Japan Day 8: Michael Ende and Elephants

I was very upset when I found out it was supposed to rain all day. I took the JR local train from Matsumoto to Nagano, and then took an even more local train north to Kurohime station in the little town of Shinano. It was raining pretty heavily and, since it is a public holiday today in Japan (Sport’s Day), the local buses were not running. So I took a taxi from Kurohime station up to the Kurohime Fairy Tale Museum.

The Kurohime Fairy Tale Museum has been my pilgrimage destination this whole trip, because it holds a lot of Michael Ende’s papers, his turtle collectibles, his school documents, etc.

Even in the middle of nowhere, manhole cover.

The view from the Fairy Tale Museum.

The Fairy Tale Museum.

The Michael Ende section takes up about a third of the museum. It was clear from letters in there that Ende had a big hand in helping the museum get established.

I could not take photos in most of the exhibit, unfortunately, but it had a ton of his original artwork as well as things from his childhood.

Kurohime is the name of this part of Shinano, and the name of the mountain /dormant volcano the museum sits at the base of. Kurohime was a princess whose father reneged on a promise to marry her to a snake-prince, who then transformed into a dragon and destroyed a lot of the area before the princess decided to ignore her dad and go with the dragon/snake prince. At least that’s the gist of what I got from the video. I bought a book with the story in it to read later.

Turtle outside the café.

This cottage, which belonged to Japanese illustrator Chihiro Iwasaki, is part of the museum grounds.

This is what her work area looked like.

These steep stairs were giving me anxiety flashbacks to the castle yesterday.

There were lots of beautiful flowers.

A cherry blossom tree planted “in memories of Michael Ende and of Kurohime” for the death of Koyasu Michiko, a fellow Steiner-fan who had spent a lot of time in Munich, was a close friend of Ende’s, and had translated some of his later works into Japanese.

Sign pointing the way to “Momo’s Time-flower Garden”

Another view of the Dōwakan, or Fairy Tale Museum.

I never got a glimpse of the top of this mountain thanks to the clouds. Mt. Kurohime is 2,200-something meters tall; the one just north had an extra 200 meters, and, according to the owner of my hotel tonight, the peak has had snow on it since last week.

Part of the Time-flower Garden.

More flowers.

What’s a Time-Flower Garden without a turtle?

A final shot of the landscape as I mentally prepare myself for the walk down.

The manhole covers in all of the Shinano area feature Naumann’s elephant.

The Pied-Piper calls you in.

My haul from the museum gift shop. Two large booklets on Ende, including a detailed list of the 2000 items of his they have in archive. A bilingual picture book in homage to Michael Ende and his surrealist painter father, with illustrations directly inspired by Ende’s “The Mirror in the Mirror.” A book of Japanese folk tales involving ghostly metamorphoses, including the story of Kurohime. A small turtle seated on a block. And a pin with the Kurohime Fairy Tale Museum’s book-turtle logo.

When I was done visiting the museum, the rain had let up, so I decided to walk the hour it would take to reach my accommodation for the night.

Solar panels.

I think this was a cable car for going up the mountain?

Most of these signs point to various guest houses people stay at during ski season.

Retaining wall with some vine (kudzu?).

Even though it was grey and cloudy, it was still a beautiful walk.

Former ski lift?

Blowing in the wind.

The path goes ever on and on…

The sign warning about the incline fell over. Not sure if that made the incline worse.

Japanese chestnuts - the annoying pokey thing on the left is filled with nuts like on the right. Foot, which got poked a couple of times on my walk, for scale.

The daily dose of train porn.

Couldn’t fine any information on this in my map. Grave? Memorial?

Look at this little lizard! He was doing too good of a job blending into the road - I almost stepped on him!

Overgrown Torii gate on the side of the road.

These beautiful red lilies could be seen at various points during my train ride through Nagano as well.

Along the way I stopped at the Lake Nojiri Naumann Elephant Museum. Elephants are the last animal I think of when I think of Japan, but 40,000 years ago humans around this lake were hunting elephants.

I stopped at the Lake Nojiri Naumann Elephant Museum.

I’m not sure what he’s doing to that elephant’s rear.

Some blue sky while at the elephant museum.

Naumann’s elephant is closer to our elephants than to mammoths. Not so hairy.

The area I trounced around today.

The museum also talked about the Irish Elk, whose fossils have also been found in the area. It wasn’t only elephants.

Tools for cutting from 30000 years ago until now (with a huge jump between 15000 years ago and now).

Try to touch it! Touch the tooth!

Panels go right-to-left, top-to-bottom.
October 1948
1. Mornings at Lake Nojiri feel great.
2. Whoa, what could this be?
3. Is it a hot water bottle? (The museum had a metal ridged hot water bottle on display so us youngsters wouldn’t think him crazy).
4. Nah, there’s that legend that long ago at Lake Nojiri a dragon and a giant crab fought, so maybe this is a dragon tooth!
5. 1954 - I’ll see if they can find out at Kyoto University.
6. Sensei, what is this thing?
It’s a molar tooth from a Naumann’s elephant.

Even Japan has to deal with invasive species. These Mississippi Red-Eared Turtles were presumably someone’s pets before being released at the lake.

They are still finding fossils in active excavations now.

I then finished heading to my hotel. Since it is the end of a long weekend, the crowds are gone and I’m actually the only guest here tonight. The owner said I’m the first non-Japanese person he’s met that has come here specifically for the Fairy Tale Museum; he mostly only knows of families going there for the events they hold.