The very mighty Adamu from the excellent blog Mutant Frog Travelogue wrote a comment which went:
your banner for this blog is somewhat… bleak. I hope “rusty parking lot” doesn’t sum up your experiences in Japan!
I don`t want to discourage comments here as I almost live for them. It`s great feeling when someone takes the time out of their day to respond to something you have written. I thank and love all commenters.
I chose the photo as the banner as it`s what Osaka means to me. If you want beautiful pictures of geisha in Kyoto or Mount Fuji, go to the excellent photoblog Sushicam which peddles postcard shots for an adoring public (myself included)
The one overriding colour that springs to mind when I think of Osaka is rust followed by grey. Man in Japan wrote a good post about what Kyoto really looks like as compared to the pictures you`d expect.
There`s a lot more to Japan than cherry blossoms, geisha and sumo (although I`ve written about two of the three in the last three days. However I don`t see geisha. I rarely see trees in Osaka let alone cherry blossoms and I can`t see Mt Fuji.
I`d love it if I saw all these things on the way to work as well as kimono-clad ladies doing the shopping. I`ve got as much chance as seeing samurai patrolling the village borders and ninja bouncing over rooves on their way to assasinate local warlords. When I see these things, I`ll put up a picture of them. Until then I`ll post real pictures.
P.S. Reiko hates the banner too.
I like the banner. I like rust. I live in Osaka and love its grittiness, love the patina of corrugated steel–the blues, the browns, the oranges and greens–that wrap its back alley factories and abandoned buildings. The Yamatogawa is not a beautiful river, but it is a beautiful river.
i like it – its gritty and urban -
What about giant transforming robots battling equally large monsters? Those would be rather hard to miss, you’d think.
Me, I’ve always liked industrial decay, so your banner appeals to my sensibilities.
It’s a good banner and all, I just wondered if it was an accurate reflection of your experiences in Japan. Apparently so!
Osaka is definitely my favorite urban jungle. Even the places like Osaka Castle that they try and make into that all-but-dead “beautiful Japan” are home to dozens of homeless people with electricity and a small battallion of vending machines just outside the castle itself.
My favorite interpretation of the over-urbanized landscape of Japan is by far Ghibli Studios’ Mimi wo Sumaseba (Whispers in the Wind in English I think). In it the main character decides that a much more appropriate song title for the the Japanese translation of the song “Country Roads,” would be “Concrete Roads” since that’s about as country as it gets.
I like the banner photo a lot, but lose the HTML text over the image file! It looks goddawful. Either put the text IN the image or put it below the photo entirely.
I like the banner as well as all your photos of decrepit old signage over at Flickr… The real stuff.
enjoyed reading your blog for some time now.. the banner picture is original, but i agree with adamu/mutantfrog about the text..
Your new banner is at least better than the last one.
It seems ok, especially the contrast between a rusty kanban of parking lot and blue sky background.
But it reminds of many old things which are very familiar to me for long time.
Recently I found that many things that never changed for three decades disappeared in my home town.
Maybe it has happened in your area, too.
I love your blog. It is real Japan. Thank you for the time you take to keep this blog active.
love it…I’v been in Japan since May 2004..living in Ashiya, working in Akashi..
Grey , concrete, rust…yep sums it up..
I would have to agree. Show all the different sights in Japan… Osaka is definitely urban. My favorite parts of Japan were the towns scattered among the fields and rice paddies.