Last week I went to NatCon (the Australian national science fiction convention) in Adelaide.  The convention itself was a bit disorganised, but I had a fun time meeting up with my friends from the Clarion workshop.

I had a bit of a wander around Adelaide as well.  There are some fun pig sculptures in Rundle St. Mall.  I also went down to Glenelg, which is nice.

(A warning that any and all statements may greatly diverge from the established body of lore commonly referred to as "reality.")

What I Learned At NatCon

Various definitions of steampunk –
    * Retrofuturism.
    * Victorian-era cyberpunk.
    * A way to safely indulge nostalgia for a time when decent, white men ruled the world and everybody else knew their place.
    * Loving the machine, but hating the factory.
    * A fashion style for people who are too old to be goths.
    * A poor substitute for monkpunk.

We were promised bases on Mars and got the Internet instead.

The mathematical credentials of men who wear cloaks is open to speculation (see below).

All numbers great than 12 should be abolished.

It’s a good idea to tell people in advance if you want to give them to give a presentation.

Even if you have interesting speakers, panels that consist of people arguing about genre definitions are not interesting.

My own cultural and gender biases have led me to conclude that the people in costume at Australian SF conventions (bearded individuals in faux Victoriana) are not nearly as attractive as the people in costume at Japanese SF conventions (Japanese girls dressed as anime characters).

All about the differing adhesive qualities of blood and vomit.  (Fortunately this information was gleaned secondhand).

Most computer illustration programs do not yet have a "Draw Everything" button.

It’s time to throw off the shackles of feminist-controlled science fiction and finally write the kind of stories that men want to read.

Publishers may not necessarily be overwhelmed with joy when they receive a book about a teenaged vampire wizard codebreaking detective. (But you are not allowed to steal my idea for The Dracula Merlin Code Files).

Quantum Writing Secrets! (By applying the inverse of Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle it is possible to derive a mathematically optimum plot for your novel).

I can remember when guests of honor used to be arrogant curmudgeons that demanded an extra room for their stationery and an endless supply of pan-galactic gargle blasters.  Julie Czerneda was far too friendly, enthusiastic and encouraging to be a proper guest of honor.

I don’t want to read any more fiction with "Schrodinger" in the title.  (Well, maybe I could be tempted to look at a Schrodingerpunk anthology).

Even if the planet is doomed, we may still have the chance to build some funky-looking buildings before global disaster strikes.

The philosophical underpinnings behind Prince of Tennis erotic fan fiction (One Racket!  One Destiny!)

I lived in Japan for 4 years, so I learned a bit about Japanese science fiction.

In 2007, I went to the WorldCon in Yokohama.

Last year the Internet Review of Science Fiction published my article on Japanese SF.

A lot of Japanese SF isn’t translated and so is hidden to English readers.

A new American company, Haikosaru is aiming to translate some of the best of recent Japanese SF.

Haikosaru’s web site claims that -

With a small, elite list of award-winners, classics, and new work by the hottest young writers, Haikasoru is the first imprint dedicated to bringing Japanese science fiction to America and beyond. Featuring the action of anime and the thoughtfulness of the best speculative fiction, Haikasoru aims to truly be the “high castle” of science fiction and fantasy.

One of their first titles is “All You Need is Kill”.

They have an interesting article on some of the differences between American and Japanese SF.

This month’s issue of the Internet Review of Science Fiction includes my article about Clarion South.

Attack of the Killer Sock Puppets: Six Weeks at Clarion South

http://www.irosf.com/q/zine/article/10551

From Warriors of Medieval Japan by Stephen Turnbull

Head collecting is a tradition found throughout samurai history… When a battle was won, the taking, recording and presentation of these ghastly trophies was as systematic and as thorough as the battlefield situation allowed.  In an ideal situation of a clear-cut victory the heads would be viewed in a highly ritualized ceremony by the victorious daimyo, who was seated on a camp stool and surrounded by his closest retainers.  He would not wish to be presented with a bloody trophy, so the heads were carefully cleaned and dressed, the hair combed, and the resulting trophy made presentable by cosmetics.  They would then be mounted on a spiked wooden board with labels for identification.
This routine was a task traditionally done by women, and there exists a rare eyewitness account that was recorded by Oan, the daughter of a samurai.  She experienced the horror of sleeping beside a collection of severed heads in Ogaku castle at the time of the battle of Sekigahara in 1600.  The castle was under constant attack from the superior forces of Tokugawa Ieyasu, and her description of her work with the heads is a follows:

“My mother and I, as well, as the wives and daughters of the other retainers, were in the castle’s keep casting bullets.  Severed heads taken by our allies were also collected in this area of the castle.  We attached a tag to each head in order to identify them properly.  Then we repeatedly blackened their teeth.  Why did we do that?  A long time ago, blackened teeth were admired as the sign of a distinguished man.  So, we were asked to apply a generous coat of black dye to any heads with white teeth.  Even these severed heads no longer held any terror for me.  I used to sleep enveloped by the bloody odour of those old heads.”

The invasion of Korea presented the logistical problem of shipping heads home to their commander-in-chief Toyotomi Hideyoshi.  Hideyoshi’s increased irrationality made him demand proof that his generals were carrying out his wishes, so a compromise was reached.  When Namwon, the first objective of the 1597 invasion, was captured, out of the 3726 heads counted that day only the head of the Korean general was kept intact.  The others were discarded after the noses had been removed, the beginnings of the process of nose collection in lieu of heads that was to become a horrible feature of the second invasion.  Toyotomi Hideyoshi began to receive a steady stream of shipments of noses pickled in salt and packed into wooden barrels, each one meticulously enumerated and recorded before leaving Korea.

It was also recommended that “samurai should grow moustaches so that their severed heads would not be mistaken for those of women.”

Advice for treating wounded samurai:

Cover the intestines with dried faeces, then close the wound with mulberry root sutures and spread cat-tail pollen over the area.  Activities to be avoided were anger, laughter, thought, sex, activity, work, sour foods and sake.

From Lost Japan by Alex Kerr. 
 

Japan is fascinated by secrets.  They are the defining feature of the way traditional arts are taught and preserved.  They cause problems for governments and business, since different departments of the same organization tend to guard their knowledge jealousy and not speak to one another.  In museums, the finer an artwork, the less it will be shown to the public – which is why you will often find that the National Treasure you travelled so far to view is actually just a copy.  The real piece stays in storage, and is shown only to a chosen few curators.

This tradition goes back to ancient Shinto, when the objects inside shrines, typically a stone or a mirror, became invested with mystical secrecy.  At Izumo, Japan’s oldest Shinto shrine, the object has been hidden from view for so long that its identity has been forgotten; it is referred to merely as "the Object."  At the Grand Shrine of Ise, the object is known to be a mirror, but no one has laid eyes on it for at least a thousand years.  When asked about Ise, the nineteenth-century Japanologist Chamberlain replied, "There is nothing to see, and they won’t let you see it."

…

Buddha statues with great power became hibutsu (hidden Buddhas), and were displayed only once every few decades, and there are some that have stayed in hiding for centuries at a stretch.

…

That evening, we stayed at Kongo Sanmai-in, one of the sub-temples that offer rooms to pilgrims and travellers.  We arrived at our lodgings at around half past four.  One of the monks asked us if we would like to see the Buddha in the main hall, but we were all exhausted.  After an early supper, I went to my room to read a book and relax for a while.  That night, on my way to the bath, I passed a monk in the hall.  "Good evening," he said pleasantly.  "How fortunate for you to have come here today.  You were able to see our great Buddha of divine power."
"Well, actually we were planning to see it tomorrow," I said.  The monk shook his head.  "I’m afraid that won’t be possible.  Sanmai-in’s Buddha is a hibutsu.  Mt. Koya’s other statues are sometimes put on display, or even lent to other temples and museums.  But this one has never left the mountain.  This is the first time it has ever been shown to the general public.  It’s called a five-hundred-year hibutsu.  the doors closed at five o’clock today, and you’ll have to wait another five hundred years if you want to see it."

This was my greatest failure ever as a travel guide.  I was so embarrassed that I could not bring myself to confess to my friends, and to this day I don’t believe they realize that they missed seeing a five-hundred year hibutsu by only thirty minutes.