photos by kamome, used according to Creative Commons License A-NC 2.0
below–the center of the photo above, enhanced to show the shrine
Yokoso! (Welcome!) On Japan’s northern island, Hokkaido, the Makomanai Takino Cemetery Park hosts, among other impressive stone sculptures, a full sized Stonehenge replica. A striking element of this replica is that the ditch and bank that make Stonehenge a henge have been included. See the bottom photo at this link. Nicely done!
Of course, the authentic feel ends in the middle, at the Buddhist shrine. There’s also a giant Buddha nearby, and a row or two of Easter Island moai.
See them there? They and Stonehenge often seem to end up hanging out together. We can think of five replicas we’ve posted or linked to that had moai, too. ( Texas Stonehenge II, Raven Hill Discovery Center in Michigan, Harry Rossett’s in Indiana, Kennewick in Washington State, and someone’s Obama Gardens of Hope. There may be others.) Weird, considering the originals are on opposite sides of the world, but okay, we’ll go along with it for now.
Do you think it looks like a pretty gaudy cemetery? But not everyone wants to rest in piece, right? Some are hoping to rock on!
It’s a great replica: made of real stone, cut unevenly (leave it to the Japanese to get it that cutting the stones in perfect rectangular prisms detracts from the monument!), bluestones included, ditch and bank included. It is true that they may have added things here and there. There probably wasn’t a buddha in the center 5000 years ago, but there may have been a shrine. Who knows?
Score: 8 druids. We would give it more if it weren’t rubbing shoulders with the moai and the huge Buddha. Good ambience requires space.
What a replica! Maybe we should have saved it for Clonehenge’s one year birthday, which is coming up soon. We’ll end with a sentence we like from a Google Translate page of a blog post about a trip to this cemetery. (Google Translate makes us lol!) “Why the road to heaven is like this?” A koan to ponder . . .
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