Here are the photos and the video from this year Obon Dancing festival (or Obon odori – お盆踊り in Japanese). Even though it looks like it is in the middle of the countryside it was just a few hundred meters from our apartment in one of the parks of HAT Kobe. As usual there were [...]
If there is a flower symbolizing Japan – this is definitely the chrysanthemum. In Japan it is known as the “sun” flower and as the emperor is descendant of the sun goddess it is his symbol too. The highest order of Japan is even called Supreme Order of the Chrysanthemum (大勲位菊花章). Every year there are [...]
If you happen to visit Kobe at the and of April/beginning of May – do not miss it! It is an annual event. The official name is Infiorata-Kobe (here is a link to its site – in Japanese) and usually it is organized in the center of Kobe near Sannomiya station. However, you can often [...]
This blog entry was created for August Japan Blogs Matsuri kindly hosted by Through Eyes From Afar blog. The main theme of the matsuri is “Japan and Nature” so I decided to show some pictures from the small Japanese islands we visited this summer. The photos were specially selected to represent how the Japanese nature [...]
It is summer in Japan and everywhere we go it’s teaming of social activities. The photos (and the movies) are from this Sunday. We barely went out of home and we were “recruited” to watch the Kasa Odori – traditional Japanese dance performed with umbrellas. It is typical for eastern Tottori Prefecture (Tottori – ken [...]
It’s 7th of August again and it is time for the annual Kobe Hanabi (Fireworks) event. (Just in case you do not know Hanabi (花火) means flowers (花) of fire ( 火) and the Japanese people do mean it when they prepare fireworks). The observation point was the same as the previous year – HAT [...]
It is said that Ritsurin Park (栗林公園, Ritsurin Kōen) is one of the top 10 most beautiful Japanese parks (栗林 – ritsurin means chestnut (栗) grove (林)). It is situated in Takamatsu (高松) city (the tall (高) pine tree city(松)) on the island of Shikoku. We were there before during early spring but this blog [...]
