Kawara with plaster

Something Ive only seen a few times, and always on the Pacific Coast, is plaster used, Im guessing, to hold the rooftiles together.

I'm guessing that it is to prevent damage during typhoons.

The place I saw it is most was on the island of Iwaishima off the coast of yamaguchi, where all theses photos were taken

It does make for some interesting patterns though....

Tenjin on the beach

Starting this weekend and running for 2 weeks is a sand sculpture event on the beach in front of Aquas. The theme is Iwami kagura.

On Friday evening only 2 sculptures had been completed, the artists were hard at work on a third. It looks like there will be 8 in total.

To open the event, kagura was performed on friday and saturday night.

Friday night was the group from nearby Arifuku Onsen.

The first dance was Tenjin, based on the story of Sugawara Michizane who was banished to Kyushu and died there. Posthumously he was raised in rank and became the kami of scholarship. Students preparing for exams will visit a Tenmangu shrine.

The first part of the dance consists of Sugawara and an aide waffling on about how unfair it all is.

The second part is a sword battle with Fujiwara Tokihira, the man responsible for Sugawaras banishment. Tokihira is of course killed.

It was a very competent performance, very tight, which is not surprising as the Arifuku Onsen group play once a week....

Inside Grin Grin

Grin Grin, or Gurin Gurin, or Green Green is a park and greenhouse complex on Island City, a man-made island in Hakata Bay.

Its planned to be a city of the future, with residnetial, business, education, and leisure facilities.

When I was there a few years ago there was no-one else there other than me

It was designed by Toyo Ito, and while it was certainly pleasant enough I dont think it deserves all the accolades it has received.

A previous post on Grin Grin can be found here

Vacation 2011 Day 5 Jardin Marjorelle

In the afternoon the weather brightened up a bit and we went to the Majorelle Gardens.

Jacques Majorelle was a French painter who moved to Marrakesh in 1919 and it was he who designed and created the garden.

Following his death the garden and house was bought by Yves Saint-laurent, and when he died he had his ashes scattered in the garden.

The shade of Cobalt blue used is named after Majorelle.

I'm a sucker for cactii, and there are lots of them in the garden..

Imbara Obon Matsuri

For Obon we went upriver a little ways to Imbara, part of Kawamoto Town, to check out their matsuri. There was kagura performed by the local kagura group who play in Hiroshima style. First dance was Jimmu, a 4 person dance depicting the final subjugation of the Yamato area by Jimmus invading force.

Next up was a performance of Zeni Daiko, a "dance" using 2 tubes decorated with tassles. Traditionally the tubes are bamboo and strung inside them are old coins, but nowadays plastic is not unusual. The tubes are waved, shaken, tapped on the floor, spun, and flipped from hand to hand in time to the music and provide a percussive accompaniment. The dance seems to be very popular in local villages.

Then some traditional dancing.....

The second kagura dance was one I had not seen before. Yamanba, based on a Noh story is popular with Hiroshima style groups, and I was pleased to see a mask that was new to me.

The "mountain hag" of the story transforms into her evil form...

... and a final battle puts paid to her and her accomplice....

Then there was the Bon Odori itself, and unusually it only lasted about 40 minutes..... other Bon Odoris Ive been to have gone on for hours. Also unusually a few of the villagers wore costumes for the dance....

The finale was a firework display..... not big by city standards, but nice that there were no barriers and huge crowds....

Kuromatsu Matsuri

A couple of weekends ago was one of my favorite matsuris at Kuromatsu, a fishing village on the coast not far from here.

I usually experience the matsuri from one of the flotilla of boats that take part, so this year for a change I thought I would see it from the land.

The matsuri takes place on the beach in front of the local shrine....

Around 5 in the evening the mikoshi is brought down to the beach......

It needs to be taken out to a small uninhabited island offshore where the honden of the shrine is located so that the goddess can be transferred into it and brought back to the beach for the matsuri.....

The boat used to carry the mikoshi, priests, and musicians, is a purpose built boat just used for this annual trip.

Once all are onboard the boat joins a flotilla of fishing boats that will escort it out to the island and back....

but first all the boats do three circuits of a small outcropping of rocks a few hundred meters offshore on which have been placed 2 small pine trees with a bamboo crosspiece to for a natural torii...

Then everyone heads out to the island to pick up the goddess....

The second part of this story can be found here...

Old Kawara

The next chapter in my photo galleries of kawara, Japanese rooftiles.

All of these exhibit the aesthetics of old kawara...

To see more click on the label below this post.....

Tanegaike Dragon

Tanegaike Dragon

The Bentengu is a shrine to Benzaiten on the shore of Tanegaike, a small lake close to the sand dunes in Tottori. Though only a quarter of a square kilometer in area, the lake is actually the deepest in the Chugoku region, with a depth of 17 meters. Deep in the lake lives a serpent.

Once upon a time a local rich man employed many local villagers as servants. One young woman, who of course was beautiful, by the name of Otane was employed as a maid. Otane was known as a particularly kind and generous young lady and every day she would give people persimmons.

One young man was curious about where she was getting the persimmons from so he secretly followed her. She went down to the shore of the lake and transformed into a serpent and then swam out to a small island in the middle of the lake and picked persimmons from a tree there.

Because she saw the young man watching her she was unable to turn back into her human form and so stayed as a serpent living in the lake.

An old lady built a small shrine to honor Otane, and this grew into the Benzaiten shrine. Benzaiten, originally the Hindu goddess Saraswati, has strong associations with water and therefore also serpents. She is one of the seven lucky gods of japan and has both "shinto" and Buddhist manifestations.

Tengu Hornbeam

This is the draincover for the town of Oasa in the mountains of northern Hiroshima. Its where we usually get on and off the expressway when driving long distances. I havent actually looked around or explored Oasa.

The tree is a Tengu Shide. The english name for shide is Hornbeam, and I must admit I have never heard of them. there is a good article on them here.

If you look on the right of the draincover you can see a tengu. Apparently the tengu shide is a mutation and the only place in the world it grows is around Oasa. According to the local story, if you try climbing one of these trees a tengu will appear and throw you off.

Lots of tengu blogs here

Grin Grin Park

Sometimes written Gurin Gurin, Grin Grin Park opened in 2005 on Island City, the artificial island in Hakata bay.

A series of connected forms, organically shaped, seem to emerge from the ground.

The structures are concrete and steel covered in glass and in places vegetation.

The spaces inside and under the structures contain plants of the area.

Grin Grin was designed by Toyo Ito who is often referred to as a visionary architect. Much is made of Grin Grin's supposed "eco" qualities, but as it is on an artificial island whose construction destroyed bio-diverse wetlands, I find it hard to see.

walkways snake up and over the structures.

entrance into the greenhouses is only 100 yen.

It was a few years ago when I visited, and maybe the growth of the vegetation has improved its appearance....