Our grandchildren love something called manga. To learn more about it, one of the first places we visited was the Kyoto International Manga Museum.
Apparently, in Western countries, manga is considered to mean Japanese comics. However, the Japanese, seem to take a broader view and consider manga to be comic books and cartoons produced anywhere in the world. So, I guess they might think Batman comics and Snoopy cartoon strips are just American manga.
We learned that the roots of Japanese manga lie in simple cartoon strips which were found in newspapers in the early 20th century. They were usually funny and were often political satire.
Paper was expensive and books were rare so manga enthusiasts collected their favorite comic strips in simple scrapbooks. These now comprise an important part of the archives at this museum.
We saw artists at work, children learning how to to the drawings and even an area where artists would create manga style caricatures of museum visitors.
The most important aspect of the museum appeared to be the huge library of classic manga books which lined the walls of several reading rooms. Folks just pulled books off the shelves from their favorite series, plopped down into one of the dozens of the chairs and started reading. It was all very cool.
On another day, we visited a famous Shinto shrine called Fushimi Inari Taisha. Built to honor a god called Inari, the shrine is know for the Senbon Torii, a path up a mountain created by a thousand traditional gates. We walked much of the way but the crowds were daunting.
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| One torii |
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| Many torii |
On our last day in Kyoto we attended a tea ceremony for which the attendees dressed in kimonos - definitely a first for me!
I found the process fascinating and worth the effort to dress the part.
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| Our teacher |
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| Properly frothed macha |
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| Someone had WAY too much fun! |
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