About halfway down the mountain, we spotted a large rock on the side of the road. The rock marked the entrance to a tunnel leading to -- don't try to pronounce this without drinking at least three beers first -- Zeniarai Benzaiten Ugafuku Jinja. We'll just call it The Money-Washing Shrine from here on out, okay?
You remember Yoritomo Minamoto, right? He was the founder of the Kamakura Shogunate, the husband of Masako Hojo, who erected that other temple we saw today in his memory. Legend has it that Yoritomo was sleeping one night after a series of battles when an old man appeared in his dream and said, "I am the god of Ugajin. There is a spring in the gorge northwest of Kamakura. Go find it and worship Ugajin with the spring water. People may start to have faith in the god and peace will be restored."
Since the dream occurred on the day of the Serpent in the month of the Serpent in the year of the Serpent (1185), Yoritomo interpreted it as a divine revelation. His men found the spring where this shrine now stands. He ordered them to dig a cave and enshrine the god Ugajin, the god of grain (uga means food and jin means god). Later, Ugajin evolved into the god of wealth and somehow became assimilated with Benzaiten, the Goddess of Fortune.
According to the Kamakura website, this particular shrine is an example of "syncretism" in Japanese religions because it combines a Shinto god (Ugajin) with a Buddhism deity (Benzaiten) through the common element of water. The torii gates and the incense burner indicate a reconciliation of Shinto and Buddhist elements.
The coin-washing routine began in 1257 when Tokiyori Hojo, the Fifth Regent and no doubt Masako's nephew or cousin, washed his coins with spring water at the shrine one day and started a rumor that coins washed here might be doubled. The rumor spread quickly and has endured more than 750 years. This is one of the busiest shrines in Kamakura to this day.
We watched a steady stream of elderly women crawl out of taxicabs at the entrance to the tunnel. Fortunately we did not visit on the Day of the Serpent since that's when hundreds of merchants arrive to wash bundles of 10,000-yen bills.
That's the background. Let's walk through the tunnel now and visit the shrine.
First we'll tuck our water bottle into our handy pocket so we can wash our hands.
Now we will go over to the counter and give the man a 100-yen coin. He will give us a basket, two little candles, and a bundle of incense.
We light one of the little candles and stick it on a nail on a stand that closely resembles a votive candle rack in a Catholic church. We light the incense bundle and head off to plant it in the big iron sand-filled incense burner in the middle of the courtyard but our incense stops smoking so back to the votive rack we go to light it again. After three attempts we manage to keep the bundle smoking by simultaneously blowing on the incense while jogging across the courtyard. We opt at this point to switch to rudimentary French so our behavior will not cause all those elderly Japanese women to make sweeping generalizations about stupid Americans. We light the second little candle and stick it on a nail.
Having found the proper home for every item in our basket, we can now enter the cave and wash some money. There is a distinct Mario-Luigi-Yoshi aura surrounding this whole procedure.
"Pardonez-moi, Weather Girl, distractez-vous ces peres while I use mes ladle to fish some francs out of this l'eau."
Everyone in Japan carries a little washcloth on their person at all times since most restrooms don't provide paper towels or dryers. The little washcloths came in handy when it was time to dry our dollars and yen. "An Anpanman cloth? What will you pull out of that pocket next?"
The final step in the money-washing routine is a bit complicated but quite fun. We each took turns tossing a coin into the money box, climbed up a few steps, clapped twice, bowed twice, clapped once, and tugged on one of those big ropes to make the acorn-shaped bell at the top jingle or tinkle. I pulled as hard as I could and my bell clamored and clanged. I wish I could explain why it mattered so much to me that my bell ring the loudest, but I can't.
Perhaps it's just a French thing.
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