Shimajiri-gun

My first day in Naha was rainy and cloudy 🌧️So, it was time for another museum again. I chose the Peace Memorial Museum - way in the south of Okinawa - and was surprised to learn about the Okinawan perspective on World War II and the preceding Japanese wars in the Pacific; mainly with China and Russia. 🧐 I also realised that Okinawa - though it is a Japanese prefecture (like a federal state in Germany) - was only recently „added“ to Japan. That explained also why Okinawa is quite different from the rest of Japan 🇯🇵
For obvious reasons, neither US military bases 🪖 nor too much interference from Japans mainland are welcome by the locals. Okinawans would rather be left alone respectively receive proper support (according to their interests) from Tokyo.
I am not sure if the museum was still located in Naha. On one hand, it was not such a big distance between it and my hostel. On the other hand, it took almost 2 hours to get there respectively back (at least with public transport). In Naha, public transport is almost entirely operated by buses 🚌 There are also some train stations and one train line going back and forth between them, but that’s it. The busses are often stuck in traffic - that’s probably one of the reasons why it took a little longer than expected to reach the destination. That day I didn’t mind it because it was raining and in the bus it was at least dry 😌

The next day was nicer. ☀️ I left the hostel in the morning to visit the beaches on the west coast of Naha. On the way, I visited „Fukushu Garden“ ⛲️ I have heard a couple of times now that - while we westerners admire Japanese gardens - the Japanese people admire the Chinese gardens 😂 „Fukushu Garden“ is a Chinese garden. It was built as a symbol of friendship with the city Fuhzou in China. The slogan of the garden is „walkable art“ and in my opinion there is really something to this claim. I think I understand now why Japanese people like chinese Gardens so much. 😅 To me the landscape was well designed and it was so nice and quiet. I could have spent much more time there - just sitting and enjoying the calming atmosphere.
In the afternoon, I went to the beaches 🏝️ which were a bit disappointing: from the sandy beaches a highway and the harbour obstructed the otherwise pleasant view. The only beach that was reachable on foot and didn’t have that, was covered in stones 🤦‍♂️ Apparently, the best beaches are on the Kemara islands of the coast of Naha. I kind of already had made the decision but if I needed any more reasons to visit them on the next day - this was it. 👍
In the evening, I met Anna-Maria for dinner again. She was still in Naha but it was her last night in Japan. We went to a really nice Izakaya (Japanese tapas bar) 🍻 Needless to say, that we had a good time eating excellent food and catching up on the experiences of each other from the last couple of days.

On the next morning, I went as planned to Tokashiki - one of the Kemara islands 🏖️ They are famous for their unbelievably blue water. It was the weekend and the weather was great. The ocean was a bit cold but so clear and the coral 🪸 and fish 🐠 so abundant that I went snorkelling multiple times. In summer, these islands are usually packed with tourists but at the time I was there, it was low season and very calm. However, for reasons I still cannot comprehend only a few dozen people seemed to be on the island. 🤔 Although (or because?) there were so few people on the island, I got in contact with disproportionally many other travelers: for example, during an organised snorkelling trip I met a young English speaking couple from Asahikawa on Hokkaido - a city that I had been to in the beginning of my journey through Japan 🇯🇵 They were in Okinawa for their one week long vacation (that is half of their total vacation in a year!). They were amazed 😮 when I told them where I had already been and that I was traveling through Japan for a total of 6 weeks. Through my hotel and our shared interest for diving 🤿, I also befriended Eidan from Israel. He works in IT and has the luxury to work part-time as well as from anywhere - truly a great combination of perks. It was already his third time in Japan. 🇯🇵
The restaurants on the island have been good as well but they had very limited opening hours. For example a really nice cafe, close to my hotel, was closed between 2 pm and 6 pm 🤷‍♂️ During that time basically everything was closed - probably because of low season. Luckily there was this little „Tokashiki Parlour“ food truck 🚚 that served also very good smoothies. I was there every day and tried the pineapple, dragonfruit and mocha flavors. All have been delicious. 😋
After 2 nights on the island, I returned very relaxed to the main island of Okinawa. My time in Japan was coming to an end and I had to get back to Naha since my flight ✈️ to Tokyo was on the 12th of December.

During my remaining time in Naha, I visited the art museum ⛪️ that had a permanent exhibition of paintings, photographs and installations from local artists. And I went for a stroll through the pottery 🏺district „Tsuboya“ (Okinawa is known for their pottery industry) with subsequent indulgence in the many offerings of „Naha Kokusai Dori Shopping Street“. I even found a top notch Café and Bakery 🍰 called „Edelweiss“ that served coffee and cake as I knew it from Germany. Obviously, I also had to try the Ice cream🍦from „Blue Seal“ - a seemingly popular brand in Okinawa (as I have seen them in many places on the island) on a sunny day.

Now, all that was left was going back to Tokyo and waiting for the next chapter of my Sabbatical to commence. 🎬Read more