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Today I went to the grand shrine in Nagai. One of the people I had met at the hostel had told me about the place and I knew roughly where it was and had marked it on my map.Nagai is at the other end of Osaka to the hostel and I had no plans to walk the distance so I grabbed a train. The station I needed is opposite Nagai park and before I went on to the shrine I decided to take a look. The park its self is pretty huge and although I only wandered a small part of it I could see it housed what looked like a stadium of some kind. As it was mid week there were loads of school kids. All 10 years old or less chaperoned by several teachers. All of the kids of which there were hundreds wore hats and the colour appeared to signify the schools so at first there was a parade of children in red hats crossing the road and a long line of kids in yellow hats being shown around the park, there were further groups of white hats and blue hats in the distance. I had a look around the park and it was mainly old men feeding pigeons or chatting to each other. There were a few older kids playing baseball and the odd couple wandering around. As I looked about ,the precession of kids in blue hats made there way to the station and a small group of about 10 shouted "Konbanwa" to me as they passed. I said it back which resulted in a fit of giggles and they then went on to say hello in the best English speaking voice. Again I replied and this started off all the other kids who all shouted "Hello" at me as they passed and i kept repeating it back to them.
The shrine was about half a mile away or so it seemed on the map and I made my way in that direction. This was a very quite part of town and not very commercial also I noticed that the few bits of English I had got used to seeing dotted about had disappeared and it would seem this was not the usual tourist hotspot. I came to my junction and turned right expecting to see a train station but did not. I wandered further still and came across shops and bus stops but still no station. Looking at my map the turning would have been just past the shrine so i turned right again hoping to come across the shrine. I ended up wandered between houses and small parks until eventually after some time I was back where I started. The shrine itself was more like a mile away and I had turned to early. I started my walk again arriving at the shrine almost 2 hours after I had arrived in Nagai.
The shrine started in a backstreet not off the road as I would have expected something of this size to be. At first there was the odd lantern shaped pillar and I passed a couple of people. Then the road opens out into a park like area and all the trees are wrapped with rope. A stream was in front of me with the lantern pillars all around and on the right was the start of the shrine. A large traditional building that looked almost fortified. It was orange and white and seemed to go on off into the distance. I followed along the wall aways until I came to the front entrance. It was quite busy and chairs were laid out in front of the altar and men and women in traditional dress were ushering people to seats. It looked like a service was about to start and unsure of the etiquette I went off to wander the grounds rather than the shrine. I looked about and saw hundreds of these pillars which would appear to be grave stones. The markings on them most likely names of those buried. There were several statues about the place and even though I had walked across the stream on a bridge construction of a grand orange metal bridge was underway with many people working away. A mother was walking her child around the grounds and chasing frogs that had come out of the stream and people cycled past apparently using the grounds as some sort of a shortcut. I looped around back to the shrine entrance and the service was over . I was welcomed by 3 women in traditional dress behind what looked like a souvenir shop. They were actually selling what I imagine to be charms and wreaths which I later saw hung about. Inside the walls of the shrine were several old Japanese wooden buildings. They were very ornate and had gold fixtures. The floors inside were tatami mats and seemed to be more decorative now that used. Several workmen men were at hand restoring parts of these buildings. Out the back of the shrine walls were several small shrines. Presumably each one with a different purpose. In front of each was what looked like a metal stand for leaflets but it turned out was more like a wishing well where those that prayed would throw in a coin before preying. I was greeted by an old woman in robes and she advised me that they locked the gates soon and she let me take a photo even thought she seemed very embarrassed. I looked for a bit longer at the shrines and the place itself which was covered in large red flags and again all the trees were decorated. I could see that it was all beginning to close up and made my leave snapping a few more pictures on my way out. The one thing I noticed is that in this part of Osaka everyone seemed to greet or nod to me. Elsewhere I'm just another gaijin and as polite as the Japanese are I am usually ignored if hold open a door etc. Here in the less commercial part of Osaka little kids waved to me and those cycling by gave me a nod of recognition. It was quite nice.
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