A Place Where They Made Sugar And Drink Tea

is exhibited in Shikoku Mura. Have you read my two previous posts on the exhibitis of this museum? If you haven't, you can read it here and here.

Sugarmaking became a specialty of the Sanuki region (present day Kagawa Prefecture) during the late Edo period (1600-1867).

While the Satsuma region in southern Kyushu had previously been known for its brown sugar, the white sugar produced in the Sanuki region soon became known as the finest in Japan.

As sugar cane cultivation spread throught Sanuki region, sugar mills or presses became widespread in the area. Only two such round sugar-presses from that era remains. Inside, there are three stone mortars driven by oxen pullling a long crossbeam (udegi); constantly walking round and round the inner circumference of the building. That's why the buildings are round - it's to accomodate the circular movement  of the oxen.

In buildings known as Kamaya, the natural syrup was boiled to remove impurities and refine the sugar. Very few such kamaya refineries remain in existence.

After sugar, we have a tea place. Pity we only got to view the place instead of being able to enjoy a cup or two. ^^

A tea hall (chado), part temple, part resting area, part meeting place. Small structures like this containing a Buddhist image were often built on main roads just outside a town to keep away wandering evil spirits and as a resting place for pilgrims.

This particular hut was from Ryukaido, a main thoroughfare between Tosa and Iyo (present day Kochi and Ehime prefectures) which was heavily travelled by pilgrims (benro) visiting the 88 temples.

Family Homes Of Olden Time

exhibited in the open-air museum; Shikoku Mura provided us insights on how Japanese people (Shikoku people specifically) lived long ago.

The first home was posted in my previous post. A home donated by Yamashita family.

This one is the Kono family home.

The house was built in early 18th century deep in the mountains of Ehime Prefecture, this farm dwelling measures 39 feet long and 21 feet deep. (By the way, it's funny that when it comes to house sizes, I am more comfortable using square feets instead of square metres despite us using the metric system for everything else. Houses area are usually advertised is sq ft instead of sq mtr here too. Why is that, I wonder?)

Two thirds of the house are devoted to two living/sleeping rooms, each with their own hearth (irori no ma). Coarse straw mats provide comfortable seating comfort on the bamboo floors around the hearth. The other one-third of the home is clay-floored work/storage area and entrance way.

This particular home even has a bark steamer for papermaking. How cool is that?

After seeing these homes, I am so thankful for modern day living and homes with provide plenty of privacy!

Time For Sanuki Udon

Need something filling, served quickly and somewhat cheap? Why look for burgers and the like when one vacations in Japan. Eat udon instead!

Well, if you are in Takamatsu and you are hungry, what would you look for? Something yummy, chewy and absolutely delicious. You must absolutely not miss trying Sanuki udon.

Legend has it that a monk named Kukai learned the art of making udon at the temple in China where he studied and brought back the knowledge to his home in Sanuki way back in the ninth century.

Three centuries later, another monk named Enni returned from China with drawings of a hydraulic flour mill and with that knowledge, made by kneading flour (noodles, dumplings, etc) flourished.

Sanuki udon, the pride of Kagawa prefecture (which was called Sanuki in ancient times) has a soft and silky texture with an al-dente firmness.The texture of the udon can't be matched elsewhere. Really.

When we got to Takamatsu, we were pretty stoked at the chance to be able to enjoy sanuki udon. More than once, hopefully. Anyways after passing through a few udon shops in Takamatsu, we decided to try a chain outlet first and if time permits, be more adventurous and head to a more traditional, mom&pop style sanuki udon shop later.

So, off we went to Hanamaru for our first sanuki udon experience. Remember, this was our first experience at eating sanuki udon though we have been advised by bloggers, Su and Lrong on how to order them.

Shop's entrance. Not as intimidating as the other shops along the shopping area for clueless foreigners like us to enter. The cook showed us a picture menu, to choose from. So it was, take a tray, pick a glass of water, order your choice of udon (type and size), proceed to pick anything else you want to add to the meal and pay at the cashier.

All three of us had the same. Raimie had the single portion and both Zaini and I had double portion (or was it S size and L size). Can't remember.

I should say we did justice to the food! Not a single drop left!

A few other udon shops just a few metres from Hanamaru. I had hoped we can try them out, but as it turned out we cut short our Shikoku trip in favour of making our way to Hakodate. You aren't seeing the last of me yet, Shikoku! I'll come back!

This place looks pretty interesting to me.Wanted to eat here, but chicken out at the last minute and decided to go to Hanamaru instead. The reason was, the place was busy with people. We were looking for a quiet, non-crowded place as we probably would make a nuisance of ourselves with our cluelessness at busy shops. He~

Mind you, we had our lunch at 4pm!

Autumn Reminiscence - Shikoku Mura

"I cannot endure to waste anything as precious as autumn sunshine by staying in the house. So I spent almost all the daylight hours in the open-air"

                                                                              
Nathaniel Hawthorne

 and spent it out in the open-air we did; one fine autumn day at the Shikoku Mura; an open air museum in Yashima, Kagawa Prefecture on Shikoku Island.

Traditional farm and folk houses (there were some quarters for lighthouse keepers too) relocated from all over Shikoku are displayed at the open-air museum but before I put up my  (most probably long, very detailed) post or posts on the traditional houses seen there; some autumn colours . Enjoy. ^^

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Why stay indoors when one can spend the whole morning looking at such wonderful burst of colours and enjoy the crisp morning air, right?

This is the second part of a 7-part Autumn Reminiscence posts that I'll do for this month. Have you seen the photos of Lake Kinrinko I posted up a few days earlier? ^^

Update:
Nothing to do with Japan or Autumn but just wanna share something to celebrate the New Year of 2012. By doing a 12K run at Padang Merbok with 4,000 other runners on Jan 8th. It was FUN!

Did a pretty lousy timing but in my defense - the route was hilly. It was up, uP and UP and downhill only towards the end.