Oyamazumi Shrine - Part 1

International Exchange Bus Tour 2007


I think I mentioned before that we will join this trip on 11th Nov. ;)


We got up as early as 6.45am to prepare for our 'bento'. Rushing indeed but managede to be at the assembly point in time. There were 9 buses all together bringing like 300 international students with their family members. The first abnormal matter is that we don't even need to report our attendance and they didn't even check if we are one of the participants before we hop on to the bus.

We simply chose a bus but it was full already, and it is obvious that all are Malays. Oooohh. That's a lot of Malays in this uni. The second bus was quite empty when we get on it. But after a while a whole group of China people joined in.

Though Japanese are punctual, not the foreigners. Though the gathering time is preset to be 8.30am, but still there were still people coming slowly after 8.30am taking their sweet time. We waited for about 30 minutes for the late comers, then off we go!



It didn't take me long for the 2nd weird thing: the pretty tour guide started to explain instructions and delivering informations about our trip, and guess what --- it's totally in Japanese. We looked at each other and no one actually knows what she was bluffing about. Since this is an International Exchange Trip, it is expected that the tour guide should explain in English. One of the China man is expert in Japanese already, he translated the info to his fellow friends. I'm really grateful that I'm a Chinese and understand Chinese. ;p Only then we were asked to take attendance on the name list and each was given a batch to identify which bus we are on. Ours is a green one.


I have this habit of sleeping on all sorts of transportations regardless airplanes, cars or trains. So, as usual I slept almost all the way. Before we reach our first destination -- Oyamazumi Shrine 大山祗神社，which is located at Omishima 大三岛, we actually crossed bridges, One of them is Tatara-Ohashi Bridge. The 1,480m-long bridge is the world's longest cable-stayed bridge.



Views along the way is really impressive, as we were travelling along the beach! The sight of brilliant blue sea, the boats, the bridges... Too bad we can't take much photos of them.


We were taking the highway to reach Omishima, and the tollS paid is really costly, got 3000 over yen, 5000 over yen. But we don't need to pay any, feel soooooo good~ ;D

After about 1 and half hour finally we were there. Given about 2 hours time we moved towards the shrine following the crowd. Actually before going we know nothing about this shrine, but we got the pamplet introducing on Oyamazumi Shrine and so let me do a little bit of story telling first...


Oyamazumi Shrine is the main shrine (Gohonden), also called a treasure shrine, is constructed on 1427. Oyamazumi Shrine is famous for the guardian deity of mountains and marine transportation. Omishima boasts the highest number of weapons designated as national treasures or important cultural properties, and the National Treasure Hall is regarded as the number one in Japan for these collections.



Torii & Komainu
One or more torii gates mark the approach and entrance to a shrine. Believers respect animals as messengers of the Gods. Komainu are a pair of guardian dogs or lions, often found on each side of a shrine's entrance. In this case, it's a pair of lions, which is very similar to Chinese tradition.

Purification fountain
Found near the entrance, the water of these fountains is used for purification. You are supposed to clean your hands and mouth before approaching the main hall. But for this one its quite a distance from the entrance. After the torii gate there's about 100m to the Purification fountain.



Main and offering hall
Depending on the shrine's architecture style, the main hall (honden) and offering hall (haiden) are two separate buildings or combined into one building. The main hall's innermost chamber contains the shrine's sacred object, while visitors make their prayers and offerings at the offering hall.

At the offering hall, visitors will throw a coin into the offering box, bow deeply twice, clap hands twice, bow deeply once more and pray for a few seconds.

Ema
Shrine visitors write their wishes on these wooden plates and then leave them at the shrine in the hope that their wishes come true. Most people wish for good health, success in business, passing entrance exams, love or wealth.



Omikuji
Omikuji are fortune telling paper slips found at many shrines and temples. It is sold at 100 yen per piece. Randomly drawn, they contain predictions ranging from daikichi ("great good luck") to daikyo ("great bad luck"). By tying the piece of paper around a tree's branch, good fortune will come true or bad fortune can be averted.

Shimenawa
A shimenawa is a straw rope with white zigzag paper strips (gohei). It marks the boundary to something sacred and can be found on torii gates, around sacred trees and stones, etc.

御守
This is the charm for protection. Different charm offers different protection. See the red charm? It's for the pregnant mothers, to protect them on safe pregnancy and delivery.