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Archive for November, 2017

Japanese Squat Toilets

Posted in Asia, Japan, Non-Urbex, Photography, Travel on 2017/11/30| 7 Comments »

Dear Japan,

So… squat toilets – what’s that all about?
I know, I know: Squat toilets are widely used all over the planet and not a Japan exclusive thing – but they are common in the country I currently live in and not in the country I grew up in (or the States, where most of my readers are from), so I will take the liberty to rant about them. I am aware that squat toilets are cheaper and easier to maintain, which is probably the reason why they became popular in Japanese apartments when private lavatories became less unusual after World War 2 – as can be seen in many old abandoned apartment buildings like the *Landslide Mining Apartments*. Furthermore there is no direct contact between the skin and some potentially dirty surface… and the last part of the colon gets stretched for an easier and more relaxed dump – unless you suffer from arthrosis, a vestibular disorder, or any form of movement disorder; then the pressure in your lower back can quickly become the proverbial pain in the ass. (Pardon my French… who strangely enough apparently also use squat toilets, at least as public toilets.)
So on the one hand you have those rather primitive squat toilets everywhere in high-tech Japan – not just in public toilets in the middle of nowhere (most times without alternatives), but in train stations, accommodations, highway rest stops, private homes, even airports! On the other hand Japan is equally famous for its luxurious Western style toilets with heated seats and a whole variety of sprinklers, controlled by up to 38 buttons and an LCD (those are also known as washlets).
Now, why this rant?
Because they are not equally used – not even close! At least not in my experience / by my observation. Whether it’s at large highway rest stops, where you have 5 squat toilets, 15 Western style toilets, and 30 urinals – or it’s at Kobe Airport (opened in 2006!), where you have 4 or 5 urinals, 2 washlets and 1 squat toilet per restroom for men. EVERYBODY avoids the squat toilets. During my 11 years in Japan I saw maybe 5 times that somebody used a squat toilet when there were alternatives available – and in those cases one of the alternatives probably opened up while the poor person bent their knees… Instead I’ve seen lines in front of sit toilets time and again, because people rather waited in the stench of a public restroom than used a squat toilet. And as somebody who isn’t used to them I totally understand that, I avoid squat toilets whenever I can. I dislike them with a passion – they are extremely uncomfortable to use and you always worry that you might lose your keys / wallet or soil your clothes / immediate surroundings. But Japanese people grow up with squat toilets, and still hardly anybody wants to use them! I get why they are still in old places and that often there is no money to replace them – but why include them to new buildings like Kobe Airport or during renovations? When literally and figuratively nobody gives a shit…
So… how? How, Japan? How are squat toilets still a thing?

(A few months ago I wrote a spontaneous rant about bakeries in Japan on the *Facebook page of Abandoned Kansai* – much to my surprise it sparked quite an active discussion for much longer than the usual 12 hour lifespan of an average FB post, so this time I publish the rant here on Abandoned Kansai, too. Please feel free to let me know what you think about the topic or rants like that in general!)

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Asahi Elementary School

Posted in Abandoned, Asia, Haikyo, Japan, Photography, School, Travel, Urbex, Video on 2017/11/28| 4 Comments »

Snow and a giant taxidermy seal… two things I definitely didn’t expect when I was planning my trip to explore the Asahi Elementary school!

The weather forecast in Japan tends to be quite unreliable – and so the 10 to 15 centimeters of snow took me completely by surprise when I arrived by train in that small countryside town the Asahi Elementary School was in; and judging by the empty roads / the way the few people were driving, I wasn’t the only one…
After walking uphill for almost half an hour I finally reached the outskirts of town and with it the deserted school. From the outside the complex looked bigger than expected – an elevated concrete behemoth with a huge gymnasium in the background.
Entering through a side entrance I was confused – with the kitchen, dining hall, and front desk this looked more like a rundown hotel than a school. The cold didn’t add to my urge to be there either, so I felt very luckily when soon after I found a taxidermy fox. It wasn’t in good condition anymore, but neither am I, so who am I to judge? 😉
The second floor was as moldy and rundown as the first one, but it looked a little bit more like a school – confirmed by large letters on the building, “family school”; maybe some kind of boarding school? A family hotel? As I found out afterwards, the Asahi Elementary School existed only from 1975 till 1983 – then it was renamend, most likely repurposed, and used until 2006.

The biggest surprise, both literally and figuratively, I found in one of the rather dark hallways – a gigantic stuffed seal in overall decent condition! Exploring an abandoned building like that on a gloomy day alone isn’t exactly a cheerful endeavor, and believe me, taxidermy animals don’t help to relax. More space and light offered the final “room” in the building, the large gymnasium – probably #3 after a yet unpublished location and the round gymnasium of the *Taiyo Elementary School* in Haboro, also converted after being retired as a public school.

After a slightly disappointing start the Asahi Elementary School turned out to be a decent location – nothing I would travel far for, but if one is in the neighborhood for other reasons it’s well worth to have a closer look… to see if the seal has (been) moved!

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Japanese Conference Center

Posted in Abandoned, Asia, Haikyo, Japan, Photography, Travel, Urbex, Video on 2017/11/21| 7 Comments »

A small, but quintessential Japanese conference center in the Japanese countryside – but most of all: a deathtrap!

Yes, I admit it: I like abandoned places in good condition! And while I appreciate the artisan work of Japanese carpenters, I prefer the solid ground most concreters provide – especially when a house is built on a slope…
Quickly after I arrived at the Japanese Conference Center with my urbex buddy Rory and his friend Toby, it became apparent that getting into the building would be a lot easier than getting out. Located on the slope of a small hill, the cultural institute consisted of a three storey main building (guest rooms, kitchen, dining room, ofuro, meeting rooms) and several small single storey constructions featuring guest rooms. The additional buildings were of no interest (too rundown, too locked-up, too generic), but the main building was actually quite intriguing due to its typical Japanese design. The main entrance featured a slab of concrete as well as a concrete wall on the slope side and a concrete staircase leading up one floor to the once with the back entrance. Pretty much the rest of the building, including some overhanging parts, was made from wood and other traditional material – and as a result the abandoned building was not only not structurally sound anymore, it had turned into a deathtrap since the last time somebody took care of it. There were collapsed walls, collapsed floors, collapsed ceilings… and the roof was partly collapsed, too. Most of the floor was so brittle that you could hear cracking noises with every step – I am admittedly a big guy, but the problem went literally and figuratively deeper as indicated by several folding tables scattered across the worst not yet collapsed parts of the floor, a way to distribute weight of previous, presumedly much lighter explorers. Unfortunately it was often unpredictable whether one would crash down two millimeters or two meters, which is why I had to refrain from seeing the whole building (I saw most of it though…), because what’s the point of equal weight distribution when you crash through the floor while standing on a folding table?

Thanks to the almost constant danger of crashing through a floor or having a ceiling falling down on me, exploring the Japanese Conference Center was quite a nerve-wrecking experience – on the other hand it had been a while since I explored a building in that bad condition, so it was nice to see one again… I just could have done without actually going through in person, so this is one of the explorations where I enjoy the photos taken quite a bit more than actually taking them. 🙂

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Countryside Golf Course

Posted in Abandoned, Asia, Haikyo, Japan, Photography, Sports, Urbex, Visited in 2017 on 2017/11/14| 1 Comment »

About a year ago I wrote about an abandoned driving range – now I finally explored an abandoned golf course!

The transition from summer to autumn was rather abrupt in Japan this year. In September Kansai felt like a steam sauna and nobody wanted to do anything outdoorsy – three typhoon weekends with heavy rain later people cancelled BBQs and other events because it was “too cold” outside. And of course those friggin typhoons hit the area I lived in exclusively on weekends, which meant that I had to postpone several exploration plans as exploring during strong rain and severe winds is not fun at all. Even if you plan to explore indoors the five to ten minutes you need to figure out how to enter a building can become nasty and expensive – and most pictures look a lot better when taken during sunshine, which is why I tend to be a good weather explorer. Sometime though bad weather is unavoidable, for example when on long planned multi-day trips or when the weather forecast fails you – and sadly the weather forecast in Japan is rather unreliable…
The Countryside Golf Course I explored on one of those typhoon weekends with false forecast. The rain was supposed to start in the evening at around 6 p.m. according to the predictions made the evening before the day trip – sadly it began to drizzle just when we arrived at our first location at around 10 a.m., minutes later it poured and didn’t stop for two days. By the time we arrived at the Countryside Golf Course the rain was so heavy that the road leading up to the main area partly turn into a shallow rivulet – luckily the rain became a bit weaker at times, but overall it was an uncomfortable and quite wet exploration with only little to see. Located in the mountains, the Countryside Golf Club offered some gorgeous, very atmospheric early autumn views that day. Sadly the clubhouse had already been demolished and the driving range was more than underwhelming in comparison to the one I explored a year prior. All the paths and bridges were still accessible, though most of the courses were already pretty much overgrown after just two or three years of abandonment. And so the only really interesting area was at the end of a lonely downhill path that lead to a garbage dump (they removed a whole club house and nevertheless left some trash?) and a shed with two golf carts in decent condition. That’s pretty much it.

Since golf is definitely not my world it was kinda interesting to have a look around an abandoned country club, but as an urban exploration location it was definitely a bit underwhelming – and the constant rain didn’t make the experience any more joyful. Surely not a bad experience, but I’d take the *Japanese Driving Range* over the Countryside Golf Club any time…

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Countryside Pachinko Parlor

Posted in Abandoned, Asia, Haikyo, Japan, Pachinko, Photography, Travel, Urbex, Video, Visited in 2017 on 2017/11/07| 3 Comments »

Closed pachinko parlors are everywhere in Japan – from right opposite train stations in busy city centers to the middle of nowhere in the countryside. Yet it has been six years (!) since I last wrote about one…

Pachinko is as Japanese as it gets – probably even more so than sushi and sumo as it is mostly contained to Zipangu. Currently there are between 15000 and 16000 parlors in Japan, and from the looks of it about 10% of them are closed or even abandoned. Although the number of regular players was cut in half between 2002 and 2012, there are still more than 10 million regulars in Japan. Some 34000 of them are professionals while the majority of players loses money big time; in 2006 the average customer spent a whopping 28124 Yen (!) per visit (today about 250 USD / 210 EUR). About the legal problems pachinko parlors face and how they are connected to North Korea in a way that’s hard to believe *I wrote about in a previous article*, so I won’t repeat it here.

Back in 2010/11 I found and explored two abandoned pachinko parlors in excellent condition and therefore wasn’t aware how rare they are in that state. In the following years I realized that most of those closed / abandoned parlors are either tightly locked – or completely filled with trash. I must have tried at least half a dozen of them under a variety of different circumstances, but none of the attempts lead to an exploration worth documenting. Until recently, when I came across the Countryside Pachinko Parlor in a small onsen town. While most of the machines were gone, the parlor was still in good condition overall. Most stools were still there, some advertising, the frames for the pachinko AND the slot machines… and nobody vandalized the large mirror / chrome / neon installments at the main entrance. Even the living area on the upper floor was accessible – featuring one of the slot machines, a kitchen / dining area, several balconies and half a dozen bedrooms. Nothing special, but better than nothing – especially after all those years, especially on a rainy day. (Exploring on rainy days sucks. Outdoor locations are hardly doable and even indoor places are a pain as everything is / can be wet and uncomfortable – from access points to whole floors…)
Overall the Countryside Pachinko Parlor was a decent exploration, but since you most likely never saw the much better earlier explorations I did, I strongly recommend checking out the now demolished *K-1 Pachinko Parlor* and the now classic *Big Mountain*!

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