World Heritage anime (Tamaki)

One World Heritage listed shrine I haven’t been able to visit yet is the remote Tamaki Shrine in Totsukawa, Nara prefecture.  It lies on the Omine Okugakemichi, one of the pilgrimage routes registered in the Kii Mountain site, and is closely associated with shugendo (mountain asceticism).  Next time I visit Kumano I am planning to get to it, but if the anime proves a success it seems I won’t be the only one…

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Entrance way to Tamaki Shrine (alleghenyaikido.com)

By TORU AMEMIYA/  Staff Writer  January 22, 2013  Asahi Shimbun

TOTSUKAWA, Nara Prefecture–A modern fantasy novel series set amid the Kumano Kodo ancient pilgrimage routes and other historical spots is being adapted into an animated TV series scheduled to premiere in spring.

The animated adaptation of Noriko Ogiwara’s “RDG Red Data Girl” is raising hopes for a revival in tourism in Totsukawa, a town still reeling from damage caused by Typhoon No. 12 in autumn 2011.

“With this as a momentum, I’d like many people to learn about our history and culture, such as the Kumano Kodo routes and the Kumano pilgrimage,” said Suehiko Yuba, a 70-year-old Shinto priest at Tamaki Jinja shrine in Totsukawa.

The protagonist in the “RDG” series is a girl named Izumiko Suzuhara, who has been raised at Tamakura Jinja, as shrine reminiscent of Tamaki Jinja shrine.

The real shrine sits along the side of the 170-kilometer Omine Okugake-michi road, which connects the Yoshino-Omine mountain range and the Kumano Sanzan shrines. The road is also part of the Kumano Kodo pilgrimage routes listed as a UNESCO World Heritage site.

Izumiko is a normal, shy girl who doesn’t leave the area surrounding the shrine until she finishes junior high school. But one thing leads to another, and she enrolls at a senior high school in Tokyo.

There, she finds herself surrounded by boys and girls with unusual powers, including “yamabushi” mountain ascetic hermits and “onmyoji” practitioners of “onmyodo,” a type of esoteric cosmology. Izumiko finds she has a unique mystic power that everyone wants to gain, and she ends up determining the fate of humankind.

The novel series is filled with elements of Japan’s spiritual world, including the ancient religion of Shugendo. It is written in a comprehensible manner so that it can be enjoyed by children and adults.

(courtesy www.sekaiisan-wakayama.jp)

According to Kadokawa Shoten Co., a member of the “RDG” production committee, original character designs were provided by popular illustrator Mel Kishida.

P.A. Works Co., a Toyama-based anime studio renowned for its very fluid and expressive techniques, is producing the series.

Decisions on the date of broadcast and which broadcaster will air the series in the Kinki region have not been announced.

Close to the border shared by Wakayama, Nara and Mie prefectures, Tamaki Jinja is actually closer to Kumano Hongu Taisha shrine on the side of the Omine Okugake-michi road in Tanabe city in Wakayama Prefecture. It still serves as an accommodation for Shugendo practitioners.

Also known as the “Oku no In (the innermost hall) of the Kumano Sanzan shrines,” the main building of Tamaki Jinja lies near the 1,076-meter Mount Tamakisan.

The shrine is far from town and nestled in a steep mountain area with poor means of transportation. But on clear days, one can view the peaks of the Kii Sanchi mountains rising above the sea of clouds like islands. From the peak of Mount Tamakisan, about a 20-minute walk from the shrine, one can even see the faraway Kumanonada Sea.

In the novel, Izumiko often stands on the mountaintop for a secret dance that has significant implications in the story.

Flooding caused by Typhoon No. 12 killed six people and left six others missing in Totsukawa in 2011. Tamakijinja suffered minor damage, including a broken branch of a 3,000-year-old cedar tree designated as a natural treasure by the Nara prefectural government.

Due to “harmful rumors” that followed, the number of visitors to the shrine dropped to 10 to 20 percent of the usual 30,000 annual visitors, shrine officials said.

(courtesy Japan web magazine)