NATURE IN SHORT / New Year visits to shrines, temples for nature lovers

Kevin Short / Daily Yomiuri Columnist

HAPPY NEW YEAR! That is a happy Gregorian New Year, of course. The calendar system developed by the ancient Romans and since adopted worldwide is a solar-based system that completely ignores the moon.

The traditional Asian system, in contrast, is lunisolar, so the New Year always begins on a new moon. The 12th and last moon of this Year of the Hare is now a fat waxing gibbous, which today should be visible throughout most of the afternoon and well into the night. Full moon comes this Sunday, and the new moon that starts the Year of the Dragon on Jan. 23.

I spent the Christmas vacation in the Los Angeles area. Although winter is the wet season in that region of the world, I saw nothing but deep blue skies and gorgeous sunsets in the cool, dry air. I also caught some awesome moonsets in the early evenings right after Christmas. Now, back in Japan, I am engrossed in the annual New Year's custom of hatsumode, or first visits to shrines and temples. Japanese like to start off the New Year with a visit to their favorite shrine or temple. Here they give thanks for blessings received during the past year, pray for health and success in the upcoming months, and buy an omamori charm sachet for their house or car. Most people visit their small local temples and tutelary shrines, as well as one or more of the more famous regional institutions. Popular hatsumode spots include the Shinshoji temple in Narita, Chiba Prefecture; the Meiji Jingu shrine and the Sensoji temple in Tokyo; Kawasaki Daishi in Kanagawa Prefecture; Hikawa Shrine in Saitama Prefecture; Atsuta Jingu in Nagoya; Fushimi Inari Taisha in Kyoto; Sumiyoshi Taisha in Osaka; and Dazaifu Tenmangu in Fukuoka.

Hatsumode are usually finished soon after New Year's day, but us countryside ramblers and druid naturalists take several weeks to make our rounds. This is because the Japanese landscape is simply packed with thousands of small shrines and temples that we feel an attachment to. Each tiny hamlet, for example, has at least one tutelary shrine, and often a Buddhist temple as well.

A bicycle is the best way to make the rounds of these sacred places. Walking would just take too long, and driving would involve hassles with parking and narrow, muddy roads. On typical dry, cold winter days, I always start off my ride by looking for a skunk vine that is still loaded with yellowish-brown berries. These berries exude a distinctive odor, giving the vine its common English name as well as its Japanese name, hekusokazura, which means something like "fart-feces-vine."

The skunk vine is a very common light-loving roadside species, found from urban areas well up into the mountains. Although the vine is herbaceous, the berries persist well into the winter. Also, the berries do smell, but not nearly as much as you would expect from their names. In fact, in mountain villages, men who go out to hunt or cut trees in the winter crush the berries and spread the juice on exposed areas of skin. This, they say, helps prevent chilblains and frostbite in the cold, dry air. On a long bike ride, I like to rub some skunk vine juice on the tip of my nose and cheeks before starting off.

At this time of year, the Japanese countryside landscape has almost completely shifted into winter mode. The rice plants have withered to a fine tan color, and most of the leaves have fallen off the deciduous trees. The coldest weather, however, is still to come. In the Sekki, a traditional Asian system for dividing the solar year into 24 segments, the Shokan, or "Small-cold" segment will start tomorrow, but the Daikan, or "Big-cold" segment, which bears the full brunt of the harshest winter weather, won't come until Jan. 21.

Fortunately, the Kanto region actually experiences fairly warm winters. Rarely are daytime temperatures below freezing. Also, although the coldest weather is yet to come, it's already time to begin celebrating the return of the sun. In Tokyo today, for example, the Sun rose around 06:50 a.m., at a point about 28 degrees south of due east. At transit, which comes about 11:46 a.m. in Tokyo, the Sun was close to 32 degrees above the southern horizon, and will sink below the southwestern mountains, at a point about 28 degrees south of due west, at around 4:40 p.m. By next Tuesday sunset will be seven minutes later, the Sun more than half a degree higher at transit, and the rising and setting points nearly two degrees further north. These incremental advances may seem insignificant, but seven extra minutes of daylight is a welcome blessing when you're taking pictures or watching birds on a late afternoon bike ride.

Hatsumode trips are all about counting your blessings, and acquiring luck and setting a pace for the upcoming year. I personally believe that catching glimpses of certain small birds, such as kingfishers and woodpeckers, is a sure sign of positive energy on the horizon for the new year.

Common Kingfisher are tiny birds with almost comical big, thick bills; and truly awesome shiny iridescent cobalt-blue feathers on their heads, wings, back and tail. They hunt along the edges of rivers, canals, and also the small ponds frequently found around Japanese shrines and temples. Kingfishers like to perch on tree branches that overhang the water, waiting to plummet down on the unsuspecting fish below.

Japanese Pygmy Woodpecker are sparrow-size birds that can often be heard drumming on trees in the sacred groves behind the shrines and temples. Their black and white wing markings provide good camouflage when running up and down tree trunks. The ones with the small red spot on their heads are the males. Any year that starts off with a glimpse of a pygmy woodpecker is gotta be a good one!

Short is a naturalist and cultural anthropology professor at Tokyo University of Information Sciences.