I got a reading light, but the biggest chunks of research time I have is during mealtimes. So I've seen a lot more video than I have read books, so far.
The Kyoto sequence is really coming together. The more I research, the more I find things that are right there in higashiyama ward, that is, the part of town centered in the Gion or old geisha district (which in Kyoto are called geiko. Just because. More kansai-ben, like "okiini" for "arigato" (which I learned when I was in Kyoto myself, but had forgotten.)
And now I just read an article on kansai-ben and realized a language bit I did in chapter two is wrong. Unless Hanae isn't a Kyoto native, she wouldn't leave off the final vowel of "desu" or use "ikemasen." Although I really don't want to get into dialect on this story! I'm reluctant enough to have much language at all!
Anyhow. The ryokan I picked is a short walk to one of the major shrines, which also marks one end of the Gion "strip," which if you follow it across the Kamo river passes by the Takashiyama department store and ends up at Kyoto Station and the Kyoto Porta. Plus the oldest and most important Kabuki theatre is along that same general line.
But I'm still getting to the south west of Kyoto for the Toei Eigamura. Which, after I'd done so much chasing of links, I cued up one of the videos on my streaming watch list and...they did twenty minutes on the place and showed the inside of the costume rental and some of the stuff that happens before and after the chambara.
And possibly hit the bamboo forest of Arashiyama because it is right there. But I've also settled on Osaka for her third very busy day in Japan (not counting the evening she came in).
Because here comes a bit of a research failure. A method failure, that is. What I am doing these days is researching enough to get the general idea and to work out the bones of the plot. Then when I start drilling down to specific scenes, I go back to the research for the intensive stuff. I really like doing this during the actual writing instead of trying to get down to that level during outlining, because if I did it that way, I'd have to go back and find my place again in all the material three months later when I finally got to that scene.
This way, everything is fresh. I've got windows open to half my stuff on Yasaka Shrine right now. I'm only bookmarking the things that I might need during re-writes. Or if I have a computer crash.
But...the plan said to start off at Atsuta Shrine, the place where Kusanagi is strongly rumored to be kept. And then have an episode at Osaka Castle.
Oops. I'd entirely forgotten I'd made two stops on the Shinkansen to Tokyo and Atsuta Shrine is a couple of hours away. It really doesn't work to have her go there (plus it is such a sprawling, all-day shrine). So I can't do that bit. Well, there's a central shrine in Tokyo that holds the other two important regalia...
Osaka also seems far...an hour and change itself. But I can get away with doing one. And here is where Bim, I mean Jim, comes in again. Because he reacted to Osaka as being a bit more dirty, boisterous, cosmopolitan city than polite Kyoto. And this is a contrast I want to do.
And it also turns out -- and I've only just started reading Turnbull, and not that Turnbull, but the recent one where he deconstructs the ninja myth a bit -- that Iga is really close to Kyoto as well. So I can do it. If I can find a place where I can stick not just ninja, but yamabushi...and snowmobiles.
Yeah, I still don't know what the "Ninja Club" is. And the first one is going to show up about three scenes from now.
***
And this is a lot of work for the "pure tourist" part of the book. I haven't done anything on plotting out the rest of it. Basically, part one is being a tourist. Part two is training. Part three is spy stuff. Part four is the final fight. As it were. And at this point, not only am I still quite vague on how exactly she's going to be working her way into the cult's secrets (or even what they are), I also don't know if describing doing some running in the woods and getting training on how to walk from the Takarazuka are going to fill out 20,000 words or if I'm going to fall terribly short.
Well, so far none of my reviewers have seemed to think the plots doddled around doing nothing when ninety percent of the books are just that kind of tourist activity and fluff. So I am relatively confident that I can blow 2-3000 words on having yakitori is going to be just fine. (In the current draft, the "look at the Yasaka Shrine" is almost exactly one thousand words.)
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