Tutoring in Kanayama is probably the best thing that has happened to me since moving to Japan. It brings me into the city at least once a week. Although at the Kanayama stop there's not much more than the Boston-Nagoya Museum and the school where I tutor itself, the station is a major transportation hub. At the southside exit, everyday there are artists and musicians performing. Today there was a guy making handcrafted leather goods and handpainted t-shirts (the picture). I stopped to practice some Japanese with him and he informed me that he and his friend are walking Japan from tip to tip, selling their crafts along the way. And I thought that kind of adventure was reserved to the novels that the Japanese only have time to read on the trains between home and work. A sub-culture exists...