Meg's Mugen Adventure: This Place Called Kanazawa

I may have mentioned Kanazawa a number of times already in either this blog or on Facebook, but I don't think I've really explained where this place is. I live in Komatsu, which is a more rural town in the Ishikawa prefecture. By train, Komatsu is about 30 minutes south of Kanazawa, which is the prefecture's capital city. And by car it's about a 45 minute drive when there's no traffic. Kanazawa is a pretty central location for the other JETs to meet up and, being a larger city, there's a lot more to do there compared to Komatsu. There are more restaurants, more shopping centers, entertainment centers, and a LOT more young people.

Komatsu, and a lot of other rural areas, are known for having a growing disparity amongst the generations living in rural Japan. While most people do move back to their rural hometowns after marriage so as to raise their kids in the same environment and be with family, many people in their 20's and 30's move to bigger cities to pursue education and careers. This is the reason most towns, like Komatsu, have families with younger children and elderly people, but there's really not a lot of young adults. Actually, Japan is starting to have an even bigger problem of a huge decline in birth rate, but that'll be a topic for another post.

Kanazawa has a university and several colleges within the city. Also, there are a lot more shopping malls there to attract the younger crowd into the city. The night life is bustling with people dining and bar hopping after late night work hours. I'm pretty sure that, with the exception of the week I was gone in Osaka, Kyoto, and Tokyo, I've been to Kanazawa at least once a week. Most of the Ishikawa JET events are held there. Most of the drinking goes on down there. KZ, as we call it, holds the two closest movie theaters. By the way, the movie theaters there are awesome, because you reserve your stadium seats when you purchase the tickets, so you will be guaranteed a seat together with friends! The prices aren't so great though, unless you go at a special time--Wednesday is Ladies Night, the last show of the day is discounted, and Monday is couples night (I'm not sure if you have to be a straight couple though or if you could just go with your girlfriends and buy two tickets~).

Some of the memorable events I have of going to KZ in these two months include: Christmas caroling in front of the KZ station, taking over a tiny bar and dancing there with other JETs, going to Kenrokuen Garden, playing various games at an entertainment center called Round One, and participating in an 80's themed Murder Mystery.

Here are some photos!

Caroling outside of KZ Station