Today Ian called at about 5 a.m. and said that he would not be able to walk today, so I decided that I would walk alone. I ended up walking a total of 20 kilometers, all in the area between my apartment and the Kita Sendai Station where I usually meet Ian. This first picture is of something that would be a bit shocking in the US. It is a toilet in the park that we walk in (we walk in the park, not the toilet). What is surprising is that it is coed. On the right is a huge urinal with constantly running water, basically it is just a wall with a platform to stand on. On the left, inside the door, is a traditional Japanese squatter facility (I supposed I should have photographed that, too) for women or for men. The point is that the women have to walk past the men to get to it.
Now, on to more mundane things. The photo below is a group of stones, which are not grave stones, in spite of how they look. Each stone has the name of a Buddha or a Bhodisattva carved on it. The road, just out of the picture on the left, follows the path of the old road which went north from Sendai. Basho, the famous haiku poet, walked along this road during the trip on which he wrote his most famous works. These stones may well have been since the Edo period - some time I will have to go to the library and see if I can find out.
The stones in the previous picture are at a modern intersection, and I turned left and started up a hill. At the top of the slope I passed under the bridge that you can see in the next picture. On the other side, I went down into the next valley and turned right on a main road. At the first intersection I turned right again and started up a long, steep hill.
Eventually, after walking about a kilometer, I found myself on the bridge that I had previously walked under. I was standing on the sidewalk when I took the previous picture, and the stones were at the intersection at the bottom of the hill.
I continued walking and eventually passed this all black building. Actually it is the S.S. Ladies Clinic where Tomone was born. The inside is quite nice and the rooms for the mothers are more like hotel rooms, but the outside certainly looks like a fortress or a high security area.
Now, on to more mundane things. The photo below is a group of stones, which are not grave stones, in spite of how they look. Each stone has the name of a Buddha or a Bhodisattva carved on it. The road, just out of the picture on the left, follows the path of the old road which went north from Sendai. Basho, the famous haiku poet, walked along this road during the trip on which he wrote his most famous works. These stones may well have been since the Edo period - some time I will have to go to the library and see if I can find out.
The stones in the previous picture are at a modern intersection, and I turned left and started up a hill. At the top of the slope I passed under the bridge that you can see in the next picture. On the other side, I went down into the next valley and turned right on a main road. At the first intersection I turned right again and started up a long, steep hill.
Eventually, after walking about a kilometer, I found myself on the bridge that I had previously walked under. I was standing on the sidewalk when I took the previous picture, and the stones were at the intersection at the bottom of the hill.
I continued walking and eventually passed this all black building. Actually it is the S.S. Ladies Clinic where Tomone was born. The inside is quite nice and the rooms for the mothers are more like hotel rooms, but the outside certainly looks like a fortress or a high security area.
No comments:
Post a Comment