Shiga News – by Philbert Ono Rotating Header Image

March, 2007:

Imamori Mitsuhiko’s Satoyama seminar

Mar 30th, 2007
by philbert.
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I think some of you might know who Imamori Mitsuhiko is (今森光彦）. He is a well-known professional photographer from Shiga who has published many photo books about Shiga and insects. He is an expert on Shiga’s nature, especially river and lake systems. Every year, he holds a Satoyama Seminar 里山塾 in Takashima where there is much nature.

If you pay money, you can join his seminar group to experience various things in Shiga’s nature. He offers a one-day seminar and two-day seminars. They are held with the cooperation of Biwako Hotel in Otsu. The next seminar will be on April 15.

It all sounds very interesting, but I think the fee is too high for most of us. Do you want to pay 7,000 yen to experience rice planting in the mud? The two-day seminars cost 43,000 yen including hotel.

More info is here:

http://rsv.ihonex.com/cgi-bin/webmainte3/hotels/biwako/display.cgi?cat=event&hid=biwako&No=22

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Omi-Hachiman Sagicho Matsuri

Mar 22nd, 2007
by philbert.
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Sagicho

Omi-Hachiman Sagicho Matsuri.

Last weekend during March 17-18, 2007 (Year of the Boar), I saw the Sagicho Festival in Omi-Hachiman, Shiga. It was great! I was very impressed by the colorful Sagicho floats made of edible materials like soybeans, small fish, aoi-nori, and many other ingredients. They were all fantastic works of art.

It was very windy and cold on both days, and Himure Hachimangu was very dusty. But it was also very sunny and a great weekend to take pictures. It seems to be a very local festival, which means there are not so many tourists. There were very few foreigners.

On Sun. night, it was very cold waiting until 8 pm when they started to burn the floats. The whole area in front of the shrine (and Taneya), which is usually a parking lot, was the main festival site. If you have never seen this festival, I highly recommend it. There’s another fire festival in Hachiman next month as well.

Pictures taken on Sat.:
http://photoguide.jp/pix/thumbnails.php?album=150

YouTube videos:

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Int’l event in Okaya, Nagano

Mar 6th, 2007
by philbert.
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Nakamura Naoko singing "Lake Biwa Rowing Song."

The city of Okaya in Nagano-ken held a major int’l event on March 4:
http://www.oiea.jp/jpn/aboutus/other/15thanniversary.htm

I participated by having a small exhibition about Biwako Shuko no Uta. The twin sisters who sang the song in Shiga could not attend, so I was delighted that the Okaya people found someone to sing the song in English in Okaya.

So the English version was sung in public for the first time outside Shiga, and for the first time in public by a Japanese person.

The singer was a college student, and she was chosen by her choir director to sing the song. Even though her pronunciation was not perfect, she sang it quite well. She didn’t know much about the song’s background, so I explained about it before she sang. She had only 2 weeks to practice, and sang three verses (out of six).

The event itself was very successful. Pictures here:
http://photoguide.jp/pix/thumbnails.php?album=515

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