Field Study Report: Asakusa 120703
		On a sunny day of December 7, 2003, three of my students from the School of Asia 21, Kokushikan University, and myself visited Asakusa, Tokyo in order to better understand what aspects of this urban district constitute its fame as one of the most popular sight-seeing spots in Japan - for foreign and domestic Japanese visitors alike. We undertook a survey that aimed to illuminate Asakusa's social, cultural, and historical oganizations.
					Three of my students, Mami, Kaori and Miwa, stands in front of Kaminari-mon gate. At 13:00 hrs, we began our initial investigation of Asakusa as a liminal space into which visitors enter and undergo the three-fold socialzation process of 1) isolation from everyday lives, 2) transformtion of selves, and 3) re-assimlation into their daily lives with an altered state of mind. Our task was to build on this analytical perspective and examine how far we can go into the "intellectual rabbithole."
		The 1700-sqm. district of Asakusa (1/3000 scale, taken from CyberMap Japan). Located in Taito City, to the northeast of Imperial Palace, Asakusa is known to the world today to consist of Tokyo's oldest temple town and commercial district. The hub of this urban site is Senso-ji, a Shingon temple that emerged in 628 A.D.(a local legend holds that two fishermen found a precious statue of kwan-yin buddha while working in a nearby river. The statue was adored by another local individual who, in order to continually worship the idol and fulfil the area with its merciful power, became a monk and turned his house into a temple that became the predecessor of Senso-ji). Much historically-salient development of Asakusa is seen during the Edo period (1603-1868). The commercial walkway called Nakamise runs approximately 300 meters between Senso-ji and its southern gate, Kaminarimon, from which a huge well-known lantern with a kanji-character "Thunder" (kaminari) hangs. This main street bears souvenir shops on both sides, evoking the atmosphere of old downtown Edo where merchants and artisans carried out their routinely work. Asakusa district is also known for its traditional festivals, including Sanja Matsuri (May), Hozuki Fair (Hozuki refers to Lantern Plant)(July), and Toshi No Ichi Fair (an end of the year event, held in December). Sanja Fest is one of Tokyo's three largest festivals, and it originated during the Kamakura period (1192-1338). Today it takes a typical Shintoesque form in which local residents get together to carry mikoshi shrines all around the district for purification and land-blessing in the name of local gods. To the west of Asakusa is a lively working-class neighborhood accompanied by both traditional and modern amusement centers such as opera houses, cinemas, pachinko parlors and other gambling houses, and eateries - not to mention Hanayashiki amusement park, which is one of the oldest, lasting playgrounds in Japan that opened in the late 19th century. These plazas and facilities burned to the ground twice in its modern history (once during the great Kanto earthquake of 1923 and second during the Second World War). Yet, the will of local residents allowed the district to be rebuilt and to continuously operate until now.
					"Tasting" part of what constitutes Asakusa as a traditional city was a quest we could not ignore! We entered a local teahouse and ordered traditional Japanese desserts: zenzai and anmitsu, both of which had as their necessary components rice balls and sweetened bean-pastes. We wondered when these desserts emerged in the history of Japanese confectionery, and how their styles changed over time. None of the waiters had any clear answers to these inquiries of ours that went beyond speculation.
					We walked about the street of nakamise and observed whatever that caught our attention. Half way into the street, we bumped into a traditional cake shop that sold a type of local delicacy called ningyou-yaki (doll cakes), which took the form of small pancake balls with sweetened bean paste in the middle. The cover term refers to its shape: an artisan held a mold of dolly shapes into which he poured wheat starch. Just as the starch was hardening over the oven fire, the artisan poured bean paste and covered the product over with another layer of wheat starch. Then he turn the mold upside down to finish up the baking. When he opened up the mold, out came a series of cakes. He produced half-a-dozen cakeballs each time he swang the mold over fire.
		A man was selling another type of cakes using a carrying stand, which he recreated roughly after an Edo model. Bedecked in a traditional happi wear and chonmage wig, he casted himself into an Edoite character. This was a business he started five years ago in agreement with the local communal effort to reconstruct Asakusa as a historical merchant-town. The man kindly and delightfully replied to our ethnographic interviews, and he encouraged us to conduct a participant observation: to experience what it is like to carry a candy stand on one's shoulder.
					Coming out from Senso-ji, we explored the amusement district that was located on the east side, recording culturally-important scenes including Hanayashiki Park, the site of the first cinema to ever operate in Japan, and so on, and interviewing people we identified as our key informants - visitors as well as local residents. Shown here is another interesting site where we captured a local streetshopper selling traditional toys. We were here intensely observing a dragonfly made of bamboo, each of which measured around 10 centimeters. Each of these balances itself on the tip of its head, never to fall from whatever to which this tip hooks. It was just as a dragonfly had came to rest after flying in the air. According to the clerk, much artisanship went into carving out the tip-of-the-head parts. "Once this is chipped, even a little, the toy is no longer functional!" - he explained as he point to the area that was smaller that the ball of a ball-point pen.
		...and the stand sure was heavy! It was hard to believe that the clerk was going around the district with this on his shoulder as he tried to sell a relatively small number of cakes. "It is not so much the muscle-power as it is the sense of balance that you really need," the man said. A very traditionally-Japanese answer!
		It is difficult to pass through Asakusa without trying to see what you fortune is - as a large fortune-telling structure appears on your side as you walk into Sensoji. What were our fortunes? ...Not too bad!

Back to My Syllabi Page