The Approach to Honmyoji Temple

 

Honmyoji is probably the most important and most visited temple in Kumamoto City. It was built by the great warlord Kato Kiyomasa and his grave lies above the temple. After climbing an intial flight of steps you pass through the huge Niomon, a modern, concrete structure.

High up in the Niomon are a pair of Nio guardian statues, but they appear small and not at all imposing. From here a long approach heads up the slope to the temple itself.

Lining each side of the approach are twelve smaller temples called Tatchu which were originally small buildings that interred the ashes of head priests but which grew into small sub-temples.

The route is lined with many stone lanterns, and a few of the temples have statues and small gardens. I visited on  Saturday November 39th, 2013 on the 46th day of my walk around Kyushu and so there was still plenty of autumn foliage to be seen.

Modern Ikebana: some works of Shogo Kariyazaki

 

A few days ago I paid a visit to Yuushien, the Jaoanese garden located on a small island in the Nakaumi Lagoon that is bordered by both Shimane and Tottori.

It was a drizzly day, so I spent more time inside the buildings and the various covered areas scattered around the gardens, and so the large Ikebana displays were perhaps more noticable. I had seen similar displays on previous visits but had not paid them much mind, but these were more attention-grabbing.

For the last ten years a Shogo Kariyazaki has been installing his flower arrangements at Yuushien. I must admit I had no idea who he was, not being a particular fan of flower arranging, nor watching any Japoanese TV, but he is perhaps the most well-known "flower artist" in Japan.

Yuushien is famous for its Peonies, and almost all the Kariyazaki pieces on display featured them. They are in bloom around the garden too and also in a special Peony House.

His work is obviously bolder and brighter than I would have expected Ikebana pieces to be. He has exhibited widely outside Japan and also collaborates with artists and designers in other media. This years exhibition runs until the end of March.

A few photos of Yuushien can be found here. and some shots from the Dahlia festival last November

Hosshinmon Oji

 

Day three of my walk along the Saigoku Kannon Pilgrimage and I leave Hongu and start to head west towards the coast. It was very misty. The first week or so of the Saigoku pilgrimage follows the same route as the Kumano Kodo, though in the opposite direction.

The next section of the route is by far the most popular of the various Kumano Kodo routes, and I expect to pass lots more people heading in the opposite direction to me.

A few kilometers outside of Hongu and I arrive at Hosshinmon Oji. The 99  shrines along the route are called oji, and on the first few days I passed very few, but the next few days there should be dozens.

Hosshinmon Oji is considered to be one of the gates into the sacred area of Hongu, though for me it signifies i am leaving Hongu. It was known as "the gate of  awakening of the aspiration to enlightenment" and formerly pilgrims would change their staffs at this point. All very Buddhist on what is nowadays touted as a shinto pilgrimage.

Dounzan Temple 1 on the Shodoshima Pilgrimage

 

The main hall of Dounzan Temple is, like many of the temples on the Shodoshima Pilgrimage, a cave. It is located high up near the top of 434 meter high Goishizan in the SE of the island. It is temple number 1 on the pilgrimage, but very few pilgrims nowadays start here. I reached it towards the end of my first day walking the pilgrimage.

Arriving at the temple you first visit a standard temple building, the Daishi-do, enshrining Kobo daishi, the focus of this 88 temple pilgrimage. From there the path heads up through a stand of giant sugi trees to the first cave, Here is a spring that, like so many springs around the island and also on Shikoku, is sid to have been created by Kobo Daishi himself.

In the cave is a very slender statue of Kannon. A few days on either side of the summer solstice the sun hits the cave in such a way that the shadows create an image on the wall that looks like Kannon. The statue takes the same form. The temple is sometimes referred to as Geshi Kannon because of this.

The path then skirts the cliff face until a set of steps that have been built leading up and in to the main hall, the cave called Zaundo. Before the steps there would probably have been a set of chains hanging down for ascetic pilgrims to climb up into the cave.

Inside the tall cave is an eight-sided shrine housing a statue of Bishamonten, the honzon of the temple.

Maneki Neko Museum

 

The Maneki Neko Museum is home to more than 700 examples of Maneki-neko, the "beckoning cat" that probably originated in Edo in the mid 19th century, though Kyoto makes a claim for it too.

The Japanese gesture for "come here" looks a lot like the gesture of waving goodbye in western cultures and the maneki-neko has one of its paws raised, either right or left. Some examples are motorized to raise and lower the paw.

They are made out of stone, ceramic, plastic, or papier mache and can be found in a variety of colors. Usually white, which represents general good luck, but red ones symbolize good health, black to ward off evil, and gold or yellow for wealth.

The museum is in a couple of renovated farmhouses up in the mountains north of Okayama City in a village called Kanayamaji, and though there is no public transport to the place the museum is very popular and even gets lots of tour buses.

I visited on my third day of walking along the Chugoku 33 Kannon Pilgrimage.

Taketomi Island Village

Taketomi 竹富島

Taketomi is a small island a 10 minute  ferry ride from Ishigaki Island in Okinawa Prefecture. The small village on the island of about 300 inhabitants is registered as a Group of Historic Buildings a classification I refer to as Preservation District for simplicity. It is one of only two such districts in Okinawa. For other preservation districts I have covered in this blog please click here.

The defining features of the village architecture are the stone walls surrounding each property, the low, single storey homes, and the tile roofs. However, the tile roofs are a very modern addition, the first one on Taketomi not being until 1905.

Historically tile roofs were only allowed for the elite of Okinawan society. That changed in 1879 when Okinawa became part of Japan, and there are still one or two traditional thatched roofs on Taketomi.

Related posts are the Shisa of Taketomi, masks of Taketomi, and Water Buffalo of Taketomi.

Ishigaki Sea Salt

Buy Ishigaki Bath Salts from Japan

Kitsuki Samurai House Exteriors

 

In the small castle town of Kitsuki in Oita there is a well preserved former samurai district with some of the Edo Period samurai residences open to the public.

In this area resided the higher ranking samurai so their homes were relatively large and luxurious. A couple are still thatched but most have tile roofs.

This is one of the more than 100 preservation districts in japan where enough buildings and infrastructure from historical times still exist to be able to give an iression on how things looked back then....

Later I will post photos of the interiors of these houses. Related posts are......  Kitsuki Samurai District, Kitsuki Samurai Gardens, and  Kitsuki Castle.

Shiranuhi Culture Plaza

 

Shiranuhi is a small town in rural Kumamoto. Shiranuhi Culture Plaza is a modrn building housing the library and a small museum.

It is one of the projects of the Kumamoto Artpolis and it opened in 1999. The architect was Atsushi Kitagawara.

The building itself is a simple, single-storey, rectangular block, however, it is encased in a framework that is much larger and covered in horizontal slats. The effect is to make the building more monumental in appearance and at the same time somewhat dazzling.

I likd it. To see other posts on Kumamoto Artpolis projects click on the label at the bottom of the post.

Matsubase Shrine

 

Matsubase is a small town in Kumamoto that I reached in the afternoon of my 45th day walking around Kyushu. Matsubase Shrine is the main shrine in the centre of town.

Known through most of history as Matsubase Gongen, the shrine now enshrines Izanami, Hayatamao, and Kotosakano.

The gingko trees and a few maple were nice with their color, but the most impressive tree was a giant camphor tree said to be over 800 years old. Camphor trees seem to be the sacred tree of choice at shrines in Kyushu.

Not far from the shrine was the next building in the Kumamoto Artpolis project for me to check out......

A Couple of Mysteries Solved

Mysteries

Heading north through the paddies north of Yatsushiro I was surprised to see tractors planting in flooded paddies. I had read that in the far south of Kyushu some places were able to squeeze two crops of rice a year because it was so warm, but late November seemed a weird time to be planting.

Later, a closer look at some paddies and it sure didn't look like any kind of rice i had seen before. Another mystery was that as I walked through each small settlement scattered across the plain there was the incessant clatter of machinery coming from farm buildings.

I was finally able to peer inside one of these buildings and suddenly all became clear. It was not rice being grown around here but a plant called Igusa, a kind of rush-grass, and the material that makes the mats that cover tatami flooring.

The area around Yatsushiro has been growing Igusa for 500 years and is now the main source for the material domestically. I have seen a few, small tatami workshops, and there are some high-end manufacturers, but most tatami in Japan now is mass-produced in Chima.