Despite having spent more than a decade in Japan, the sight of rice fields is still something I find fascinating, and even more so, especially as I’ve seen it just this once, when they are somewhat surprisingly supplemented by a snake — which may well have been a マムシ (mamushi) — enjoying a bathe.
And then a bask on the bank.
The sight of which was a far cry indeed from the preserved and putrid serpents I had last seen.
There's also the option of following Tokyo Times by full feed RSS, and now Twitter too.
{ 7 comments… read them below or add one }
geeee.
despite the fact that you really know your ” game” you really are lucky too.
I envy you.
To be honest it’s the only Japanese snake name I know…
Cheers to you for staying to take the picture. I would have screamed and dropped the camera long before it touched land.
I’m not that brave. I kept a safe distance from it I can assure you!
Hi Lee, nice snake pic.
I think that one is a ‘yamakakashi’ – we had several around our house in Fukushima. The previous occupant of our house didn’t want to live in it because she believed there was a giant snake in the woods that would eat children. Well, we saw nice 2 meter specimen quite a few times but it never caused any problems.
The cat even brought a small one in in the middle of the night and started playing with it under my bed! It escaped with my help and slithered off into a crack in the wall.. . or at least I think thats where it went… I just went back to sleep.
Here is a link I found :
http://homepage3.nifty.com/japrep/snake/namihebi/hiba/text/eyamakagasi.htm
Cheers,
Willy
Thanks Willy. Great to get some more information. Like I mentioned earlier, the Mamushi is (or now was) the only Japanese snake I know. Fortunately though I only saw it when out on bike, and not in my home!
That’s a funny tale about the mythical child eating snake. I wonder where that story came from…?
>That’s a funny tale about the mythical child eating snake. I wonder where that story came from…?
Well, rural superstitions in a rather awkwardly superstitious country I guess. there was a lot of talk of ghosts the like around there too… lots of blessings and so on to ward of the devils… all rather amusing…
Take it all with a grain of salt ( pun intended) I say!
Cheers,
Willy