Part two of my Northern trip

Kushiro (釧路) and the Ainu village, which is by Lake Akan (阿寒湖), were the main reason why I even took this whole trip. Were it not for my quite recent mini-obsession with Ainu culture, language and their civil rights, I’m not sure if I’d go to Hokkaido at all, and even if – I doubt that I’d get so far from Sapporo, the only place there that I vaguely knew of beforehand.

But I’m very glad that I did go because that is the sort of place I really like: there seems to be nothing there, but it’s full of great atmosphere and if one’s not looking for grand attractions then there’s plenty to see and to experience. And Kushiro was the first place where I saw Hokkaido as I imagined it: full of nature and landscapes, without the clutter of cities that grow unnecessarily bigger and bigger. Sure, there’s a bit of that around Sapporo too, for example on the way to the airport, but it’s not the same.

From a tourist’s point of view Kushiro doesn’t have that much to offer. The pamphlets mainly told me about stuff that is nearby, not in the city itself: spots for cross country walks, red-crowned cranes, the aforementioned Ainu village… Nothing on the scale of Tokyo or Kyoto, but it isn’t nothing either, which is worth stressing because, despite advertising, not that many people wander off to Eastern Hokkaido, which is quite a pity.

I was lucky and unlucky at once that my night bus arrived in Kushiro at about 5:20am. Ouch! I’m not a morning person, but if I had to be awake at such ungodly hour, then I decided to take advantage of that and having left my suitcase in a locker at the train station, I wandered around the town itself for a little bit.

First view of Kushiro.

Little church by the train station.

A bus stop made prettier with cranes.

Nusumai Bridge.

Dangerous bowling balls, do not feed!

Another little church with a catholic kindergarten next door.

These are all pictures taken on the first day just past dawn and I’m not sure if it’s the mist or the lack of people and the quiet that goes with it, or something else entirely, but during that walk Kushiro found a special spot inside my heart. It’s such a small port town, which still clearly lives off the sea, in some places there are very clear Western influences and in others, seeming kind of squeezed in and a little bit hidden, are small, very Japanese houses or restaurants. As in every port town, everything is mixed with each other. And even the next day, when I went for a similar walk, but during the day this time, my impressions and sympathies haven’t changed a bit, so the mist and the early hour probably had nothing to do with it after all.

A flower bed clock - I imagine it blossoms in spring.

It’s just peaceful, no urban rush and noise at the cost of everything else, friendly people… I think that’s where I rested the most, even though I don’t feel like I was being lazy or anything. If I ever get a chance, I’ll return to Kushiro with great pleasure, for me this place has a great atmosphere, though I know I wouldn’t really be able to live there, I like being close to big shopping centres etc.

Did I mention the cranes? Yes, I did go to see the red-crowned cranes. What’s more interesting, I only learned about them the night I was leaving for Osaka: I had dinner at the Irish restaurant and when I mentioned that I’ll be in Kushiro, Tony, the owner, took out a book, showed me the cranes and said that I absolutely have to go and see them. I’m not a bird enthusiast, I still can’t tell the difference between a raven and a crow, but if Tony hadn’t mentioned the cranes, then despite a few pages in the tourist’s leaflets, I probably wouldn’t go. I don’t know if I’d regret that, as I said, I’m not a fan of birds and/or bird watching, bit I did go and I’m glad I did – it not only helped me to stay awake after arriving, but it’s also refreshing to every now and then do something different than what we’d usually do.

Tsuru-midai (crane observation point).

People crowded by the fence.

The viewing point was fantastic, especially for people like myself – I imagine that true birdwatchers would prefer to stay hidden in the bushes until they see a crane in the true wilderness instead of doing the easy touristy thing. And I was surprised about two things. Firstly, the cranes were a bit bigger than I expected. I mean, sure, I knew they were big birds, no sparrows, but I still thought they were a little bit smaller. And secondly – gosh, are they loud! The observation point was in the middle of nowhere, there was maybe one car going past every fifteen minutes or less and other than that the only source of sound were the people and their clicking cameras. When everywhere is this quiet, once the cranes started screaming (two of them even seemed to fight over something), I jumped at first, completely surprised by this noise.

Since you can see everything, or most of the stuff, in Kushiro in a day, if you exclude the day trips to nearby places, like the crane village, do not be shocked that my story of it ends here. For the rest of the time I had lots of fun with my Couchsurfing hosts and their friends. I admit, I like travelling alone, it’s cheaper and easier, one doesn’t have to explain anything to anyone, one just does as one fancies. But I am still ridiculously happy to have found such amazing hosts. In one sentence: I didn’t feel like I was couchsurfing, more like I was visiting old friends.

And not to say that I had a business in that, but were it not for my great hosts and their friends, my visit to the Ainu village would’ve been more expensive and shorter due to the buses. But this way I managed to catch a ride and had company pretty much until it was time for me to leave for Otaru.

Before I go any further, I’ll explain the basics about the Ainu, to whom I owe this trip. Simply speaking, the Ainu are the natives of Hokkaido, but also of some nearby islands and even some parts of modern Russia. When we talk about the Ainu today, we ought to think of them as we do of the Native Americans: purposefully killed off (in the case of the Ainu: by the Japanese), treated as a worse race for years, denied civil and human rights until relatively recently, and nowadays treated more like a display which someone’s trying to squeeze as much money out of via tourist as possible, while there’s still some of them around. It’s very sad what human beings can do to each other, but we can’t change the past, while we can look after the future, as pompous as this may sound. The culture and the language of the Ainu seem to me like a mix of Japanese and Russian ones (understandable, just look at a map), yet when it comes to views on life or life philosophy, so to speak, I think they’re the same as those of any other natives anywhere: live according to the laws of nature and focus life on farming and hunting. And to me the icing on the cake is that the most comprehensive research on Ainu to date, both those in Japan, as well as those in Russia, was done by a Polish anthropologist, Bronisław Piłsudski in late XIX^th, early XX^th century! Were it not for him and his anthropological interests, with the extermination of the Ainu all knowledge of them and their culture would be gone, not to mention their language (even now there’s only a handful of speakers of Ainu language, it’s seriously endangered by extinction).

After such an introduction you probably won’t be shocked that the Ainu village was far from the real deal, but very, very close to the tourists’ idyllic village, bordering on a Japanised vision of Santa Clause’s village. Again, it’s very sad, but at the same time if it means that someone finds themselves interested in Ainu culture, then some good may still come out of that. What’s important is that there are still Ainu living in Japan – one of them even ran one of the souvenir shops in the village and I could tell that he wasn’t very Japanese. Though, an interesting fact, genetically speaking, modern Japanese are Koreans, while the Ainu have always been the Ainu and always lived on the same island – so who’s Japanese here and who’s not?

Anyways, I digress. Although I couldn’t spend a properly intellectual day, as I would’ve preferred to, the village didn’t offer much in terms of deepening one’s knowledge on the culture or history of the Ainu, instead having lots of souvenir places, I am still happy I went. I absorbed as much of this culture as I possibly could, I enjoyed the winter (-15°C, oh, how nicely it pinched your cheeks!) and the company of my new friends, as well as the first, since I can remember, walk on a frozen lake. And in the evening, again, in a not so authentic, but very touristy fashion, there was a little show which did include some aspects of the Ainu culture, some games on snow/ice and fireworks. Probably no Japanese festival is complete without fireworks…