We’ve returned to Kyushu, the southern-most main island of Japan. Fukuoka is near one of the four National Museums of Japan, which is where my tour began. With the other three national museums all being in major cities (Tokyo, Kyoto, Nara) on the main island of Honshu, I was confused why this museum was here at all. However, if you look at a map you see that no only is Kyushu the southern-most island, it’s also the most western. Thus, it is the closest to mainland Asia. This museum does not focus on art, but on archeology and anthropology, as Kyushu is the first island occupied by humans from the continent.
Fukuoka is the farthest south we are going with this segment of the cruise, so the cherry blossoms in the parking lot are the most developed we’ve seen.
Quick side note: the museum is build near where a large gate that existed hundreds of years ago. So, the first thing we saw was a model of the gate. The model artist had a sense of humor, note the tiny cats on the roof.
There are lots of the standard stone-age and bronze-age stuff that you see in such museums, but then they had a section with stone rubbings of the animal zodiac, which made it’s way to Japan from China. Here’s a snake, since it’s the Year of the Snake.
But the museum curators could not avoid the “Cult of Cute” with the exhibit sign.
Two items that really grabbed my attention were two wooden guardian sculptures with amazing muscle definition. Even tho the statues hung off walls the artist still put the effort into the backs as well.
This iron kettle is covered with raised ‘beads”. I can’t imagine being the one to take all the time to carve those beads on the original cast.
This pile of coins were found upon the discovery of a sunken boat nearby. Note how the coins are tied in loops with string thru the holes in each coin.
One of many lovely screens. The houses I’ve seen from this era didn’t have much privacy.
In the museum shop, someone had a sense of humor. Here is Snoopy surfing on the famous “Wave” image.
From here we traveled to the Dazaifu Tenmangu Shrine. From the bus parking lot we walked thru several blocks of shopping and restaurants before arriving at the temple, but I was wondering at the large percentage of teenagers or younger. But then our guide explained that this shrine is for the spirit of academics and scholarship. With the new school year starting next week, it seems many are trying to get a head start on the new year.
The legend is when this educated guy died his body was carried by an ox, and the shrine was built where the ox refused to walk any farther. Thus, there is a bronze ox at the entrance where many stood in line to rub its head.
You cross thru a lovely garden to get to the official shrine. Our guide explained one of the main differences between Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples is shrines don’t usually have ponds. Seems this one is an exception.
Here is the path to the main shrine. You can see that not all torii are painted red.
Outside of the shrine gate is a kirin statue, kind of an Asian unicorn.
The main shrine is undergoing renovations. To assist all the worshipers they have a modern stage in front of the shrine with a priest and assistants working non-stop helping folks with their prayers, ten people at a time on stage in front of relics. There was a smaller ox statue, but just as shiny.
Due to the timing of our tour (and delay with morning immigration) we were going to miss lunch on the ship. There was a snack shop near the buses which offered fries and chicken nuggets “plum flavored”. Challenge accepted. They had some kind of almost purple shake-on spice, kind of like cayenne pepper, and damn if it didn’t add a faint plum flavor to the items. The cashier was surprised I knew that “ume” meant plum.
On the way back to the ship we passed two llamas encouraging folks to recycle. Cult of Cute again…
Our guide explained how most Japanese move seamlessly between Shinto and Buddhist beliefs. For the most part, Shinto shrines are visited for happy events (weddings, child age ceremonies), where Buddhist temples support sad events, like funerals.