Mascot Manholes

There are more "cute" mascots per capita in Japan than anywhere else on the world by far. Last year a serious culling took place but still they continue to propagate. Among the latest is even one for the campaign to "promote" the cleanup of the nuclear meltdown at Fukushima.

To my mind such infantile mascots belong in the realm of the under 7's, but I seem to be in a minority. Its not surprising then that such mascots appear sometimes on the manhole and drain covers. The first is of one of the pair (male and female) of mascots for Sanda City in Hyogo. I believe it is based on the official city bird, the green pheasant.

The second depicts Ratochan, the official mascot of Oda City where Iwami Ginzan is located. It is based on the shell-candle miners used to take to light their work underground. The third is from Nakatsu. Kurokankun is based on Kuroda Kanbe, the samurai who built Nakatsu castle.

The fourth is Kintakun, the mascot of Kawanishi in Hyogo, and the final one is I think a cat in samurai helmet representing Hikone.

Yokai Manholes

I won't be posting for a week or so as I am off on the pilgrim trail, and as we are approaching Halloween I thought these would be appropriate.

Sakaiminato in Tottori was the home of Mizuki Shigeru, the great manga writer and the town has a whole bunch of new manhole covers featuring some of his most famous yokai.....

The first one is Gegege no Kitaro, with Daddy Eyeball. The second one is Kitaro's sidekick Nezumi Otoko, ... filthy, disease-ridden, never bathing, with disgusting breath and farts......

Then we have Neko Musume,...normally with the appearance of a young girl but able to transformn into a monstrous cat........ then there is Konaki Jijii.....Little Crying Old Man...... who attaches himself to enemies and then increases his weight until he crushes them.

The final one is Ittan Momen, a length of cotton cloth that attacks by wrapping itself around the head and mouth........

Manholes by Children

On some recent travels I came across a couple of towns that have their manholes designs designed by children. The first was Takamatsu in Kagawa on Shikoku.

These first three designs were all executed by high school students at a local arts & crafts High School. 2 of the designs show views of the famous Ritsurin Garden located in Takamatsu, and the middle design features Sanuki Udon, the noodle speciality of the area.

The other 2 designs come from the town of Obama on the Japan Sea coast in Fukui, and these were done by obviously much younger children.

Bovine Drainspotting

An unusual subject, one would think, for manhole designs in Japan is cows and bulls. This first one is from the highlands of the Chugoku Mountains in northern Okayama, Hiruzen-Kogen, which is apparently the main breeding area for Jersey cows. Who would have thought it?

Chibu, the smallest inhabted island in the Oki Islands group in the Japan Sea off the coast of Shimane, is famous for raising cattle, Unusual for Japan you can bump into them standing in the middle of the roads.

Bullfighting or rather Bull Sumo, is popular in several areas of Japan, including Uwajima on Shikoku.

Bull Sumo is also very popular on Dogo, the largest of the aforementioned Oki Islands. Two of the towns have fighting bulls on their manholes.

Manhole Bridges

Misasa in Tottori is a famous hot spring resort in the middle of the prefecture not too far from Kurayoshi. Several bridges over the river are symbols of the area, and opoen air pools under the bridges contain the highest level of radon for any hot springs in the world.

Mount Kasayama is a small, 100 meter high volcano just along the coast from Hagi in Yamaguchi. It is known for its "forest" of camelias. At the base is a small pond with a bridge leading over to an Itsukushima Shrine.

The Ichinosaka River runs through the middle of Yamaguchi City, but I have no idea which particular bridge this is or its significance.

Tabuse on the south coast of Yamaguchi has this bridge named Sakura Bashi, cherry bridge, for its famous promenade lined with cherry trees. In the middle of this modern bridge are a pair of tall steel sculptures, symbols of the sakura festival.

A little further down the coast is the town of Obatake where the Oshima Bridge connects to Suo Oshima, the third largest island in the Inland Sea.

Manhole Rice

The most common motif by far  used in the designs on manhole covers in japan is the cherry blossom. Considering the central place occupied by rice in Japanese identity it is surprising that it does not appear more often than it does. This first one is from Mizuho up in the mountains near where Iwami meet Hiroshima.

I found this second one in the village of Koshita south of Usa in northern Kyushu.

Also in northern Kyushu, but on the opposite side in Fukuoka, this one is from Itoshima, one of the very ancient centers of early Japanese intereactions with Asia.

The final one is from near Kurayoshi in Tottori and it shows a farm woman using a senbakoki, a threshing machine with a steel "comb" that separates the the easr and grains from the stalks. Prior to its invention in the 17th Century a tool made from a piece of split bamboo, a kokibashi, was used.

Manhole Boats

Composed of thousands of islands, it is not surprising that boats feature on some of the local manhole designs. This first one is from Hirado, the island in Nagasaki that was the center for trade with the Europeans especially the Dutch.

Kurahashi, a small island near Kure in Hiroshima, was where some of the early boats were built that transported diplomatic missions from the ancient court in Yamato to China and Korea.

Imari in Saga was where the local porcelain was exported, mostly to Europe.

Innoshima in the Inland Sea was a base for the pirates who controlled the shipping lanes and who eventually became part of the "navy" used by Hideyoshi in his failed invasion of Korea.

Etajima, the island in Hiroshima Bay that is home to the Japanese Naval Academy is reached via a short ferry ride from Hiroshima Port.

Tamatsukuri Historical park

Both the manhole designs for Tamatsukuri feature magatama, the "comma" shaped jewels. This first design also includes an image of the Tamatsukuri Historical Park.

Located on the hillside right behind the Public Onsen, the park is the site of the biggest magatama production area so far discovered in Japan.

There is a modern structure protecting the archeological remains of the magatama workshop and a reconstruction of a yayoi period building.

Behind the park is a small museum with displays on magatama and their historical production.

Ube City, Yamaguchi

One of the common manhole cover designs in Ube City on the south coast of Yamaguchi depicts Katta-kun, a Great White Pelican born in a local park that became quite a celebrity.

Tokiwa Park is also home to many swans, including Black Swans, and they feature on several other designs.

The city markets itself as " a city of greenery, flowers, & sculptures" pretty much on the basis of the park, but in fact, like much of the southern Yamaguchi coast, it is very industrial with refineries and factories producing chemicals, steel, and most famously, cement.

The official city flowers are Azalea and Scarlet Sage, but the center of this bottom design appears to be Iris.

Fossil manholes

The town of Mine in central Yamaguchi is known as the fossil capital of Japan. Dominated now by cement production the area is geologically quite interesting.

It was the site of one of the first copper mines in Japan, in Meiji coal was mined here, and also marble. Now it is known for Akiyoshidai and Akiyoshido, the largest karst and limestone cavern in Japan.

There are two museums, the Fossil Museum, and the local History & Folklore Museum, that have extensive displays of fossils, and the main street has a series of small sculptures based on fossils. It is even possible, for the whopping fee of 100 yen, to look for your own fossils at a local site though you need to bring your own hammers and safety glasses.

Not surprising then that the towns manholes feature ammonites.....

Hinase, Okayama

I started my walk along the Chugoku 33 Kannon Pilgrimage at the small port town of Hinase as this was the closest train station to the most easterly of the pilgrimage temples, number 3 Shoraku-ji.

As the towns draincover shows, it now includes the cluster of small islands just offshore.

The towns main industry is oyster farming, but obviously shrimp are another locally caught product.

The town is home to an unusual museum on Latin America. Started with the collection of a local man who collected arts and archeological artifacts from his visits to that part of the world, I really wanted to visit it but was there several hours before they opened and as I had a long day ahead could not afford to wait.

My route climbed above the town and headed inland.....