As an amateur historian, I always love a good enigma, and in Japan, we don’t have dozens, not even hundreds; we have an infinity.   The English language can be limited and is mostly straight to the point; in stark contrast, Japanese Kanji writing often holds secrets, hidden meanings, and clues that about 97% of the Japanese population lack the interest to investigate.  The lack of interest in exploring historically significant events and treasure hunting extends beyond the borders of Japan and is a global phenomenon.  In general, the armchair adventurer’s introduction is via the History Channel, Discovery Channel, or a NatGeo history special, but they quickly forget and wait for the next historical tidbit to be featured.  A television has not been a fixture in my home since my teenage years, and I’ve always been intellectually curious about truths; and love expeditions, especially when the area is a repository of literature, historical treasures, and a spiritual guardian protected power vortex.  “You can always count me in on that type of adventure, or wildlife adventures, such as my annual Hokkaido photography workshop tour.”  Ancient traditional Japanese Kanji characters can be mind-boggling to understand, and there are said to be more than 50,000.  In Japanese education, there are roughly 2,000 characters that are taught in compulsory education.  University professors and well-read people can recognize about 5,500.  The remaining 45,000+ Japanese Kanji characters are where Shinto priests, Buddhist monks, historians, and linguists are needed to interpret the potential meanings.

While researching in Nikko, I came across documentation related to a priest accepting a Masamune sword from the 1940s, which synced with the timeline of the Honjo Masamune sword, but once the resident priests saw the head priest had entered the study with me and documents on display, the priest quickly shuffled the sword related documents underneath the original blueprints for the building of the Toshogu main shrine, and the priest quietly uttered, “Return when the head priest isn’t here.” With a knowing nod from him, I exited the study, snapped a few more photos around the temple, and rejoined my team in the main hall to take our leave.  There are treasures that carry certain symbols, just like the Japanese language itself, to be discovered in Nikko, and I look forward to my next opportunity to dig deeper into the legendary Japanese samurai sword once social distancing has subsided.  This is one of the reasons I start my days in Nikko in the blue hour because I need to be at specific samurai-commissioned structures as the sun touches them, as some are rumored to possibly be functioning as a cipher to interpret historical messages left by individuals who belong to the samurai elite. These men were in charge of constructing these UNESCO World Heritage temples, shrines, historical monuments, torii gates in Nikko and Japan.  It’s nice to have friends who are willing to provide me access to national treasures such as paintings, scrolls, Shinto/Buddhist artifacts, samurai-constructed blueprints, and others.  The kanji on some of the older pieces of text takes so much time and effort to accurately translate that I sometimes have to wait a month or even longer for a sentence of the text.  Most of the time, I find myself at the entrance of a rabbit hole, but I love the chase, and I’ll continue to do it.

Recently, I came across an article in the Asahi Shimbun titled, “Original letter from warlord Hideyoshi Toyotomi found in Kyoto” by the staff writer Yukiko Kitamura.  I immediately took issue with the characterization of Hideyoshi Toyotomi.  He was the most powerful person in Japan during the Azuchi-Momoyama period (1574-1600) and held the title Taiko, or prime minister, of Japan.  He was bestowed the title Taiko by the emperor when he unified Japan.  He was not given the title shogun because of his family lineage.  That is why the Battle of Sekigahara occurred on October 21, 1600.  If the emperor had bestowed Hideyoshi Toyotomi, the title shogun, his family would have been in full control of Japan for years to come, as was the Tokugawa bakufu.  One of the more significant disagreements I had related to Japanese history, specifically samurai and Hideyoshi Toyotomi, was when I was on a scouting trip at Tsuruga-jo (Aizu castle) in Fukushima prefecture.  While I was there, I picked up some of the English print pamphlets while walking the castle grounds.  I sat down to enjoy some tea and read the pamphlets as a diversion.  My eyes were immediately drawn to the following words written in the pamphlet, “Hideyoshi Toyotomi - the shogun,” a mistake so egregious I had to correct it immediately.  Just as I finished reading about Hideyoshi Toyotomi in their pamphlet, one of their tour guides strolled by with a client, and I politely asked her a few simple questions, “Is this pamphlet from your office?”  I then followed with, “It says here that Hideyoshi Toyotomi was shogun.  Is that correct?”  Her reply was, “Yes, that’s right.  Hideyoshi Toyotomi was shogun.”  I launched into a 5-minute corrective measure to her on Japanese history, explaining the points that I made above.  The gentleman who she was guiding on a private, historical tour of Aizu castle confirmed, “Yes, he’s right.  There was never a Hideyoshi Toyotomi shogunate,” and he then made a quick and polite excuse to end his tour with that particular guide, but this was only the beginning.  To the average reader, this may seem harsh, but Japanese people pride themselves on factual accuracy, but seemingly only for themselves at times.  Losing face is a concept that has crossed the cultural divide, and if a samurai lost face, then it meant death by his own katana.  However, it seems that for international visitors, non-Japanese, that the ‘facts’ are presented in a much more cavalier manner.  With all this in mind, I visited the main administrative office of Tsuruga-jo and made my case for the factual error in the English pamphlet.  The conversation started with me talking to a clerk, then quickly, the head administrator came to continue the conversation.  We exchanged business cards, as is the custom in Japan, and I began, “Excuse me, is this some kind of a joke, kind sir?  Japan had three shogunates which are: the Kamakura, Ashikaga, and Tokugawa bakufus, but according to your pamphlet,” I said incredulously, “there was a fourth bakufu/shogun, the Toyotomi?  I must have missed that day of lecture at Tokyo University.”  By this time, the conversation had attracted several other staff members, but the head administrator summarily excused everyone else in attendance and told them to return to their desks.  Everyone in the office beside me was red-faced with shame.  The administrator told me in Japanese that he would remove the pamphlet from circulation immediately.  I reflected for a moment and wondered how long this historical inaccuracy had been in print, so I asked how many years that mistaken pamphlet had been available for tourists, to which he replied, “Two years.”  You could have bowled me over with a feather.  He added that the pamphlet had been translated by a person in Tokyo, and they accepted it as correct.  Small English errors such as ‘tee’ for ‘tea’ don’t bother me, but this is an enormous factual error that people who had read the pamphlet would internalize and take home with them.  I’ve heard horror stories from clients, friends, and colleagues about getting incorrect information when I wasn’t present.  Japan is a country full of superstition. People hate admitting that they don’t have the answers, so to save face, the tour guides give shallow, oversimplified answers to questions, such as reducing Japan’s mystical, mythological, and sociological history to good karma and bad karma.  Your average tour guide is just that, average, so you get average and often below average answers to your questions.  These guides don’t have backgrounds in history, and they know about 2,000 kanji.  This is part of why I started digging and studying ancient Japanese folklore and history and befriended several academics from Tokyo University and Waseda University.  They were of great help and guided me along my way to start understanding authentic Japanese symbology, mythology, sociology, and authentic folklore, among other topics.

People who have experience and knowledge of the supernatural and what some would refer to as the unknown have a better idea than 95% of the population about what they are getting involved in.  Sometimes there are places I’d rather not enter because the energy is where the spiritual animals reside, and, in general, humans are not welcome.  If you have ever seen Richard Gere in the Mothman film, you will have an idea of what I’m talking about.  If you want to dive deeper into authentic Japan and Nikko, there are 103 buildings and structures, and I intimately know most of the history of the 103 and many other power vortex spots throughout Japan, but I am human, and at times, I require the assistance of the Dimensional Concierges and references from my journals for accuracy’s sake.  Some of the stories are so intense that in today’s social climate, I would have to warn everyone about the graphic nature linked to some of the historical events and some of the sordid happenings inextricably bound to Samurai, Nippon, and contemporary Japanese history.  Furthermore, today, we have the LGBTQ+ community.  I’m cisgendered, but across Japan, there seems to be a problem with the LGBTQ+ community in modern times.  However, before the Meiji Era, the LGBTQ+ community was strong.  Some of the bravest samurais that you have heard or read about, such as Oda Nobunaga, were rumored to have enjoyed the company of his sandal bearers, which would be considered the actions of a non-binary individual.  Toyotomi Hideyoshi’s first post under Oda Nobunaga, who he hand-picked, was a sandal bearer, but there is no concrete evidence of a clandestine relationship.

As a side note, an acquaintance and colleague who is a professor at Tokyo University suggested I read the “Hagakure: The Book of Hidden Leaves: The Way of the Samurai” by Yamamoto Tsunetomo.  It was an easy read.  My colleague at Tokyo University was so impressed with my ease of reading this supposed Japanese enigma; he mentioned that over 99% of Japanese don’t even know that this book about the samurai exists.  The Hagakure is codified Bushido, a handbook for how to conduct yourself as a samurai.  I thought to myself, “Have I have finally found friends to guide me on my journey through ancient mythological histories and truths, including symbology in Japan?”  In some ways, yes, my colleagues are of great help to quench my thirst for knowledge. Still, sometimes it takes Shinto temple high priests, Japanese Buddhist abbots, or the First Nations Japanese elders, The Ainu, to satisfy my thirst for knowledge regarding authentic Japanese folklore, symbolism, and history.  Another side note, but I cannot promise it to be my last; in Japan, there is what is known as the “Kofun Mounds,” and the caretaker of the mounds and all Kofun sites is the imperial family of Japan. They recognize about a dozen sights, but across Japan, there are over one hundred and seventy thousand Kofun sites that include villages, mounds, and the slowly deteriorating rock carvings similar in age to those across Mesopotamia and regions including Egypt.  As folklore would have it, the imperial family of Japan claims to be decedents of the royalty that are buried in the Kofun mounds. Still, to date, no DNA evidence has ever been shown to prove that the people buried in the mounds are related to the imperial family, yet another Japanese enigma that needs to be solved, and even more puzzling, during the coronation of the Reiwa Era Emperor in 2019.  Apparently, the newly crowned emperor had not ever laid eyes on the imperial, national treasures that are required to be present for each emperor’s coronation.  These artifacts are said to be so holy that only the highest Shinto priests can handle these heavenly manifestations of Japan’s alleged divine origins, the so-called building blocks of Japan, but the First Nations People of Japan, the Ainu, were residents of Japan long before the Kofun period.

Even after finishing the last Nikko article, I had more to discuss, but, in truth, Nikko is a never-ending rabbit hole of stories, photography, and adventures.  It not only has shrines and temples, but as mentioned in my previous article, it has nature, samurai battlegrounds, and one of the most breathtaking waterfalls on the planet.  What’s not to love?  I realize this article has focused more on history than photography, but it’s part of the story I left out of my previous article. I wanted to revisit this historic power vortex location with you.  Nikko is a spot that embodies samurai history, architecture and is eye candy for the visual artist.   And in my opinion, after visiting Nikko, all others will pale by comparison.