Morning With Mamo

Assuredly, pictures are coming to the few of you who are following this, but we are having problems downloading pictures from the fancy-shmancy camera.  Apologies.  Our diversion to Harmonyland requires much effort to portray :)  In addition, we were out of internet contact when we spent a day and a half on a small island in the Seto Inland Sea which has become famous for its art projects.  

In the meantime, today (June 13) we met up with two volunteers from a club at a Kyoto university.  The club has English-speaking guides that will take you around the city.  We asked for the less than touristy spots, which I think threw our main guide for a loop.  She was really quite sweet though.  We toured the Daisen-In and Ryogen-In Zen Temples' rock gardens, and the girls struggled to explain to us what was going on.  Shimmon took some time to explain to them the metaphors that they were trying so hard to explain to us.  In the end, I suspect the two girls learned as much as we did.  But now they will be able to do a better job with the next tourists who come along.

None-the-less, on the walk to the temples I was chatting up Mamo (the main guide, the other one was an apprentice and I forgot her name.)  Mamo, it turns out, was studying "law and politics" at her university, and so I was able to ask her about a few basic government themes.  To note:  she said that family size is decreasing (and thus the tax base is decreasing) because women must choose between a family or a career.  Businesses do not allow for women to have families (at least if they want to move up in the company.)  Devolution of power to local governments is a major theme from the last ten years, although it seems to have come with a classic short-coming of devolution: the national government is loathe to give up the tax money to help pay for the services that it burdens the local government with.  Local government revenue comes from what sounded like the equivalent of excise taxes on tobacco and alcohol, as well as tourism.  The economic crash last year dropped tourism 50% in Kyoto alone, which has meant the city has struggled to keep up.  Ironically, a decrease in smoking has hurt local tax revenue as well.  The reason for the decrease in smoking: the high price of cigarettes due to the taxes imposed by cash-starved local governments.  Other tidbits to investigate more:  the government is considering upping the sales tax dramatically.  Right now it is 5%, but there is talk of 15%.  I'm skeptical that she had this part right, but it's something to ask the Diet member we'll speak to.