My trip to Kamaishi

As I wrote in a previous article, my geisha mother is keeping in contact with Kamaishi’s last remaining geisha.

On July 9, my geisha mother, some geisha sisters and I went to Kamaishi in order to learn Kamaishi’s local folk songs and dances. These songs and dances are unique to Kamaishi and are only known by Kamaishi’s last remaining geisha.

Before going we learned 2 local Kamaishi folk songs, “Kamaishi Hamauta(釜石浜唄)” and “Kamaishi Kouta(釜石小唄)” from my shamisen teacher.
My geisha sister also discovered the “Kamaishi Kouta” on the Internet, and they learned the dance before we went to Kamaishi.

In the early morning of the day we left, some members took the Shinkansen from Tokyo station and other members got on the same Shinkansen at Omiya station.
We took the Shinkansen to Shin-hanamaki and then from Shin-hanamaki, we took the local train (Kamaishi-line). The trip was a quite long, especially since it was a one-day trip.
The total return journey was about 8 hours.

We heard from my geisha mother 2 or 3 days before our trip to Kamaishi that NHK would film our visit. So she said to us that we had to wear a Yukata (Summer kimono) and style our hair (wear our hair up).

When we arrived at Kamaishi, we had lunch at the station. There were many flies in the town. Although I had heard about it on TV, I was surprised to see so many flies. In addition, that day was too hot.

From Kamaishi station to the shelter where we had arranged to meet, we took a taxi.
I saw many damaged shutter doors fronting the shops on both sides of the streets. A lot of debris still remained in the town.

We arrived at the shelter within 5 minutes. I was surprised again because it was also very hot and were many flies in the shelter. However, the people who were staying in the shelter and the volunteers gave us a warm welcome.

To my surprise, Kamaishi’s last remaining geisha greeted us dressed in a perfectly starched Yukata. She looked beautiful.
While we were talking she smiled the whole time.

My geisha sister and I had brought our shamisens, so we prepared them to play quickly. Soon Kamaishi’s last remaining geisha’s lesson started.

At first she taught us the “Kamaishi Kouta(釜石小唄)”. It was not so different from the version we had learnt from my shamisen teacher. However the “Kamaishi Hamauta(釜石浜唄)” was a bit different.
She taught the “Kamaishi Hamauta(釜石浜唄)” to my geisha sister and I without using any music score.
I usually use music scores when I play, so it was my first time to learn a shamisen song by only verbal instruction. I got tense but I respected her, because in her era, there were no music scores for geisha songs.

She also taught the “Kamaishi Hamauta(釜石浜唄)” dance to my geisha sisters. At first she said to my geisha mother that she wouldn’t dance herself because of her health condition. Nevertheless, for our benefit, she made an effort to dance for us. I felt her passion and that she really wanted to express her art to us.

We left Kamaishi after only a 1 hour visit.

I never forget her words:
“I will never give up just because of a Tsunami.”
“You should always be happy.”

I was very tired, however I could learn many new things from her.