Back in January, my friend and I drove down to Hitoyoshi in southern Kumamoto Prefecture.  This is actually the first time I discovered the shrine and temple stamp book and my life was changed forever.

We made three major stops while we were there: Eikokuji, Aoi Aso Jinja, and Bukekura.

Eikoku-ji

Address: 5 Dotemachi, Hitoyoshi, Kumamoto Prefecture, 〒868-0057

All information from this temple was obtained from a blog post on Nihon Fan by Tony Mariani.  Please check out their original post here:
https://nihonehime.blogspot.com/2013/10/eikokuji-temple-hitoyoshi-kumamoto.html

Eikoku-ji is a temple of the Soto sect of Zen Buddhism and is a direct branch of the Daihonzan Sojiji temple in Yokohama City. The temple was established in 1408 by the 9th Daimyo of the Sagara clan, Daimyo Sakitsugu. The principle Buddhist images enshrined at the temple are the Shakyamuni Buddha, the Monju Bosatsu and the Fugen Bosatsu.

Eikoku-ji is most famous for a scroll painting of a ghost that hangs inside the main temple purportedly painted by the founder.  The story behind the painting is quite interesting.  When the temple was built, there was a well know samurai in a neighboring town who had a jealous mistress.  In fact, she was so jealous of his wife, that she threw herself into the Kumagawa River and died.  In Japanese mythology, it's very common for jealous or resentful women who die unnatural deaths to return to our world and haunt the living as a ghost or a demon.  And so this jealous mistress returned as a ghost and haunted the wife until she was almost driven mad.  The wife fled to Eikoku-ji to seek the powers of the temple founder, Jittei Osho.  The priest then spoke to the ghost on the tenants of Buddhism, and the jealous ghost was thereafter shocked and appalled by her own appearance.  She begged Osho to pray for her and to help her become a Buddha so that she might escape her wretched form.  And so he prayed for her and she disappeared, never to haunt the wife again.

Because of this story, the temple is sometimes called Yurei Dera, or Ghost Temple.

~~ NOTE: As always, the pictures below often have captions, so please click on them to enlarge and see my comments. ~~

Back in December, some friends and I decided to go on a challenging hike in the mountains.  We decided to travel to Mount Unzen in Nagasaki prefecture.  Mount Unzen is actually a group of three volcanoes that are notorious for causing trouble.  It was most recently active in 1995 and had a major devastating eruption in 1991.  These eruptions actually formed a new peak on the mountain, Heisei-shinzan.   The mountain's two highest peeks are Fugen-dake (1,359 meters) and the newly formed Heisei-shinzan (1,486 meters).  For reference, that makes Mount Unzen about the same height as the 5th tallest High Peak in the Adirondacks, Whiteface Mountain.

Mount Unzen has always been a very popular hiking destination.  But after the 1990's eruptions, the trails were temporarily shut down for repairs.  I mean heck, there was a brand new peak on the mountain now!  After finishing some major restruction and repairs, they recently reopened the mountain to the public.  Lucky for us!

So that leads us to my adventure with some other ALTs from Kyushu.  We drove out to Nagasaki on December 12th, bright and early.  To get there from Kumamoto, it takes a fairy ride and lots of driving.

​Name: 太宰府天満宮​ - Dazaifu Tenman-gū
Enshrined Deity: Tenjin
​Address: 4-7-1, Saifu, Dazaifu, Fukuoka Prefecture 818-0195
Size: 350,000 Square Meters - 86.5 acres

The deity of Dazaifu Tenman-gu is Tenjin, the deified name of the real life scholar Sugawara no Michizane.​  Michizane was a government official during the Heian period.  He rose to the prominent position of Minister of the Right, an action which inspired much envy and bitterness in his rivals.  So, in 900 BCE, the powerful Fujiwara family unleashed a devious scheme against him and he was subsequently demoted and exiled to Kyushu.  Upon departing Kyoto, he composed this poem: