Nagasaki: Japan’s best tourism destination

NAGASAKI CITY — I was here in Nagasaki City since Wednesday for a tourism and business familiarization tour organized by my good friend, Consul Robert “Bobby” Joseph who was recently tapped by Department of Tourism (DOT) Secretary Wanda Teo to be her tourism adviser. But frankly speaking this familiarization tour was hatched long before the May 2016 elections when Sir Bobby visited Nagasaki. We were accompanied by Bryan Ang, assistant vice-president for passenger sales of Philippine Airlines (PAL) and the Network of Independent Travel Agencies (NITAS).

This was really an official visit to Nagasaki Prefecture officials. First was a dinner at the Nagasaki International Hotel, with Omura City Mayor Sonoda together with Kenichiro Yamashita, Department of Tourism, Commerce and Industry executive director joined our group. We didn’t know that it was a very hectic day for Mayor Sonoda as it was the Omura Nagoshi Matsuri (Festival), which is usually held in the first three days of August. Like the Sinulog Festival, everyone dances to one tune, the “Omura Ondo,” while parading around the Nagoship Yume Dori (Dream Street) or Station Road. But unlike the Sinulog Festival, which more often than not gets too boisterous and wild, the Omura Summer Festival is a bit subdued.

The next day we had dinner at the Hotel Nagasaki with Director General Kisakazu Matsukawa of the Nagasaki Prefecture’s Culture Tourism and International Affairs Department and Souta Matsuo Overseas Promotion Section as Nagasaki Prefecture officials wished to forged strong cultural and religious ties with the Philippines… after all, they have 130 Catholic churches in Nagasaki City… which is the most Catholic city in Japan.

One such unique attraction to Nagasaki especially for us Filipinos is that Christianity was first introduced to Japan in the Year 1549 when St. Francis Xavier started the Jesuit missions there. If there was no oppression by the Tokogawa Shogunate against the Christian Daimyos (Lords) Nagasaki City would have turned the whole of Japan into a Christian country. But that was not to be. On Feb. 5, 1597, 26 Christians (Krikistans) were crucified in Nishizaka Hill, most of them Jesuit priests and laymen, two Spaniards, a Mexican and a Portuguese in a brutal repression that lasted for 250 years.

We visited that hill, which has become a pilgrimage site for Japanese and Korean Christians and I think we Filipinos should make Nagasaki City part of our pilgrimage tours. Behind the monument of the 26 crucified martyrs is a statue of San Lorenzo Ruiz who was also tortured and killed in that hill in a much later time. The curator of the 26 Martyrs Museum is Fr. Renzo De Luca, a priest from Argentina who was personally appointed to head this facility by Pope Francis who wants to visit Nagasaki to honor his fellow Jesuit Martyrs when he visits Nagasaki in the near future.

The Oura Cathedral is located high up on a steep hill overlooking Nagasaki Harbor. Its major significance came in the year 1862 when two priests Fr. Louis Theodore Furet and Fr. Bernard Petijean were dispatched to Nagasaki after the lifting of the ban against Christians and in that church in Oura District, they met the “Hidden Christians” descendants of Catholics from 250 years of repression. The French priests were shocked that Christianity survived hundreds of years of repression.

To prove their true Catholic faith… the hidden Christians showed their rosary and asked for a statue of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Apparently many of these hidden Christians used Kwan Yin or Kannon, the Buddhist Goddess of Mercy as their cover to pray to the Blessed Virgin Mary.

Then we huffed off to Sasebo City for formal talks with Sasebo City Mayor Norio Tomonaga and like the rest of Nagasaki Prefecture officials, they too wanted more Filipinos to come and visit Nagasaki City. We stayed at the Yumihario Oka Hotel up in the mountains of Sasebo City and harbor. I didn’t realize that Sasebo City is a US Naval Base with US warships from the Seventh Fleet stationed in their harbor.

We also toured the Kujukushima Islands and ended at the Huis Ten Bosch Hotel a theme park in Sasebo City that recreated the Netherlands named after the House of the Woods/Bush one of the official residences of the Dutch Royal Family. I consider it one of Japan’s best-kept tourism secrets. Next column I write about the Tram system of Nagasaki Prefecture.

Oh, yes before I forget. What most people remember about the City of Nagasaki is that it was the second Japanese city where the second atomic bomb, a 20-kiloton nuclear bomb dubbed “Fat Man” was dropped by a US Boeing B-29 Superfortress called “Bockscar” piloted by Charles Sweeney. Actually, its principal target was the City of Kokura, but it was covered with clouds and haze, so the secondary target was Nagasaki. Fat Man destroyed 3.8 square kilometers of Nagasaki, killing more than a hundred thousand people. This bombing happened exactly 71 years ago today!

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