people were happy to eventually donate their figures to local museums that now hold interesting, diverse collections. In Iwate, people give the figures new clothes each year, layering one set on top of the others so they pile up year after year. They leave the carved faces exposed. In Aomori, the people cover the faces with their clothes, so no one sees the carvings, and keep only one clothing layer, often a very ornate costume. Each year they take their Oshirasama to a ceremony at a Buddhist temple that reinvigorates their power. We were able to attend this annual rite. People came both from nearby and far away, dressed their figures in luxurious brocade outfits, some also with crowns, and placed them near the Buddhist altar. The priest purified and re-empowered them with chants, the smoke of ritual fires, and the waving of ōnusa. Buddhist and Shinto rites apparently remain intertwined here. This temple is associated with Aomori’s Itako, who, in the past, were connected with the oshirasama tradition, although we never received a clear or full story of exactly how. Did they use them in healing and divination, or just in telling the Oshirasama story? The few itako that practice today, it seems, work primarily in healing and counseling people with troubles either privately or at their annual event at Mount Osore, and have little to do with Oshirasama. We were not able to meet any itako to find out more. Finally, just a few days before I returned to the United States, again with Professor Kamino and also with my friend Watanabe Yoshihuro, an actor who had spent many years living in the US, I was able to catch a glimpse of the 800-year-old Tenzushi-No-Mai ritual puppets in Yamanashi. Their annual ritual was also canceled, but we were allowed to watch the tradition’s honzon kai assemble the puppets for an exhibit at the Yamanashi Prefectural Museum that would take place after I had already returned to New York City. Although developed years before the well-known karakuri figures, several of these dolls have arms that move to play instruments, activated by puppeteers pulling ropes elaborately strung through their bodies. Witnessing the inner workings of these systems had once been forbidden to all except the performers who put them together. While this is no longer strictly the case, seeing these puppet mechanisms was still a rare opportunity. The group worked quickly putting together two full sets of their wooden puppets, whose faces remained covered in red cloths throughout the process. Longtime members instructed newer ones on the systems as they worked. The swiftness of their work made it - 75 -
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