What I Did On My Summer Vacation Part Two: Nagoya

You may remember my recent posting on my trip to Tokyo. (Forget? Here it is again.) After that week in Tokyo, I took the Nozomi Super Express Shinkansen to Nagoya. It was my first time on the Nozomi, one of the types of bullet train. In the past I had taken the Hikari, which isn't as fast and makes more stops, but that's the one they make you take if you have a JR Rail Pass. Now that I'm visa-fied, I can take whatever train I want. Actually, I would have taken the cheaper one but this is a busy travel season and all of the cheap seats were already booked, so I took the expensive one. I even had to pony up for the Green car, the first-class car! It actually wasn't that much more, and the extra leg room was nice.

I only had two days in Nagoya and lots to see, so I quickly checked into my hotel and then headed out to Inuyama, about an hour north of Nagoya in the suburbs. My destination?

That's Inuyama-jo, Japan's oldest standing castle. It was built in the Warring States period in 1537 by Oda Yojirou Nobuyasu, Oda Nobunaga's uncle. In 1584, during the Battle of Komaki Nagakute, Toyotomi Hideyoshi used the castle as his headquarters in a campaign against Tokugawa Ieyasu, who would eventually go on to rule Japan. I love Japanese castles, and I love Japanese history. Walking into this military fortress, I could really feel the history. 

Unlike at Nagoya-jo.

Nagoya-jo was built by Tokugawa Ieyasu in 1612, after he had become shogun. It was intended as a symbol of his power and opulence. Compare it to the austerity of Inuyama-jo (although it should be said that Inuyama-jo was once quite a bit bigger). Nagoya-jo was also largely destroyed during Allied air raids in WW2, so what you're looking at is a concrete reconstruction. (Most of the castles in Japan are reconstructions. Only 4 original castles remain, including Himeji, which is often used in movies and TV in place of the long-gone Edo-jo.)

It was brutally hot the day I visited the castles. Luckily I brought a change of T-shirts so I didn't have to be soaking wet all day. My shirt was so wet with sweat, it made the pages of my Lonely Planet guidebook crinkly inside my backpack. Eww!

I had planned to head out to Ise-jingu about 2 hours south of Nagoya the next day but I was running out of cash and couldn't find an ATM to accept my local Oita bank card, so I made due with exploring the city. Nagoya is an interesting place. There's a sizable Brazilian population, complete with Portuguese on the signs in the subway, and Brazilian restaurants in town.

Not sure why this place is camera-worthy, but there you go.

Nagoya also has a visible homeless population, which seems to have figured out that it's OK to panhandle to Westerners. I was surprised numerous times by homeless people approaching me for money. This is striking for two reasons: I thought the homeless in Japan didn't panhandle, and no one ever talks to me on the street! In fact, I had more people (homeless or not) start conversations with me in Nagoya than anywhere else I've been in Japan. A few of them even touched me! It's strange to get used to being invisible and then to suddenly become visible again.

I couldn't get out to Ise-jingu, shrine to Amaterasu Omikami the sun goddess and holding place of the sacred mirror, one of the three regalia given to the imperial family by the goddess. I could, however, visit Atsuta-jingu, the 1900-year-old shrine that houses the sacred sword. (The third sacred item, the curved jewels, are kept at the Imperial Palace in Tokyo.) Of course, I couldn't actually see the sword. No one sees the treasures except the Emperor and maybe a few select Shinto priests.

The shrine is located in the middle of Nagoya, in a grove of 1000-year-old cypress trees. This is worth noting: the trees are 1000 years old, but the site has been holy for almost twice that! Of course, the main shrine building itself is not 1900 years old. It's made of wood, after all. However, it retains its original, pre-Buddhist, pre-Chinese-influenced architecture. It looks almost Polynesian.

Next I visited Osu-Kannon, a Buddhist temple moved to Nagoya by Tokugawa after be became shogun. The temple was so auspicious, the guy decided to have the whole thing moved so it would be near his recently completed castle. A castle where he didn't even live, it should be noted. Now that's power.

I happened to arrive just as Hat Day was getting underway. (I'm not kidding—there was a sign that said, in English, "Hat Day.") In the picture you can see a procession of priests emerging from the temple. They were headed here:

Yup, they set fire to the hats and chanted. The hats were donated (presumably by the people watching) and, I'm assuming, cleansed. There are a lot of these kinds of ceremonies in Japan, this cleansing. 

I was extremely happy to have witnessed this. It pretty much made the trip for me.

Lots more pictures of Nagoya here.