As I was writing a few days ago, I attended a couple of times to the New Year’s Japanese traditions, starting with the Joya no Kane and continuing with the Hatsumode. But the most special experience was to follow, like many Japanese people, a 7 Lucky Gods New Year’s pilgrimage.
There are many versions of this pilgrimage in Japan, only in Tokyo I know of 20 such routes: groups of Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples from the same neighborhood, each dedicated to at least one of the Lucky Gods, are grouped together in a single route. Visiting all of them can take a couple of hours or more and sometimes it can be quite tricky to find all the locations, even though the area is often marked with especially made maps.
But it is a very rewarding experience if you want to feel the local touch…
Here is a photo taken at one of the temples from the most famous pilgrimage route in Tokyo, the one in Asakusa. The temple is called Hashiba Fudo-in and it is dedicated to Hotei. You can see in front of the temple votive plaques with the 7 Lucky Gods and to the left of the photo you can also see the dedicated map…
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Yesterday’s Japan Photo:Demon-breaking arrow, Hamaya |
