Leaves are being handed out at various shops along the old national highway.
The place where we got a leaf was “Seizaemon,” the shop whose onigiri we previously introduced on Nishitsu.
It’s a leaf where you write a message of support for the shop.
Sounds like just a survey, right??
But it’s not.
You can get a message back from the shop staff too!
You can feel the love, the love.
Mama @ Nishitsu is writing a message too. It feels like having an exchange diary with the shop.
Apparently customers really take their time thinking about what to write on these leaves.
(Some customers even take the leaf home because they think so hard about what to write. Cute.)
So, these leaves with messages of love written on them…
They’re being posted up somewhere so everyone can see them.
It’s the Naruo Branch of Amagasaki Shinkin Bank along the old national highway.
And the ones putting them up are…
the students from the art club at Gakubun Junior High School.
As expected from a local art club! They drew the trunk of a zelkova tree.
Why a zelkova tree?
Because the area where these zelkova leaves are being handed out is a shopping street called “Koshien Keyaki no Sanpomichi”.
Here it is on the map↓
Shops along Keyaki no Sanpomichi that we’ve written about on Nishitsu↓
The Secret of the Wild Boar on the Zelkova Leaf
There’s a wild boar drawn on this leaf, and it’s apparently based on the komainoshishi, the guardian boars of Okada Shrine.
Article we wrote on Nishitsu →Apparently the komainu at Okada Shrine are wild boars
The wild boars at Okada Shrine are tied to a legend called “shishi-uchi,” or “stopping the boar,” and this “zelkova leaf” project apparently began with the meaning of stopping misfortune. Sounds like it could help us beat COVID too!
These “zelkova leaves”…
They should somehow be available at the shops through the end of the year. It ends once they run out.
It may feel a little embarrassing to exchange leaves like this, but why not take this chance to visit that shop you haven’t been to lately?
You might find yourself able to write things you surprisingly couldn’t put into words before.
There’s something nice about this analog feel, too.
