The skies over Shimane are always dramatic, almost supernaturally so. It’s befitting an area that’s known as “Land of the Gods,” the setting of many Shinto myths and home to the Izumo Taisha Grand Shrine where all kami are believed to congregate once a year in October.
On this particular day in December, I’m in front of Matsue Castle, when a starling murmuration swirls over my head and thunder sounds once. I’m in the middle of listening to a ghost story about a girl buried in the castle walls (a semi-legendary practice of human sacrifice known as hitobashira) from 19th-century writer and Japan transplant Lafcadio Hearn. Then, a second interruption comes not from the sky but in the form of two cats running and meowing straight at Naoko Fuji, my guide and storyteller.
I can hear distant meows as I follow Fuji, paper chōchin lantern in hand, to a nearby Inari Shrine populated by fox statues. As she tells us another story about a mother coming back from the grave to feed her child that’s been buried alive, the feral felines sound almost babylike.
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