A battered stone statue was placed next to the shrine building of Nishimuki Tenjinsha

Old stone statue at Nishimuki Tenjinsha Shrine — Battered stone statue at the Nishimuki Tenjinsha Shrine

There is a Shinto shrine in Shinjuku that is named after the fact that the shrine building faces west. It is called Nishimuki Tenjinsha. There are some theories that the shrine faces Kyoto or Dazaifu, but in any case, the name comes from the fact that it faces west. However, if you look carefully at the direction the shrine is facing on a map, you will see that it is not actually facing the direction of Kyoto or Dazaifu. It looks like it's facing Nagano, where Suwa Taisha is located, and I'm bewildered. It is a shrine dedicated to Sugawara no Michizane, but I wondered if it was actually dedicated to Takeminakata.

When I stepped into the precincts of the shrine, which was built on a small hill, I found a cozy shrine building with a very old stone statue standing beside it. It must be a Buddha statue of some kind, but unfortunately, the face of the statue was not in its original form, as if it had been spotted by the Taliban. Not only the face but also the halo seemed to be missing. Even in this state, the stone statue seemed to be well cared for and was placed in a clean and neat place.

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