Takanabe Sunflower Festival
At different times in my life, August has either represented the approaching autumn, or the coming spring. And as if to echo those transitions, it has marked my most exciting…
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In Pictures: Miyazaki Cherry Blossoms
“Cherry blossoms in spring, they mean everything…” coos the Night Beds’ Winston Yellen on the sixth track of Country Sleep. A truer line could never be sung for Japan. Here, cherry…
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The Garden of Love
In Shintomi Town, on the road from Takanabe to Saito, is a garden carpeted in bright, pink flowers. During spring, when the shibazakura (moss phlox) is in full bloom, the…
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Inside One of Japan’s Abandoned Hotels
In Out of the Silent Planet, C.S. Lewis wrote, “The love of knowledge is a kind of madness.” I must be kind of mad, then, because everyone who knows me…
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A Horse-Blessed Harvest
Here in the inaka, rice fields are woven into the scenery like squares on a patchwork quilt. The need for a calendar is obviated by their narrative of the seasons; glassy strips in early…
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Ookawara Gorge and the Firefly Festival
If ajisai is the quintessential flower of tsuyu season, the firefly must be it’s insect. Called hotaru in Japanese, these lightning bugs swarm around streams and rivers in the countryside from late May to…
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Ajisai and the Plum Rains
Due to the stubborn Mei-yu front, most of East Asia experiences a two-month rainy season. During June and July, the weeks become an endless parade of cloudy days, accompanied by debilitating humidity and,…
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The Horse Dance Festival
Mark and I have been joking that I should rename my blog “Following Mark around Japan” since the last couple of posts have all been about my adventures with him.…
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Himuka Music Camp Festival
Up until Saturday, my music festival experience consisted of five dusty days at Woodstock 9 in the highway town of Harrismith, Free State. So when Mark invited me to celebrate his birthday with a…
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Bokusui Spring Festival
Miyazaki is definitely an underrated prefecture, and one of the more un-known, buried in the depths of Google’s search results, under all the pages dedicated to Hayao and his many castles. But the great…
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Sekino-o Falls and the Oketsugun Potholes
“Woaah!” I exclaimed to Mark. “Are you seeing this?” The red shrine that he was investigating wasn’t enough to distract me from the roar of water falling down. An unexpected stop on our roadtrip…
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