 The original town centre of Kitami used to be about one kilometre east along Route 39 from Kitami Station. There a grove of pines stands on a rise to the left. At twilight in late autumn a reddish glow fills the cold sky as the sun sets, the colour intensified as it shines through the pines. The scene calls to mind a verse by the priest Jakuren in the twelfth century Shin Kokinshu anthology: |
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| The very colour of loneliness - Sunset in late autumn on the pine-covered mountain |
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| Among the trees is the Soto Zen Kodaiji Temple. Through the temple gate can be seen a statue of Kannon, the Buddhist Goddess of Mercy, and a flight of stone steps lined on both sides with as many as eighty-eight stone Buddhas. Chipped faces and haloes have been carefully restored, showing a gentle touch within the strictness of Zen. At the top of the steps is a bell tower and a gate flanked with fierce-looking Western Japanese style Deva king figures, leads through to the main hall of the temple. A landscape garden extends in front. | |
| One warm, clear evening in May, I sat under an arbour there, gazing up at mountain cherry blossoms tinted by the declining sun. It felt as if I had entered the scene described in an eleventh century verse by the priest Noin: | |
| An evening in spring in the mountain village - Cherry blossoms fall to the tolling of the sunset bell |
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| Kodaiji temple takes great care of its trees. In the garden is a red pine shaped like a reclining dragon which was planted by Saiki Shutei, the founder of the temple. There is also a splendid old yew presented by a faithful parishioner and a magnificent oak in a corner to the east of the priest's residence. | |
| The trunk seems to be about six or seven metres round. The hard, dark-brown bark, which looks like stone, has vertical splits. Delicate light-green moss covers protrusions at the base. Seven or eight branches stretch and twist like gigantic arms up into the sky. From the central trunk, apparently snapped off by lightning, a new branch has grown that retains some brown leaves from the year before. | |
| This tree, thought to be a thousand years old, is protected by Kitami City. In ancient Germany, people apparently venerated oak trees as dwelling places of the gods and this tree certainly seems to have a spirit of its own. Japan of the tenth century, when this oak was a sapling, witnessed the elegant court life described in the Tale of Genji, but also fierce power struggles within the Fujiwara clan and the sufferings of plague. The country seemed possessed by a vengeful spirit, having lost the innocent mood evoked by the poets of the Manyoshu in the ninth century. It had become over-shadowed and hellish times seemed to portend the end of the world. | |
| Ancestors of the Ainu people lived in pit dwellings near the Tokoro River during that period in the Kitami region. They used twigs to imprint decorative patterns on their earthenware pots, a feature of the final Satsumon era of the pottery-based culture they created. They survived mainly by hunting, fishing and foraging for wild plants. Perhaps this oak looked on as they chased bears and deer through the undergrowth or gathered kokuwa berries and wild grapes. | |
| Now the tree is in a busy part of town, but a mere thirty years ago children on their way home from school used to call to one another as they scrambled up hanging vines to pick wild grapes. This tree would also have witnessed the sad sight of the Tokoro River flood of 7 September 1898, sweeping away houses and animals from the town below, built by newly arrived tonden soldier-farmer pioneers. | |
| Hard oak wood has many uses, such as making barrels, charcoal and firewood. Tannin can be extracted from the bark for manufacturing leather. So nearly all the oak trees have vanished from Kitami. This tree alone, saved by its position within the precincts of Kodaiji Temple, has been protected by successive generations of incumbents from the founder, Saiki Shutei up to the present Shuko. So once more this year it will send out an abundance of fresh growth into the sky. | |
| (from the Kitami City Newsletter, April 1988) |