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Wednesday, June 1, 2011

Japan Trip, Incl Tsunami Damage


With Kayaki-Sensei and his Tendai Horyu Shugendo disciples




























The purify-by-water place, commonly located just inside the gate at most shrines in Japan. This one is Sekizan.










Tendai Shugendo perform annual Saito Goma on the courtyard of the Kompon Chudo, Mt Hiei.















Ryoyu (Ishikawa), 31 years old, has been serving at Sekizan in Kyoto the past 5 years, while his father ran the temple on the coast near Sendai. The temple, Manpo-en, was entirely swept away in the Tsunami of March11. Ryoyu visited the scene with his father and uncle about a month later and took these photos. The Tendai Journal interviewed the father who described being several miles away from the temple, just by chance, when the tsunami struck. Ryoyu says the height of the tsunami was measured at 17 meters (55ft). The father received a frantic phone call from his sister: "Brother! A tsunami is carrying me away in the car! Water is coming in! It's Cold! I'm flowing away!" Then the phone went dead. And her body washed up about a month later. His mother who was at the temple was never found.