Travel Logs Discovering the Spirit of Aomori and Akita A Journey Through Nature, Tradition, and Samurai Heritage
In the northernmost reaches of Japan's Tohoku region, Aomori and Akita proudly celebrate their heritages, working to preserve the traditions and the dramatic landscapes that have shaped them. This is a region where artisans and communities work in synergy with the environment.
I journeyed to the area to discover the innovative craftspeople reimagining local arts, learn about what makes the forests and mountains here so special, and see how ancient traditions are carried through into modern Japanese life.
Day 1
If you didn’t already know what Aomori was famous for, you’d soon catch on as you stepped off the Shinkansen at Shin-Aomori Station. Huge, illuminated washi paper floats (called neputa) from the city’s annual summer parade greet you in the station lobby, as does a giant apple, in a nod to the prefecture’s domestic fame for producing some of the world’s best apples. Though I was about to find out there’s a lot more to Aomori, apples and neputa remained a strong theme throughout my stay.
Wandering through Kuroishi’s wooden arcade
I rented a car and headed directly to Kuroishi’s Nakamachi Komise Street, a portal to the Edo period (1603 to 1868). I parked near a sake brewery with huge browned sugidama (a sphere made of green cedar leaves). “When they turn brown, the sake is ready to drink,” my guide informed me.
Sugidama hanging outside the sake brewery
Both sides of the street have well-preserved, covered wooden walkways, with vibrant washi-paper paintings fixed inside frames. These artworks have been upcycled from the neputa floats that parade through the streets during the Kuroishi Neputa Festival, giving the art a more permanent position in the town.
Neputa art in Kuroishi’s arcade
On my guide’s recommendation, we began our exploration of the town at Miyuki. This traditional restaurant with low tables, tatami mat flooring and, crucially, the local speciality; Kuroishi tsuyu yakisoba, made with wide and flat local noodles in a hot broth.
Kuroishi tsuyu yakisoba at Restaurant Miyuki
Between bites, I told my guide I loved the concept of repurposing neputa as street art. Her eyes lit up as she told me about a boutique across the street, IRODORI, where neputa are repurposed to create small lanterns and Japanese fans. After slurping the last of our noodles, we headed straight there.
The enticing entrance to IRODORI
This small boutique is filled with colourful lanterns and fans made from upcycled neputa. “Before we began upcycling, these neputa would have been burnt after the festival,” my guide told me. Now, IRODORI takes these large artworks and cuts them down into small, uniquely patterned squares.
Lanterns and fans made from upcycled neputa
To make the pieces even more special, IRODORI offers a workshop in which you create your own lantern. The shop owner gave me a simple wooden frame, glue and several large piles of squares, all cut from washi paper neputa designs.
Choosing the squares for my lantern
I spent an inordinate amount of time looking through these squares to choose the most beautiful ones for my lantern. I carefully glued them inside the wooden frame as the shop owner told me about the festival’s history.
Spoiled for choice
Kuroishi’s neputa festival dates back at least 300 years. “Other cities in the area have neputa festivals, with Aomori City’s being the most famous,” she told me, “but Kuroishi’s streets are much narrower, so the floats are far smaller with more intricate paintings that are designed to be seen close-up.”
My finished lantern
It’s impossible to discern what these small squares once were as they are completely transformed once cut up. “Kuroishi neputa depict images of ferocious warriors on the front. In contrast,” she tells me, “the backs are painted with mournful women who are left behind as their men go to fight. They’re very emotive.”
When I finished my lantern, the shop owner showed me my lantern lit from within by a small bulb before packing it up for me, complete with bulb and switch. I couldn’t think of a more beautiful way to repurpose neputa art than transforming them into a personalised souvenir you can take home.
Looking out across Hirosaki Castle Park moat
Struck by the beautiful autumn colours in the park
My next stop was Hirosaki Castle, first built in 1611. Though the original keep burnt down not long after its construction, the current keep dates back to 1810.
Looking at the original site of the castle and its temporary new location
Hirosaki Castle in autumn
I noticed construction work as soon as I entered the park grounds. Typically, I would pay little notice and try to photograph around it. However, the construction at Hirosaki Castle is different. “The castle’s walls needed some maintenance,” my guide told me, “so in 2015, they moved the castle around 70 meters. It will be moved back in 2025 when the renovations are complete.”
Hirosaki Castle
I assumed she meant they’d taken it down and reconstructed it piece by piece. In fact, the castle had been gradually shuffled over several months to the scenic location where it now stands, with Mt. Izumi in the background. My guide showed me a YouTube video of this unbelievable process.
A gate at Hirosaki Castle
Hirosaki Castle’s expansive grounds are one of Japan’s most popular places to see cherry blossoms in spring, but the maple-lined moats ensure it’s spectacular in autumn, too.
Boat trips along the moat
Appreciating the autumn foliage
My guide took me to a spot amongst the trees where the canopies of several trees combine to form a heart shape which, my guide told me, is particularly beautiful in spring when it becomes pink with cherry blossom petals.
Hirosaki Castle Park’s famous heart canopy
Taisho Roman Tea Room
When I started to get hungry, I visited Taisho Roman Tea Room to try its famous apple pie. This European-style tea room within Fujita Memorial Garden dates back more than 100 years.
A conservatory table with garden views
I took a seat in the corner of the tea room’s conservatory so I could admire the garden as I ate. A waitress in a vintage-style white apron took my order and, since I couldn’t decide which of the selection apple pies to choose, I ordered three and a cup of coffee. The coffee came in a pretty porcelain cup, adding to the vintage charm of the venue.
Some of the tea room’s apple pie options
Three delicious pastries later, I was ready for a sunset stroll around the park. I walked along the illuminated sakura trees that line the castle moat until I found the perfect spot to watch the clouds turn pinky-orange and cast a warm light on the autumnal foliage.
Sunset over the moat
We walked through one of the imposing castle gates and back into the castle park. Seeing it after dark is an entirely different experience than seeing it in the day and, at this time of year, Hirosaki Castle Chrysanthemum and Autumn Foliage Festival was in full swing. The maple trees framing the castle were at their peak, displaying bright yellows, greens, reds and oranges accentuated by carefully placed lights. Chrysanthemums planted at the base of the trees complemented this riot of colour.
The castle and foliage illuminated
That evening, I drove into the mountains to stay at Sukayu Onsen, a traditional inn with a 300-year-old onsen housed in a beautiful wooden building. The immense size of this historic wooden bath, paired with the steaminess of the room and the milkiness of the water made the experience feel much more private than many other onsen I have been to. After bathing, I headed straight to bed and fell asleep to the sound of spring water gently flowing outside.
Sukayu Onsen
Day 2
As I drove around Aomori the next morning, I noticed apple details everywhere: traffic mirrors, railings, and public clocks were all apple-shaped. With apples on the brain, I drove to Hirosaki Apple Park, one of the many orchards in the prefecture.
Hirosaki Apple Park and Mt. Izumi
This huge orchard has more than 2,300 trees and grows 80 varieties of apples. A guide at the park invited me to try four varieties of apple in the visitor centre and I was surprised how differently they all tasted. He told me that not all the varieties are available to pick at any time and that they would show me a few trees of two types of apples that I could pick from; one a Fuji red, one yellow.
Sampling apple varieties
As we walked towards the trees, my guide told me that apples were first introduced to Aomori around 150 years ago by an American missionary. “Apples have thrived here and are considered some of the best in the world,” I asked him what the secret to Aomori apples is and he said it was a combination of factors. “The climate is ideal,” he said. “Sunny days and cool nights create delicious fruits. The volcanic soil is another factor. But one of the biggest reasons is the intensive cultivation techniques.”
Fuji apples
A huge Fuji apple
I’d already noticed mirrored surfaces underneath trees, which my guide explained are used to reflect light and ensure the entire apple is equally bathed by the sun. There are also very particular pruning techniques involved, undertaken during Aomori’s harsh winter when the orchard is still deep in snow. Farmers are careful to prune away leaves to ensure apples receive adequate light and turn them as they ripen. Even as he told me the very particular way Aomori grow apples, I still thought I knew how to pick one; you just pull it, right?
Learning to pick the professional way
Wrong. My guide gave me a tutorial, showing me exactly where to place my thumb on the stem and apply pressure to ensure a clean break and a picture-perfect apple, complete with stalk. It took me a few times to master, and my guide informed me that apples without stalks are less valuable due to this aesthetic inferiority.
Assessing whether this apple is big enough for me
I wandered through the trees and gradually filled my wicker basket with some of the biggest and most beautiful apples I had ever seen. Later, when I ate one of them, it took me three sittings to work my way through. Huge and delicious.
A basket full of apples
Swinging my basket in hand, I took my fruit loot back to the visitor centre to weigh them and pay.
Aqua Green Village Anmon
Next, my guide had some more tree-themed adventures in mind. We arrived at the Aqua Green Village Anmon to explore this UNESCO World Heritage site. Our guide, from BBB Outdoor Guides, explained the importance of this forest.
About to enter the virgin beech forest of Shirakami-Sanchi
“Shirakami-Sanchi is the largest virgin beech forest in East Asia,” he told me. Despite this, there were plans to build a bypass through the forest, but luckily a black woodpecker was spotted in the forest which halted the plans and earned the forest its UNESCO World Heritage protection.
Sampling the local springwater
My guide’s enthusiasm for this forest was infectious. He showed us a variety of maple trees that he said you could distinguish from others because the leaves appeared to wave as they blew in the breeze. He waved back to them and, after spotting the trees a few times, they took on a friendly, welcoming persona in my mind and I began to wave back to them.
Discovering maple tree varieties in these mountains
A newfound love of beech trees
There are springs in the forest that are so clean that you can drink straight from them. It's this water that keeps the beech trees well-fed. My guide explained that beech trees love water and cluster close to the streams through the forest.
Walking through the beech trees
This forest is around 8,000 years old and has been left untouched by humans. The beech trees have a lifespan of around 300 years and when one dies, there are plenty of competitive saplings on the ground jostling to take their position within the forest canopy, ensuring the forest is constantly growing and changing.
Spotting wildlife
The canopy of Shirakami-Sanchi
The forest is dominated by beech trees, but my guide also pointed out hinoki cypress trees, maples, Mongolian oaks, Japanese wingnuts and Japanese sumacs.
Appreciating the tenacity of beech trees
As we wandered back to the Aqua Green Village Anmon, he pointed out a sculpture of a large woodpecker by the side of the river, now an ambassador for this extraordinary forest. It’s incredible to think that if that bird hadn’t been spotted, this ancient forest may have been lost forever.
Learning the basics of mountain biking
The next leg of our adventure was on a bicycle. My guide gave me a safety briefing, reminding me that on the mountain roads we were about to tackle, it’s important to use both brakes simultaneously when I need to slow down or stop.
Uphill climb
The short cycle felt far more uphill than down, so I put the bike’s gears to good use and attempted to hide how much I was huffing and puffing as my guide easily glided up the mountain roads.
Enjoying the views
Thankfully, the views were a fantastic distraction. Rolling mountains in autumnal hues, forests, lakes and rivers held my attention the entire route. We cycled towards the lake where our guide had readied kayaks for us. As we cycled, he taught me the word for “let’s go” in the local Tsurugu dialect. “Abe abe!”
Autumnal scenes along the road
After a 5 km ride, we reached the dam lake in Nishimeya, where the kayaks awaited us. The guide warned me they were lower and less steady than the canoes I am more used to, so I put my phone away in a dry bag.
Before we set off, he gave me a lesson in paddling and fastened me into a lifejacket.
Learning to use the paddle
The autumn leaves were in their final flourish of the season, with burnt oranges and browns covering the mountainsides around the lake. My guide set the rhythm for our paddling; ten strong paddles, then glide and relax. It gave us the opportunity to soak in the atmosphere.
Enjoying the autumn colours
Most of the lake is open and easy to paddle in but, in my opinion, the most beautiful corner is filled with semi-submerged trees, making it an atmospheric, almost spooky spot.
Kayaking through submerged trees
My guide encouraged me to use my senses; smelling the fresh air, touching the bark of the trees we rowed by, and listening to the wind shake the leaves to fully appreciate the vastness of the nature surrounding us.
Carrying the kayak back to the van
When we reached shore, I waved goodbye to the maple leaves that waved back at us and helped my guide bring the kayak back to the van.
Roadside Station Tsugaru Shirakami "Beech Nishimeya"
Some of the best places to find a local snack are roadside stations, so when my guide suggested we cycle to Beech Nishimeya for a little shopping and to sample local honey, my cycling pace picked up.
Trying local honey
I had to do some souvenir shopping, so I tried the seasonal local honey; spring, summer and autumn varieties, admired the vegetables and bought some garlic, sauces and beers.
Local vegetables
I took my haul back to a hotel near Hirosaki Station and rested until dinner when my guide wanted to take me to a local restaurant. We stopped to try candied sweet potatoes (daigaku imo), which I have daydreamed about every day since. Then we arrived at Tsugaru-jamisen and Local Cuisine Restaurant Anzu, a restaurant that serves local food with a side of entertainment.
Tsugaru-jamisen and Local Cuisine Restaurant Anzu
The cosy atmosphere inside Tsugaru-jamisen and Local Cuisine Restaurant Anzu
Every evening, four shamisen performers play as you dine. Shamisen is a three-stringed instrument played across Japan, but the local style is known for being similar to jazz because Tsugaru shamisen have more room for improvisation.
Shamisen players at Tsugaru-jamisen and Local Cuisine Restaurant Anzu
Shamisen players at Tsugaru-jamisen and Local Cuisine Restaurant Anzu
I hadn’t known what to expect from this traditional instrument, but I certainly wasn’t expecting to be captivated, singing along to the chants and finding myself mesmerised as the group, a man and three young women, played with such soul.
Kanpai!
Seafood at the restaurant
Eating local snacks
We ordered beers to toast to a wonderful day and ate an array of seafood to keep us sated until the next day.
Watching the performance
Day 3
My newfound love affair with beech trees continued with a visit to the Bunaco factory. Bunaco is a wood crafting company whose name comes from the fusion of ‘buna’ (meaning beech) and the Tsugaru dialect suffix, ‘ko’. This craft is particularly incredible because beech was considered a useless tree in terms of woodwork until 1956 when it began to be used as a base for lacquerware. “A lacquerware specialist, Yoshio Mochizuki, saw the potential in beech for the first time and began experimenting with more modern designs,” my guide told me. Aomori has more beech trees than anywhere else in Japan, so discovering a way to make durable and stylish woodwork from the tree was a revelation. Since then, Bunaco has been designing minimalist, creative homewares.
Learning about Bunaco
An artisan at the factory showed me around, demonstrating how thin beech strips are coiled and manipulated into various shapes. These pieces are then sanded down and smoothed to make them flawless.
Watching Bunaco artisans at work
An artisan at work
The factory tour allows you to wander in and out of rooms and watch artisans at work. I watched as they skilfully coiled the wood into flat plates, ready to be shaped into bowls, lamps, ornaments, furniture or even speakers.
A Bunaco artisan curving the piece
In another room, artisans took these flat plates and began shaping them, using a ceramic cup to roll the coils and gradually push them outwards.
Learning the hard way that shaping the pieces is tough!
After watching the artisans at work, it was time to try making my own Bunaco artwork. My guide handed me a tightly coiled plate and a ceramic cup, explaining the techniques needed to roll the beech coils outwards and start to build them up into a bowl.
Attempting to create a bowl
It took a lot more strength and skill to shape the coils than I anticipated. My plate remained entirely flat after more than five minutes of attempting to shape it. My guide suggested rolling the cup the entire length of the coils, from the very inside to the very outside.
Tips from the artisan
The piece began to take shape once I’d nailed the technique and, when the bowl came up enough, my guide showed me how to curl over the top of one side to embellish the design further, although this step is optional.
Adding a personal touch to my piece
When I was happy with the shape, my guide gave me a pencil to personalise the base. I drew an apple as a symbol of my time in Aomori - and a symbol that was easier to draw than a beech tree.
Ta-da!
Finally, I added a glue layer to the piece to ensure the coils wouldn’t shift and chose from a selection of colours to use as a finish. I opted for red, which would be applied after the piece had dried and then posted to my house.
Apple-shaped Bunaco pieces in the gift shop
Before I left, I looked around the gift shop and cafe at the incredible array of designs, all crafted from beech wood using this same technique. “Bunaco was used for lampshades in the luxury hotel, Hoshinoya Tokyo”, my guide told me as I wandered through the cafe while I marvelled at the lightweight, elegant designs. I could see the synergy between the two brands; Hoshinoya is known for its design focus and understated elegance, too.
Bunaco artworks in the onsite cafe
Before we left Aomori for Akita that afternoon, my guide insisted we try the local ramen, known for its dried sardines and a chicken bone-based soba. We grabbed a quick bowl at Bunshiro, a warming treat for the drive ahead.
Lunch at Bunshiro
Our next stop was the Namahage Museum and the Oga Shinzan Folklore Museum in the Oga Peninsula. As we drove up to the building, we all muttered “oh wow.” The building is stunning, with a modern stone building and a traditional thatched property. Its mossy garden was full of tall pines and maple trees at the peak of their autumn colours.
Namahage Museum and the Oga Shinzan Folklore Museum
Autumnal gardens at the museum
I didn’t know much about namahage other than that they are a local New Year ritual intended to encourage children to be good. The museum had an enormous display of life-size namahage costumes; straw capes and scary demon-like masks. Both sides of the large room were lined with dozens of them, making me feel somewhat intimidated. The display had English signage that made it easy to understand the ritual.
Namahage masks on display
Local namahage costumes
Men in Oga dress up as namahage at New Year. The namahage represent incarnations of mountain deities that go from house to house on New Year’s Eve to drive away evil, bring in happiness for the year ahead and chastise the laziness of the household members.
Learning more about namahage
The intimidating sight of dozens of namahage
I was shown a video, with English explanations via a headset, in the museum’s theatre that documented the arrival of these namahage in a typical Oga household. The namahage are undeniably terrifying, and I couldn’t help but chuckle as the children in the household depicted wiped away tears as the namahage searched the house for them and made them promise to be good the next year. It paralleled threats from my own childhood that I would be on Santa’s naughty list if I wasn’t good.
An introduction to the history and meaning of namahage
After the short film, I was invited to dress the part, donning a straw cape and mask, ready to scare people. This is a New Year’s tradition I could get into.
Dressing as a namahage
Admiring the namahage costume
These engaging displays gave me a good sense of the local tradition, but I was promised that the immersive experience in the thatched house next to the museum was the best way to understand this ancient custom. My guide had warned me that it was a little scary, so I stepped into the building with the same caution I do when I enter a fairground haunted house.
The stunning museum gardens
The house was set up like an old farmhouse in the Oga region. keeping the house toasty warm, and I took off my shoes as I entered the tatami mat area.
Ready to experience namahage
A small audience gathered around the hearth to watch the performance. I was given an iPad to explain each section in English. The performance showed the New Year ritual of namahage arriving at a house.
Stoking the sunken hearth fire
The homeowner sat peacefully by the hearth until suddenly, there was loud and impatient banging on the wooden door around us, making everyone jump. Despite knowing the namahage would soon arrive, the brashness of their entry made me jump.
Namahage talking to the homeowner
The homeowner welcomed them in and offered the namahage sake and meal. They accepted it and began discussing the reason for their arrival. Soon, they were up and walking through the audience, searching for the newly joined wives and children.
Namahage looking for the hidden family members
Even with the confidence that I hadn’t been lazy or disobedient this year, I was still a little on edge. Thankfully, I escaped a telling off from the namahage, who left as quickly and noisily as they had arrived, dispelling evil spirits with their loud voices and sounds, leaving plenty of straw in their wake.
Namahage speaking with the homeowner
As we left, my guide told me that locals are bringing back the annual namahage ritual, keen to keep the tradition alive for the next generation and beyond.
A hidden onsen getaway
A night in the mountains of Akita
I retired for the evening to the beautiful Nyuto Onsen, an area known for the hidden hot springs that flow up from its dense primaeval beech forests and had some slightly scary dreams of namahage.
Day 4
Manpukuji Temple in Kakunodate
I woke up early and headed to Kakunodate, a former castle town famous for its samurai past. I started at Manpukji Temple for a morning zazen meditation experience. I met the head monk of the temple who explained the links between Zen Buddhism and samurai. “Samurai quickly adopted Zen Buddhism when it first came to Japan from China because much of the samurai mindset is about mental strength and clarity,” he told me.
Inside the temple
Manpukji Temple is part of the Soto Zen Buddhism sect, which prioritises meditation. The monk gave me robes to change into and a small cushion to sit on, suggesting I sit position I could hold comfortably for 15 minutes. He explained how the meditation would work and said that, if I felt my mind wander, I could raise a hand and he would apply a firm tap on my shoulder with a stick to help bring my mind back to the present. Before the meditation began, he asked me to turn to face to wall, leave my eyes open and my gaze soft, looking at the sliding doors of the temple.
Decor within the temple
I was eager to avoid the stick, so I tried to focus on breathing in and breathing out, bringing my thoughts back to my breath whenever I noticed they had wandered. Before I knew it, the monk rang the bell to signify that the meditation was over. Fifteen minutes had flown by.
Learning the art of zazen meditation
Focusing on staying in the moment
I got changed back into my own clothes feeling calm and a little smug at having mostly managed to stay focused, the latter of which probably isn’t the goal of zazen. The monk invited me to sit down and drink green tea with him as we discussed the meditation. I asked him the best way to deal with a monkey mind that doesn’t want to focus. He told me that the foundation was in the way we sit for mediation and that if the posture is good and our lungs are open then we have created a great foundation. Everything else takes time and patience.
Leaving feeling refreshed
Though I’d had no caffeine yet, I felt awake, alert and ready to explore more of the town. I started by wandering the area with my guide, nipping into dessert shops selling chestnut sweets and stumbling across Ando, a soy sauce and miso brewery that was established here in 1853.
Ando, a local soy sauce and miso brewery
Yatsuyanagi, cherry bark artisans
We strolled further down the street, past dozens of small shops housed in preserved buildings. One of them was Yatsuyanagi, which specialises in cherry bark crafts called kabazaiku. I’d already noticed a cherry bark jug at the temple that morning, which caught my eye as an unusual piece. I mentioned the jug to the owner of Yatsuyanagi and she happily confirmed that it was one of their pieces.
An array of handcrafted cherry bark products
Understanding more about kabazaiku
Kabazaiku is the only craft that uses wild cherry blossom bark. The craft is specific to this town, and was first created by samurai who would use its characteristics of maintaining moisture to craft tobacco holders. Though Kakunodate was castle town with a large samurai district, the town was very peaceful, so samurai would busy themselves with other pursuits. “It was a side hustle for samurai,” my guide told me.
Discovering the work behind kabazaiku
Local samurai once used cherry bark for tobacco holders
Since then, the skill has been passed down, and the artisans at Yatsuyanagi are the seventh generation of their family to master the skill. “There are only three wholesalers of kabazaiku now, and they are all in Kakunodate”, the owner tells me. But far from being in competition with each other, she tells me they all have the common goal to keep this local art alive.
My kabazaiku workshop
The owner invited me to learn the basics, creating a kabazaiku coaster to take home with me. She brought out a sheet of rough bark, which looked nothing like the lustrous, rich red tones of the crafts that surrounded me.
Learning to scrape the bark
However, with the help of a blunt blade and a lot of strength, she showed me how to scrape off the top layer of the bark to reveal the beautiful bark beneath. While I scraped, she told me how the artisans collect the wood, which they can only do during a short window each year. Artisans are careful about the bark they take, ensuring they don’t take too much from one tree. Bark takes seven to eight years to regenerate, and they can take from the same spot up to three times. She showed me the difference between the first layer of cherry bark and the second and third layers. Each was beautiful and surprisingly different.
Scraping bark takes some strength
After scraping the bark, I applied a natural glue to the base of my coaster and waited for it to dry a little. While I waited, I browsed the shop and was impressed by the mix of innovative and traditional designs available; a kabazaiku insulated cup and cardholder, pens and kokeshi doll were some of my favourite pieces. There was also a tea made from the pieces of bark that couldn’t be used in the crafts.
Admiring my own craftsmanship
I asked the owner if she ever found bear claw marks in the bark. She replied that they see it often but that, traditionally it wouldn’t be good luck to use the scratched bark in designs, though she said she had often thought it would make a cool design. I agreed, and admired her ingenuity, constantly innovating this traditional craft.
Applying the glue
Yatsuyanagi experiments with modern designs
When the glue was tacky, I applied the sheet of cherry bark before using a hot iron to seal it before applying wax to buff and shine the coaster. Before I left, I also bought a little pot, made of cherry bark that hadn’t been buffed, giving it a rustic, earthy look.
“Ironing” my coaster
Learning that samurai had a side hustle making kabazaiku made me realise I knew very little about the lives of these warriors, so I walked with my guide to the samurai district, which would have surrounded a castle that once stood there.
A well-preserved samurai home
Autumn leaves in the bukeyashiki samurai district
The area is known as “Little Tokyo” for the Edo period (1603 to 1867) properties throughout the district.
The beautiful bukeyashiki samurai district
Maple trees colouring the samurai district a spectrum of autumn hues
The main street is populated with grand residences, many of which are open to the public. My guide explained that the closer these residences were to the castle, the higher ranking the samurai would have been, and the more grandiose the property.
A rickshaw in the bukeyashiki samurai district
It was autumn when I visited and colourful maple leaves against the thatched residences and the rickshaws that offer rides along the street presented a quintessentially Japanese scene.
A well-preserved samurai residence
My guide suggested I go one step further to learn about the lives of samurai by taking a class in samurai swordsmanship at the local dojo.
Entrance to the dojo
Inside the huge dojo I met my two senseis, who would teach me the basics of swordsmanship. But first, I had to look the part. They ushered me into a changing room where two women dressed me in the traditional hakama. The outfit was far more complicated than I had expected, with lots of layers and precise tucks that left me looking and feeling a bit like a warrior.
The dojo
Before I re-entered the dojo in my outfit, my guide advised me to bow as a sign of respect and enter the dojo with my right foot first. Excitingly, my senseis handed me my sword straight away. It was extremely blunt, making it safe for a clumsy beginner like me, but it looked the part.
Bowing in respect as I enter the dojo in traditional dress
Clumsily learning to sheath my sword
My class began with a lesson in how to keep my sword sheathed by keeping my thumb on the hand guard and how to safely and smoothly sheath and unsheathe my sword. The pros made this look remarkably easy but, despite trying it multiple times throughout the class, I never made it look anything other than clunky and awkward.
Holding a sword was surprisingly complicated
Mastering sword placement
During the class, my senseis told me I would learn up to four routines, which they then demonstrated. Even as I watched, I knew my poor choreography skills and lack of mental recall would probably only allow me to complete one of the sequences.
Learning from the professionals
A demonstration of the routine I would learn
We built up the sequence slowly, starting with a bow, unsheathing and then a few slashes of the sword. With lots of repetition and a few hints and clues when I (frequently) forgot what I was doing.
Starting with the basics
These patient men persisted with me, and by the end of the class I could complete a sequence that looked vaguely cool when I watched it back on video later.
Keeping your thumb over the tsuba (hand guard)
Mastering sword placement
Before the class ended, I had the opportunity to slash a cardboard man. I’d never held a sword before this class, and hadn’t considered how exciting this would be. With my game face on, I raised my sword and slashed it down with all the control and power I could muster. I didn’t behead the cardboard man, but I think it would have been a painful blow had I been a real samurai in battle.
Game face on
After my class, I exited the dojo left foot first, bowing as I did. Though I probably wouldn’t have cut it as a samurai, I was grateful for a glimpse into the etiquette, skills and discipline required in this historic art.
I left the dojo and made my way to the nearby shinkansen station, reflecting on the ways the people of Aomori and Akita protect and share their heritage, finding ways to preserve it for the future generations. Local artisans use ancient and modern techniques to craft wood, neputa are upcycled into contemporary souvenirs, namahage rituals are being revived for a new generation and samurai culture is woven into everyday life in Kakunodate.
Visiting this corner of Tohoku gave me an insight into the importance of keeping a strong connection to tradition and using it as a touchstone in our modern lives.
