Feeding Seagulls in Yokohama

Feeding birds seems to be an almost universal pastime for the elderly of all nations on Earth. Here is a gentleman that I met in Yokohama who was kind enough to allow my photography as he was feeding the local gulls one fine afternoon in the sun. When I get to be his age I hope I can return the favor and do my share of bird feeding as well!

Yokohama and Osanbashi

A couple of weeks ago while in Yokohama I took these photos of the fantastically colored sky and the city. It was a once-in-a-decade sort of sky, very cool. I also visited the international pier at Minato Mirai, the Osanbashi. Easily one of the most interesting landmarks of Yokohama, and one of the rare examples of perfect modern architecture. A must visit!

Costa Victoria in Yokohama Port

Visiting Yokohama with friends last week I just had to take a detour to one of my favorite Yokohama landmarks, the Osanbashi and the International ship terminal there. Sort of blocking our view though, was the biggest ship I have ever seen, the simply gigantic Costa Victoria. The name might ring a bell if you remember the more unfortunate Costa Concorida that capsized of the coast of Italy earlier this year. The Costa Victoria really towered above the usually quite huge Osanbashi, even though we missed out on the view of Yokohama Minato Mirai, we were impressed by the ship instead. Funny thing was, on the other side of the pier, another huge ship was resting at anchor, but I forgot her name (last photo of the blog post). I wonder if anyone on these ship reads this blog?

Kamishibai – Volunteer Storytelling in Yokohama

Kamishibai, or 紙芝居 in Japanese is a very old Japanese kind of traditional storytelling involving pictures and a spoken story that was originally meant to teach buddhist principles and moral stories to illiterate people but these days it’s mostly funny or uplifting children’s stories. Kamishibai is one of the many amazing traditions that have survived over the centuries here in Japan, and the other week while walking in Yokohama’s famous Yamashita Park I saw this old man making the best of his electric wheel chair give a volunteer performance for both kids and adults. His voice had to be enhanced by a microphone but he still made full use of his dramatic voice and wooden clappers for special effects. Kamishibai as it looks today is most closely related to the way young men in the 20′s and 30′s would use this simple performance art to travel around the Japanese countryside and earn a small living during the hard economic times of the depression, and that is also when the storytelling turned from moral to entertaining. I can imagine local mothers were happy to have their unruly kids spend an hour or two listening quietly to the storytellers while they took care of the home! This man however, is a local volunteer and is proudly wearing the official Yokohama 150th anniversary t-shirt from 2009, cY150!