Welcome to the Everything Else Substack, written by Chris. If you’re joining us from my other blog, Spatial Awareness, welcome!

Japan Trip Duration: January 20th 2025 - February 25th 2025

Thursday, February 20 2025

To be honest, I wasn’t totally sure what to expect out of Nagoya. I had been told by people who had visited Japan in the past to skip the city, as there wasn’t that much ‘unique’ about it.

Taking the train from Kanazawa to Nagoya was straightforward, and I didn’t get lost this time! I snapped a number of fun shots on my way into the city. I got in around 3pm, dropped my bags off at the apartment I rented, and made my way to Atsuta-jingu shrine. This shrine wasn’t super noteworthy at first glance, but it was one of a couple places I had seen on the map that I thought would be worth checking out. By the time I got to it on Thursday a lot of other stuff was closing, so I figured why not.

Atsuta Jingu, much to my surprise, has a long history! It was established over 1,900 years ago, and is considered one of the most significant Shinto shrines in Japan. The Treasure Hall (which I didn’t have a chance to visit) showcases relics of the past, many of which are gifts from former emperors and shoguns.

I enjoyed walking around the park that the temple resides in, and was shocked by the amount of crows living in the park. Seriously, more crows than people. I will never get used to the amount of crows in Japan and their attitude.

After the park, I was getting hungry, and wanted to check out one of Japan’s famed AEON malls. AEON malls are a big deal in Nagoya, but I didn’t see any outside of this city. These malls have largely replaced traditional shotengai (shopping streets) and are extremely busy at all times of day. The AEON mall I visited was a multi-floor sprawling maze, with every possible thing you can imagine for sale.

I ended up walking the entire thing, stumbled on an arcade where I failed to win a Dragon Quest slime, and had an excellent steak from the food court. I’ll never get over how fast casual restaurants in Japan have better meat than some of the best steak houses I’ve been to in the states. Truly a different bar for excellence.

While walking back to my apartment from the subway, I came across yet another Denny’s. Denny’s in America is obviously a breakfast place (and a place I frequently associate with smoking cigarettes inside and drinking copious amounts of coffee). Denny’s in Japan is a family restaurant that is also owned by Seven & i Holdings (the company that owns 7-Eleven in Japan). It is a massive chain in Japan, and focuses more on being a Western-style family restaurant with limited hours (it isn’t 24/7).

The menu couldn’t be more different from America. Despite claiming it is more Western-centric, most of the menu are things like grilled fish, hamburg steak, omurice, pasta and doria, and katsu curry. I love all of these things but they are not American! They don’t sell pancakes!

Clean, casual, and great food. The polar opposite of Denny’s in the states. I had mentioned this before, but I do think that a chain like Waffle House would be great in Japan. I just don’t think the Japanese would be as inclined to eat an American style breakfast for…breakfast. It seems like it could work? We’ll think through it.

Friday, February 21 2025

Today was fun! One of the biggest reasons why I wanted to visit Nagoya was to see Toyota’s museum. So, I headed there first thing in the morning.

Toyota’s Commemorative Museum of Industry and Technology was opened in 1994, and is housed in Toyota’s original textile factory. The museum highlights Toyota’s roots, with the first half showcasing textile machines. Sakichi Toyoda started the automatic loom business, and the company later changed its name to Toyota to make it more memorable as it transitioned to car manufacturing. Partly due to Japan’s rapid modernization, Toyota tried its hand at creating vehicles, modeling them initially after Ford and other American car companies. They were successful at doing this and the rest is history.

I didn’t know I was into looms, but I guess I am. The main floor for the looms was wild, with guides speaking both Japanese and English doing demonstrations for them. The museum walks you through the initial innovations of Toyoda’s earliest looms, some as early as the late 1800s. As we get to the early 90s and 20th century, the looms are obviously all computer driven and can weave incredibly sophisticated designs. I wasn’t aware of Toyota having a loom division, but yeah.

The latest model was the Toyota Air Jet Loom from 2023. Watching this machine work its magic was…magical. One surprising thing: looms have gotten louder, not quieter, over the last century.

The second half of the museum is dedicated to what Toyota is known for today, cars. The first few cars Toyota produced in the 1930’s look strikingly similar to Fords and Chevys from that time period, nearly identical. I’m a big fan of the model BX and G1 trucks, which featured an all-steel cabin. Making this at the time was considered nearly impossible in Japan, and Toyota pioneered and led the way in Asia for the production of modern vehicles.

Besides older vehicles, the museum features one-offs and experimental designs, like Toyota’s hydrogen fuel-cell car. And, of course, various Toyota racing cars, sports cars, and every possible car you can think of from the lineup from the 60s through the mid 2010s.

The museum also features mock production lines with real Kawasaki robot arms doing their thing. They are impressive to watch and somewhat daunting. I often imagine falling near where the car is being assembled and being torn to shreds.

Finally, upon heading towards the exit, I was serenaded by one of Toyota’s Partner Robots, experimental robots made for random stuff. In this case, playing the sloppiest rendition of a classical piece I’ve ever heard outside of elementary school on the violin. Toyota has been at this for a while, so it is still somewhat surprising that Toyota hasn’t pushed harder to build better androids given the recent push. For example, even though Figure is a relatively new company, their Figure 01 robot has capabilities that vastly exceed all of the prior prototypes of Toyota. More robots please!

After the museum, I took the train to Nagoya Castle, but I barely got the chance to walk around before being told that the castle was closing early. That was actually a relief, because at this point I’m pretty sick of castles.

I then headed to Shirakawa Park, which has Nagoya’s city art museum and the impressive Nagoya City Science museum. The contemporary art museum was a bit of a miss for me. No notable pieces, and taking photos wasn’t allowed in the building. It was fine to kill some time, but I left a bit bored.

I spent some time walking around Nagoya’s downtown, grabbed some sushi, and snapped a couple shots of Mirai Tower, a 180m steel tower. It wouldn’t be a mid-sized Japanese city without a tower!

Nagoya was cool. I really only spent a day here, but it was worth it for the Toyota museum. One thing that was surprising was the lack of green space in Nagoya. Compared to other cities, Nagoya doesn’t have a ton to really incentivize tourists to visit. This became more obvious walking around, as I was one of the only tourists I saw during my time here. A Mormon missionary did come up to me when I initially arrived at the train station, and asked me if I spoke English. He was from California and had been in Nagoya for over a year. We chatted about Salt Lake City, seeing the Mormon temples there, and then fist-bumped and said our goodbyes.

Tomorrow, I’m heading to Yamanakako, a city near Mt. Fuji.

Peace,

- Chris