The city of Kurashiki, in Okayama Prefecture, was once a bustling trade town during the Edo period. The traditional buildings, concentrated along the willow-lined Kurashiki River, have been preserved in…
Okayama is best known as the home of Momotaro, a beloved folktale about a boy born from a peach. But the prefecture is also the birthplace of Japanese denim. In…
Covered in black clapboards, Okayama Castle is known as Ujo, or “crow castle.” Fittingly, it sits atop one of three hills overlooking the Asahi river. Perhaps even more fittingly, it…
While browsing Google Maps one day, as my cartophilia has me do, a particular site in the area caught my eye. Mostly because I mistook it for my own name…
For someone who grew up with only two seasons (kak hot and a little chilly, respectively), autumn and spring are still a novelty for me. If I had to choose…
In September 2015, after visiting Miyajima in Hiroshima, I wrote about the island’s starving deer population. Just over nine years later, in November 2024, I went back to see what…
In the heart of Yamaguchi lies the city of Mine. With a population of just over 20,000, it’s one of the more rural areas of the prefecture. But what it…
Across the street from the Genbaku Dome in Hiroshima stands the 14-floor Orizuru Tower. It’s known for its specialty souvenir store and organic café, which you can easily access from…
The original Hiroshima Castle, built in the 1590s, was older than the city itself. But like most buildings, it was largely destroyed by the atomic bomb in 1945. The castle…
I was lucky enough to visit Hiroshima’s Peace Park once before in 2015. That year was the 70th anniversary of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings. I remember seeing the Genbaku…
As some of the first flowers to open each year in Japan, plum blossoms signal the start of spring. They may not be as popular as cherry blossoms, but they’re…