Naoshima
I should thank my lucky stars, because after yesterday’s rain, today it was clear -if still muggy- all day long! This means I was able to fulfill my master plan of going all the way to Naoshima! Naoshima is this island in the Inland Sea that sits between Honshu and Shikoku, two of the main Japanese islands along with Hokkaido in the north and Kyushu in the south (Kyushu is where I just came from, where Fukuoka and Nagasaki are). The island has become famous lately because the Benesse Foundation has turned the island itself into a modern art museum of sorts, with several avant-garde sculptures scattered along the shore, not to mention multiple actual art museums that are as valued for Tadao Ando’s architecture as for their collection. The drawback is that it’s kind of a pain to get there, especially from the main cities like Kyoto and Osaka. Okay, here goes: from Shin-Osaka station, I had to take the shinkansen to Okayama (50 min), then a regional train to Chayamachi (20 min), then anot