Tsuboya Shisa

Tsuboya Shisa

After our usual morning routine spent with the computer and with e-mail we leave the apartment on foot and walk in the direction of Kokusai Street stopping at a flag store where we purchase and Okinawan flag as a gift. A bit further on is Shurei-do martial arts supply store, the best one on Okinawa. Art is looking for a karate gi but they are temporarily out of his size. Art want to visit the Tourist Information Bureau off of Kokusai Street to introduce himself and to gather information. It is just around the corner from the Starbucks on Kokusai Street and we pick up brochures and maps. We wander down Heiwadori Street (Peace Street) again and Art buys another sweet bean fish cake hot off the griddle. (They are really very delicious, so be sure to try one if you have the opportunity.)

The covered market ends at the Tsuboya pottery district which is one of my favorite areas in Naha. The main street of this interwoven district is lined with Okinawa pottery shops. Most of the buildings here are the old wood houses with red tile roofs and each gateway is guarded by a pair of Shisa. A Shisa is neither dog nor lion, but a guardian creature unique to Okinawa culture. A pair of Shisa, one with its mouth open and one with its mouth closed is sentry to most every home and business on Okinawa. They come in all sizes and styles and there are several pottery studios in this district that make them. There is a major studio on the main street where you can watch specialized craftsperson’s meticulously sculpt and incise the clay into these magical creatures. We don’t visit the studio today, but I have watched them work on several other occasions and have always felt welcome.

Today we wander uphill and discover the ruins of an immense hillside pottery kiln that was shared by the artisans of this district many years ago. Broken earthenware vessels and pottery shards are embedded in the embankment and a cat lounges lazily on the sun warmed roof tiles of the ancient building. If you poke down narrow side streets or walk off the main street along a stone path you will discover many small pottery studios and sweet spots, lush with tropical foliage. Many of these intertwined streets have walls hewn of Okinawa limestone. You will also see monstrously ugly cement apartment buildings crowding and dwarfing the ancient tile roofed houses, and expensive cars sit in the driveways of many of these ancient homes.

It’s 3:30 P.M. before we start home and we are hungry. Many places have already stopped serving lunch and are not yet open for dinner so we resort to a non-descript 24 hour Okinawan eatery. John orders an ebi fry, (fried shrimp) I order a vegetable and beef champuru (stir-fry) and Art has a tonkatsu-don (a bowl of rice with breaded pork cutlet.)

Back at home, I work on waxes until nearly 7:00.P.M. and then relax with John and his beetle Frack and watch a bizarre Japanese T.V. program. The premise of this program seems to be that the T.V. crew barges into a “victims” bedroom and puts a stag beetle on the sleeping victims’ nose. The beetle pinches on hard and the T.V. crew uses a stopwatch to time the victim to determine how long he can withstand the torturous pinch. (I am concerned that some of the beetles may get hurt with all the thrashing around and hysteria this “Beetle Fear Factor” program generates.) John thrusts Frack in my direction and I start in fear. I am not yet ready to hold John’s new pet, let alone be timed with one pinched to my nose!