General Nogi Shrine and the Atago Shrine Legend

Jan. 31st--Today, we had plans to visit two shrines.  These shrines both have stories attached to them. 

The first one was the Nogi Shrine, dedicated to General Maresuke Nogi and his wife Shizuko.  Nogi Shrine is one of the three shrines most associated with the advancement of Japan from a closed feudal society to a modern industrial nation in the late 19th century. 

 

It's the end of January, and the plum blossoms are coming out! 

Upon entering the shrine, we washed to be clean before entering....(Caitlin helping Audra)

...only to come upon a wedding that was just ending.  The wedding party was walking out as we finished washing.

It was fun to see how the Japanese people dress for their weddings.  The men were all in suits, and the women were in kimonos.  

The groom was wearing a ceremonial black kimono, and the bride was beautiful in her light-colored kimono.  Her kimono was covered in pastel flowers, but the brightness of the sun made it so I couldn't get a good picture.  It was her wedding day, though, so I think it appropriate that she was glowing on her special day!

Because the wedding party was taking pictures, we didn't go up to the temple, but instead went up these stairs to a smaller shrine to pay our tributes to General Nogi.

General Nogi was born in 1849 to a samurai family. Being born into a samurai family meant that Nogi was destined to become a warrior and in 1871 he was appointed a major in the new Imperial army that took over from the Shogunate army after the 1866 restoration of the emperor Meiji.

In 1904 he led the Japanese army to battle against Imperial Russia where he became a national hero after the siege of the Lushun fortress in Port Arthur (then Russia, now China). The siege lasted from July 1904 to January 1905.  It is hard to calculate the number of people killed but it was probably many tens of thousands.

General Nogi came back a hero, being responsible for the first victory of an Asian country against a modern European empire with the use of modern technology and warfare. He lost his two sons in the battle though, and felt enormously responsible regarding the huge loss of life that came as a result of the siege. 

To atone for the many soldiers killed, he asked the emperor for the right to commit suicide. Famously, the emperor forbade him: “Not until I have left this world”.  General Nogi then spent two years touring Japan to show his grief to the many families who has lost family members in the war, and he invented an artificial arm for amputated soldiers.

As a part of our visit to this shrine, we visited General Nogi's and his wife's garden.

His home is also on the property.  It is not a traditional Japanese-style home, but instead is built much like the French army buildings that impressed Nogi while he was studying in Germany. 
In 1912, Emperor Meiji died and on the day of the funeral General Nogi and his wife committed seppuku (suicide) in this home.  Suicide in Japan is not viewed like it is in the Western part of the world.  They performed this act as a sign of honor and loyalty to the emperor as well as to show their remorse for the great loss of life during the general's greatest battle.

The general's stable was also on the premises.

There were some photographs of General Nogi, as well as his wife.  They are contained in this glass display that had a roof built over it.  The weather and sun are still doing damage to these photographs, however.

We left the Nogi Shrine and grabbed some lunch at a restaurant before getting on the metro to go to the Atago Shrine.  As we were walking, we came upon this Buddhist temple.  The kids wanted to explore it, so in we went.  There was no one around and the temple was locked up.

This temple was an interesting find, however, because it had many unique things to view.  There was a stream that had been built to flow in front of the temple.

At one end of the stream was this depiction of Buddha as a child.

The other end of the stream featured this dragon spewing out water.

And, there were more plum blossoms.

As we wandered up some stairs, we found this large statue.

Then, we followed some more stairs....

....to an area where there were several little Buddha statues depicting his life.

It is interesting to note that most Buddhist temple gates contain these menacing looking statues on either side.  They look to be guarding the temple property.  They vary depending on the temple, but they will always look ferocious and have some type of weapon.

They will also usually be stepping on a demon of some kind, such as this:

Or this:

We enjoyed getting distracted at this temple and seeing the unique statues and landscaping.  Next, Atago Shrine:  "Tokyo's Stairway to Heaven".

Atago Shrine was built in 1603 by order of shogun Tokugawa Ieyasu. It was the highest point in the old city and also served as a fire lookout.  Legend has it that a young 17th-century samurai rode his horse straight up the steps to deliver a plum blossom branch to the shogun.
Samurai were touchy-feely about things like flowers when they weren't slicing and dicing each other and the odd peasant, you see.
The shogun was so impressed that the young man’s future was assured. No mention of what became of the horse that actually did all the work, or how the horse even got down.

The legend sparked superstition about the staircase. It's known as Shussei no Ishiden ("Stone Staircase of Success"). It's thought that climbing the staircase and praying at the shrine can bring success in life. This attracts a steady flow of business people seeking good fortune in their career.  It is also a place that Japanese people will come to if they are graduating from college or at some other type of crossroad in their life.
Everyone but Caitlin (she didn't want to climb them and there was an elevator available, so she took the stroller and Audra up) and the two littles climbed the stairs....we had heard a rumor that you have to climb them without stopping or you won't have the success that these stairs are supposed to bring into your life.  We couldn't confirm that in the legend, but we didn't stop to rest just to be safe. 

There were 100 stone steps in total and they were STEEP.  We all made it though, without stopping.

 There was an ornate and small gate at the top of the steps leading into the shrine.

The area at the top of the hill was small but beautiful.

Most of it was covered by this pond full of koi fish.

Amazing attention to detail.

There was a cut-out as well, of course.  The Japanese seem to really like these things.  This picture features Tayla as the amazing horse, Christopher as the samurai.

 Then we have Nathan as the horse and Logan as the samurai.

 

It was fun to climb these steps after learning the history and legend associated with them.  Time will tell on whether or not we will have success from it!  :-)

 



 Here's what the kids thought about the day:
Caitlin:  It was kind of fun being the photographer for the day.  The statues were strange.  I don't think that the Atago legend is true, I think his horse would have died.  That's pretty pathetic just for plum blossoms. 
Tayla:  The Nogi Shrine was really pretty and I liked the torii gates.  I think the wedding we saw there was cool.  The Atago Shrine was really cool--I liked all the steps going up.  The gardens were really pretty.  The stairs were my favorite part of the day. 
Christopher:  I really liked this day.  I really liked the red torii gates leading up to the mini shrine at the Nogi Shrine.  I really liked the wedding, I thought it was neat.  His house was kind of neat to see, and the pictures were kind of nice to see.  The man himself, in real pictures.  I liked the stables because they were old.  I really enjoyed this little garden that he had with bamboo trees.  There were also cats in it.  For lunch, I had miso soup, 12 gyoza, rice, two pieces of chicken, cabbage, and water.  It was really cold when we left the restaurant.  When we got to the Atago Shrine, the first stairs that we took, I only counted 64 steps.  They weren't the real steps, and when we got up there, I started to explore.  I realized the actual stairs that the samurai came up were in front of me.  I went down and they were really, really steep.  I felt like I was going to fall forward.  Then, I went back up.  Normally, when I go down stairs, it's really nice compared to going up stairs.  But, with these steps, it was easier to go up than down because they were so steep.  I liked the torii gates that they had there in front of the mini shrines.  I really enjoyed the little pond there because it was full of fish.  It was fun to look for the black fish. 
Logan:  It was cool to be where a samurai rode his horse.  It was cool to see the general's house and stable and to see the wedding. 
Nathan:  Good.  The stairs were scary because they were steep.  I got up them by being brave and holding onto the chain.  Lunch was yummy, yummy in my tummy.  I had chicken nugget things, plain rice, and gyoza.