Exploring Sakaiminato- The City of Yokai
The White Cotton Cloth Monster who flies around with Kitaro but afraid of fire and scissors. He is also known as sweet-talker to women.
Sakaiminato is a port city in the San’in area, at the western end of Tottori prefecture on the coast of the Sea of Japan. The town has a reputation for its local fresh fish and crustaceans, but is also popular among the fans of Shigeru Mizuki, the city-born famous manga artist. Sakaiminato attracts many tourists as a town associated with yokai, the ghosts, goblins, monsters, and otherworldly creatures of Japanese lore and legend.
Yōkai are mythical, supernatural beings that are popular in Japanese folklore and mythology. They are often influenced by nature and can resemble animals, inanimate household objects or people. Yōkai have traditionally had spiritual or supernatural abilities, with shapeshifting being a common theme throughout them. Along the 800-meter Mizuki Shigeru Road leading out of the Sakaiminato railway station, visitors encounter statues of the yokai given physical form by manga artist and Sakaiminato native Mizuki Shigeru (1922-2015), who is famous for his Gegege no Kitaro series.
Kitaro is a yokai boy born in a cemetery after the death of his parents. He is the last surviving member of the Ghost Tribe. He fights for peace between humans and yokai.
This sleepy little town’s main street, is a road named in Mizuki-sensei's honor, called Mizuki Shigeru Road. This road is filled with no less than 177 bronze statues as a tribute to the strange characters imagined by famous mangaka Shigeru Mizuki (1922 - 2015). Here, various statues of Mizuki-sensei's demons and lots of kitschy Kitaro-themed shops would surely delight fans of Gegege no Kitaro. Although it might not compare to the anime of today, some of which has been adapted for the big screen, GeGeGe no Kitaro has been a constant among the youth of Japan. Kitaro is a yokai, or a supernatural spirit, born in a cemetery, and the stories are of his antics alongside his yokai friends. It began in 1954 as a kamishibai, or "paper play," before becoming a comic in 1965. In 1968 GeGeGe no Kitaro became a TV series, running for 65 episodes in a year and three months. From then onwards its popularity skyrocketed, and to date more than 500 episodes have been aired across six series.
Yokai interact with the human world and spark common notions of frightful things.
The yokai-spotting fun begins as soon as you step out of the bus drop off near the at the Sakaiminato station. At the train station, you can pick up a treasure hunt book from the information center at the train station, then the yokai hunt can begin. You can’t really miss them. There’s a museum dedicated to them, a huge stone eyeball in the local shrine, yōkai manhole covers, and even eyeball street lights. Kids will love collecting the stamps, and adults will probably admit to enjoying stumbling on these adorable sculptures, too.
Yokai is a difficult term to translate into English and you will sometimes see it as demon, monster or goblin.
At the end of Mizuki Shigeru Road is Sakaiminato's most famous tourist attraction, the Mizuki Shigeru Memorial Hall. Here, one can learn about Mizuki-sensei's contributions and life. The place is dedicated both to the singular and diverse universe the mangaka created, and to the modern yokai spirits he invented. The exhibition is in Japanese but English language audio-guides are available.
The Chiyomusubi Sake Brewery is just a two-minute walk away from JR Sakaiminato Station, and close to the Mizuki Shigeru Road and the Yokai-jinja Shrine. The brewery produces a wide range of alcoholic drinks, from traditional sake and shochu, all the way to liqueurs, spirits, and amazake. In recent years, it has begun hosting a competition in which visitors can sample different sake and vote for their favorites. Meanwhile, at its exclusive hanpukai sales event in 2021, the brewery offered a wide variety of different sake which was brewed using a different rice every month, helping buyers choose by introducing the types of rice used and the farmers responsible for their production.
Chiyomusubi Sake Brewery
131 Taishomachi, Sakaiminato, Tottori Prefecture 684-0004
Open for inspection: 9:00-16:00 (reservations required)
Closed: Open year-round