chiba sand art

At my workplace, there are always posters up everywhere advertising all sorts of things: tax payments, business support, but also for events, and last month on of them happened to catch my eye - Chiba Sand Art 2014. It was taking place in Inage Seaside Park, which is a huge park not far from my house that I'd actually never properly visited, and looked pretty cool, so I made it a block event and went with some other Chiba City folks!

Our first stop in the park was a quick visit to the Inage Civil Aviation Memorial Museum, which I've translated stuff about for work but never actually visited. Inage is actually 'the birthplace of civil aviation in Japan', because the country's first civil aviation practice field in Japan was established here back in the day. The museum has some replicas of early biplanes and some exhibits, and they have regular events where kids can make different types of paper planes.

Next we headed off to see the sand art! The first thing we saw was tons of little sculptures all over the plaza, which were made by families. Some of them were really cute, and I bet they were fun to make. And then we saw the main sand sculptures, which were pretty impressive! I think the artist(s?) spent about a week making them, if that's any indication of the scale. The theme was the sea, and I liked how the smaller sculptures involved different animals that blended pretty seamlessly all the way around.

After looking at all the sculptures, we set off to explore more of the park, and we watched some groups performing eisa, a type of dance with drums from Okinawa, before making a quick stop by Inage Beach. Chiba City has the longest artificial seashore in Japan, which includes Inage Beach. I keep telling myself I need to go to a Chiba City beach (after translating things about them over and over again), so it was glad to have finally done so, even if only for a few minutes.

Our next stop (after indulging in some Dippin' Dots outside) was at the Sanyo Media Flower Museum (formerly known as the Chiba City Floral Museum), which is yet another thing I've written about for work and never gone to. It looks pretty small from the outside, but actually it's quite large - with several floors and different areas/galleries. I particularly liked the vegetable garden on the roof, and the giant hollow (fake) strawberry that we had to keep waiting for little kids to leave it alone so we could go in it, haha. For 300 yen admission, it was quite a good deal and well worth it.

Sanyo Media Flower Museum
Admission: 300 yen for adults
Address: 7-2-4 Takahama, Mihama-ku, Chiba City
Hours: 9:30 - 17:00 (closed Mondays and year-end/New Year)
Website: http://cga.or.jp/flower/index.html (Japanese only) 

Finally, we had lunch at Mother Moon Cafe, a cafe that my senpai CIR took me to when I first got to Chiba. It's quite close to my apartment but pretty well-hidden amidst a lot of factory buildings, so I'm surprised people can find it, but when we went it was actually pretty crowded, despite being past 2PM. It's got a lovely atmosphere and delicious food, so it made a nice wrap-up to the afternoon.

Mother Moon Cafe
Address: 117 Shinminato, Mihama-ku, Chiba City 261-0002
Website: http://www.mothermoon.jp/