Across from Kameshima

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Kameshima

2015/12/102015/12/10 islandanomalyLeave a comment

In April earlier this year, my boyfriend and I went out on a random adventure and ended up in Itsuwa, at an island called Kameshima (亀島), or Turtle Island. So often I am surprised and intrigued by places that aren’t quite on the tourist and/or sightseeing path, but are locally well known and part of everyday citizens lives.

So Kameshima is – you guessed it – shaped like a turtle, and sticks out of the water a short ways offshore. You can walk to it at low tide, but once it’s high tide you might need a boat to get back! Many locals here come to catch bugs or small fish with their children, some elder locals come out to fish or collect seaweed for making their own food.

I was a little surprised by some of the sights pictured in some of these photos. I expected little to nothing to be on the island when we originally trekked over, but once we got there we spotted a number of items. My personal favorite was the down-and-out, yet likely functioning port-o-potty. The cabin with someone’s homemade hunting equipment left there was up there with the potty though. It was quite surprising, making me surmise that someone lived there. (A friend informed me afterward that they think the city of Itsuwa rents the cabin out to interested parties, which makes sense. But does it lock? And who uses it when no one is there? A city official with an urge to return to the wild? ;) ) A well and a wheelbarrow were also spotted on the scene.

There’s not too much to do on the island itself if you’re not staying there to maroon yourself for a few days, but it’s worth a trip out to walk on and adventure about in your free time. We enjoyed it quite a bit!

Nagasaki Lantern Festival

2015/10/072015/10/07 islandanomalyLeave a comment

In early February every year, the city of Nagasaki hosts the aptly named Nagasaki Lantern Festival. It is the most colorful Lantern Festival I’ve seen to date, so I enjoyed it very much. And that is even with crowded streets and a cross-shaped, two-street Chinatown. The photos should give an overall vibe of the scene that met us here at this festival. :)

We started out at a smaller park area that served as a one of the smaller venues, featuring a parade of a lantern mikoshi and a Chinese acrobatic show. There were a lot of fun acts that we saw, among which included a many masked dance, where the performer changed face masks with the wave of her fan, juggling, plate-spinning, and a chair stacking acrobatic demo of balance! It was a pretty exciting way to kick off the festival.

The park also exposed us to many lanterns as an introduction of what was to come later. You really get an eyeful of color at this event, which was one of my favorite things about it!

During the day, the lanterns were impressive enough. As you can tell from some of the photos, the lanterns are huge! Some of them are taller than most of the people that wandered the area. It was like being in a paper zoo!

After taking in the show here at the smaller venue, we started walking over to the main venue area, based just outside of the Chinatown in Nagasaki. This Chinatown is a plus shape, and literally consists of two streets, but it is of historical import, being one of the first Chinatown areas in Japan.

As you can tell, it is very crowded there at this time. Though it makes navigating the brimming streets difficult, you get used to it temporarily. It is worth putting up with for the views that the area provides. Even in the light of day the sights are moving, as having a look at these creations is rare. The crowd itself becomes a sight as does the street, likely becoming more lively than it had been for months previous. Around this time we ducked the crowd temporarily by popping into one of the restaurants to have try champon, a Chinese noodle dish introduced through trade that has now been adopted by the culture here as a mainstay. We enjoyed a few other dishes too and it was very delicious! I don’t remember the name, but if you approach the Chinatown through the gate from the northwest side, coming from the shopping areas, you’ll see it. It’s the first major restaurant on the corner on the left.

And as the day progressed into night, things only got more impressive. The lanterns are naturally more dramatic at night, and being surrounded by them makes you feel transported to some other world.

The most interesting part of this display was indeed a sight that is visible at the main venue. Though I’m sure it has to do with some aspect of the event’s history and/or its Chinese roots – I can’t say for certain – a huge offering was set at the center of the lantern viewing area that looked like this:

Numerous pig heads were set out on platters in a glass-encased room, with attendants ever attending the candles to keep their flames alight. It was such a display that at first I wasn’t sure that I was seeing what I was seeing. Or perhaps I hoped it was an illusion… It was dramatic and somewhat startling to say it simply.

After viewing all the sights there we called it a night. We had seen most to all of what the festival had to offer and the next morning we planned to go to Gunkanjima, so we got somewhat of an early night. Passing by a temple on the way, we headed toward Cybac to attend our crowd-worn and sleepy minds and bodies. It was a great day.

Tsujunkyo Bridge (通潤橋)

2015/09/012016/02/09 islandanomalyLeave a comment

On the outskirts of Yamato town in Kumamoto prefecture, is a very old, very functional aqueduct bridge known as Tsujunkyo. Built in 1854, it is the largest aqueduct bridge made of stone in Japan! Most weekends the bridge demonstrates its irrigating success by spurting out massive amounts of water around 1 PM. I went in the morning on the way to Miyazaki last time, so I was unable to see the latter, but it was still an interesting experience I wanted to share. The area is full of natural scenery intertwined with agricultural lands, which provides visitors with yet another idyllic vision of Japan.

Reihoku & Amakusa-machi 苓北と天草町

2015/08/172015/08/17 islandanomalyLeave a comment

It’s about time I offered another post with a bit of local flavor, so here it is. Located on the west side of Shimoshima, the lower island of Amakusa, lie Reihoku and Amakusa-machi. The latter, Amakusa Town, is the namesake for what has become the collective of formerly independent towns on the island; Reihoku still operates separately from Amakusa City. They are two separate areas, but they have some of the most beautiful natural scenery, not to mention a few of the more well-known sightseeing spots, on the island.

One day after school in my first year here, a couple of the 3rd year JHS teachers had decided to go on a quick whirlwind tour of western Amakusa, intent on taking photos and videos that would further inform students about the greater area in which they live. Though many students have lived here their whole lives, they’ve never been outside Hondo, the most populous/urban area! I understand though; since I’ve been here I’ve yet to make it to quite a few of the highlights on the upper and lower islands. But I think since my time here may be wrapping up, I will make more of a point to visit them in the year that follows. It would be a definite shame to not check out the beautiful natural attractions for sure, a few of which are to follow.

Reihoku is known for its beautiful seaside, pottery, castle, and sunsets. It’s a mainstay on the sunset drives that come highly recommended in the area’s tourist paraphernalia. Here’s a sample of some of the beauty you can see here.

After our stop in Reihoku, we were racing against daylight to catch the sunsets at a couple of the other viewing points, so we stopped off two more times on the way to Amakusa-machi.

After this point, there was little to no sunlight left, but through a bit of determination, we made it to Amakusa-machi to check out Oe Church and Sakitsu Church, with varying levels of lighting, as you’ll see. Amakusa-machi is similarly well-known for its pottery and sunsets, but also for it’s beaches and history with the Hidden Christians. Groups of Christians observing their religion covertly due to oppression during the Edo period were found in rare pockets of multicultural exposure, mostly ports and harbours in Japan (also see Nagasaki, Kobe, to name a couple). It wasn’t until the Meiji era that religious freedom was restored and people were allowed to observe their religions without repercussions. I’m no Christian, but isn’t freedom of choice a wonderful thing?