The Melancholy of Hyougo Prefecture

My friend is a big fan of The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya, I mean, he's definitely a bigger fan of it than I am, but because Kyoto Animation did a really bang up job of denying the fact that they drew 1:1 inspiration from a certain town in Hyogo prefecture, I though it would be fun to take a look. And okay, maybe I was super duper excited about it too. I just really wanted to see some time travelers, aliens and espers.

And maybe I wanted to do the dance where it happens.

Hyogo is actually not very far from Kobe, which means of course it's not very far from Osaka, and took maybe an hour or two by train to get there. Getting to the actual high school where the show took place though...now that was an adventure. We actually got off at the wrong station the first time, but still recognized quite a few places that could have been from the show.

Step one when we did make it to the proper town was finding a bus to get us up the mountain, because despite being so close to the sea, Hyogo is extraordinarily hilly. According to Google Maps we had to take a bus going to a very specific part of town, and it was very undecided on just where the bus terminal to take that bus was at. So we walked along a river until we found the bus station we thought we were looking for.

The good news is the sakura were in season, the bad news is we'd be going up that mountain in the distance.

Then we waited, and waited, until finally a bus came and it was my job to timidly ask the driver if it was going to the right place. We were and when we got off was when the true melancholy started to sink in. Step two of course, was find the school.

You may notice way off in the distance the ocean and way close a steep hill.

Rather than look up proper directions online we decided to let our good friend Google Maps do the navigating which, for the record, is a horrible, horrible idea. It took us to where it thought would be an open gate to the school, which was in all actuality and locked gate. I suppose we could have jumped it pretty easily but being strangers in a strangeland, didn't want to get arrested. Which was a shame as the hills we conquered were astounding eighty degree angle beasts.

You may notice that the town is EVEN SMALLER FROM UP HERE.

After realizing we had just gone for a very long hike we backtracked and went for an alternate path, using the handy map Mr. Google Maps provided to manually navigate our way to the school. And finally we felt true victory.

Actually this is the junior high...but close enough!

At the very least we were able to understand why every anime features sakura on a hill. They just look really nice!

I can feel myself become one with the anime.

Step three was getting home, which of course meant waiting for the bus, which of course meant reading an unfamiliar schedule. In fact, as soon as we walked away from the stop in exasperation, the bus drove right by us and right by the stop...Which left us feeling about as cynical as Kyon.

Fact: his butt is probably perfectly toned from these hills.

Looking back on others pilgrimages I can see now where we went wrong which was...mostly just taking the JR train to Nishinomiya. It isn't hard to get to Hyogo, but it does make it extremely difficult to get to where you're going. If you want someone with a little bit of a better experience check out this story on Tokyo Otaku Mode.