For this trip I’m consulting Fodor’s, and National Geographic, instead of the usual Rough Guides and Lonely Planet. And to get into the mood for Japan I opened Kurosawa’s
Something Like an Autobiography, and went up to page twenty-five today. He was born in Tokyo, and till where I’ve read he describes himself a crybaby, but he reveals himself as determined and exceptionally hardworking as a boy. On a normal day when he was in grade-five he rose and walked an hour and twenty minutes to reach fencing school. The sun came up while he walked back home hungry for breakfast with a task waiting to be performed before reaching home—an enforced visit to a Shinto shrine. After breakfast he went to school and came home after sunset, after calligraphy classes, and some time spent at the home of a favorite teacher.
He says his childhood home had the set and mood of a samurai's.
Writing this, I have a sudden urge to go see the Daiō Wasabi Farm, location of Kurosawa's
Dreams