I admire the Japanese dedication to preservation of historical sites and monuments. I appreciate being able to visit historical sites and to see the structures as they existed in years and centuries past — either in their original form or in a restored condition. Fortunately, the Japanese government (national and local) takes care to preserve many important sites, and the Japanese people respect and appreciate those sites as well. (I rarely see trash on the ground in Japan, and graffiti and other forms of defacement of property are rare as well.) You can see this care at work on the fortifications
Read moreMonth: January 2017
Tokushima Castle: Samurai Palace Ruins
During my recent research trip to Japan, I visited Tokushima Castle Park, an island of green in the center of the prefectural capital Tokushima City and the former site of Tokushima Castle.
Read moreA Visit to Kenzan Shrine
Kenzan Jinja is a small Shinto shrine perched atop Mt. Bizan in Tokushima City, on the Japanese island of Shikoku.
Read moreA Visit to Mount Bizan, Tokushima, Japan
Bizan is one of Japan’s smaller mountains; the summit rises only 280 meters (920 feet) above sea level. The mountain’s name means “eyebrow,” because Mt. Bizan apparently looks like an eyebrow at a distance from any direction.
Read moreHappy New Year, 2017!
I hope you had a happy holiday season and that 2017 is a blessed, happy, and joyful year for you and your family. Look for big changes on the website in the next few months. I’m working on a new design and porting the entire website over to a larger platform (which means better stability, and better capacity to deal with the increased traffic the website is receiving). It’s going to have a whole new look, as well as expanded content about the Hiro Hattori / Shinobi Mysteries, Japan, and ninjas. Exciting things in store! I took the photo below at the Awa
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