Matsushima | Get beneath the surface

Family festival fun and remembering the tsunami

Posted on 8 December, 2011 by jimbojapanam

This is the final instalment from Uday and the Kanitkar family who travelled to the Tohoku region for the ‘Big Three’ festivals in August this year. By the way, we haven’t mentioned that before the family had headed north for the large dose of festival action, they had already been in the cultural capital of Kyoto for the massive Gion festival. These guys wanted festivals and they got festivals and much more.

For anyone wanting to experience Japanese culture at its best, amazing Japanese hospitality and something you won’t find anywhere else in the world, then this is the way to do it. Having partied at the Kanto festival in Akita, enjoyed the fun and hospitality of the Neputa festival in Hirosaki, they headed to Aomori for the huge Nebuta festival and then on to Sendai for Tanabata. Along with the festivals, they also discovered some of the harsh realities of the Tohoku tsunami which hit the region in March 2011.

The Nebuta festival in Aomori was massive! Words will not do it justice, so it is better described in pictures.

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Having had another fantastic time in Aomori, we headed to Sendai for the most famous Tanabata festival in Japan. There were lanterns everywhere beginning at the Railway Station and just a ten minutes walk away was a covered arcade where at least a thousand colourful lanterns were hanging off the ceiling creating a very festive atmosphere.

People were out shopping and partying dressed in all kinds of colourful clothing. Food stalls were everywhere and we wondered around not finding any trace of the disaster that I had seen on the news four months ago.We had lunch at the Date-no-gutan restaurant at the mall above the train station in Sendai which offers the local delicacy, Beef Tongue, in different recipes. After we took our first bite all the reluctance and hesitation was gone -We were quite happy to have tried something new and tasty.

We checked in at the Tenryu-Kaku Ryokan for yet another delightful experience in Japanese style living and amazing variety of food. The room was well appointed, spacious and offered some beautiful views of the river below and amazing views of the sunset.

On our second day we decided to do a day trip to the Matsushima Bay Area and I am glad we did. As soon as we got out of the train station on our way to the ferry terminal at Shiogama evidence of Tsunami damage was all around. Heaps of cars and debris was noticeable, boats washed inland lay where the tsunami had carried them.

Matsushima bay offered some very picturesque views from the ferry as we lazed through all the little island outcrops with scenic vegetation while snacks, sake and beer kept flowing. By the time we got to Matsushima I stood on the jetty feeling nice and tipsy for a few minutes trying to figure out the controls on my camera.

We walked down Matsushima Kaigan Street enjoying all the delicious sea food at the stalls along the road. GodaidoTemple and ZuiganjiTemple are very beautiful places to visit with a relaxing atmosphere and beautiful landscape.

After taking in enough of pretty Matsushima, we walked up to the Tourist Information office to see what else we could do. We asked the very friendly and helpful lady there if we could visit the Tsunami hit areas. For 6000 yen, she arranged a taxi to take us there, show us around and bring us back in abut 90 minutes. We had not really witnessed any of the huge tsunami damage that had filled our TV screens in the west until now.

We got into the taxi and half an hour later we were in Okumatsushima smack in the middle of the disaster zone. The taxi driver took us to what was his little township of 90 houses along the beach and listened in horror as he narrated how he managed to grab his two children, wife and run up the hill behind their house, seconds before the Tsunami washed away all 90 houses, some as far as half a kilometre away inland from where they stood.

Clearing crews were busy trucking away debris. Only the foundations of houses remained in place with Asian style toilets open to the sky. Large trees lay snapped like twigs, Steel poles lay bent like match sticks, the clock at the train station had stopped at 3.48pm when the Tsunami struck, ghostly houses damaged and empty with owners dead stood along the roads. Schools, Hospitals, factories lay wrecked and deserted.

We stood there contemplating a twenty foot tall wave of water many miles long and many miles deep approaching us at 300 km/hr. I still shiver with the thought of its savage force and my heart goes out to the thousands of victims who are still struggling in Tsunami Shelters trying to bring some sense back into their lives having lost everything and loved ones in a blink of an eye. With a stoical approach they go about their business rebuilding whole towns.

Despite the huge devastation and size of this disaster, the people that we have met up and down the Tohoku region have shown little sign of misery and despair. In fact these wonderful people have been more generous and kinder than we could have ever imagined and shown us an amazing region in a very special country. Arigato!

Having spoken with Uday since his trip, it certainly sounds as though this trip was one which will live in their memories for ever and for all the right reasons. Uday’s blog pieces have focused on the family’s time in Tohoku, but they visited many other stunning places in Japan. It is obvious though that it was their experiences in this rural region, the positivity from the festivals and the warmth of the people that they met that will have a lasting impression on their lives.

Filed under: Culture, Events, Family Holiday, March 11th Tsunami, Sightseeing | Tagged: 'family holiday', Culture, earthquake, Festival, Festivals, Japan, Japanese culture, Kanitkar, Matsushima, Nebuta, Sendai, Sightseeing, Tanabata, Tohoku, tsunami | 3 Comments »

Sendai and Matsushima after the tsunami

Posted on 12 May, 2011 by jimbojapanam

InsideJapan Co-Director, Simon King is currently travelling in Japan meeting up with colleagues, suppliers and business partners across the country. His travels included a trip to the Tohoku region which had areas very badly damaged as a result of the earthquake and tsunami on March 11th 2011. Simon was keen to meet with people that InsideJapan Tours had worked with over the last ten years and show InsideJapan’s support for this beautiful region of Japan, as well as survey the situation for himself. Here is what he had to say,

After a couple of nights staying in a really nice ryokan in the heart of Tokyo’s historic district of Asakusa, it was on to Sendai and Matsushima. These are both places I have been before although not for a good few years – the last time I stayed in Sendai was during the 2002 Football World Cup co-leading a group of 29 England fans. It was just me this time but, aware that our ‘Northern Soul’ tour visits this area, I was looking forward to seeing for myself how the city had fared.

Sendai has become synonymous now with pictures of complete devastation from the tsunami, the airport inundated, coastal areas destroyed. However, as was reassuringly apparent on my arrival, this is a big city and the city itself suffered very little damage.

The re-opened Tohoku Shinkansen carried me comfortably and quickly for the 217 mile journey from Tokyo’s Ueno station in a shade over 1 hour and 40 minutes. This is the same line that will soon be boasting bullet trains speeds of up to 260 miles an hours. I digress with train facts (easy to do in Japan). So, en-route I was looking for signs of damage – the only things I could spot were a number of house roofs where tiles had obviously come down and blue tarpaulin sheets were covering the apex. But that really was it.

On arrival at Sendai, the station was nicely full of hustle and bustle, shops busy and lots of people around. The tree lined main street Aoba Dori looked fine with its neat lines only spoilt by the ongoing construction of new subway line – started before the earthquake struck and scheduled to complete on time. Numerous taxis were waiting at the front of the station and the big departments stores Loft and S-Pal were both open.

The exterior of Sendai Station had been damaged and was covered with sheeting – impossible to tell from the inside and therefore clearly cosmetic rather than structural.

Next, by taxi, on to one of our frequently used ryokan, the Tenryu-kaku. Probably Sendai’s oldest ryokan it is located next door to Zuihoden, local hero Masamune Date’s mausoleum. I immediately recognised the very genki owner Yokoyama-san who was pleased to sit down and talk about business and the earthquake. It had certainly been a strong shake in Sendai but she re-iterated that damage in the city centre was very limited and her ryokan was fine. The city museum is open, the old castle remains can still be visited and the handy ‘loople’ bus is still doing its never ending circuit. The devastating damage had been far out of town in the coastal regions – real suffering here but well away from the city. What had also suffered was her business – with cancellations being hard to bear.

After a photograph with Yokoyama-san at the front desk, I headed back to the city and on to Matsushima. I took the JR Senseki line to Hon-Shiogama and the sightseeing boat from here to Matsushima. En-route there were definite signs of the Tsunami – 3 or 4 cars washed up along a river, a boat or two in rather unconventional mooring situations. There were also some mountains of rubbish and tangled steel – the clear up had obviously been a massive job and was now reaching its final stage. But houses and offices generally all looked fine and people were going about their daily lives, hopping on and off the small train, chatting about work and school.

It’s a 10 minute walk from Hon-Shiogama to the port and on the way there was some more damage with a major super market (the appropriately named ‘Max Value’) closed for repairs. The pavement had also clearly seen better days. At the port itself the restaurant complex had suffered but the Italian eatery was open for business and I had a great 500yen pasta lunch (vege version specially requested by awkward me!).

The boat journey was exactly as I remembered all those years ago – though without the football chants and, in fact, with far few people on board. The numerous islands for which the bay is famous had clearly acted as a breakwater and saved Matsushima from the worst of the wave. The islands are indeed beautiful and justifiably one of Japan’s ‘top three sights’.

At Matsushima itself I visited the famous Zuiganji temple and, for the first time, the lovely moss gardens at the neighbouring Entsuin Temple. Both were a delight! The sea facing front at Matsushima had clearly been hit and a number of restaurants were closed – but more than half open and the souvenir shops were doing a pretty good trade.

What was most markedly different on my trip ‘up north’, more so than the few bits of damage that I saw, more than the having to take one alternative train, was the lack of foreign tourists. This was Sunday in Golden Week and not a non-Japanese face to be seen. It is the local people and business affected by this fact that could be the tragedy after the tragedy.

Sendai and Matsushima need and want people to visit and as far as I could see there is every reason still to go.