to anybody looking to spend some time in a very gorgeous environment. The entire event is hosted in Japanese, so  going with someone who has done it before or understands Japanese would be a good idea. Overall, this was one of the best outings I have done in my time in Japan.