I am in Shikoku, the smallest and perhaps least 'developed' of the four main islands of Japan. About to cycle off to the end of the Yashima peninsula to where I discovered a lovely little sandy beach yesterday, from where I can sit and look across to the passing ships and the various islands dotted around the Inland Sea, including Ogijima, which is where, according to legend, Momotaro (a boy born from a peach) defeated some devil or other. At the highest point of the Yashima peninsula is a shrine (number 84 of the 88 that form a circular pilgrimage route of the whole island - a 3-month hike). This shrine is dedicated to a 1000-handed kannon of mercy, and a badger. There are large stone badgers and the tourist shops are full of happy dancing badgers with straw hats. Next to the shrine there is a large marble plaque with the following inscription:
"In the old days when the grand priest Kobo opened the 88 pilgrimage temples on Shikoku, he lost his way in foggy Yashima and met an old man wearing a straw rain coat, who guided him to the peak of mountain. It is believed that the old man was the figure of the Yashima tasaburo's badger's metamorphosis. The Yashima tasaburo badger is noted for being one of 3 badgers in Japan, together with the danzaburo badger of Sado island and the shibaemon badger of Awaji island. It was the messenger of the Senju kannon or the thousand-handed kannon found in the main hall, enshrined preciously because he did a lot of goodness as the tutelary god and was respected as the general head of badgers in Shikoku. The legendary skill of the sophisticated metamorphosis stood unchallenged throughout Japan. The Yashima tasaburo badger was also considered to be a monogamist and is respected as a god of peaceful families, marriages and the restaurant business. Believers who wish to have babies
and good luck visit the Yashima tasaburo badger from all over Japan."
You couldn't make it up. It really is extraordinary what piffle we are capable of believing, as long as enough other people around us are convinced, and we are desperate to believe in something, anything that gives us hope. Anything to avoid looking at the truth - ie. in this case, a monk met an old man who showed him the way.
"The legendary skill of the sophisticated metamorphosis stood unchallenged throughout Japan" - how could anyone possibly hope to compete with a 1000-handed god pretending to be a badger pretending to be an old man? Even if he was a monogamist. And compete for what? Being god of the restaurant business? Would that include cafes? Or would there be an opening there for a separate god I wonder? A 12-nosed caterpillar god with 3 arms pretending to be a flying walrus impersonating a barber shop quartet perhaps?
At the foot of the mountain is a museum of sorts, consisting of houses, agricultural in the main part, dating back to Meiji and beyond (19th century), which have been dismantled and rebuilt here - a paper-making hut (washi), where thin mulberry branches were first steamed for hours, then the bark was stripped off and the white inside beaten to a pulp, laid out, dried and Bob's your uncle. A soya factory with its great wooden vats the size of a small room. A sugar cane mill, driven by an ox going round in circles all day. A water wheel. Oddly, a British Victorian (VR) pillar box and telephone box, and some lighthouse keepers' cottages, the sturdiest structures there, built by British engineers, reflecting the importance (to the British) of protecting their ships in the 'opening up' of Japan.
July 4th, Independence Day, 1945, between 02.56 and 04.42, 116 US B29 bombers dropped 809 tons of incendiary bombs on this city, destroying 18,505 buildings (16,103 homes) - 80% of the urban area. Remarkably only 1,359 people were killed and 1,034 wounded. This was one of over 800 such raids on Japan.
I walked up the mountain through the woods, but when I got to the top found that a wide road had been built round the back, bringing coachloads of tourists - hobbling high-heeled girls with fake suntanned boyfriends. There is an aquarium up there. I watched from the road as the Bay City Rollers' 'Saturday' (a great karaoke favourite here) blares out. I can see two grey seals swimming round and round interminably the edge of a small transparent-walled pool, and a large turtle. I walk away in disgust as 'Saturday' starts up again - evidently also on an interminable loop.
Right - time to get the bike out ...
"In the old days when the grand priest Kobo opened the 88 pilgrimage temples on Shikoku, he lost his way in foggy Yashima and met an old man wearing a straw rain coat, who guided him to the peak of mountain. It is believed that the old man was the figure of the Yashima tasaburo's badger's metamorphosis. The Yashima tasaburo badger is noted for being one of 3 badgers in Japan, together with the danzaburo badger of Sado island and the shibaemon badger of Awaji island. It was the messenger of the Senju kannon or the thousand-handed kannon found in the main hall, enshrined preciously because he did a lot of goodness as the tutelary god and was respected as the general head of badgers in Shikoku. The legendary skill of the sophisticated metamorphosis stood unchallenged throughout Japan. The Yashima tasaburo badger was also considered to be a monogamist and is respected as a god of peaceful families, marriages and the restaurant business. Believers who wish to have babies
and good luck visit the Yashima tasaburo badger from all over Japan."You couldn't make it up. It really is extraordinary what piffle we are capable of believing, as long as enough other people around us are convinced, and we are desperate to believe in something, anything that gives us hope. Anything to avoid looking at the truth - ie. in this case, a monk met an old man who showed him the way.
"The legendary skill of the sophisticated metamorphosis stood unchallenged throughout Japan" - how could anyone possibly hope to compete with a 1000-handed god pretending to be a badger pretending to be an old man? Even if he was a monogamist. And compete for what? Being god of the restaurant business? Would that include cafes? Or would there be an opening there for a separate god I wonder? A 12-nosed caterpillar god with 3 arms pretending to be a flying walrus impersonating a barber shop quartet perhaps?
At the foot of the mountain is a museum of sorts, consisting of houses, agricultural in the main part, dating back to Meiji and beyond (19th century), which have been dismantled and rebuilt here - a paper-making hut (washi), where thin mulberry branches were first steamed for hours, then the bark was stripped off and the white inside beaten to a pulp, laid out, dried and Bob's your uncle. A soya factory with its great wooden vats the size of a small room. A sugar cane mill, driven by an ox going round in circles all day. A water wheel. Oddly, a British Victorian (VR) pillar box and telephone box, and some lighthouse keepers' cottages, the sturdiest structures there, built by British engineers, reflecting the importance (to the British) of protecting their ships in the 'opening up' of Japan.
July 4th, Independence Day, 1945, between 02.56 and 04.42, 116 US B29 bombers dropped 809 tons of incendiary bombs on this city, destroying 18,505 buildings (16,103 homes) - 80% of the urban area. Remarkably only 1,359 people were killed and 1,034 wounded. This was one of over 800 such raids on Japan.
I walked up the mountain through the woods, but when I got to the top found that a wide road had been built round the back, bringing coachloads of tourists - hobbling high-heeled girls with fake suntanned boyfriends. There is an aquarium up there. I watched from the road as the Bay City Rollers' 'Saturday' (a great karaoke favourite here) blares out. I can see two grey seals swimming round and round interminably the edge of a small transparent-walled pool, and a large turtle. I walk away in disgust as 'Saturday' starts up again - evidently also on an interminable loop.
Right - time to get the bike out ...
