Nagoya City Aichi: Travel the Unknown Japan Part 2

Perhaps the face of Aichi in terms of popularity is Nagoya. This is one of the metropolitan cities of the country aside from Tokyo and Osaka.

The Nagoya TV Tower and the Central Park

You are now at the city center when you see the stainless steel spiral art sculpture in front of the Nagoya Station. Its name is the FLIGHT which symbolizes the people creating a new city and bright future.

Like the latter metropolises, Nagoya has its popular icon called Nagoya TV Tower. It has a similar image and features to the ones in Tokyo and the Eiffel Tower in France, although they differ in height. The 180 meter-high tower is the oldest TV tower in Japan and offers two observatory decks (the 90 meter-high indoor deck is called Sky Deck, and the 100 meter-high outdoor deck is called Sky Balcony) which give a 360-degree view of the city and its surrounding areas. A stroll at night is ideal to see the illuminations of the structure.

Hiyasa Odori Park, where the Nagoya TV Tower situated

Sakae District

The Nagoya TV Tower is located at the heart of Hiyasa Odori Park, the central park within the downtown district, Sakae which is ideal for shoppers and food lovers. The two-kilometer park is also the venue of the annual Nagoya Festival which attracts many visitors.

Sakae District

Saw this sculpture around the area near our Hilton Nagoya, where we checked in.

Manga Stores are just around the corner of Nagoya City.

Haagen Dazs with different flavors. I recommend you try the 'matcha'. This is just one of the items you'll see while strolling around Sakae District.

When you say Toyota, the first thing that comes to a Filipino's mind is a car. Indeed, Toyota is one of the biggest players in the automobile industry in the Philippines. Let's take a look at how one of the biggest car companies in the world began.

The facade of the Toyota Commemorative Museum of Industry and Technology

One of the advance looming machine inventions of Toyota

The viewing of the Toyota Commemorative Museum of Industry and Technology also known as Toyota Techno Museum is one of my favorite parts of the tour. I learned the humble beginnings of Toyota that started from the founder Sakichi Toyoda’s brilliant idea which was then turned into reality in 1926 through a company called Toyoda Automatic Loom Works, Ltd. Needless to say, his impressive inventions went through numerous trials and errors from a series of manual to machine-operated looms.

Different types of looming machine

The life-size sculpture of the two founders of Toyota, Mr. Sakichi with his looming machine and his son, Mr. Kichiro with his bicycle

The line up of Toyota's first of each model

I heard a story from our tour guide, Akiko 'Ako' San, about Mr. Sakichi Toyoda. He has a son named Kichiro who became the successor of his business. His son traveled the United States of America (USA) and the United Kingdom (UK) in 1929 to sell the patent of one of their inventions to Platt Brothers, a textile company in the UK. During that visit, his attention was caught by the automobile running the streets. It was then when the young Toyoda wanted to begin the new line of business. His father Sakichi said to him to 'Try first and don't be afraid of failure'. But due to the opposition from stock holders, it took him 4 years of preparation for starting the car division of the company. He decided to build factories in Koroma City, known today as Toyota City. The interest of the young Toyoda brought forth the shift from a textile company to an automobile enterprise in 1933. It is known as Toyota Motor Corporation and today, it is the world's largest automobile manufacturer.

The wooden prototype of AA

AA. The first Toyota passenger car

The museum houses the preserved former factory and the company’s industrial heritage, starting from the birth of Toyoda Autoda Automatic Loom Works, Ltd. up to the current Toyota Motor Corporation. It displays the different kinds of textile looming machine, from manual to electronically-operated. The same museum is home to their very first passenger car called AA. It also features different car models and their prototypes as well as their collection of robot inventions. (See gallery below for more photos).

The robot collections of Toyota at the Toyota Commemorative Museum of Industrial and Technology

The line up of Toyota's first of each model

The author with the Toyota's Humanoid Robot. This is one of the advance inventions of Toyota. The last part of touring the museum is to witness the serenade of the humanoid robot who plays the violin

Video clip of the robot playing the violin will be uploaded soon

Speaking of robot, the last and exciting part of visiting the museum was the experience of being serenaded by the humanoid robot who plays a violin.

The Sake barrel along the way to the shrine

The Atsuta Jingo Shrine

This is the biggest among the seven camphor trees in Atsuta Jingu Shrine. Shinto believes that it is where the white snake resides.

In the midst of the metropolis lies a solemn and peaceful spot called Atsuta Jingu Shrine. As written in Shinto's document, it was established in 113 AD. It is one of Shinto's most important shrines and has been one of the greatest centers of worship since the ancient times in Japan. It enshrines the sun goddess Amaterasu and stores her sword, Kusanagi-no-tsurugi which is one of the three sacred treasures that symbolize the imperial throne.

Special thanks to Tourism Bureau of Aichi Prefecture Government and Rakso Travel who sponsored my trip to Aichi Prefecture of Japan!

G A L L E R Y
(Photos by Charito Nario | taken last November 7-11, 2016)