【Nail】Lisa & Gaspard

【体験】Japan theatre - Nohgaku 能楽

Japan has 3 very important theater

which is registered as the 

Intangible Cultural Heritage

無形文化遺産

Part of UNESCO

which is 

Nohgaku, Bunraku, Kabuki

能楽，人形淨瑠璃文楽，歌舞伎  

Fortunately 

I have all the chance to experience all of this Cultural Theater

all fully sponsor by my scholarship (ASJA)

First I will be introducing 

Nohgaku 能楽

★★★★★

(well I will be not explaining about those history stuff )

I will just explain the things that I saw

and my experience of watching it

I went to SuginamiNohgakudou
(more info here)

It is located near Shin-nakano station 新中野駅

東京都杉並区和田一丁目

At that time

My scholarship association booked the hall for us

and there are also experience session

Starting with lecture session by the professional

This SuginamiNohgaku building

has a very interesting story

here the story comes

In long long time ago
(I dunno how long)

In the WWII
(Please don ask me when is it)

There are a fighting and bomb all around the area

As you all know

There are also War Jet

It fires up all over the place

and somehow there is a miracle happened

Only SuginamiNohgaku Building have not being blew up

They believe that the sacred place is being protected by the GODS

and after that they are very grateful

and trying to protect this building

and the Nohgaku Cultural Theatre

till now

This is what I heard in the lecture session

Ok next I will explain what actually is Nohgaku 能楽
(for who wants to know more bout it click here)

★★★★★

We are not allowed to bring our camera in

so I will just have to get some photo from the internet

to explain what I saw inside

(please forgive me.. hahaha)

This is the hall

where the theatre will be performed



Nohgaku 能楽

Registered in UNESCO in year 2001

there are two types of performance

Noh & Kyogen

能＆狂言

From the very beginning

both been performed on the same stage

★★★★★

Noh 能

Noh is through its pursuit of a symbolic ideal beauty

is a performance using various Mask

They said the mask will create different expression

with the view of different angle

I have not get the chance to see this yet

This is one of the performance of Noh
(Taken from youtube)

★★★★★

Kyogen 狂言

Kyogen is through its realistics expression of humor portray the true essence of human nature

 and have been passed down to us today in these mutually complementary roles

(I saw this performance)



This Kyogen is being performed using facial expression

and some small item such as fan etc

This performance is basically base on imagination

You will need to imagine there are a tree or river

The dialect that they are using is more easy compare to the other theatres

such as Noh, Bunraku, Kabuki

They are using more to Kansai Dialect

The story of the performance is all base on our daily life

like anger, selfish, crooked etc

This theatre is usually trying to teach the younger generation

to become a better person

not to cheat and be honest

I kinda love this theatre

very interesting (^^,)

After watching it

we get the chance to go up the stage

and learn few steps of how they perform

I can say is kinda hard

One is you must sit on your feet for very long time

and you must walk and run with your feet touch the floor

means you must not raise your leg nor leave your feet from ground



This is one of the performance of Kyogen
(Taken from youtube)

【東北】Volunteer Program

【Volunteer Program 2010】

In this volunteer program

includes Experiencing Japanese Culture, Nature and Team Work

Here in this post

We are volunteering as a staff in this national institution

国立那須甲子青少年自然の家

At Nasukashi

This place is mainly for people having

Hiking, Camping, BBQ, Club Activities, Camp fire and so on

Every morning 7am 

we need to gather at the ground site

So what we gonna do next

is

MORNING EXERCISE

Stretch your hands up into the air!!!

Here is the dormitory for the students

You need to clean and tidy up the beds yourselves

Self-Disciplines

This is the volunteer staff room

more spacious and more privacy (^^,)

Here starts our volunteer job

First

Clean the FOREST

Then

Clean the windows

up and down



Every corner of the building



We are doing this for few hours

Although is nothing much about my experience cleaning the place up

Just wanna share my experience in volunteer program

to my junior

about what we have done in the previous year

fortunately

This year there is no CLEANING session

Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!!!!

【東北】Hiking at Nasukashi hill side

【Volunteer program 2010】

Hiking at Natsukashi hill side

那須甲子

located north of Tokyo

This is a continuous post from my trip to Tohoku at yr2010

(blog post here)

Just before the earthquake

Actually the hill side that we hiked is not that big

Just wanna show the 

beauty of the nature

So lets start to hike!!!

We joined the junior high school boy scout gang 

for hiking

They are so CUTE!!!!!!

Later you will see how cute they are

Hike into the woods

in a line so that we would not get lost

Of course there are resting time

for drinking water

Continue hike hike hike into the green green woods

Till we saw a small river

That will be our destination!!!!

The river is so CLEAN!!!!

and very chilling!!!!

The view in the hill side is awesome!!

Fresh air!!!

Nice scenery!!!!

relaxation MAX!!

The boy scout is very disciplined

All of them line up and wait for order

After their captain set them off for lunch time

they need to be independent

to open the can by themselves

and learned how to survive in the nature

Can you open a can when you are 9 years old??

These 2 kids are sooooooooo CUTE!!!!!

The right one is so Handsome!!

hahaha

Too good looking for a kid

I hope I have such cute and good looking kid in the future!

After lunch

and some water activities in the river

is time for us to go back before dark

Hope you all enjoy the beauty of nature in Japan!!

See you all in next post!!

【静岡】Ride with Japan Electric Car - Leaf

CAR talk time

(I do not know much about car though)

well

after HYBRID generation

Now Japan is promoting
Fully ELECTRIC Car (EV car)

No Ekzos = No Smoke

No Engine = No Sound

very ECO

★★★★★

I rent and had a ride with Nissan Leaf 

日産リーフ
(Exterior look at here)

Car price at 2,990,000yen (RM98k)

Japanese Government is encouraging the people to use EV car

so 780,000yen is being subsidies

So this car is only 2,200,000yen (RM72,600)





★★★★★

My experience with the EV CAR

The car is very POWERFUL

in driving up the mountain

and very STEADY in Highway

It can run up to 120km/h easily

but the electric consumption is HIGH

when you use for mountain and highway

SO

You will need t search for Charge point all the time

a bit troublesome

as the car Battery tank only can charge up to 150km

40km will be reduced if air conditioner in on

and distance will reduced twice faster for driving on mountain and highway

watching the meter of the battery

like watching stock market

up and down

★★★★★

There is 3 common types of charging point in Japan

100V, 200V, Speed Charge(400V)

If you use 200V

1 hour charge up to 3～4km

(very slow)

Usually Speedy charging point is recommended

but the charging point is limited

Speed charging point will cost you 30～60mins

to fully charge (110～150km)

very time consuming

★★★★★

When we searching for a charging point

an EV QUICK sign will be shown

which is the place for Speed charging



It looks like a petrol station

but it is individual

the number of station around is very limited



Get the pump

and plug into the hole in front of the car



Then press the start button

then after sometime

The input voltage and ampere will be shown

and so as the battery's percentage 

Since it is under government campaign

It is FREE for charge

Just leave your car at the charging spot

and leave for meal break or toilet break

of course you need to lock your car

EV car is very comfortable, spacious, soundless

BUT

the charging system is a bit troublesome

good for riding in town

but not for long distance

unless you willing to spend time waiting for charging

I had a great experience with this EV car