Thumb sucking

Tomone with a new variation on an old theme. Most babies suck their thumbs, but ....

Shichigahama continued

As we walked through some rice paddies, Ian and I found an interesting group of houses. They looked like they had been built on a hill but the sloping sides had been cut away so that they were vertical. The white house on the right had the first floor, probably just one room, at the paddy level but the rest of the house was on the hill. From what we could see, the man-made cliff around the houses had no support whatsoever. It was just hard dirt.On the other side of the island, we found an interesting empty lot. It was at the top of a hill and the lots on all four sides had been dug out down to the street level. The lot in the middle, however, was unimproved, forming a tower of dirt beside the road.

Shichigahama

Ian and I drove to Shichigahama which is an island about 20 km away. Access is by a short bridge and it is a resort and surfing area in the summer.

After leaving the car in the parking lot at a public park at the highest point on the island, we walked toward the ocean. After a few kilometers we saw a sign that pointed toward the ocean and the Hanabushi Jinja. We decided to explore and soon were on a dirt road leading into the woods.

Eventually we discovered two torii, the outer painted red and the inner unpainted concrete. As you can see from the picture, a torii has two vertical columns with two horizontal cross pieces at the top. These are always located at the entrance to a Shinto shrine.

We followed the path deeper into the woods and entered the shrine grounds. Hanabushi Jinja is small but nice and stands on a cliff overlooking the sea, although the trees block the view.
Off to the right side of the shrine proper was an administration building, used mainly during festivals as a place to eat and drink. On the left, however, we discovered something surprising - a whaling harpoon. I searched around but could find nothing else related to whaling. Actually there was little else to see except for some small not very artistic statues. I assume that in the distant past the hill on which Hanabush Jinja stands was used as a lookout point for the local whalers.
Near the shrine there was a long, steep flight of stairs going down toward the water. Thinking about the climb back up, we decided not to go down. However, we soon found a path leading down in the same direction, so we took that. After a long steep walk we reached the edge of a cliff and could go no farther. However, the path ended in a larger cleared area, overlooking a beautiful cove. Around the sides we found piles of cut up logs and smaller branches. It looked as if the festival that we had seen advertised at the shrine entrance must consist of a large bonfire.
We walked a round the perimeter of the island and a very good workout because the roads we all up an down with very steep slopes.


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Bottomless cup of coffee

I went downtown on Friday to meet a friend. We had lunch together at a restaurant in a new department store next to Sendai Station. I had pasta with a salad for 980 yen (about US$10, a little expensive, but not too much) and then for 105 yen (about US$1) more I got the 'drink service'. My friend and I both ordered coffee and discovered that the one buck gave us a bottomless cup. I have not seen prices like that in a long, long time.

The pasta, by the way, was so-so, and the coffee was strong and at least as good as I expected.