Hitotsugi Park (cont.)

Third day at the park brought new discoveries. One of the fist things I noticed upon climbing the stairs again was the cat man. He was out again with his cats, frolicking in the shade provided. As I neared the top of the stairs I saw a cluster of umbrellas strewn together to look like an igloo. Inside the make-shift igloos was a circle of plates all containing cat food. It looked as if the installation was permanent and I was surprised that a colony of cats hadn't already taken up residence in the area.

When I reached the park, it was unfortunately around lunch time again. I had hoped to get there the day before at dusk, it turned out that I arrived a bit later than planned. I saw a couple that work as scooter messengers sitting and talking and eating lunch. The man was moving about wildly gesturing and telling stories. From the giant smile and laugh of the lady present, I could tell that it was thoroughly enjoyed.

More people cycled through per usual and left. It was a sunny day unlike the others and the amount of people that stopping by was constant so I didn't feel like it was the time to be snapping more photos.

However, I did find out some amazing things about the stools and the wall.

First the stools:

The stools were indeed a bunch of children's games and rhymes that almost every Japanese recognized and knew. Friends told me that they were games past on from generation to generation and played by children everywhere.

One game is where children pretend to be a pot and sing a song where the bottom falls out and they turn about from facing each other to facing away while holding hands.








Another stool had a game played with five or more children. In it, one child sits in the middle of a circle and covers their eyes. Then the other children hold hands and circle around singing a song. When the song stops, the child in the middle has to guess which friend is standing behind them.






The other discovery I made was that the giant map covering the wall in the park was actually a map of ancient Akasaka in the Edo period. It points to where you are now (the big red circle in the middle). Then it marks all the places around it including famous shrines, temples, and places where famous people of the time lived.

I'm not sure what my final is going to be about but I'm getting inklings that might involve this map in some way. Just off the top of my head, it would be cool to get the map and recreate it in a DVD/Web presented program that lets you interact with all the areas it points to. In those areas, it would be nice to interview some people and take some footage of the places to give locals and foreigners alike a glimpse of ancient Akasaka in present day Japan.

So I suppose that in a sense this exorcise has served as a building block to form a final presentation on. The map is interesting to both myself and other Japanese that see it. To find out in a broad sense more about the area of Akasaka would be a fantastic discovery alone. But to present it in a manner that is engaging and artistic would truly be worth while.