Spring Report

Hello, it’s Daniel. Remember me? Wow, it’s been a while. So much has happened, almost all of it good, and so much to talk about since my last post.

Okinawa

At the end of February my partner Lana arrived from LA, and after a few days we went to Okinawa to escape the cold in Kyoto.

Warm, and a very rural experience the way we did it. When the nearest konbini (aka 7-11) is an hour drive from our hotel, you know it’s remote :-)

Warm 70° weather, deserted beaches. After dinner, we’d go up on the roof to look at the stars.

Quite a nice experience on Ishigaki Island. Blue skies and blue water, even on a cloudy day there was sunshine.

One morning, we got up at dawn to watch the sunrise at the lighthouse at the northern tip of the island a few miles away. I wanted to make a picture of the lighthouse and the sunrise, but it quickly became clear that the lighthouse was not close to where the sun was going to rise. Also many clouds at the horizon meant that the sun would be too bright when it finally popped out of those clouds. Although I had a very wide angle 21 mm lens, I needed to shoot a seven shot panorama to get the lighthouse and the light sky in one image. But I’m happy with how it turned out. The bruise where the metal lens hood on my camera engraved itself on my finger when I tripped, is a reminder of that wonderful morning.

We went to Miyako Island for a few rainy days, then Naha on the main island of Okinawa. This was not unlike coming into Honolulu after spending time at one of the more remote Hawaiian islands.

Our hotel on Naha was just south of the airport, so we had a front row seat to the planes taking off and landing. Unfortunately, I didn’t bring a super telephoto lens with me like all the aviation enthusiast photographers we saw. But the best thing was the blue water, tropical breeze and the island vibe of the people.

Sakura

It was a good cherry blossom season this year. I tried to resist my partner’s penchant for traveling somewhere an hour away, when we could just walk down the street to see the cherry blossoms unfolding. Actually, I like the idea of repeatedly visiting the same trees over and over, you get a better perception of how they evolve over time.

Anyway, it was beautiful, The crowds were not too overbearing, and I got some photos I liked, so I’d count that as a success!

Kyotographie

April 12 started the annual month-long Kyotographie photography festival. This year there were over 130 sponsored and individual exhibitions. I did not have my own exhibition as I did last year (and will again next year), but one of my photographs was included in a retrospective of Kyoto Journal magazine, celebrating almost 40 years of publishing a magazine about art and culture in Kyoto and beyond. In the late 80s I would often buy a copy of the magazine at a Japanese bookstore in LA's Little Tokyo. More recently, I’ve had my photos featured in the last 10 or so issues.

I ended up spending quite a few days working at the exhibition, which was a wonderful event: a wonderful group of about two dozen photographs set in a wonderful gallery in a former sake distributor’s building from the Edo era, with the exhibit spaces surrounding a lovely little atrium garden. Quite often, the Kyotographie exhibit spaces are as impressive as the exhibition themselves, and this one at Shimadai Gallery was no exception.

We greeted visitors and helped them with their shoes. The gallery had tatami flooring which requires taking off one’s shoes. I joked more than once that my role was “shoe concierge.” Just really interesting people from all over the world walking through, looking at all the photographs and magazines.

I volunteered Lana to make subtitles for Felicity Tillack’s wonderful video about Kyoto Journal. That's her profession after all, and I think everyone appreciated having a professional in charge. Everybody involved in the video did great work, people actually sat and watched all 36 minutes of it. You can watch the video here. It’s a good introduction to what Kyoto Journal is, and how it came to be.

It was great to spend extended amounts of time with John Einarsen, the magazine’s editor and creative force, his wife Midori, and many other members of the Kyoto Journal community. We’ve hung out numerous times before, but not for hours on end, as we did during the exhibition. Lana also got to spend time with everyone at the exhibition, and is now an official member of the Kyoto Journal community as well. 😄

Osaka Expo 2025

The Osaka Kansai Expo 2025 opened on April 13th, held on a man-made island off the Osaka harbor.

We went on the third day of the expo. We could not make reservations for most of the popular pavilions, so we just walked around to experience it. For us, the Grand Ring was the best part. This giant all-wood boardwalk surrounds most of the fairgrounds and walking around on top, ~100 feet above ground, gave us a bird’s eye view of the entire event. It was a clear sunny day and you could look across the sea at Kobe and Awaji Island in the distance.

We visited the Philippines, Jordan, Thailand, Turkmenistan, Israel, and Kuwait pavilions, among others. It was fun to hear people from around the world speak Japanese, each with a different accent.

The centerpiece of most every pavilion we attended was a big video screen, with a happy presentation about that country and encouraging people to visit. There were also local treasures, delicacies to eat, and souvenirs to buy.

We kept track of pavilions to visit next time, as I will probably make three more visits before the expo closes in mid October.

Last week, Lana and I traveled to Tokyo for her return flight to LA, then I hung around for another week that included friends, photo opportunities, and of course, more used camera shopping.

It’s hard to stay in Tokyo these days. The hotels have become so expensive, especially on the weekends. It’s at the point now that I have resolved not to visit on weekends at all.

One of the cheaper hotels I found was near the Tokyo SkyTree tower, so I took the opportunity to go up to the top for a dusk time photo of the sprawling metropolis, that even included a cameo by Mt. Fuji!

Okay, I think that’s it for now.

I’ll be in Japan for another two months. It's getting very warm now. I hope it doesn't rain the rest of the time I'm here.

Stay well everyone!

Daniel Sofer
Hermosawave Photography