彦根城 (Hikone-jō)

OKEY DOKEY, ARTICHOKEYS! I finally been to Hikone-jō, or Hikone Castle. Sunday, yesterday, after a hardy lunch of bacon sandwiches, a group of 9 of us Americans set out by bike to the local feudal -age castle, since it was supposed to be one of the few days of reprieve from the bombardment of rain in this rainy season. Before coming to Japan, I looked up a bit about the castle. I knew it was built in 1603 in the Edo period of Japan, aka the era in which Japan was ruled by shougun. Hikone-jou is one of the few completely remaining castles in Japan, and it's considered a national treasure. Asian castles look different than our idea of a castle, like what we get from Europe. I guess most people would call this style a palace, and although I don't know the finer details about what makes a building a castle and what makes it a palace, it's called Hikone castle, so there. And it looks like this:

Going to Hikone-jou for sitting under the cherry blossoms in spring and drinking and picnicking and singing and gaming is a popular past-time for the people of this area, and it's known in Japanese as hana-mi (花見), which means "flower viewing". Seeing as it in June, there are no Sakura blossoms, and it was so hot climbing up all those stairs built into the mountain in the 80 degree heat while wearing a sweater (since in Japan, girls tend to not have uncovered shoulders in public). When we got there, a few of our Japanese friends joined us, and we enjoyed seeing all of Hikone from the top of the mountain, chasing the dozens of butterflies that were fluttering around the pink and orange flowers, and chatting with friends. We didn't get to see Hiko-nyan though. Hiko-nyan is the name of the mascot character for Hikone castle. Every castle in Japan has a mascot, and they're always some sort of cutesy animal that walks around the castle grounds, probably dying of heat stroke within the furry costume, and dancing and posing for pictures. I shall google a picture.

^Hiko-nyan is the samurai cat in the middle

Hiko-nyan comes from Hikone, obviously, and the Japanese onomatopoeia for a cat's meow, which is nyan! Japanese onomatopoeia often don't make sense to me, but they sound fun, and people often speak in onomatopoeia. For example, the onomatopoeia for heart beat is doki doki, so when you are nervous, you often say "doki doki suru", meaning "you are doing doki doki", implying your heart is beating rapidly cause of your nerves :P

Before I get into more description of our tour, here are a few pics and vids:

 ^The group in front of the castle

 ^Hiko-nyan

 ^Large, beautiful butterflies were flying everywhere

^View of Hikone

We were allowed to tour inside the castle as well as other buildings on the castle ground. However, there really isn't anything worth seeing on the inside. Unless you like wooden floors and wooden walls and wooden ceilings and walking up incredibly steep stairs while holding your shoes in one hand all the while being in an extremely long line to walk in a circle around said wooden rooms. One room in one of the buildings had two little glass cases though, which had things like roof tiles and door hinges inside.

I swear, those kind of stairs would never fly back home; someone would fall, they castle would get sued. And speaking of "I swear", sorry for that, folks. I had a rather traumatic fall down stairs like that in Germany, and as a clumsy person, walking down those was reeeally frightening :P.

So although the buildings themselves weren't that fun, walking to each one on the castle grounds was! There was so much beautiful nature, and like I said, there were butterflies of various varieties, along with dragonflies, hawks, herons, turtles, frogs, and such. 

View of Lake Biwa from the mountain

Hanging over cliffs

Alex in front of the scenery

On the way down

I can count 5 birds here. Click to enlarge

Forest

Climbing down into the forest

The moat

So yeah, that was oodles of fun. Then afterwards, the large group of us invades the local 7/11 (yes, 7/11 is everywhere here. Not as many as in New England, per say, but in Mizuho's little town, I counted 4. Yeah.), got some food, and ate it together on the curb. On the way home (after stopping for the groceries), you could see the sun setting over Lake Biwa, and it was a perfect way to end our adventure.

So now with all these wonderful pictures I've taken so far, I feel obligated to start putting some on facebook now. I guess I know how I'll be spending my evening!

Mary

Location: My desk

Mood: Anxious (^^;) 

Listening to: Don't Lose Yourself - Man with a Mission

Japanese for the day: 日本が大好きです Nihon ga daisuki desu. - I love Japan

                                 *Note for pronunciation: In Japanese, high vowels are often deleted, so daisuki sounds like daiski and desu sounds like dess.