One Monkey Looked Up

July 22, 2009 was the date of the longest solar eclipse of the century, visible across much of Asia, including our little island, Amami Oshima, as one of the prime viewing spots. The island was overrun with lousy tourists (like me, I guess). They are still hanging on, camping on the beaches, clogging the highways with traffic. Unfortunately, the above was not our view of the event. Contrary to unpopular beliefs, there was no huge earthquake, no tsunami, no major catastrophic event of any kind. Although I suppose that may be a matter of interpretation, since it was a major disappointment here. There were a number of big events, none of which I know anything about, really, since I'm generally out of the loop here, being illiterate. There were some big music festivals, and the best place to watch the event was the northern tip of the island.

We just went a little north to a place where the Yamato Taiko drummers were doing yet another show/workshop. Masami kept them busy while they were here. It was outdoors, so I was able to get some good shots of them and their energetic performances.

It was a workshop for kids, too, so the kids performed, with Theo up front and center.
A small, laid back group of people were gathered there for the event. The eclipse took about 3 hours from when the moon's shadow first inched across the sun to when the sun was fully exposed again. Unfortunately, the day was cloudy, which was ok at first, with the clouds moving in and out, keeping it cool and still allowing periodic clear views of the sun.

It looked as if it would be ok at first, and I took a few pictures of the moonshadow inching across the sun's disk, but then the clouds came in heavy and totally obscured the view. You could look directly at the sun without the special sun viewing glasses, but couldn't see its outline. We watched it get dark, kind of dusky, then light again. We knew when it was total, because they knew the exact time it was supposed to happen and told us.

It was a major bummer, but everybody took it in stride, partly cheered by the news that it was raining in other places people had gathered to see it. Theo was pretty disappointed, but I told him he'd have plenty of other chances to see one. I felt sorry for all the people who had planned all these events, and for people who had come from so far at such a great expense to see it. Like most supposedly great things, it didn't live up to expectations.

But I did discover that you don't need to wait for a special moment and spend a lot of money and time going to the end of the earth to enjoy an eclipse. You can enjoy much the same thing anytime the sun is shining, with a camera and an oreo cookie,with the sun as a creamy center.

We did get to watch it on tv, so it was visible somewhere. People expecting weird things to happen as a result of the eclipse went to the zoo somewhere, and a camera crew was there. Theo told me that the animals didn't really react, except for the penguins, who came out of the water and their homes to watch, and one monkey looked up.

There was a street festival that we walked through that night on the way to the grocery store. People in Amami love to party.

We went to the boat to say farewell to the Taiko drum group. They still throw paper streamers from the boats here, which is quaint. Japan, and especially Amami, seems like it's part of some idyllic past sometimes. Usually you throw them from the boat and people on the ground are supposed to catch them, but this time they had it really organized, with maybe a hundred of these things, rolls of paper on broomsticks, which they fished up to the boat on a string. It was a grand sendoff and end to what was supposed to be a great day.

Celebratory squash.