Heroic Dreams - All Things Medieval

 Here is a video of the beginning of my adventure in Japan.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OceFbtzJ4w0[/youtube]

Yesterday I returned from my trip to Japan and wow, what an amazing experience the whole trip was. And i have so much stuff I am going to be showing you and writing about. I purchased a sword which is being shipped to me and I visited some of the famous medieval castles of Japan. I also went to a couple of Origami museums and visited a world famous bonsai village.

There is so much stuff that is really amazing about Japan and I will be developing a lot of it into projects and articles that you are absolutely going to love. I will also be writing comments and thoughts about the Japanese Culture and some guides for traveling there. But for now, I am pretty Jet Lagged and will be taking a couple of days off just to decompress. But, stay tuned because I have some remarkable stuff coming!!

Here is a summary of some of the things I have planned that are derived from my trip to Japan.

• All About Samurai Swords, how they are made, how much the real ones cost and where you can find them. Tracking down real Samurai swords was a bit of an adventure for me and I will tell you all about it.
• The Medieval Castles of Japan - There are some remarkable castles in Japan that have been around twice as long as America. I visited a few of these and I visited the most famous one of all. This is Himeji castle and it was used to make Tom Cruises movie “The Last Samurai” - I also purchased a scale replica model of this castle which I will be making.
• Origami, Bonsai, Woodcutting, Tatebanko, Puzzle boxes and more. — I have a whole bunch of stuff that I will be doing projects on including miniature castles, miniature tatebanko, puzzle boxes and so much more. This is going to be a lot of fun.

Himeji Castle 

A priceless Samurai Sword

Things have been going well for me on the island of Okinawa and I have been talking to a lot of different people about where I can find myself a real Samurai Sword. Of course people have been telling me I can just buy something through the net but this doesn’t fulfill the sumbolism of it.

I have been getting snippets of information about various ways to get a sword and people sometimes mention, with a proclivity toward speaking in hushed tones, the Japanese Mafia. I would imagine this type of sword has real significance in certain secret circles. And it is magnified by the fact that Okinawa has been ruled by other countries for a very long time which means they probably have several secret organizations that have been around for a very long time.

For centuries now they have been barred from the use of swords and you can bet this hasn’t stopped them from making them! It simply drove underground the art of making and using them.

A solid clue as to where I will get my sword

Anyhoo, I was on this peculiar little tour a couple of days ago and we were visiting  several small artisans and businesses in the area. The Japanese tour guide was extremely knowledgeable about all things Okinawan and Japanese and being close to 70 years old she has experienced and witnessed a lot of the history. Outside one of the shops while my fellow tour mates were looking at the wares of a local artisan I approached her with the question of my quest for a Samurai Sword and well……

she explained to me some of the intricacies of the whole thing and we talked about the only sword maker on the island (the only official one anyway). Then she went on to draw me out a map of a section of the city of Kyoto which is in the Japanese Mainland. And on this map she showed me exactly where to go to purchase a real samurai sword.

So, my quest moves closer to completion and today I will be flying over to Tokyo, and a couple of days after that I take a bullet train to Kyoto.

Stay tuned, I will keep you updated on my quest for a real samurai sword and I have a whole lot of fascinating stuff to tell you about the local castles, the samurai, the ancient city of Kyoto and much more…

Did you know that there is one man in Japan who is the Samurai Sword guy? He determines which swords are national treasures and of course, these national treasures will never be allowed to leave the island. Anyway, he lives in Kyoto…..

 I have videos and lots of pics coming… The quest for a real samurai sword continues.

I am in Japan and I am really having a wonderful time. There is so much I have done and seen and there is still much more for me to experience here. I am currently on the island of Okinawa which is the birthplace of Martial Arts. And I am on a quest to find myself a real samurai sword. - It has proven to be a bit of a challenge though for a couple of different reasons.

Getting a tourist type samurai sword has proven to be quite easy. These swords are nice and usually in the 100 -200 dollar range. But this is not the type of sword I am looking for! I am looking for something more than that and it is proving to be quite elusive.

First let me give you a little insight into Okinawa and the legend of Samurai Swords.

If you are a fan of the Kill Bill movies you might know that Uma Thurmon goes to the island of Okinawa to get a sword from the famed sword maker Hattori Hanzo. There is a bit of truth in this adventure that Uma takes because on the island of Okinawa there is actually only one licensed sword maker and where he is located is a bit of a secret. He really exists and his name is Kiyochika Kanahama.He only makes one sword at a time and he does it for private clients. And they are extremely expensive, but of course worth every penny!

But there is a basic irony to the art of sword making on the island of Okinawa and that is that for just about the whole history of the island they have been under the rule of various other countries like Japan or China. And this means that they have not been allowed to make swords or bladed weapons of any type. And it is in this fact that we discover the birth of martial arts with such weapons as the Kama and the Nunchaku. They were common tools that were used by the residents and they were also the centerpiece of secret martial arts.

So, it looks like I will not be getting a sword from the island of Okinawa and my quest to find one will continue as I adventure over to the mainland of Japan and visit Tokyo, Kyoto and some other places. I will try to keep you posted on my progress but my access to my blog and website is limited.

Some other Japanese related things I have coming.

I have hundreds of pictures and quite a few videos that I will be using here on the blog and on my website. These include a legendary medieval japanese castle and a whole host of other amazing stuff ranging from Bonsai to Origami. 

About the elusive samurai sword and the culture of Okinawa -

I find myself wondering about the difficulty I have been having in getting myself a good sword. And I think that part of this is due to the culture of Okinawa. This is an island that has created secret and potent martial arts hidden in things such as the kama which is the handle for a mill and the Nunchaku which is a grain threshing tool. This makes me think that they do have a potent and vibrant underground and secret culture of sword making that has been hidden from prying eyes for hundreds of years. Anyway, the chances that I will crack into this secret subculture are pretty slim so I will probably not be buying a sword until I hit the mainland of Japan. I will keep you posted.

Lots of pictures of castles, swords, samurai, and other stuff coming soon.