by Josko Kozic

Hello to all from the hot and humid Yabu Valley, located in Hyogo Prefecture. Almost a year has passed since my last post in this beautiful blog, and this time I am happy to share with you my latest report of an outreach in the field.

As a doctoral student in religious studies, I am researching contemporary mountain worship and ascetic training (called shugendō) with a focus on rural areas off the beaten path. This time I would like to introduce you to a very unusual priest I met while visiting Hyogo Prefecture, a priest who lives and serves for both spiritual concerns and everyday life.

I don’t usually discuss or even mention the pandemic in my research, as my topic is different, but more and more I realized how much of an impact this topic had on both my research conditions and the content itself. Unfortunately, as the number of infections in Japan continues to rise, many important events and gatherings at temples and sacred sites are being cancelled one after another. So being in Japan does not necessarily mean automatically being “on the ground” and able to conduct participant observations, as one might think. 

In these hesitant times, however, I came across a beautiful Buddhist temple on the sacred Mt. Myōken in the small, lush green town of Yabu. After enjoying the quiet and solemn atmosphere of the place, a relatively young priest came by to greet me warmly and show me the temple’s main shrines, including rare Buddhist statues. It was Dr. Morita Ryushin[1], who serves both as the temple’s head priest and as the director of the local Nikko clinic in the town of Yabu, from where he provides community-level medical care. After I introduced myself to Dr. (or priest) Morita and had a good conversation for the first time, we knew we wanted to meet again. However, it took another year before we finally met again during the current season of O-bon, the prayerful and devotional festival of the dead. During this time, many people return to their (often rural) hometowns to spend time with their families.

Dr. Morita cares daily for patients struggling with corona infections and other illnesses, and says that even during the O-bon festival, he is now unable to receive his community members and even his own family. His gentle way of caring for his hometown and its residents, both as a doctor and as a Buddhist priest, makes him special to me in many ways. That’s why I appreciate his kind invitation from the day before even more. During our conversation, he also told me how much the succession of a Buddhist temple is declining in the countryside, and that temples in his childhood were usually seen as the center of a local community.

The study of Japanese religions can be so diverse, both in terms of topics and approaches. Many international scholars have recently been conducting research on current and important topics such as the looting of ancient Buddhist statues in rural temples and the handling (or recycling) of valuable shrines in rural temples. The importance and diversity of religious institutions, actors, and activities as vehicles of local community can be explored from many different angles, making it a fascinating research topic.

Josko Kozic (MA) moved to Japan five years ago after graduating in Japanese & Southeast Asian Studies at Goethe University in his hometown Frankfurt. He currently resides in Yokohama while working on his PhD thesis about contemporary Shugendo (a Japanese religious tradition). He is affiliated with the faculty of Religious studies at Heidelberg University.

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[1]
There is a short documentary in Japanese, introducing Dr. Morita: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2lODJjgajRU

by Maritchu Durand

When the summer heat strikes the concrete of the city, we all look for a way to cool off, physically and mentally. Unlike Lynn, who’s strategy to find some freshness is to picture snowy landscapes, I tend to look for a cool and shady spot in the park or near a lake, with a good book to help me through the heat waves. This time, I took on a Japanese book that had been lying in my bookshelf for some time now: Kamusari Nānā Nichijō by Miura Shion [1].

Yūki is a young man from Tokyo who just graduated high school. Having no plans whatsoever of going to college or looking for a fulltime job after school, he gets forced by his mother and teacher to join a government program training young Japanese in the lumber industry. He is transferred to the village of Kamusari in the mountainous countryside, where he will spend a year as an intern for the lumber industry. After a day long journey on local trains, he arrives at a place with no phone reception that is full of insects and locals with a thick accent. After getting basic training, he is sent to the historical center of Kamusari at the foot of the mountains, where he will work for Seiichi-san, the village head who owns most of the woodland in the area.

Throughout the book, I followed Yūki’s journey learning all about the art and tradition of the lumber industry. He is accompanied by his friendly team members: the boasting, loud and impulsive Yoki, a young man with bleached hair living with his wife and grandmother with whom Yūki moves in; the serious and calm team leader Seiichi-san; and the two other members with thick Kamusari dialects Iwao-san and Saburo-san. The word ‘nā nā’ being the most prominent expression of the local dialect, of which Yūki will learn the different meanings throughout his stay. For example, why it might describe a slow and peaceful way of living, it can also mean ‘this is really serious’.

Kamusari Nānā Nichijō is not only about the hard work of Japanese lumberjacks in the cool shadows of the high rising suki over the mountain peaks. It is also a journey alongside a young man who learns about rejection, ostracization and finally acceptance by the locals, about traditions, peculiar festivals and beliefs, about life in a small, close and rather remote community.

While the novel does not make a pass on the unavoidable love story and the exaggerated rough representation of the rural community, the portrayal of the omnipresent nature that almost becomes a character in itself, the likeable characters and the persevering Yūki made me want to be part of this community although it is threatened by the problems we all know: outmigration, an aging population and a low birthrate.

At first, this very romanticized and caricatural portrayal of rural Japan first made me think: yet another representation of furusato. But reading on, I got attached to the characters and caught myself daydreaming about climbing on the high trees and looking over the morning mists of the mountains of Kamusari. I realized how powerful a novel can be and how much potential it carries. No wonder this book was turned into a movie[1] two years later. Although the plot has been slightly modified, the message remains the same: it is a strong promotion of life in the countryside and gives a positive image of a rural community in Japan. For Yūki who was lost in the big city without strong connections or attachments, finding a home and a family in rural Japan made him grow and find some sense in his life, entering adulthood.

I will avoid spoilers and will not say if Yūki will decide to stay or not after one year in Kamusari. On a last note, however, when reading the credits at the end of the movie, I was surprised to see that special thanks were addressed to the MAFF, the Ministry of Forestry and Agriculture. Beyond concrete political measures and schemes to promote urban-rural migration, I can understand why this type of media is considered by the ministry as a great addition to its efforts to attract young people to rural Japan.

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References

[1]
Miura, Shion (2012): Kamusari Nānā Nichijō [the ‘nana’ daily life in Kamusari], Tokuma Shoten.

[2]
Yaguchi, Shinobu (director) (2014): Wood Job! [Film], Japan: Toho.