I had a short trip to Obuse and Komoro of the Nagano Prefecture. Obuse is famous for the Paintings of Katsushika Hokusai and nuts. Komoro is well-known as the author of Shimazaki Touson and the ruins of the old castle. The middle aged Japanese would have interests on these sightseeing spots. However I found that Obuse people emphasized sales of their sightseeing spots. To the contrary, Komoro is declining to show the attractiveness of their sightseeing resources. The reason why I have chosen Obuse was because my mother had been there once. As she said "This town is very interesting", I had an interest on Obuse. When I arrived at this town, I felt that people were very eager to create some sightseeing resources and that they made the bus line to connect these spots. This classical style bus can connect the following sightseeing spots. The Highway Museum >> The Obuse Station >> The Hokusai Museum >> The Obuse Museum >> The Town Parking >> The Obuse Chinese Museum >> The Floral Garden Obuse >> The Jyoukou-ji Temple >> The Gansyouin Temple >> (circulation) 　This circulating bus is an old-fashioned one of the bonnet type, so it is not so good for us to take it. However it is very convenient for us to visit many sightseeing spots. In addition to these spots, we can go the Bonsai Museum, the Japanese traditional light museum and the Takai Kouzan Memorial Museum. Unfortunately I had not so much time; I decided to visit the Hokusai Museum and the Gansyouin Temple. In the both places, there are Hokusai's arts. Hokusai (1760〜1848) is a great artist of mainly Ukiyoe, but the arts of these places are the ones that he painted in his eighties. You might be wondering why such a famous artist's arts were kept in such a rural area. Frankly speaking I was one of them. I went to the Gansyouin Temple, which is located in skirts of a mountain of the mountainous area in Obuse. There was the ceiling picture "All around glare Chinese phoenix chart". When I looked it up, I believed that this is the Hokusai, because it was a magnificent calligraphy, which was certainly common to the 36 views of his arts. Well, this is the picture which is very young and psychedelic modern work. No one could believe that Hokusai painted this at the age of 89 years old. But it is the historically true fact. I have no confidence whether I could keep my energy to do the same thing as Hokusai had done at his age. Katsushika Hokusai was born in 1760 at the Edo Honjyo, which is Sumida Ward of Tokyo. He realized that he had the ability to draw the picture at the age of six years old. He started to learn Ukiyoe by Katsukawa Syunsyou. At the age from thirties to the beginning of forties, he became famous for Ukiyoe drawing beauties. At the age from forties to sixties, he drew cuts of books. At the age of seventies, he created the 36 sceneries Ukiyoe of Mt. Fuji, which are the most famous arts. Although he was so old, his ability as an artist had been strengthened. At the age of seventy-five years old, He changed his art from Ukiyoe to real painting. At the age of eighties, he visited Obuse three times by the invitation of Takayama Kouzan. He draws some pictures there. At the age of nineties years old, he passed away, by leaving such words, "If I would have more ten years or at least five years, I could become the master of arts." By the way, the Gansyouin Temple is one of the oldest temples in Obuse, which was built in 1472. Although this temple is located in a very rural are, it has a famous picture of Hokusai at the ceiling. In addition, it has a sales point of a small pond in the backyard. On the date of the 20th of April in 1816, the famous poet, Kobayashi Issa visited this temple and made a Haiku poem. The thin flog, cheer up. I am here, your friend. Actually, this Haiku was dedicated to his son, who was suffering from some disease. However he passed away after one month. Returning to this temple, not only the temple but also the surrounding atmosphere is indeed rustic. For instance, there are two statutes at the gate of the temple. It is obvious that these statutes were made by a layman, because they are really unskilled. But it is suitable for a temple in a rural area. By the way, as it was in autumn, there were the woods of the chestnut, harvested rice fields and the grape fields around the temple. I took the sightseeing bus again and took off the bus at the Hokusai Museum. Through passing the road, where the chest nuts were paved, I reached to a plaza, where not only the Hukusai Museum but also restaurants, sweets manufacturers and souvenir shops were located. It was very interesting for me to visit each museums and , restaurants and shops. I took chestnuts sweets. After taking sweets, I entered into the Hokusai Museum. It was a modern building and fit to the surrounding historical buildings. The sales points of this museum were ceiling pictures of the floats of the drawn festival and other small pictures drawn by Hokusai. As I had an image that Hokusai was an artist of Ukiyoe, I watched these pictures as if they were also Ukiyoe. Even if Hokusai said he would concentrate into drawing the real paintings, I thought he could not leave from the skills of Ukiyoe. Although Hokusai influenced the Impression artists on France, Hokusai's way still remains as an Ukiyoe authors. However, only the picture of chrysanthemum is different. It was too realistic. Thinking that this masterpiece was drawn at the Edo era, I dare to say that Hokusai was a genius. Like this I don't evaluate the masterpieces of this museum, however, I would like to say that the quality of the slide show of the image exhibition room was really wonderful. If you would have a chance to visit Obuse, I would like to recommend it. On the Next day I took a train. It was passing through apple fields and rice fields and arrived at that Komoro. At the station, there were some stands, where chestnuts, apples, grapes and vegetables were sold. I thought that the number of sightedness was very few. After walking only a few minutes, I arrived at the Komoro Castle Ruins, whose name was the Kaiko-en. It means that a garden of thinking olds. There were old gates and stone walls with moss. It was exactly as I expected in advance. According to the pamphlet of the Kaiko-en, the origin of the Komoro castle was the house built by Komuro Taro, about 500 years ago. Since then eight generals owned this castle, but finally in 1702, Makino family took over and kept it throughout ten generations. Normal castles in Japan are higher than town area. However, this castle is lower than the town, which is very extraordinary structure. It is called as "a hole castle". On the upper part of the third gate, there was a frame written by one of the Tokugawa generals, Ietatsu. The letters are very easy to read. Beside of this gate, there is the Cyoko-kan Museum. It exhibits old armors and goods, owned by Makino family. It is surprising for me that Maeda family was the object of the Kaiko Shinto Shrine, which is located at the end of this castle. Anyway the existence of the lord of this area seemed to be a special one for locals. I advanced between old stone walls. With watching sun-light coming down between trees and purely green moss of the ground, I thought "This is the Komoro old castle. It is exactly aesthetics of ruins". At the bridge of the black gate, I turned to right; I arrived at the Shimazaki Touson Memorial Museum. On the left of the building, there was the statute of Shimazaki Touson. He seemed to be early thirties. He wore glasses and had big eyes. I thought his face was a typical intelligent man's one. Shimazaki Touson is his pen-name. His real name was Shimazaki Haruki. He was born in 1872 at Magome. His family was the owner of a big inn and the lord of that area. He was sent to Tokyo for study at the age of 9 years old. He commuted to the Taimei Primary School of Ginza. He graduated from the Meiji Gakuin and became the national language teacher. He taught at the Meiji Women's School, the Touhoku Gakuin. After that he came to Komoro as the English and national language teacher at the Komori Gijyuku in 1899. He retired from this school after six years. During these six years, he authored poems and novels, which made his a well-known author. Especially the poem of the Chikuma River sense of journey and the novel of Hakai are famous. After his retirement as a teacher, he moved to Tokyo as an author. He studied in France in 1913. He authored "Yoakemae (Just before Dawn)", which made his the most famous. He passed away in 1943, while authoring "The East Gate". When I was a junior high school student, I was so impressed by his poem, the Chikuma River sense of journey. I was also surprised to know the theme of Hakai and Yoakemae. He is an author of so-called the realism. However the recent school would never teach such an author. There were a few young girls at this museum. They gathered together and made noise. I was wondering what they watch. It was a shop seller's thick credit sales notebook. It is a record, when, what and to whom the seller sold. As the volume was rather thick, the young girls were simply or innocently surprised to see the credit sales notebook. How stupid they were! They should be impressed by Shimazaki Touson's goods. For example, he guided a student how to write good sentences. For brushing up their composition skills, he let students their own sentences and added his comments on them using red ink. He wrote, "You should write sentences so as easy for the reader to read and get the meaning. So first of all you should write what you want to say. In that sense, your composition is very good." How nice if my sentence would be commented by such a famous author! This student should be very lucky. Moreover, it was quite new for me to know that there was a private school named Komoro Jyuku, which was established by Kimura Kumazou in 1893 on the request of the volunteer on this town. He was a priest, who stayed in the United States for 12 years from the first year of the Meiji era. He opened this school for the education of this small town. It had developed into the junior high school. However, it was forced to close in 1906 after Russo-Japanese War, because it was too liberal. Shimazaki joined to this school as a teacher at the age of 28. The Keio Gijyuku that Fukuzawa Yukichi opened to Mita in Tokyo might have been originally similar to this school. Such an ideal school was lost, which was very regrettable for me. I returned to the Komoro Station and searched some sightseeing spots for me to visit. I was surprised to see that about half of these spots were closed. Although it was the best sightseeing season, what is this! The number of sightedness seems to be down. I think that the shops and restaurants near the station should be most prosperous area. However, strangely enough some of them are closed. I am afraid that not only Shimazaki Touson but also the town Komoro seemed to be forgotten by people. This is just like as the old castle. Shimazaki has been forgotten together with the old Komoro castle. According to the guide chart, there seems to be a small town, named Unnojyuku at the outskirts of Komoro. Formerly this small town seemed to be a stage along the Northern provinces highway. It seems to be interesting. I assumed that I should go there. It is near the Station named Tanaka of the Shinano railway. I took a taxi. It passed the route, both sides of which, there were rice fields and apple fields, along with the Chikuma River. Suddenly I could see a straight road, beside of which there was a small river. Both sides there were many houses of the Edo are style. Willows were planted in the vicinity. I went into the History Museum of Unnojyuku. I learned the history of this town. As this area was the strategic location of military traffic, Unno family had governed about 1200 years ago. In 1181, Kiso Yoshinaka and Unno organized troops here. His troops attacked Heike and reached to Kyoto. After this Unno Toro has become famous for his ability of shooting arrows and riding horses. When it was Edo area, this town had been prosperous for Shouguns' going to and coming back from Edo. However since the Meiji Restoration started and the Edo era had finished, the travels of Syouguns finished. This town had faced serious economic problems of the long-term depression period. People started to look for new way for bread and butter. Finally they had engaged in the silk industry. The cool and dry weather of this area was suitable for producing high quality silk. In any places or any periods, we should look for our way to live through endeavor. (October 4, 2005) （C）Yama_san 2005, All Rights Reserved