Yanagawa (柳川)

After the stunning spectacle of thousands of roses at Huis Ten Bosch and the fantastic meal there, we were taken to a quiet little town of slightly more than 70,000 in Fukuoka Prefecture called Yanagawa (柳 川市), formed by merging Yamato and Mitsuhashi (both from Yamato District). The city is famous for two things: it's the place of birth of a famous prolific modern Japanese poet and children's song writer Kitahara Hakushu (北原 白秋 ) (1885 – 1942), originally called Kitahara Ryūkichi (北原 隆吉), one of the top 5 Japanese tanka (短歌 or short poem) poets writing in Taishō (大正時代 )(1912-1926) and Shōwa (昭和時代 ) (1926-1989) periods and widely accepted as one of the most popular and important poets in modern Japanese literature, having more than 200 publications under his own name. The city is criss-crossed with nearly 500 km of wide canals. It's really pleasant to feel that sense of leisure and serenity as our small boat glided smoothly along a stretch of one of their canals by one of the 200 professional "punters" pushing their pole proudly and apparently effortlessly in his impeccably clean kimono.

The Japanese May holidays over, the boats lay empty

Hotel, Food and the Dutch Night (酒店食物荷蘭夜)

The hotel where our  tour group stayed in Nagasaki is an interesting bit of Nagasaki history

It's a hotel built to commemorate the presence of the Portuguese traders and missionaries who first came to Nagasaki in 1543. To the left of the photo, one finds the front of a Catholic church "confessional".

The code of arms of the Nagasaki Monterey Hotel

No photos of the Hotspring at Kurokawa-Onsen: It's forbidden! (黑川溫泉没照片:嚴禁拍攝)

I was very pleasantly surprised when our coach arrived at our hotel in Kurokawa Onsen.

 

This is the view from my hotel room. In the distance one can see the Aso Volcanoes  and closer, the roof of the hotspring bathing house at the further end of the lawn, where for obvious reasons, one is forbidden to take any photos. .

The Journey to the hotel in Kurokawa-Onsen (Hotspring) in Kuju (熊本縣九重黑川溫泉酒店之旅)

It appears that every inch of the countryside of Kyushu is covered with vegetation.

Our coach passed by some bamboo groves on our way from Fukuoka (福崗) to the Kurokawa-Onsen (Hotspring) (黑川溫泉), in Kuju (九重) in Kumamoto Prefecture (熊本縣)

We passed by a lake with wisps of morning mist drifting across the valleys

The old Moji-ku Harbour (門司區的舊港口)

Japan has always been a country about which I have some very mixed feelings. Japanese influence has been quite strong in Hong Kong: Japanese electronic products first infiltrated and then dominated the Hong Kong consumer market: radios, television, cartoons, dolls, cars and aeroplane models and other cheap toys in the 60's, then televisions and rice cookers, hot water bottles, fashion and participation in the building of the cross harbor tunnel in the 70's and  video games and sci-fi toys in the 80's and 90's etc. But as a student of history, I could never forget the first Sino-Japanese War in 1894-1895 following which they took Taiwan and the Pescadores Islands (澎湖群島) and the eastern portion of the Bay of Liaotung Peninsula from China under the Treaty of Shiminoseki (馬關條约) 1895 in which China had to pay a huge indemnity to Japan (200 million Kuping taels (庫平兩) of silver), lost sovereignty of Korea to Japan and was forced to open up Shashih, Chungking, Soochow and Hangchow for trade to Japan and the Qing government recognized definitively the full and complete independence and autonomy of Korea so that Japan might more effectively control this former vassal state of China and to grant Japan most-favored-nation treatment; the Russo-Japanese War in 1905  which ended with the Treaty of Portsmouth 1905 whereby Russia was compelled to recognize Korea's independence and Japan's "paramount political, military, and economic interests" in Korea and ceded to Japan without payment all Russia's rights in the Chinese Port Arthur and Dalian in the Liaotung Peninsula (then leased to Russia) and all railways built by Russia in Manchuria; the invasion of China in 1931 following the Mukden (Shenyang) Incident and the setting up of Manchukuo in Manchuria and Inner Mongolia shortly thereafter and the famous Nanjing Massacre in  December1937 in which an estimated 200,000 to 300,000 Chinese were killed and as part of the 2nd Sino-Japanese War (1937-1945)  and of course the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong in 1941-1945 ( a total of 3 years and 8 months). I still remember my father's account to me as a child about how once, he was made to bow to the Japanese flag during the Japanese occupation and how he resisted by running away at the fastest speed in his life and how difficult life was under the Japanese occupation. I can never erase from my mind the the machinations of the Japanese government over the Diaoyu Islands first by permitting right wing civilians to erect a light tower over one of the islands and then purporting to "purchase" them from a Japanese family which claimed to have "ownership" rights of the islands and thus turning them into "national" territory so that it can come within the terms of the US-Japan Security Treaty of 1960 and which America (whose capacity is merely that of a "trustee" acting on behalf of the United Nations) unilaterally, wrongfully and against the express terms of the Treaty of San Francisco 1952, delivered the "possession" and "administrative rights and jurisdiction" (not "ownership", which Japanese government is now claiming)  over the islands to Japan instead of returning them to China in 1974. But the Japan I saw in this trip is quite different: the houses and roads all appear well-maintained, the people polite and you can see how the Japanese take meticulous care of whatever it is that they do and especially in preserving their own cultural traditions and customs, without however forgoing the benefits of modern technology and economic development. Clearly there is a distinction to be drawn here between the Japanese people and its culture on the one hand and the acts of its government and its politicians on the other.

This is the amusement park right opposite to my hotel room in Fukuoka

Seeing Chinese Wisteria Tunnels in Japan (在日本看中國紫藤隧道)

There are beautiful flowers aplenty. But it's rare to find a flower which will bloom so prolifically in late April and early May as the purple vine or Chinese wisteria ( Wisteria sinensis) (紫藤、 朱藤、招藤、招豆藤、藤蘿). As in so many things, the Japanese took from China certain materials or methods and by dint of constant and careful reflection, turned it into an art. If we need an example, then the art of growing the Chinese wisteria would appear a perfect one. Whilst the people in Henan, Hepei and Shandong provinces in China busy themselves with boiling and then mixing the wisteria flower with glutinous rice to turn it into "wisteria cakes", the Japanese would turn the Chinese wisteria into a visual delight. Since 1977, there has been a garden specially dedicated to the growing of this principally bluish-purple flower which hangs down in millions of strings. When they bloom together in Hanoi, Fukuoka Prefecture on northern Kyushu Island (北九州 福岡縣) the spectacle can be  breathtaking. This special hillside wisteria garden is called Kawachi Fujien 河內藤園  at the south-western part of Kyushu Island. 

Lured by a photograph of the garden, I booked a place in a photographic tour group  which held out this garden as its star attraction. This is a photo of what I found there. There were so many people who visited the same garden that I had to wait for more than an hour before I could take a few photographs with less people. During the two hours we spent there, there must have been at least 10 separate groups, including people who came all the way from South East Asia, China, various parts of Japan, France, Portugal, Spain, Italy and even some Northern Europeans. We were told by our local tour guide that the owner of the garden would charge entrance fees according to the percentage of Wisteria in full bloom. The garden covers an area of about 10,000 square meters and there are some 150 wisteria in 22 slightly different varieties. This year, the flowers started to bloom in late April but by the time we arrived, we were charged only 70% of the full admission charges. Paradoxically, this is not bad at all. The weeklong Japanese holiday ended just the day before we arrived. We were told that had we gone there a day before, all we could photograph would be people, people and more people!  

A Journey in Time .1st stop Tehran: 7 National Museum of Glass and Ceramics (時間之旅 :第一站 . 德黑蘭之七: 琉璃及瓷器博物館)

Originally built some 90 years ago by Ahmad Qavam ol-Saltaneh as his residence and office on a 7,000-CM2  garden and used by him till 1953 when this 2-storey octagonal building in mixed Iranian and 19th century European style was sold to the Egyptians as their embassy and remained such for 7 years until it was closed when Iranian-Egyptian relation turned sour during the presidency of Abdul Nasser in Egypt, when it was  sold first to the Commercial Bank and later to Farah Pahlavi in 1976 when she got some Iranian, Austrian and French architects to turn it into a museum. The building has some suspended pillars and a basement with the first floor connected to the second through wooden Russian-style steps with double windows instead of terrace and wooden doors behind the windowpanes to regulate the light and temperature and houses rare glass and ceramics dating back from the 4th millennium B.C. up to the contemporary era and especially 18th and 19th century European glass works in six halls and two entrance halls in separate sections depicting different historical eras and subjects.

Probably the contents of this glass covered trough at the entrance hall is intended as a foretaste of what we may expect from this museum in matters related to history of pottery in the desert strewn country of Iran.

A Journey in Time .1st stop Tehran: 6 Bronzeware of the Museum of Archaelogical Iran (時間之旅 :第一站 . 德黑蘭之六: 伊朗考古博物館之銅器)

Apart from the pottery and stone ware section, the museum also has a section devoted to bronze ware.

Here are some bronze spear heads found at Luristan dated late 2nd and early 1st millenium BCE. Those at the bottom seem more suited for defense than attack.

This one appears quite elaborate and seems to form the head of a ceremonial spear, more decorative than functional.

 

A double function weapon head

A Journey in Time .1st stop Tehran: 5 Stonewares and Monuments of the Museum of Archaelogical Iran (時間之旅 :第一站 . 德黑蘭之五: 伊朗考古博物館之石器及石碑)

A second section of the museum is devoted to artifacts in stone whilst a third is devoted to those involving the use of bronze. There were much less stone wares, statues or other artifacts than those related to pottery but there were columns and reliefs.

This is a chlorite vase found in Shahdad in Kerman Province and is dated 3rd millenium BCE. It's carved with what appears a woman in a dress on top and beneath her is what appears the head of  a man. What does that mean, that their society was matriarchical? According to internet sources, the Elamites were indeed a matriarchical society. If so, was it made by the proto-Elamites who were then living in the region forming part of Iran today around that time? .

A Journey in Time .1st stop Tehran: 4 Pottery at the Museum of Archaelogical Iran (時間之旅 :第一站 . 德黑蘭之四: 伊朗考古博物館之瓷器)

After visiting the Carpet Museum, we were driven to the National Museum of Iran ( Muze ye Melli ye Irān‎)  which in fact consists of two separate museums viz. the Museum of Archaeological Iran ("Muze ye Irān e Bāstān"), a Sasanian revival brick building inaugurated in 1937), and the Museum of the Islamic Era ("Muze ye Dowrān e Eslāmi", inaugurated in 1972). But in fact we only had sufficient time to see the former but not the latter. The building housing the Museum of Archaeological Iran has three halls exhibiting various artifacts and fossils from the lower, middle, and upper Paleolithic ("Lower/Early  Stone Age" 26,000 to 10,200 BCE ), the Neolithic ("New Stone Age" 10,200 to 8,800 BCE) , Chalcolithic ("Copper Age" 7000-5000 BCE), early Bronze Age (5,000-3300 BCE) [roughly equivalent to the Hemudu culture (河姆渡文化) (5000-4500 BCE) ] and late Bronze Age (3,300 to 1,300 BCE), and Iron Ages I (1,300 to 1,000 BCE ) (the Persian late Bronze Age and Iron Age I roughly straddle the Shang Dynasty(商朝) in China from 2194-1046 BCE) Iron Age II (1,000 to 600 BCE)( roughly equivalent to the period of Spring and Autumn 春秋 (771-746 BCE), Iron Age III ( 600 BCE to 500 CE ) through the Median (678 to 549 BCE), Achaemenid (550 to 330 BCE), Seleucid (312 to 63 BCE) [ Iron Age II, Iron Age III , the Median, Archaemenid  and early Seleucid dynasties are roughly equivalent to the period of Warring Nations 戰國 in China (475-221 BCE) ], Parthian (247 BCE -224 CE) and Sassanid (224-651 CE) periods.  The oldest artifacts in the museum are from Kashafrud, Darband and Ganj Par, sites that date back to the Lower Paleolithic (300,000 to 2,500,000 BCE) period. There are also Mousterian (300,000 years ago) stone tools made by Neanderthals. The most important Upper Paleolithic (50,000-10,000 years ago) tools are those from the Yafteh Cave, dating back approximately 30,000-35,000 years. There are also 9,000 year-old human and animal figurines from Sarab Hill in Kermanshah Province.
The second building  housing the Museum of the Islamic Era also has three floors and exhibits various pieces of pottery, textiles, texts, artworks, astrolabes, and adobe calligraphy from Iran's post-Islamic era .

We were told that the Museum of Archaeological Iran was designed by the French architect Andre Godard using the kind of brick laying style peculiar to Persian architecture.

and its main entrance adopts the style of Sassanid vaults, particularly the iwan of Ctesiphon, the imperial capital of the Parthian or Arsacid (247 BC – 224 CE) Empire and Sassanid Empire(224-651 CE ), the largest city in the world from 570 CE, until its fall in 637 CE during the Muslim conquests.

A full frontal view of the main entrance with its beautiful curves and arches punctuated by straight lines in the typical brownish yellow color of Persian bricks broken by some Persian calligraphic script written in gold over a band of green mosaic tiles.

A Journey in Time .1st stop Tehran: 3 Carpet Museum (時間之旅 :第一站 . 德黑蘭之三: 地毯博物館)

If anyone in Hong Kong has ever heard anything about Persia at all, I'm quite sure that it'll most likely have something to do with the famous "Persian carpets". We got a chance to look at some of the most finely crafted Persian carpets in the Carpet Museum the second morning after we arrived in Tehran. The museum in the nearby Laleh Park, is just 10 minutes away on foot from our hotel .

Before getting to the museum, we first got to pass through the Laleh Park

 

A clump of rushes at Laleh Park

 
The exterior of the Carpet Museum, completed in 1976 is deliberately built as if it formed part of a carpet loom. It's the idea of the last queen of Iran, Queen Farah Daba Pahlavi who simply loved Persian carpets. 

Tunisian Tour 14.2 BardoTunisian Tour (突尼西亞之旅14 .2 巴度博物館)

 Cont'd

The chief attraction of the Bardo Museum is not its collection of Carthaginian and Roman sculpture but its reconstitution of floor or wall tile mosaics from different ancient Carthaginian and Roman monuments and ancient archaeological sites.

  

An early  3rd century BCE mosaic found at Hadrumetum ( Sousse) in the House of Virgil, showing the famous Roman poet Virgil surrounded by two muses: Calliopse the muse for eloquence and epic poetry and Polymnia, the muse of pantomime.

A mosaic of various figures grapes, birds, ducks etc.

Tunisian Tour 14.1Tunis. Bardo Museum (突尼西亞之旅14 .1 巴度博物館)

Cont'd

After Nabeul, we're back where we first set foot on this complex country with a complicated historical past going through Greek-Phoenician, Roman-Carthaginian, Arab-Muslim, German Vandal, Hispano-Moorish, Persian-Egyptian, Turkish and French influence : Tunis.

The countryside looks quite green. 

From time to time, we even passed through some fresh green, something you rarely find in the south.

Tunisian Tour 13.2 Cap Bon. Kelibia. Kekouane. Nabeul (突尼西亞之旅13 . 好角. 加利比亞. 蓋赫庫阿勒. 那布爾)

 Cont'd 

There was a slight change of tour itinerary the day we went to Sousse, such that instead of going there first, we we were taken to first to Kelibia, and then to Kerkouane and only then to Sousse. It didn't matter much but I have never been to any of those places. Kelibia used to be a fortified sea port with a fortress on the hill guarding the harbor . However, we weren't given any time to go up there.

This is the famous fortress overlooking the Kelibia harbor. It had just been renovated. But we did not have time to visit it.

Tunisian Tour 13.1 Cap Bon.Kelibia.Kekouane.Nabeul (突尼西亞之旅13 .1 . 好角. 加利比亞. 蓋赫庫阿勒. 那布爾)

Cont'd

After a night's rest, we were on our way again, heading for the point nearest to Italy, the tip of Cap Bon Peninsula in the Nabeul Governorate in the far northeastern part of Tunisia. We were told that our first stop would be Kelibia, a fishing port with a population of slightly more than 40,000 and home to Tunisia's National Fishing School. The beaches around it are considered some of the finest of the Mediterranean Sea. Kelibia was founded by the Carthaginians as the fortified town of Aspis in the 5th century BC.It's famous for its recently restored Kelibia Fort on a hill overlooking the harbor and its fruity Muscat white wine, considered by some as the best in Tunisia.

We passed through the main streets of a number of small towns. The side of such streets are studded with all kinds of stalls: folksy ladies fashion. Looks a bit like ladies street in Hong Kong except that it's much less crowded and is in a much more pleasant setting and the style of the garments sold. Perhaps a bit like those in some rural towns in India without their dusts? 

Tunisian Tour 12 Sousse (突尼西亞之旅12 . 蘇斯古城)

Cont'd

After Kairouan, we went on to Sousse, another old town on the UNESCO's world heritage site list. Since Souses is a seaside town, the road we took stuck fairly closely to the Mediterranean coast, richer in rainfall.

 For the first time, I found some grazing sheep, some cows and some goats

and lots of market gardening land. Whilst farmers elsewhere separate their fields with earth mounds and trees, in Tunisia, they do so by planting cactus!

Tunisian Tour 11 The Great Basins and the Great Mosque of Kairouan (突尼西亞之旅11. 大池與大廟)

Cont'd 

I was lucky. The following day was a bright and sunny day. We visited three points of interest. The first was the site of the two reservoirs built in the 9th century by the Aghafid governors of Kairouan to solve the city's problem for the supply of fresh water..  

 This is the first reservoir that now remains. Originally, there were 15.

Tunisian Tour 10 - Kairouan (突尼西亞之旅.10--開羅安)

Cont'd

After our buffet breakfast of bread, croissant, fruit juice, hams, sausages, yogarts, cheeses and tea or coffee, we were off again to another historic city, Kairouan  (irwan or al-Qayrawan), capital of the Kairouan Governorate and its cultural capital, It's a city founded by the Arabs around 670 CE during the reign of Caliph Mu'awiya (who was caliph 661-680 CE ). It's a UNESCO World Heritage site. It's famous because of its great mosque Sidi-Uqba which became an important centre for Islamic and Quranic learning and ranks only next to Mecca and Medina in Islamic culture. 

But first we had to drive through lots of other little towns and villages

Tunisian Tour. 9 - Sbeitla (突尼西亞之旅.9--斯貝特拉)

Cont'd

The following morning, we were taken to another Roman ruins in Sbeitla, a small town 264 km north-central of Tunis, quite close to the Roman ruins of Sufetula,with the best preserved Forum temples in Tunisia. It was the entry point of the Muslim conquest of North Africa and southern Europe. There are still some Punic megaliths and funeral stela there.Sbeitla was first occupied by the nomadic Berber tribes until the Roman Emperor Legio III Augusta established a camp at Ammaedara but it only came under complete Roman control between 67 to 69 CE during the reign of Emperor Vespasian. During the 2nd century, it grew quite prosperous from its olive oil production facilities. Some olive presses could still be seen in the ruins there. However its suffered serious setbacks from the Vandal invasios during the late Roman Empire period, as evidenced by temples dedicated to Germanic gods. But with the arrival of the Byzantines, recovered its prosperity. In 647, it came under Muslim control when Rashidun Caliphate governor of Egypt Abdullah ibn Saad defeated Gregory the Patrician.

A small town we passed through on our way

Tunisian Tour. 8 - Tozeur. (突尼西亞之旅.8--吐澤.)

Cont'd 

After our visit of three mountain oases, we were taken to Tozeur (Tawzar  or in  Latin Thusuros) in the south-west of Tunisia, on the edge of the Sahara Desert, an oasis town famous for its palm dates and for that reason, it's sometimes called Jarīd (meaning Palm). Situated north-west of Chotts of El-Jarid (Al-Jarīd) and the smaller Al-Rharsah (Al-Gharsah) and popularly described as "the gate of the desert", it was an important Numidian town on the ancient caravan routes between Vescra (now Biskra, Algeria) and Tacapae (now Gabès [Qābis] and the current capital of the Tozeur Governorate and was already settled in Roman times before its conquest by Amazigh (Berber) tribes after which it stayed a quasi-independent area until the rise of Ḥafṣid rule in the late Middle Ages. In the 14th century it was an active marketplace. Now the town relies more and more on tourism and every year, between November and December, an "International Festival of Oases" would be held there.  It used to have an extensive system of open surface irrigation canals first developed by the Arabs in the 13th century but now it is used less and less because the water there has  been artificially pumped off, leading to the decay of many old oases around the city. The city was the birthplace of a famous Tunisian poet called Aboul-Qacem Echebbi (Arabic: أبو القاسم الشابي‎) (1909-1934) whose elegant and powerful words have been used in the current  Tunisian national anthem.

Entering Tozeur

 The Habib Bourghiba Avenue of Tozeur, its main street