🧵10/ Unexpectedly, members of our #Archaeoastronomy #HistoryTour group bought many many small souvenirs in #Asuka to decorate their Christmas trees 🎄 They are indeed cute 🙂 #JapanTravel

🧵9/ City staff explained the stone tortoise at Sakafune-ishi ruins, mentioned (?) in 1,300 y.o. Nihon Shoki (Chronicles Of #Japan). The sand-filled rectangle filtered spring water into the turtle 🐢 Exciting during a #HistoryTour; #Asuka locals hope @unesco.org soon registers it as a World Heritage!

🧵8/ Sakafune-ishi stonework remains mysterious: did ancient Japanese fill it with water/alcohol to reflect & study stars, create medicine, …? In a hilltop bamboo grove of Asuka village, its carved granite feels surreal ✨ #Archaeoastronomy enthusiasts and empaths I guided told me it's a must-touch!

🧵7/ In #Kyoto, 1,250 y.o. Kiyomizu-dera Buddhist temple is beautiful with #autumn leaves nowadays. The wooden structure was built without nails, and can be photographed from the bottom (I also took a vertical photo of our group there). #清水寺 #JapanTravel #Architecture

🧵6/ Rainy 08:30 at #Kyoto Fushimi-Inari Grand Shrine, head of 30,000+ shrines, to feel #Shinto power through Inari (god of rice 🌾 with fox messengers 🦊). Immediate rewards: rare encounter with shrine maidens & priests, crowdless group photo at the torii gates tunnel, wish-come-true lucky charms… ⛩️⛩️⛩️

🧵2/ The chef of Grains (Miho's Kitchen) makes her #PlantBased eel & chicken from scratch using local soy & konjac 🌿 She sells this foundation as "okacon". #VeganNagoya #VeganJapan

🧵5/ At Kanayama Megaliths, a local journalist interviewed us (maybe the only tour without Japanese visitors for years!), and Deïmian bought Tokuda-san & Kobayashi-san’s new #archaeoastronomy signed book in English/Japanese. Fun fact: I’m on 1+ photo of the book (as 2023 #HistoryTour guide here).

🧵4/ At Kanayama Megaliths deep in #Gifu mountains, Tokuda-san & Kobayashi-san showed/detailed 4,500 y.o. sun/stars observation points, calendar systems that they noticed & unearthed 28 years ago: solstices, equinoxes, midpoints, leap years (!)… unaffected by #Japan many earthquakes 🌋 #HistoryTour

🧵3/ A day trip from Tokyo let us walk on and inside 1,500 y.o. keyhole-shaped burial mounds of Hodota Kofun cluster in #Gunma and climb the mysterious cliff of 1,400 y.o. Yoshimi Hyakuana “Hundred Caves” in #Saitama! Deïmian’s storytelling & theories enlivened our #HistoryTour 👍🏻

🧵2/ Our #HistoryTour lively discussions started at the Japanese archaeology gallery of Tokyo National Museum (my favourite in Japan), at the old walls of Edo Castle (with huge stones now protecting the Imperial Gardens and Nippon Budokan), and at #Tokyo oldest (1,400 y.o.) Buddhist temple Senso-ji.

🧵7/ How may curators make this #Osaka tour truly exciting for everyone, not just for history buffs? My main recommendations related to storytelling (the substance is fine) and to multilingual audio (not just Japanese). Hope you'll soon enjoy it too!

🧵6/ I finally did this! As hands-on activity at #Osaka Ikegami-Sone Yayoi Learning Centre, we shaped & kept our own magatama, comma-shaped jewels mentioned in Japanese myths. Do they represent fangs, foetuses… or are they Power? It's a 3,000 y.o. mystery! Lovely #CulturalTourism souvenir 🙂

🧵5/ Fun time & memory trying a costume of shaman-queen Himiko at #Osaka Museum of Yayoi Culture. We took photos in the lobby and (with special authorization) inside an exhibition room. The curators liked the results, which cleared any worries regarding cultural respect. #CulturalTourism #HistoryTour

🧵4/ Our immersive lunch was a bento of Yayoi & local ingredients. I had convinced the organizers to add a #PlantBased alternative so vegans joined (13%) and enjoyed with me Yayoi-era-inspired rice balls (same chef) plus complements by Merry Momo (restaurant I recommended). #JapaneseFood #VeganOsaka

🧵3/ Exclusive during our #HistoryTour: touching millennial pottery, weighting replicas, Q&A about the source of #JapaneseCulture with #Osaka Museum of Yayoi Culture curators, climbing into a reconstructed building at Ikegami-Sone archaeological site… Special connection needed; staff came to unscrew!

🧵2/ Fascinating #HistoryTour in English: we saw #Osaka artifacts, learned about #Japan early rice cultivation, metal tools, first wars two millennia ago… The diversity of burials caught everyone's eye! We asked too many questions to also cover the emergence of rich/poor disparities 😓 Plan a guide!