The Natural History of Japan

How's that for a title? It sounds rather all encompassing, as though this blog entry will be the definitive reference for suburban/exurban Japanese natural history queries. In fact, it's little more than a listing of the few species I observed and identified while visiting Japan for two weeks. I promised this post weeks ago and I apologize for the delay; too many other things caught my eye. Below you will find the common name, scientific name, and a brief description of my encounter with the creature(s). For some species, I've included a photograph.


Gray Heron (Ardea cinerea):
These familiar looking herons were plentiful in the numerous rivers and streams of Japan. It made little difference to them if the stream bed had been coated in concrete - a common practice in Japan - or if apartments lined the banks; there they stood, looking remarkably like the Great Blue Heron (Ardea herodias) so well known in the Americas. Interestingly, it seems Ardea cinerea has been even more successful than A. herodias, having populated three continents: Europe, Asia, and Africa. (By the way, why is Europe considered a continent again?)

Rufous Turtle-Dove (Streptopelia orientalis):
This bird superficially resembles the mourning dove (Zenaida macroura), a handsome species I hunted in the harvested fields of Virginia every fall of my youth. As the name suggests, the rufous turtle-dove has browns and reds in the plumage. It is also more heavy-bodied than many other dove species, though still smaller than the rock dove (Columba livia), better known to most urban folks as the pigeon.


Carrion Crow (Corvus corone orientalis):
As I have mentioned before, I have a soft spot for the corvid family. Jays, crows, ravens...oh, my! The Carrion Crow stands out because of the terrific name and its alarming size. My friend Ben contends that these large crows are the inspiration for the giant corvids populating so many video games (“Resident Evil,” for example). I believe it. They seem to be half again as large as your average American crow (Corvus brachyrhynchos) or Fish crow (Corvus ossifragus) and their scratchy squawk is a staple of Buddhist cemeteries and Shinto shrines. The irridescent quality of their plumage is readily apparent, particularly around the neck.

Unfortunately, I was unable to get very close to any of the carrion crows; they are a skiddish bunch. To get the picture above, I had to approach the bird without making eye contact, taking care to keep my gaze directed at the ground until I was within six feet. As soon as I raised the camera, the bird began shifting about, taking flight just moments after I snapped the slightly blurry photograph. Situations like this one had me cursing my decision not to bring my wildlife lens, the 280mm big boy or, as I like to call it, the Sweaty Butcher.

Insects (and spiders) Galore:
If I were a more knowledgeable amateur entomologist, or if I had a really good insect field guide handy while in country, I could have filled pages with the names of insect species I encountered. Katydids in the shower, cicadas whining in the trees, cranefly-like creatures hovering alongside trails, millipedes on fallen tree trunks, many species of ants rushing about their business, mosquitoes in the bedroom... Japan is an insect haven. The rainforests of Central and South America are teeming with insect life, almost certainly without compare, but I was nevertheless impressed by the sheer abundance found on Honshu. Below I give more detail about one spider species which I was able to identify. (Check out “Encounter With The Giant Asian Hornet (Vespa mandarinia)” for information about another frequently encountered species.)


Giant Wood Spider (Nephila maculata):
A member of the orb web spider family, the giant wood spider provided me with repeated frights. I admire spiders a great deal as predators and find them to be generally fascinating creatures, but I still act irrationally when I believe a large spider might be on me. Several times I yelped and frantically brushed webbing from my face and hair, convinced I was about to be bitten by one of these hulking arachnids. Of course, I never was. In fact, I never even had a spider on me, though I did destroy quite a few webs with my hystrionics. In any event, my antics provided Ben with much mirth, so some good came of it.

The female wood spiders are quite large, and rather striking, especially when compared to the smaller, dull-colored males. As with many orb weaver spiders, the male Nephila maculate searches out a female and takes up residence at the edge of her web. He courts her over time, usually by plucking the web to express his intentions. When the female finally responds, she might elect to kill the male and, should she instead be receptive to his advances, she will kill and devour the male after they mate. All in all, a pretty sour deal for the guy; his only purpose is to provide the sperm. In the picture above, you can see the male in the upper left of the frame. The image below shows a female quieting an unlucky cicada.

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Turtle Feeding:
In Kyoto's Imperial Park, Ben and I came upon a man feeding turtles on the shore of a coy pond. Though his English was basic, he did manage to explain what species we were seeing, though the common names he gave were notably different than those accepted in herpetological communities. For example, he called the Chinese softshell turtle (Pelodiscus sinensis) a "pig nosed turtle," which is a perfectly accurate description of this large species. In fact, the turtle was so much bigger than the other species vying for the man's bread handouts that several turtles would be pushed up and away from the feeding by the larger turtle's carapace whenever it surfaced. In the picture below, you can see the head of this beast, alongside one of the smaller, common species, a Reeve's pond turtle (Chinemys reevesii).

The Reeve's pond turtle is evidently quite common in Japan, along with an introduced, or alien, species that we in the west are quite familiar with, the red-eared slider (Trachemys scripta elegans). I spotted at least three of these prolific, adaptable turtles clawing at the rock on which the turtle man perched. Whether intentional or not, the turtle man repeatedly ignored the sliders in favor of the other species. Given the xenophobia of the Japanese, I wondered if this wasn't a considered act.

The fourth species at the feeding site was a darker colored turtle, the Japanese pond turtle (Mauremys japonica). Though smaller than any of the other species present, these guys seemed the most successful feeders. They heaved themselves out of the water onto the rock and collected bread bits directly from the turtle man's fingers, as you can see above. Below, both M. japonica and C. reevesii crowd the edge of the rock awaiting service.

After ten minutes or so, Ben and I moved on, leaving the turtle man with his friends as dusk settled in and the players' shadows on the nearby baseball diamond stretched long.


Photo credit: Gray Heron, copyright www.aves.be; all others, Hungry Hyaena, 2005

Temple brooms; Kyoto, Japan, 2005
Photo credit: Hungry Hyaena, 2005

Flotsam and Jetsam

Benjamin and Yuki, Toei, Japan

Photo credit: 2005, Hungry Hyaena

The Encounter with the Asian Giant Hornet

Devo, of Vitriolic Monkey fame, has been encouraging me to post about the Asian giant hornet (Vespa mandarinia). This large hornet (pictured above attacking a caterpillar of unknown species) is aggressive and relatively common in Japan. Though it is easily confused with the yellow hornet (Vespa simillima), the size and thorax markings allow for identification confirmation.

Over the course of five days, I saw at least twenty Asian giant hornets just outside Nagoya, Japan. These high numbers gave me pause; initially, I second guessed the species but, after some online research, I've determined that the hornet I was seeing was indeed Vespa mandarinia.

One encounter with the species stands out. On a particularly sunny morning, as I was walking to the World Expo grounds, I elected to take a shortcut through a forest path in the Nagoya suburb of Seto. The path was landscaped and well tended; even the inset dirt steps were topped with a layer of loose gravel.

As I neared the trail's end, I noticed a young Japanese man ahead of me. He stood casually, smoking a cigarette while he contemplated the last hundred yards of the path. I smiled as I approached, nodded, said 'Konnichiwa,' and moved to pass him, but he extended his arm, blocking me. I looked at him quizzically, and, because he correctly presumed that I didn't speak Japanese, he made wild gestures uphill, toward the path's end. Making sure I continued to watch him, he then brought his arms to his sides and fluttered his hands. He resembled, I thought, a wounded chicken. "Bird?," I asked, confused (and a little amused). I opened my arms wide and slowly flapped to pantomime my guess. He shook his head vigorously. He again imitated the wounded chicken and said something in Japanese. Perhaps he was warning me of mosquitoes, I thought. (The mosquitoes were bad in Seto. Sometimes I was bitten multiple times while I slept.) "Mosquitoes?" I asked. No reply. Instead, the man extended his arm, pulled back the shirt sleeve and proceeded to use his other hand to attack his flesh repeatedly, stabbing at it like one of Hitchcock's birds. Now, even more confused by the surprise game of charades, it occurred to me that the man may simply be crazy.

I looked hard up the path, hoping that I might spot an injured goose or something that might explain the man's bizarre behavior. In fact, roughly thirty yards from where we stood, a number of large insects buzzed low over the ground. Aha! Stings, I realized with satisfaction, not bird attacks!

I'd not yet read of Vespa mandarinia, so I didn't know that their sting was described as "a hot nail through my leg" by Tokyo based entomologist, Masato Ono, or that they kill a few people in Japan each year.

I turned back to the man and nodded, making a buzzing sound and offering my own colorful interpretation of the "I'm-being-stung" routine. He smiled, happy that I finally understood him. Suddenly, though, he bolted uphill, sprinting up the dirt and wood stairs just a few feet from where the hornets busied themselves. Astonished, I watched as two hornets peeled away to pursue him. The man's white shirt allowed me to more easily track the large hornets as they chased him to the top of the hill. Once he reached the summit, the man turned back and waved. I gestured frantically, waving my arms, trying to communicate what I'd seen. I don't know if he understood my wild antics but, in any case, he spotted the hornets as they descended upon him. He yelped and ran out of my field of vision. I waited about thirty seconds before deciding that I should head back to main road to take the normal route to the Expo. After all, many hornets remained, busy near what I assumed must be their nest.

Just I started to retreat, however, I heard a shout from above. Turning around, I saw my mime friend, beaming. Apparently he'd avoided harm! I waved at him with a big smile. That smile disappeared, though, when the man motioned for me to follow his example. Nervously, I looked back at the hornets.

So the spry Japanese guy had bounded past the vespids with minimal problem. Still, the insects had pursued him. Would my six-foot, lumbering frame get me past the aggressive hornets without incident? The man motioned for a second time and yelled something that I didn't understand. Alright, I thought, unshouldering my backpack, let's do this.

I'm happy to report that my run was a success. Though taller and slower than my new Japanese friend, my legs allowed me to take two, even three steps at a time and, when you fearfully assume that huge, angry hornets are chasing you, your legs really perform. When I reached my new friend at the trail's end, he smiled broadly and laughed. No hornets had tailed me.

We turned and walked alongside one another in silence. He lit another cigarette. I declined his offer to join him with a mumbled, 'Arigato' and a gracious wave of the hand. At the next corner, we parted ways with simple nods.

I saw hornets on many occasions while in Japan, but I'm not sure that all the sightings involved Vespa mandarinia. Some of the hornets may have been Vespa simillima, as they seemed smaller and more yellow than orange. The hornet killing the caterpillar, though, and those guarding the Expo shortcut were definitely Vespa mandarinia.

Knowing what I do now, I may have hesitated more before charging uphill. A "hot nail" through my leg ain't my cup of tea, especially considering that hornets and wasps, unlike bees, can sting their target repeatedly.

When I was six or seven, I was cruelly rebuked by a dozen or more paper wasps (Polistes sp.). I remember leaning over to pick up my bucket under the hose loop and, suddenly, being in pain. By the time I realized what was happening and streaked for the house, the angry bastards were chasing me. Once safely indoors, under the care of my mother, I saw that the wasps had stung me between ten and fifteen times. While I greatly admire the Hymenoptera order (ants, wasps, and bees), I respect their territory and fear reprisal should I mistakenly encroach. I'm thankful that the hornets didn't punish me that morning in Seto..very, very thankful.

Photo credit: 2005, Hungry Hyaena

Notes on Japan

It’s difficult to summarize a first visit to another country. The challenge is compounded when the country in question is culturally and geographically "on the other side of the world." Any thoughts that I put down on paper are too neat. They're in no way comparable to the messy musings of this traveler when I was still abroad.

Unfortunately, if I do not write about such trips, my experiences quickly become vague, fading to the point of inapplicability or cocktail party conversation – “Oh, Christopher went to Japan a couple of years ago, didn’t you?” For me, the best trips are an education (as opposed to a vacation) and I'd rather risk forwarding an especially obvious observation than abandon the memory.

I’ve long been fascinated by Japanese culture and was therefore eager to see the country and the people for myself. Many of my assumptions proved accurate – no great feat in the age of globalization – but it would be disingenuous of me to claim that everything I was presented with - custom, food, place - was unsurprising or even to my liking.



Cleanliness:

Japan is a very clean country populated by a very clean people. Several times, I saw loose paper or plastic chased down and pocketed, presumably for proper disposal. The first time that I saw a subway employee scraping discarded gum off the sidewalk, I was struck by two things.

1) This was the first "litter" that I'd seen in Japan.

2) A foreigner must have dropped the gum. (This isn't necessarily true, of course, but the idea of a Japanese person carelessly dropping garbage on the ground is anathema.)

The relative absence of litter is that much more impressive when one realizes how few public trash receptacles are readily available in Japanese cities. Granted, I'm used to New York City, where most street corners are home to a trash bin. In Tokyo, on the other hand, I sometimes carried empty cans or plastic trash for hours before spotting a receptacle.

That said, plastic drink bottles are easy to dispose of. Most vending machines - the usual source of the bottles - have a recycling container positioned nearby. I was also impressed by the recycling ethic; I rarely saw a receptacle that was for "general" rubbish. Most bins are labelled; plastic bottles, steel cans, plastic, combustibles, and paper all find separate homes.

Timeliness:

An unsurprising confirmation of an established stereotype: many Japanese people adhere to a strict schedule. Lateness is unacceptable. While I find this altogether refreshing, it isn't necessarily a social good. Two of my Japanese friends, both of whom have also lived in the United States, view the timeliness obsession with ambivalence. A friend told me of a recent accident involving an agitated, young subway conductor. Having fallen behind schedule (by just a minute or two), this conductor attempted to make up the difference by racing the train to the next stop. In doing so, he gained enough speed to derail the train, which then crashed through the basement of an apartment building. A number of the commuters on board were killed. According to some recent studies, schedule related stress also takes a toll on Japanese city dwellers. (Of coruse, I assume that the effects of stress on urbanites everywhere are similarly negative.)

Convenience Stores:

Daily Yamazaki, Family Mart, AM/PM, Sunkus and Circle K all became regular stops for me. In these one-stop shops, you can buy just about anything you need. These stores are not your standard-issue 7-Elevens, another chain which has colonized Japan.

The "combini," as they are called, offer more variety than their American cousins, even though the total stock is equivalent in size. In the States, convenience stores usually allow us to choose between junk food, junk food and, well, junk food. At combini, I could buy junk food, fresh sushi, or balanced box lunches which would cost a pretty penny here in the States. And buy them I did. When I wasn't eating at a restaurant, combini offered an inexpensive, healthy option.

True vegetarian dishes were hard to find, unfortunately. I would buy a rice wrap, for example, thinking it was simply rice wrapped in seaweed, only to be surprised by the salmon hidden in the middle. As a result, I several times (unwittingly) broke my dietary restrictions.



Population and Sprawl:

The Japanese have devised aesthetically pleasing ways of dealing with concentrated population, but the small living spaces and stacking necessary for such a feat often strike Westerners as curious. For my part, I like small houses and small rooms, but the notion of a "back yard" doesn't seem to exist in the suburban sprawl surrounding Nagoya or Tokyo. In fact, "front yards" are absent, too. You do see small, immaculate gardens, however, which make the neighborhoods quite inviting despite their similarity to our own American brand of suburbia. Strip malls, chain stores and unnecessary traffic signals are also common.

Cities like Kyoto and Nagoya felt no more crowded than Boston or Atlanta, but Tokyo is a nightmare for those folks, myself included, who don't care to find themselves set down in a sea of humanity sans greenery.

From the viewing tower of the Tokyo Municipal Government Building I realized just how large Tokyo is; it dwarfs New York City both in population and area. Tokyo, with an area of about 2200 square kilometers, has 8 million full time residents and, during the workday, a total population of 12 million. The workday population of New York City, having an area of just 1200 square kilometers, tops out around 8 million.

"Ticket Punchers":

A good friend describes the Japanese as a “nation of pointers” and the stereotype of the Japanese tourist/photographer suggests that my friend is not alone in his assessment. I prefer the term "ticket puncher." During each of my trips to Central America, I met compulsive birders on a quest for certain species they "needed" to add to their "life list." I enjoy birding immensely, but I've never appreciated this competitive, cataloging approach, as it lessens the likelihood for real learning and substantive communion. Whatever the case, there are many birders of this stripe; some of them actually call themselves "ticket punchers." They'll say, for example, "Well, I finally saw a Resplendent Quetzal today...got my ticket punched on that one. Gonna head to the coast tomorrow and see about knocking off a Magnificent Frigatebird."

The Japanese experience isn't so much different. Whether "knocking off" a monument with a photograph or pointing excitedly at a zoo animal, they seem to take very little interest in any signage or prolonged observation. Point, click, shuffle on to the next "sight." Once there, it's point, pose, peace sign, click, shuffle on to the next "sight." And so on. Of course, this approach is largely shared by contemporary Westerners, too, especially in our global culture of distraction, but I condemn it in us and therefore see no reason not to condemn it in the Japanese. It's fundamentally thoughtless and incurious.



Telephone Lines:

One sometimes hears recent travelers to Japan remarking on the oddity of the country's above ground telephone system. In a country as technologically advanced as Japan, it seems strange that so much land should be covered with a haphazardly constructed spider-web of communications lines.

This arrangement contrasts sharply with the United States and most of Europe, where communications lines are usually buried, especially in urban locales. Looking up, one doesn't see dangling wires and lines crisscrossing the blue canyons of New York City, for example. In Japan, even lounging in an outdoor onsen in the small mountain town of Toei, I gazed up at tall, steel telephone towers. Wires are strung tightly from one tower to the next, and these towers march over and around the country's mountains.

Surprisingly, I didn't find Japan's above-ground communications system aesthetically troubling. (In some areas, it's even attractive!) But I believe I'm in the minority. Furthermore, aesthetics aside, the installation and maintenance of all these towers plays havoc with the already stressed mountain slopes.



Erosion of hillsides/mountains:

It seems that every mountain and hill in Japan - with the exception of Fuji - has been manhandled. The principal culprits are road construction and the ever-expanding communications network. The activity causes the mountainsides to erode at an alarming rate. In response, trees are cut down and stacked to serve as barriers. When these barriers fail, as they eventually do, local engineers cover the eroding slope with wire mesh or spray it with a plaster-like mixture to halt further subsidence.

Japan's equivalent to U.S. "pork barreling" results in a lot of federal funding for local works projects, devised to inject money into rural economies and keep constituents happy. Not surprisingly, many of these projects are thoroughly unnecessary and only further degrade sensitive areas.

Hybrid/Bio-diesel and the Marketed Greening Revolution:

While I can't confirm (and don't believe) that all Japanese cities have taken the same steps that Kyoto has, all buses and taxis in Kyoto are either hybrid or biodiesel vehicles. I saw some evidence of a similar transition in Tokyo and Nagoya, but I'm not sure implementation is "across the board" in these cities. Though encouraging, I hope Japan won't rest on it's laurels; it has an opportunity to lead the world in this arena.

Throughout the country, the "green" PR spin was in effect. Signs announcing the dawn of a ecologically harmonious age dotted city blocks. This may be the result of the 2005 World Expo, currently being held in Nagoya. The Expo's theme is the environment. At the Expo, I visited several corporate pavilions ostensibly devoted to "green" research and technology. Not surprisingly, Toyota led the pack, featuring new fuel-cell vehicles alongside their robots and walking human carriers, but other companies also championed the push for "green" reform. One couldn't help but be suspicious. I fear such doubts are well founded; the pavilions stunk of snake oil.

Vending Machines, Panties and Porn:

With some sorrow, I have to relate that one of my favorite Japanese peculiarities is either true no longer or altogether apocryphal. Vending machines selling used panties were nowhere to be found! While you can buy a great many things from Japanese vending machines, I found none of the items offered particularly surprising. Sure, it's unusual for an American to see beer and cigarettes available so readily - insert Yen and out pops a brew - but it's not exciting. I asked several people - guys and girls both - about the rumored "pantie machines." Everybody laughed off the notion as a popular myth. Alas, that photo I so wanted to take will have to remain unrealized.

In any case, I'm sure it would have been a short-lived thrill. The first time that I noticed a Japanese business man looking at a porn magazine next to me on Tokyo's public transit system, I thought only, "Huh...well there you have it."



Proximity of Suburbia and Localized Agriculture:

On my first evening in Japan, I took a stroll with my friend Ben in his Nagoya suburb, Seto. The landscape's most striking feature were the many rice paddies, everywhere butting up against apartment buildings and roads. We walked along dikes that divided broad fields surrounded by houses, restaurants and combini stores.

This sort of localized agriculture is very much a part of the Japanese landscape, whether urban or rural. Excepting city centers, it is not uncommon to see planted fields and vegetable gardens throughout Japan, even in areas dominated by commercial ventures. In the United States, an equivalent scenario would set corn and wheat fields amidst suburban population centers like Alexandria, Virginia, Westchester County, New York, Cambridge, Massachusetts or Berkeley, California.

Because of this comfortable relationship between "cultured" human settlement and agriculture, the nighttime noises of suburban Japan are not that much different from those of the countryside. Many species of amphibian, bird and insect frequent the edges of Japanese cities and suburban neighborhoods. While some readers may feel the same can be said of the United States, our brand is absent the biodiversity I observed in Seto.

Bad teeth:

"British people have terrible teeth." We've all heard it said and most of us (especially Americans) agree with the generalization. Most Brits counter that Americans have an unhealthy, frivolous obsession with the cosmetic. In other words, we're all vain fools.

Despite having had braces briefly as a young boy, my wisdom teeth (still intact) shoved several of my front teeth out of place. Though it may be considered unsightly by some, I couldn't care less...so long as I have clean, healthy gums and no cavities. Admittedly, I'm not a good example of your everyday American; many of us are obsessed with cosmetic concerns.

Still, most dentists, British or otherwise, agree that much of the British oral "problem" is due to negligence. In the States, a dental visit every six months is considered normal, almost mandatory, whereas many older Brits pride themselves on having gone for a cleaning only a few times in their lives.

Well, the Brits ain't got nothing on the Japanese. Crooked teeth and odd bridges - crude looking metal installations - are considered "cute" in Japan. This is an understandable reaction to an unfortunate reality. Japanese children often experience extensive tooth decay and, while medical care in Japan is very good, the same can not be said of the country's dental care. I was shocked by the gross crowding, discoloration and fillings I observed. Having traveled to several very poor countries, I've spent time with people who have received no dental care in their lives; their teeth were healthier than many, if not most, of the Japanese people I saw.

Halitosis is also a serious problem in Japan, owing to the poor oral care. As Dr. Kazumi Ikeda, a practicing orthodontist in Tokyo, puts it, "The Japanese have much poorer oral conditions than not only westerners but people in less economically developed nations."

Thankfully, this is changing. Future generations of Japanese will have increasingly healthy teeth. Go, go globalization!

Trust:

The Japanese are a trusting, honest people. As evidence, I submit the following examples.

I rarely had my JR Railpass (Japan's equivalent to a EuroRail Pass) inspected by train conductors or station personnel - even when I mistakenly boarded the reserved "super express" train - and when I couldn't locate my friend's keys after he left for work, he suggested I just leave the apartment door unlocked when I left.

The crime rate in Japan is very low and "good faith" stories abound. For example, a wallet forgotten on a restaurant table is usually in the same place when the panicked owner returns. More noteworthy still, a couple from Singapore I met told me that a Japanese woman had covered their station locker storage fee ($5.50) when the first locker machine they tried had proven faulty. Without another 600 Yen between them, they didn't know what to do. As I understood it, the Japanese woman intervened because she realized the couple was planning to leave the country that afternoon. They wouldn't have time to straighten things out with the locker company, so she payed for a new locker and gave them her address! Then she was on her way.

Interestingly, I several times found myself in a position where I could have elected to "pull one over on the man." Often in New York City one feels good about finding a five dollar bill on the sidewalk or getting a free subway ride. In Japan, though, I did not feel like taking advantage of such situations. (Of course, I did keep my mouth shut about the "super express" train, because had I been caught I would have been out a considerable sum and my transgression was totally innocent, a result of my poor Japanese.)



Photo credits: all images, Hungry Hyaena, 2005

Japan pictures

I've never been this jet-lagged. After nearly 50 hours without healthy sleep, I think (and hope) that my body is at last ready for serious slumber. Below, I'm posting a few pictures from the incredible trip.







Photo credit: Hungry Hyaena, 2005

A New Definition of Eden?

My idea of a good "vacation" doesn't include beaches, relaxation or umbrella drinks. Mosquito netting and hiking boots are more my speed. This doesn't mean I'm adverse to the idea of "cultural travel," but I do feel that any such trip - a trip to eastern Europe, for example - should include some time in the rural or more remote landscapes of the region. I don't feel that I've experienced a place until I've seen the boundary between untended Nature and human activity.

Generally, I've been lucky. Excepting my European EuroRail adventure, a two-and-a-half month backpacking tour in the summer of 1996, my travels have taken me to sparsely settled territories. This is true of most of my travels within the United States and, to a lesser extent, Canada, but the most rewarding trips have been outside North America. The many months that I've spent in Central America - Costa Rica, Honduras and Nicaragua granted me the longest visits - and southern Africa touched me deeply and fundamentally informed my perspectives on human rights, charitable giving and environmentalism.

My upcoming "vacation," though, will likely resemble my European experience. Eleven days from now, I'll board a plane bound for Nagoya, Japan. Although the itinerary consists of three cities - Nagoya; Kyoto;, Tokyo - and only one rural side trip, I'm very excited. Because Japanese culture is so different from our own (the Japanese relationship to Nature, in particular), travel and observation anywhere in the country should prove richly informative.

An expatriate friend of mine describes the country as "one great bonsai." The dwarfing and shaping of trees suggests an obsession with control. Even standard Japanese pruning techniques seem harsh by North American standards. Whereas the conscientious American gardener may remove dead leaves or "cut back" aggressive growth, Japanese gardeners are regularly cutting, pinching and shaping their plants, apparently seeking the perfect form. As a teenager, I felt such efforts were tortuous and "unnatural." It was wrong, I believed, to force beauty upon an object when you should instead be looking for the inherent aesthetic worth.

Yet it is unfair to condemn a practice without understanding it first, and my bias for North American "natural aesthetics," born of our romantic faith in "wilderness," led me to an undergraduate class on Japanese culture. Wabi-sabi is a Kanji word used to describe the Japanese aesthetic of impermanence and imperfection. It means, in a general sense, imperfect beauty, but this definition is incomplete.

Wabi-sabi also includes a hint of melancholy - an under-appreciated concept in our egocentric, global culture - and is tied to Zen transcendence, the search for the simple life. Three essential truths embody wabi-sabi: "nothing lasts, nothing is finished, and nothing is perfect." In other words, all the tending, all the editing and pruning, all the tying and directing, these are not considered acts of control, but of assistance, seeking not perfection, but a fleeting "rightness" instead.

After learning this, I was forced to edit my opinion of Japanese gardening. The practice no longer seemed so manipulative and the "soul" of the aesthetic, if you will, seemed as pure as the North American concept of "wildness." I came to view the two approaches - western "wilderness" and eastern "gardening" - as mutually exclusive, occupying opposing ends of the spectrum. As Marcus Hall writes in his dissertation, "American Nature, Italian Culture," "A gardener promotes culture on a natural landscape, whereas a naturalizer promotes nature on a cultural landscape." Can these two philosophies be married? Increasingly, I've become more interested in the intersection where these two distinct practices meet.

I'm not alone. Academics have debated questions of "gardening" versus "naturalizing," conservation versus preservation, and preservation versus restoration since at least the late 1980s. More recently, contemporary philosophers and artists have joined in the fray, drawing attention to these concerns and, to some extent, popularizing the discussion. A search on Amazon.com turns up a multitude of books on the subject; the majority of these are published after 1990. As fringe environmental movements like "deep ecology" have gained momentum, the pertinence of such questions has only increased.

Unfortunately, most commentators merely talk around the core issues. A heroic exception is the brave William Cronon. In his essay, "The Trouble With Wilderness," he champions the gardener:

"Only people whose relation to the land was already alienated could hold up wilderness as a model for human life in nature, for the romantic ideology of wilderness leaves precisely nowhere for human beings actually to make their living from the land."

Cronon has succeeded in getting many "greens," myself included, to ask tough questions of themselves, to examine their own inconsistencies and potentially unproductive actions.

I am a supporting member of The Wildlands Project. One of their stated goals is the formation of "MegaLinkages," or the physical connection of diverse ecosystems, across North America. These MegaLinkages should increase both genetic and species diversity, but they also invite some worthy questions. Once established, what will our human role in these corridors or linkages be? Are these preserves, areas of land off limits to the public? Or are they public parks? If they will be the latter, what sort of activities are allowed on these lands? Eric Higgs, in his excellent book, Nature By Design, fears the trap of wilderness dualism, which ultimately separates humanity from Nature.

"They embody a vision of the world in two parts, with protectionist rules for nature inside the park and exploitative rules for nature elsewhere. In a culture that accepts this dichotomy, people may exult in the wild beauty of the protected places and support parks with cash donations, but continue otherwise in a lifestyle that erodes the foundations of ecological integrity. The result, sooner or later, is a set of highly fortified islands of threatened wilderness surrounded by a sea of relatively heedless industrial activity."

(I should point out that Higgs and I both support The Wildlands Project and I believe the organization very thoughtful.) What is the alternative, then? If both Yellowstone National Park - representative of preservation and protection - and suburban sprawl - representative of egocentric consumption - ultimately lead to a similar erosion of our relationship to Nature, in what direction can we turn?

We might look east, to Japan. This may seem counter intuitive; Japan, after all, is associated with a relentless push for commercial whaling, overfishing, sprawl and, most notably, crowding. Those of us who followed the Kyoto Treaty (Protocol) brouhaha know that Japan produces many tonnes of CO2, well below the levels of the United States, but more than any European country. Furthermore, Japan's reliance on nuclear energy upsets many environmentalists.

But if we take a quick look at the numbers, we find some interesting patterns. Despite Japan's ranking 81st of 86 countries in biosphere reserves per capita (making the small size of the country less relevant) - compare this figure to Canada (20th of 86) and the United States (25th of 86) - the country ranks 2nd of 68 countries in biodiversity richness (ahead of both Canada and the U.S.) and 31st of 142 countries in endangered species protections (just behind Canada, but well ahead of the U.S.). Also curious is the shockingly low municipal waste generation; Japan produces 410 kgs person/year, whereas the U.S. produces 760 kgs and Canada, 640 kgs. The ecological footprint scores are also remarkable. Whereas the United States has an average score of 12.22 per person and Canada an average of 7.66, Japan's average is 5.94, lower than most European countries. Overall the trend is apparent. Japan offers little in the way of habitat protection, that most celebrated of North American conservation strategies, but instead incorporates the human element into the surroundings with minimal detriment. Ranked by percentage of "wilderness," Canada ranks 2nd out of 142 countries, the United States ranks 32nd. Japan doesn't even break 100, coming in 104th. Japan, a small, industrialized country with little protected "wilderness" pollutes less and has greater biodiversity than either Canada or the United States. What's going on here?

For an answer, I turn again to Eric Higgs, who writes,

"I prefer to think of management...as a negotiated process between restorationists and ecological processes. If one presumes management to imply control, this will result in restorations that fail because of overdetermination and artificiality. At the other end of the spectrum, those who hold that ecological processes are endlessly adaptable and do not require management are simply avoiding a hard lesson: some human intrusions are irrecoverable without further human artifice, so that human agency is sometimes a good thing. Between these two extremes is a participatory - some might call it coevolutionary - process wherein restorationists are working in conjunction with ecological processes with skill, intelligence, and appropriate modesty."

In describing intelligent conservation (though he terms it ecological restoration), Higgs is effectively describing the practice of Japanese gardening. Some degree of control and manipulation is encouraged, but the hand is ultimately expected to be tender, to share the experience with the tree, plant or landscape. There is minimal distinction between the human contribution and "natural" processes. The wabi-sabi aesthetic celebrates that which is temporal, divine in its "naturalness," but not perfect. Wabi-sabi, then, is a celebration of humanity via Nature, and vice versa. The concept of Eden, so important in western conservation, is mostly irrelevant to the Japanese. There is no "original" garden to which we can return, no dominion granted by our Father up in the sky. Humans shape the eternal garden, day in and day out, part of the same force, ritualized though the practices may have become.

I've been preoccupied by these ideas this week, especially with the Pleistocene Park idea being bounced about in the media. We North Americans need to decide what it is we want. Too much focus on preservation will likely result in unfortunate results, and perhaps even accelerate the decline of biodiversity. But we also need to decide how to handle our desire to "restore" Eden. Where do we draw the line? Should we really spend many millions of dollars introducing African species to our plains in an effort to "return" to a 30,000 year old ecosystem? Is it any more sensible to aim for healthy populations of large North American mammals circa 1900? 1850? 1492? Can we move past Judeo-Christian ideals to advance an agenda that maximizes biodiversity and strives for lower human impact, or will we follow Europe's lead? Progressive though the Europeans may be, healthy ecosystems are few and far between in that fragmented part of the globe.

Admittedly, Japan is not without sin - their "gardening" would do well by an injection of wildlife biology knowledge, a field which isn't much established in Asia - but they seem to have had some success marrying humanity to Nature, even in contemporary life. In part a result of religious belief, in part a result of aesthetic prominence, Japan's approach deserves a more careful examination by our philosophers and biologists. I remain quite excited about the upcoming trip.

Photo credit: copyright, Uwe R. Zimmer

Player Haters?

Last Sunday, sick and frustrated, I watched the deciding game of the May "Subway Series" on television. Some weeks earlier, a friend had offered me a ticket to the game and I had eagerly anticipated the afternoon ever since. But instead of animatedly talking baseball on a beautiful Sunday at Shea Stadium, I was feverish and pouting on my bedroom floor in a sweat-drenched t-shirt and boxer shorts. That the afternoon had turned rainy and cold, thereby making things less than ideal for those fans who were able to make the game, did little to make me feel better; I'd been betrayed by my immune system. Even the run of unfortunate errors by the young Mets' players, and the resulting Yankees rally (which whipped me into a frenxy of anguish despite my fugue-like state) could not quell my frustration at having not been able to be there.

Fortune sometimes smiles on all of us, though, and another friend offered me a ticket to a Wednesday night Yankees/Tigers game in the Bronx. So yesterday, in now familiar cold and rainy New York weather, I headed up to the Bronx after work. Despite having lived in New York City for nearly six years, this would be my first game in Yankee Stadium! The seats were the best I have had since attending a Baltimore Orioles/Cleveland Indians game at Camden Yards in the early 1990s. Directly behind home plate, just this side of the "gated" boxes, I found my spot moments after the first out of the game. I love baseball stadiums almost as much as I love the game, and I spent the better part of the first inning studying the stadium itself. By the end of the third inning, though, it was neither the game nor the stadium that demanded the bulk of my attention, but the fans. One pair, sitting four rows behind my left shoulder, was especially difficult to ignore. Early in the evening, during a relatively quiet moment in the stands, one of them yelled out, very loudly, "F*ck you, Detroit! You f*ckin' suck, you pieces of sh*t!" Unfortunately, this was only a warm-up.

I've been to a number of baseball games in the last decade - though only a small number of cities: Baltimore, MD; Philadelphia, PA; New York, NY - but I have never before heard such hateful taunting. Granted, I have a chip on my shoulder. I don't hate the Yankees, as a team, but I do loathe most Yankees fans. They represent the worst kind of spoiled royalty. As I see it, the fans who support the richest and winningest team in all of American sport should be proud and charitable. To point fingers and scream "You suck" at the rest of the field is akin to a member of the aristocracy leaning out of his carriage to call a toiling peasant a loser. But my desire for the average Yankees fan to inherit some humility and grace is not the matter at hand.

While watching that Sunday "Subway Series" television broadcast, I could hear New York Mets fans boo Kaz Matsui, the struggling Japanese import, when he approached home plate to bat up. Each time I heard these jeers, I shook my head; after all, the Mets are one of my favorite teams (second only to the Chicago Cubs) and the heckling that Matsui was dealt incensed me. The commentators noticed the booing, too, and mentioned how difficult such treatment had proven for Matsui. In the Japanese equivalent of our major league (Puro Yakyu), fans never heckle their own players. In fact, they don't boo or berate players on opposing teams either! Kaz Matsui (not to be confused with the more successful Hideki Matsui, currently playing across town for the New York Yankees) emerged a superstar from a league in which players receive only support. Today, he finds himself centerstage in a much tougher arena, one in which fan regard is fickle and their bite is often terrible.

The friend who had given me the ticket is married to a Japanese man and I decided to ask him, as we quietly sat among the ruckus at Yankees Stadium, what he made of Major League Baseball. While he isn't a big baseball fan, he immediately commented on the difference in the stadium experience. In Japan, he explained, each player has a song or a dance associated with them and Puro Yakyu stadiums are filled with fans ritualistically celebrating their team, even when they lose. The whole experience, he said, "is about having fun."

When the Yankees next scored on a two RBI double by Jorge Posada, the fans in our area went crazy. The first few seconds were fun, with lots of high fives and wild cheering, but then the chorus of, "F*ck you, Detroit!" and "Who's your Daddy?" began anew. A crippled man seated in front of me grabbed at his wrist crutches and struggled to his feet. He attempted an awkward high five with a buddy of his who was screaming something to the effect of, "We own you, Detroit!" Perhaps wrongly giving him the benefit of the doubt, I imagined that this crippled fellow, a casualty of genetics or circumstance, couldn't move quickly enough to ditch his sh*thead friends. I suppose he, too, could have been slandering the mothers of the Detroit Tigers, but I couldn't hear his more quiet ejaculations over the rest of the din. The crowd "celebration" was a curious mix of happy excitement, vitriolic fervor, and entitlement. I turned back to Koh and said with a smile, "Just like Japan, huh?" He shrugged and shook his head, half laughing. He appeared bemused. We sat in our seats among the standing, screaming Yankee fans and tried to take it all in.

By the time that exchange took place, the Yankee duo sitting behind us had elected to up the ante. Below are just a few of the many things screamed over my shoulder. Some of these were repeated many times.

"F*ck you, you f*ckin' f*ggots!"
"Hit the mother f*cker in the face with the pitch....Yeah, hurt 'em!"
"You fat piece of sh*t, there's a cheeseburger on second...can you make it, fatboy?"
"Detroit sucks! Boston sucks, too! F*ggots live in Boston!"
"Let's Go Jankees! Yeah....Jankees!"
"You suck, Detroit! Why bother trying?"

Occasionally, these fans even opted for a little abuse of their own boys.

"Hey, Giambi, you f*ckin' juice head! You're a potato head, you sh*t!"
"Hey, Matsui, hit the ball to China or wherever you come from!"
"Hey, Posada, if you had good knees you could run better! Shoulda been on second with that hit, you putz!"

In between such outbursts, the pair talked about beer, cell phones, and their pursuit of women. On beer, for example, one announced, "I don't drink Heineken...it's just too dark and thick, ya know?" Heineken is way too dark and thick? Um...okay.

Anyway, while these two "characters" were certainly the loudest around, they were not alone. Cries of "Detroit sucks!" could be heard anywhere you moved and every time a Yankee player failed to make a play or get a hit, no matter how difficult, the fans voiced their displeasure. Most distressing of all, though, was the encouragement given the loudest idiots in the stadium. Even those folks who seemed more inclined to clap and cheer than berate and boo egged on Tweedledum and Tweedledee. A girl noticed me staring over my shoulder at the pair of jackasses and she laughed. "They're awesome, aren't they?," she asked, with a smile. No, they're reprehensible and offensive, in fact. Shamefully, I said nothing.

I don't want to give the impression that I never cheer on my teams - I've jumped up and down at games and screamed obscenities at the television more than once - and I can't claim to be above booing a bad call. (A clear bad call is legitimately angering, but I won't boo close ones, even if disappointed in the result; after all, I'd hate to make a judgment mistake on the field, and I trust that the referees and umpires want to do as good a job as they can.) Yet I have absolutely no urge to call anyone on the other team a "piece of sh*t," even if I dislike them. What little I know of Alex Rodriguez, for example, makes me disinclined to like him, but I've never booed him (though I have wished for a strike-out or a botched bit of fielding). Shaquille O'Neal drives me mad with his dominating play and arrogant attitude, but I don't hope for a broken knee or a torn ACL.

The point is, I'm distressed by the prevalence of negativity in American sports. I'd like to think that it hasn't always been this way, but the truth is I'm not so sure. The nostalgia one feels for "the good ol' days" is largely a result of edited history; Ken Burns need only add a sepia tint and a banjo track to his "Baseball" footage and everything seems that much better. Even Barry Levinson's "The Natural," considered by many to be the pinnacle of "sports movies," hints at the venomous sting of the fan base. Is our culture really this willing to become the ignorant mob? If, as many folks say, contemporary athletes and celebrities are elevated to sainthood, their experience is equal parts transcendence and martyrdom. We love 'em, we hate 'em. We love to hate 'em, we hate to love 'em. It all seems a little schizophrenic to me. While I champion complexity, I guess I just prefer Southern hospitality and reserve at the ball park.

Making my way out of the stadium, a few drunken Yanks fans decided to make comments about my Cubs hat. Fortunately, they were not particularly nasty. "Look at this guy with the Cubs hat. What the f*ck is that about?," and "Hey, a Cubbies fan is here tonight, bro," weren't intended to insult. These drunks just wondered what I was "all about," and there's nothing wrong with that. Nevertheless, I left the stadium thinking highly of baseball, but none too highly of the species that showed so much promise back when games were first being invented, when we were discovering ways of channeling our competitive aggression into an afternoon of fun.

Photo credit: unknown source; image of Freddy, an old-timer who attends every Yankees home game and bangs on his pot with a spoon. On Wednesday night, his spoon and pot were so abused by some fans that he reclaimed them, then opted to hold them out of reach for a while.