Maybe it was the way the light shined through the trees, or the little bits of brightly colored ornate porcelain that was cemented into the streets, or the fact that this was the first time on this trip that my tiger twin, Shaina and I, shared an early morning adventure together, but there was really something quite special about this journey. Knowing that the things we reject are sometimes the things we need the most, I’m not sure why the towns of Arita and Imari were so far down on my list of places to see. I remember when I was given a pamphlet about Imari and Arita here in Japan about a month ago. My initial reaction was, “I’m not going there.” At the time, I was looking for old villages, nature, and onsen (hot spring baths), along with saving my energy for getting through 2 months of many shows. Now that I’m on the downward slope, my adventure bug got a bit more triggered and I began looking around for local cities I could visit that are within an hour to an hour and a half, making it possible to have adventures on working days. In my search, I came across Imari and Arita, both which are within an hour’s reach of Haenosaki. Something about what I was reading triggered my curiosity this time, and so I asked my Tiger Twin late one night after the completion of our 7th show in one day, if she was interested in getting up in the morning before dawn to go to Imari and Arita with me, to which she said yes. Therefore, we rose before the sun headed toward Imari, our first stop.
Imari is a small town. We arrived at 8:20am and not much was open in town, however upon arrival just out of the train station we were immediately greeted with a large statue made of pieces of porcelain and another quite odd scene here in Japan, a bench full of trash. I’m not sure if it was actually litter or some type of artistic offering to the porcelain God, as here in Japan, to date, I’ve seen relatively no litter anywhere. Shaina and I stood there for a moment perplexed, taking in the morning scene, and kind of wondering where we should go, when we noticed a street just across the way that looked like a gated entrance into another world as it had two quite large porcelain Goddess statues on each side of the street. Following the artistic flow, we ventured passed the entrance gate into what became quite a magical day and another world indeed. There is a canal that runs through Imari and several bridges that connect one side to the other and is surrounded by steep, green tree mountains that come to a perfect point. There are a few little stores, yet other than that, there really isn’t a lot on the surface here. I sensed it was the magic that lurked beneath the surface that makes Imari a special place to visit. On every bridge, on both sides of the street, as well as both sides of the bridge are large, beautiful, fully intact, porcelain vases, urns, and figurines. The canal waters were like glass and with barely any people around, there was a mysterious presence looming in the morning light.
Imari and Arita are the birthplaces of porcelain here in Japan. Both cities have very old histories and are world famous for their porcelain. In Imari, the canal was used to transport porcelain to other places yet now appeared to be a special place for the local ducks to enjoy. Porcelain was everywhere. It was etched into the walls, the sidewalks, the street signs, and we even found a city map with suggested tourist spots also made out of porcelain. We ventured over each of the bridges, then made our way guided by the first site of cherry or plum blossoms blooming on a mountain ahead with the hope of catching a glimpse at the first sign of spring. However instead of finding the Cherry Blossom trees, we found a delightful canal side temple that rose up some of the steepest, green mossy steps I’ve ever walked up toward a Temple nestled in the trees. There were several dragon headed, ornate, porcelain lined, cleansing fountains to mark the entrance and the sound of an owl coughing up something it had apparently eaten. Inside the temple we were honored to have been welcomed for a short time to witness a Buddhist funeral ritual where the transference of consciousness ceremony was taking place.
From the temple we decided to head back to the train to catch the next train to Arita. Arita is about 30 minutes from Imari on a delightful ride through the countryside. Arita was bright and the light hit me upon arrival like a lightning bolt. We were offered gifts at the train station and within 5 minutes of walking out of the train station, an Australian womyn with a Japanese male partner approached us to ask us how we found out about Arita. She informed us that Arita is a creative, artist town, and that she and her partner are going to be creating some artist studios there, she was curious if we lived in the area. After she pointed us in the direction toward the older part of town, we began a 2 mile walk up an old village street lined with more porcelain shops than I’ve ever seen toward the Izumiyama Quarry which was the very site of the birthplace of Japanese Porcelain. A 17th century potter found a Kaolin stone and made white porcelain for the first time. The porcelain was everywhere and was intricate, bright, colorful, and full of amazing design work. We got so immersed in the experience of each other’s company, the artistic and bright scene, as well as the adventure to the navel of Japanese porcelain, that we lost track of time and realized that we had a train to catch in 30 minutes and at least an hour’s walk ahead of us. Taxi it was. A nice lady in a porcelain pottery store helped us communicate to the taxi company where we were and within 10 minutes we were on our way to the train station, making it back for another day of 7 shows. It did make for a long day, however, it was well worth it and I feel inspired in some deep place in my being. I’m equally grateful to my tiger twin for her company and these months of dancing daily with each other. I wonder if it’s normal for two tigers to get along so well, maybe it’s the fact we are literally 23.5 apart in age, same year, same month. At times the similarities kind of weird us out, we are both yoga teachers who have studied with the same yoga teachers, we both fire dance professionally, we are about the same height, same hair color, we hold the same monetary denominations at the same time in the same hand, and even have developed the same ingrown hair in the same spot. People think we are related and before we came our work visas were even transposed causing us a delay in getting our visas. At the root of the connection, is Erin, who I equally have to thank for again connecting me to another amazing being in this universe. May the love continue to blossom like the Cherry’s and Plums that we will soon see.
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