Hotspring baths are truly delightful, provided the temperature is not too hot. At many resort hotels, baths are built in a very elaborate fashion, usually with marble, stone, or fancy-colored tile. In these hotels abundant water from the hotsprings is conducted into the great bathroom, in which the big pool is very much like an indoor swimming pool. At the Fujiya, the internationally-renowned hotel in the mountain resort of Hakone, some seventy miles west of Tokyo, there are two strikingly splendid baths, named the Aquarium and the Mermaids. The former has glass walls and is surrounded by an aquarium, while the latter is decorated with fantastically-carved mermaid statues. Immersing oneself in the hotspring pool, which is welling up all the time, and gazing at the fancy goldfish dancing up and down in the floodlit aquarium, one forgets all his worldly cares and finds himself in a state of ecstacy. This is bathing at its best, and one can even imagine that he is bathing in one of those fabulous Roman baths in which many an emperor bathed during the heyday of the great Roman Empire.
Thousands of GI's, officers, and their families who have come to Japan since the end of the war have experienced our hotspring baths. Most of them seem to have enjoyed them very much.
In no other country in the world do the four seasons alternate with such clock-like regularity. It is a surprising fact, considering that Japan, though a tiny country composed of a chain of islands, extends for some 1,500 miles from north to south. European and other countries are subject to a very changeable climate. In the British Isles, whose geographical position is somewhat analogous to Japan, inhabitants often shiver in June and sweat in a December heat wave. Such atmospheric phenomena are utterly unknown in Japan. Punctuality of the four seasons is such that, throughout the country, people stop bathing in the sea abruptly at the end of August and begin again in the middle of July. Likewise, our worst storms seem to come on certain days each year.
Our popular pastimes, apart from baseball and other imported sports, invariably have something to do with nature, for which the great regularity of the seasons is in part responsible. In spring, cherry blossoms bloom early in April. There are many cherry groves, similar in size to the one on the Potomac River in Washington, D.C., to which many people in groups, both large and small, go on picnics. Under the gorgeous cherry blossoms, holiday crowds revel in drinking and other forms of merrymaking. In autumn, when the leaves of trees change color, maple-leaf viewing is the occasion for nation-wide outings. Among the various trees, the Japanese maple is by far the most striking and variegated in color. Here and there in the mountains there are maple groves to which the people flock to admire the autumn brilliance, when the leaves are at their most beautiful. Even bleak winter is not without its quota of nature-loving pastimes. Older people, especially, take delight in admiring snow scenery, when gardens and mountains are wrapped in this white garb. Gazing at the snow scenery from a veranda of a house or inn and sipping heated sake, a native rice wine, out of a tiny cup, has always been a favorite pastime. This type of enjoyment has always been considered highly esthetic by my countrymen. It is customary on such occasions for the participants in the gathering to compose poems. Here there is a joviality and a conviviality with a deeply satisfying inner feeling which gives us lasting pleasure. This type of pastime should have a universal appeal, for is it not friendship at its best?
Flowers, mountains and rivers, mist and rain have been the principal themes of our drawings from ancient times. Thus, early Japanese drawings and paintings were usually devoid of animals or human beings. This innate love of nature in the Japanese people has given rise to such time-honored customs as the tea ceremony, flower arrangement, moon-viewing festival, and the like.
As a result of this inborn love of nature, along with the fact that the Japanese have for centuries been confirmed vegetarians, due to the extensive influence of Buddhism, we are as a general rule not given to brutality. I have known many of my countrymen whose hearts grew faint while visiting the famous Chicago stockyards, and who could not eat meat for several days afterwards.
The Japanese, mainly because of overcrowding and the scarcity of natural resources, have been accustomed to perennial poverty from ancient times and have contrived various methods to compensate for it. Their efforts, however, have not been directed towards conquering nature, but rather in the negative way of making the best of what nature has to offer. They have tried to adapt themselves to nature, rather than to control or subjugate it. I have often questioned whether man can really control or subjugate nature.
Our people have never seriously attempted to utilize the abundant supply of hotspring water in order to provide heat for buildings and homes, even in a small commercial way. Years ago when I visited Iceland, I saw in the outskirts of Reykjavik a greenhouse in which tomatoes were being grown by using the water of a hotspring. Such an idea could be adopted to advantage in Japan, where thermal springs are found almost everywhere. I have told many people here about it, but apparently they are too conservative to utilize this wonderful source of heat. Instead, my countrymen seem to be content with sunshine and a tiny charcoal fire and depend solely on these for heating purposes.
Living like hermits for centuries in the narrow confines of their miniature land, my countrymen have learned to live in utmost simplicity and frugality, and to seek pleasure and contentment in that which nature freely provides.
3 The Japanese Woman in
Kimono
THERE is a popular saying in my country that living in an American-style house with a Japanese wife and eating Chinese food constitutes an ideal living arrangement. An American home, with its labor-saving devices and efficient plumbing and heating, is no doubt the best dwelling in the world and the envy, I believe, of many less fortunate peoples, including the Japanese.
The Japanese are particularly impressed by the modern American kitchen with its refrigerator, electric stove, and sink with garbage disposer. No doubt they should be impressed, for a Japanese kitchen is usually very gloomy. It has practically no modern conveniences, save perhaps a gas burner, and the sink is usually an affair of tin and wood.
One of the members of our inspection group to the United States recently held a very high government position. He lived a reasonably comfortable life at home. When he visited an American home and was shown the kitchen, he remarked that he was glad his wife did not accompany him to America. She would have held up her hands in despair and refused to work in her own kitchen, once she had seen an American one.
In spite of the material superiority of American kitchens, it is the Chinese cuisine which is world famous for its variety and for those of its dishes which enjoy universal gastronomic appeal. Though French cooking may be considered more palatable to the Occidental, there is no doubt that the Chinese are excellent cooks who can concoct many delectable dishes.
On the other hand, it is the Japanese wife who is most faithful and devoted to her husband and to the household, even to the point of servility. The Japanese wife considers that her mission is to bear and rear children, and to perpetuate the tradition of the family into which she has wed.
Living in an antiquated house with no modern conveniences worthy of the name, the Japanese wife usually spends most of her time drudging away in her house. Even with domestic help, the Japanese wife in a middle- or upper-class home is confined to the house almost all day, and it is rare that her husband takes her out to dinner or to a show.
The Japanese husband seeks his own pleasure in his own way—in a geisha house or at a restaurant. The Japanese seldom entertain at home, for to do so has long been considered a lack of respectability. Only a mean or poor person is said to resort to such informal entertaining. Parties, if they have to be given at all, must be given in a restaurant or a teahouse, and since Japanese parties are essentially men's affairs, usually waited upon by geisha hostesses, the Japanese wife has practically no