“Which side?â€ Shiraishi sounded genuinely puzzled as she stood in front of the tree, holding the sanpo with the offerings on. It took Akiko a moment to understand her question, but once she did she was equally puzzled. She carefully put the mats and tables down, and started walking round the tree, looking at it carefully. Which side was the front?

The trunk was thick and gnarled, too large for her to reach around, the bark twisted into complex patterns, green with moss and lichen. The roots dove into the earth around the base, and the leaves rustled in the morning breeze, sounding almost like laughter. The white shide on the shimenawa fluttered in the breeze, and a small lizard ran down the bark.

All the sides looked about the same.

“I don’t know,â€ Akiko said, as she came back to stand beside the priest. “I can’t see anything that looks like a front.â€

“In that case, we’ll suppose that it’s facing south. Which, I guess, is that way.â€ She pointed back towards the shrine entrance. “So, here, then.â€ Akiko nodded, and set the tables and mats up where Shiraishi indicated, one pair in front of the tree, and another pair off to one side. Shiraishi put the offerings on the table off to the side, and then knelt on the mat in front of the tree, while Akiko knelt beside the offerings.

The ceremony was short and simple. First, Shiraishi performed a harae to cleanse the area, then Akiko passed her the offerings, which the priest placed on the table in front of the tree. Then Shiraishi offered a short norito, before removing the offerings, and passing them back to Akiko.

As they walked back to the shrine house, Shiraishi sighed audibly.

“I suppose we’d better look at getting that flag up.â€

“The national flag? Yes. Do we have a flagpole?â€

“I think there’s one somewhere in a store cupboard.â€

“You don’t sound very enthusiastic.â€

“No. Nationalism makes me uncomfortable. That’s what got us involved in the war.â€

Akiko did a quick mental calculation to confirm her impression, and then asked outright.

“But you aren’t old enough to remember the war, right?â€

Shiraishi shook her head.

“No, but my parents remembered it well, and my grandfather. My grandfather never said much about it, but my father told me more. Apparently, my grandfather was quite enthusiastic about State Shinto, the supreme authority of the Emperor, and Japan’s manifest destiny to rule Asia, maybe the world. He raised my father and his older brother to be good patriots, as well as to be priests.

“In 1945 my uncle was nineteen, and a student. He wanted to fight for the Emperor, and my grandfather was enthusiastic. I think my father was, as well. They saw him off with flags and a special ceremony.

“A few days later, they got a letter from my uncle. He had decided to join the Special Attack Corps.

“Soon after that a messenger came to tell them that my uncle had died in his kamikaze attack.

“My father said that, had Japan avoided occupation, my grandfather might have accepted his eldest son’s death, but instead he came to believe that the whole war had been a waste of life, and that State Shinto was a perversion of what Shinto should be.

“We haven’t flown a Japanese flag here since.â€