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Last week, I mentioned that Gunma-Fujioka wasn’t on my original list, probably because past me didn’t think to include every prefecture in Japan as a prefix when searching for Fuji stations way back in 2006.
Which is, if you ask me, both perfectly understandable & par for the course.
Past me also didn’t think to include historical names of regions that no longer technically exist any more either, so it turns out that Musashi-Fujisawa also never made the original list. I didn’t think I had missed much initially.
Turns out that Musashi-Fujisawa is a lot more interesting than its appearance would have you believe. Situated in the town of Iruma, Saitama, the station name reflects the place it used to be – once upon a time, there were four towns, one of which was called Fujisawa. In 1956, these four towns got together and made a new town called Musashi. In 1966, this town decided it was supposed to be something else entirely, and became the city of Iruma.
Perhaps in keeping with this traditional tendency towards transformations, Iruma was the first city in the world to elect an openly transgender mayor.
Musashi-Fujisawa hides its interestingness pretty well though. It feels, for the most part, like another sleepy Fuji. Although it does have an airbase and I was pleasantly surprised by a fair few low-fliers:
Iruma is also where a lot of tea is grown – specifically the Sayama variety – and there is a tea museum you can visit. It’s a fair walk from the station though, and I wasn’t feeling particularly ambulatory on this day. I did happen across this old tea thresher sitting outside a shop not far from the tea fields, so I feel like I got my dose of history for the day.
Apart from tea fields, Musashi-Fujisawa had a stellar example of one of my favourite places that feel like they’re only Japan specific – a 24 hour secondhand store. These places are big warehouses filled with retro games, old plastic toys, comics, CDs, records … some of them have clothes too. I’m not entirely sure what kind of existential crisis means that you’d need a secondhand copy of say, River City Ransom, and a Famicom to play it on, in the middle of the night, but these shops obviously find somebody to cater to.
This great shop is right next door to a Sega game centre, so should probably get double points for awesome.
Both of those are just down the road from the final piece of random that Musashi-Fujisawa served up that day. A curry powder factory:
(Yes, it did smell fantastic. They should really do tours.)
#50 MUSASHI-FUJISAWA GALLERY
FUJIS LEFT AT THE END OF MARCH 12th, 2020:
10/60
CityHillsAndSea 