Courting the Muse

I mentioned a few posts back that the DVD release of the last season of Hozuki no Reitetsu was marked by a promotion at Animate, and that this promotion included an art contest.  What I did NOT tell you was that around that time I found a couple of Benzaiten's shrines around Yokohama.  She came up in my post about the Shichifukujin Meguri, the only female deity included in the lucky seven, and the patron of artists and musicians, so she holds a special place in my little infidel heart.  Because I really, really wanted to win that contest, I decided running around Tokyo visiting every one of her shrines that I could find would be an AWESOME use of my resources.  I mean, I'd put every bit of cleverness and ingenuity I had into my entry, but I was a visitor playing on the home turf.  I needed to lure her into my cheering section, if I could.

Okay.  So it's possible right now you're thinking that this is some next-level blasphemy.  Maybe you're even right.  I choose to look at it as me addressing prayers to my deity through a power spot.  Since the lightning hasn't struck yet, let's move on...

Honestly, at first this was just kind of for funsies.  The first shrine I found after leaving Sankichi, the pigment store near Kannai station.  I was on my way to Coco Curry (who I've mentioned probably more times recently than either Coke or Lonely Planet, so I'm going to start hitting them up for a sponsorship as well), and only knew it was affiliated with Benzaiten because it had a money washing station.  There's a long story about my Dad and I passing a lucky $100 bill back and forth, but for now suffice it to say that I don't need to wash my money, but I did drop a five yen coin in the box before hurrying on into the night.

The next shrine I found a few days later, as I was about to catch the train at Myorenji.  At the edge of Kikuna-Ike there is a small shrine, and as I walked passed the alley leading to the park it caught at the corner of my eye.  Since I'd just seen the train leave the station, I decided I had enough time to go see whose shrine it was, and when I saw the dragons and the symbol of the Triforce surrounded by waves, I knew that this was going to become a thing.  I was going to start my own Ichifukujin Meguri.

However, this is easier said than done.  It's not always clear who's enshrined where.  Google Maps spat out a few answers for me, but I suspected that there were a lot more, so for the first time in my history I became an expert* in iconography.  Back in college my croaky old art history professor talked about how you figure out which saint was which.  I cared slightly more when my Tibetan guide was telling me how to figure out which Bodhisattva was which, but for me, visiting old temples and churches has never really been about who's there.  Now, though, I learned that the goddess of water was usually located next to a pond - like this rather incongruous pond on a hill at Atago Jinja - sometimes on an island.

"The" Itsukushima shrine is a great example of this, and when I realized that I'd been to one of the three major Benzaiten shrines in Japan already it actually gave me a clue to finding more.  I was taking the train back from Shibuya after my lesson one Saturday when I saw a shrine on an island in a pond.  When I found it on my phone I realized it was an Itsukushima shrine as well, which helped me to find others.

Not only is water associated with Benzaiten, so are the animals associated with water.  I mentioned dragons, but the animal that is actually sacred to her is a white snake.  You don't always see the snake, though - her shrine at Kamishinmeitenso is one of the few I've seen with prolific white snakes...you can even buy a small votive snake at the shrine office.

Instead, because there is almost always a water feature at Benzaiten's shrines, you'll see living animals - fish, frogs, and even turtles.  Maybe the fish are a coincidence...after all, this is Japan, and what would a pond be without some koi?  Maybe the same is true of the turtles, but since I almost never see them anywhere else, I'm suspicious that they were put there in connection with the shrines.  But I freely admit that I may be talking out my ass...I've been known to do it before.

Although the first few shrines were easy enough to get to - one was practically in Tokyo 2nd Ward's backyard - it wasn't long before I had to start clocking lots of kilometers on my Kansai OnePass.  There were a couple in Shinagawa, a few around Asakusa, one on the pond in Ueno, which I first saw four years back as I went looking for Ryokan Sawanoya.  Several were west of the city, including one in Inokashira that we walked past when visiting the Ghibli Museum.  I didn't make it to them all - there were five I identified but hadn't managed to visit when I left for Mongolia on spring break.  See, that was my deadline - the exhibition that the contest was a part of wrapped up on March 31, and that was what this was all about, right?  Winning a contest???

Actually, I made it to my last shrine - Sanno Itsukushima - on the last pre-deadline Sunday before church.  After clapping my hands and bowing my head, I began my prayer, but about halfway through I realized I hadn't mentioned the contest. 

From the beginning of my pilgrimage, I justified wanting to win the contest because it would mean that someone had acknowledged me as an artist.  "Being acknowledged" - having some sort of skill, being worthy as a rival, that sort of thing - is a recurring theme in anime, and there's a reason for that.  Having someone validate you helps to give you purpose, makes you feel like you can hold your own.  And I want that.  I really do...hell, who doesn't?  But although this is freaking cheesy to say (and I'm cringing just a little as I write it) nobody can really tell you your worth except you.  By that last shrine, I had realized that as nice as winning a contest would be, I actually cared more about being an artist, and simply winning wouldn't make me something if I wasn't it already.

As far as I know, a winner hasn't been announced (hey, maybe it wouldn't change whether or not I'm an artist, but winning would still be wonderful).  I've kept an eye on my email as well as their website and Twitter, without any word.  But an artist doesn't sit around waiting for someone to say, "Yeah, you're the real deal," no matter how much they want to hear it.  They've got art shit to do.  And so do I.

More on that next week.

*I use this term loosely.  I'm probably exaggerating.