July 30 and the second site of this year’s summer tour brings us to Shiga prefecture. This is the western loop of this long tour, before we head east again toward Ishikawa, Niigata, and Nagano on back to Tokyo in 10 days. Shiga prefecture is dominated by Lake Biwa, the largest freshwater lake in Japan. The southwestern section of the lake is surrounded by Otsu city, where the Jungyo event is being held. There’s quite a bit of historic significance, like the assassination attempt of the future Tsar Nicolas II of Russia, and World Heritage sites. A particular kind of fermented sushi, funazushi, is considered a delicacy in the area. It sounds like something Scandinavian that I’ve read about, gutted and salted when fresh to draw out the moisture, then stored for a year. It’s then taken out and stored again in rice. I’m a glutton, so I like food but my nerd side wins in Otsu – this Open Data site looks more appealing than fermented sushi. http://www.city.otsu.lg.jp/opendata/ I wonder whether a sumo jungyo mash-up with tourist or restaurant locations would be helpful…
Funazushi is actually the original form of sushi, predating the fresh rice + very fresh fish modern version.
And I think this is a good place to embed Hakuho’s tweet from his Father’s day excursion to Shiga:
Lake Biwa is also an ancient center of Jomon culture. The museum there is pretty damn neat if you want to learn about the ancient tribal peoples of Japan and their culture. Especially if you are into trees. There is a TON of knowledge on Cryptomeria Japonica trees (Japanese cedar).
Hmm… can I just go knock around Japan for a year being a museum junky and talking to people?
Tigerboy the fat, lazy tourist says “So, dear folk of Lake Biwa, your roof is held together by string and you eat fermented goldfish.That’s so traditional and fascinating. Is it ok if I order a pizza and sleep out in the yard?”
When I show up, they take one look at me and know I am a crazed, uncultured barbarian. So most odd behavior can be explained away with that as a guide. It was even more potent when I had my beard.
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Thank you. Hopefully I’m the only one…