The Iwami Kagura Museum is located in what used to be the village elementary school in Ichiyama, but now is home to the village community center.Entrance is free.There is an extensive collection of masks.As well as other implements and accessories used in kagura,including the richly, decorated costumes.Most of the museum concentrates on Omoto Kagura, the shamanic dance that is now only performed

My favorite temple, Gakuenji, like most larger temples is guarded by a pair of Nio statues.Once the largest temple in the province of Izumo, and during medieval times a massive complex of building scattered over the area, Gakuenji is now very much off the beaten track and rarely visited outside of the maple-viewing season at the end of November.Most of the buildings have long since disappeared,

This is a continuation of a previous postLower Imbe is a small hillside village that is cut off from the main road (Route 24) by a small resevoir created on the Imbe River. Here I found one of the things I am always on the look out for, a sacred grove of trees with a Kojin shrine. You can see the rope snake wrapped around the tree in the back.These shrines are never marked on maps as they are "

Matarajin Shrine is located next to the main hall in Gakuen-Ji Temple, though the shrine originally stood behind Izumo Taisha.It was dismantled and carried up into the mountains probably in the 16th Century.Matarajin ( or Madarajin or Madarashin) was brought back from China in the 9th Century by the Tendai monk Ennin as a protector of the Amida Sutra, and so has strong links with Tendai.

The Fukuoka City Museum is located in the Momochi district, an area of land reclaimed from the sea in western Fukuoka City.It was opened in 1990 and was designed by the AXS Satow Company.The museum has permanent displays that showcase the history and culture of the region as well as changing special exhibitions.Probably the most famous object on display is the gold seal given by the Chinese

Images and statues of a white fox appear all over the place in Yuda Onsen, a spa resort next to Yamaguchi City, even on the drain covers.The reason is that local legend has it that the hot spring and its healing properties were discovered by a white fox.A priest from a nearby temple saw an injured white fox bathing itself and from then there have been spas in the area.This occurred in the

I was woken this morning by the whine of the village rice paddies being sprayed with insecticide.The area to be sprayed is not huge,.... I reckon a single person with a sprayer on his/her back could spray the paddies in a good long day, but why do that when expensive, hi-tech, labor-saving devices are available?Surely it costs much more to hire a team of 4 men with an obviously expensive piece of

Karakama Shrine (Korean Forge) is not an easy shrine to reach, First you have to find the way along narrow mountain lanes in the mountains north of Izumo Taisha. Once you find the old wooden torii it is then a climb up into the mountains.Once you get up close to the shrine one further hurdle must be crossed.... to reach the shrine one must squeeze through a narrow crack between rocks.... and it