MImuroto-ji and fireworks
I happened to know yesterday that Uji Fireworks Display this year was going to be the next day.Oh, I have to see it, because this summer I haven't seen any fireworks yet!!
So today I went to Uji city, south of Kyoto. Before the fireworks display began, I made a short visit to Mimuroto-ji Temple (ji means temple) near the venue of the display in the same city.
the main gate
This temple is famous for beautiful flowers in its precincts. For example, hydrangeas in rainy season of June and July; around this time, lotus flowers are pretty, I've heard.
Oh sure, so beautiful! Not only flowers but buds as well.
I didn't know a lotus flower is big and gives out a faint fragrance, along with kind of "mysterious" atmosphere around it.
a stone lantern near the entrance of the precincts
I left the temple and took the train to the next Uji Station, the closest one to the display venue, the riverside of Uji River.
At Uji, however, I was just stunned: entrance of the station as well as the station square was filled with crowds and crowds of people, with police officers shouting out, "This place is filled up! Go back to the direction of Mimurodo Station (near the Mimuroto-ji) !! You can see fireworks from there too!"
...... OK! Got to go back now! :(
The bank near Mimurodo Station was not so crowded. I sat down in an open space on the bank to get my 'territory' there, and waited for the fireworks more than two hours, reading a magazine.
And at last, it began!!
Fireworks displays are one of the typical summer features in Japan; every year people look forward to seeing one.
I nearly missed this one, so now I'm very glad to be able to catch it. It was a good day today.
posted by asta @ 11:58 PM
2 Comments:
AWESOME! I love lotus - haven't the seen the flower in real though... We have fireworks in Switzerland as well. Mainly to celebrate our national day on 1st August but also on some other occasion. This year f.e. there were some really special ones at a lakeside party on the lake of Zurich (not in Zurich though). They even did the fireworks together with some music. So the fireworks were supposed to characterize the music or vis versa. I even kind of like the idea of that!;)
Oh, you love lotus? I carried another big photos of flowers on my Japanese blog... they're on the post dated August 10th. Enter the top page of that blog, click what appears to be the post title in lightgreen color(sorry all written in Japanese), and I hope you'll manage to find them... ;);)
Fireworks and music... sounds interesting and artistic! They should present so magnificent a view and atmosphere.
In Japan, we tend to enjoy the shapes fireworks make; recently more and more unique shapes have been coming up.
What do you think is the second one from the bottom on this post? It's supposed to be a "phoenix!" The bottom one is crysanthemums, I guess.
(I put another photos, and movies, on Aug.23 post of my Japanese blog)
Not only this big sky-rocket ones but also more causal, hand-held types of fireworks are popular in Japan. Here, summer always is bound up to fireworks :)
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