Mount Fuji A Unesco World Heritage Site?
Everyone keeps telling me how on a clear and perfect day, you can see Mount Fuji from Tokyo. Well hell, I’ve spent the better part of two years in and out of Tokyo and every time I’m in town, I have never once been able to see it.
But some lucky shmuck with the Associated Press today was able to snap off this photo and capture it perfectly. Damn it! In case your not familiar, Japan said on Monday it would try to have its famed Mount Fuji and four other sites registered on the U.N.’s World Heritage list.
I’m not sure if Fuji really constitutes a world heritage site. Its a very iconic image, but UNESCO wants places that speak to the history of human kind. Mount Fuji as far as I know hasn’t directly impacted mankind. It is a very iconic image of Japan of course. But World Heritage Site? I don’t know… I’m not sure where I stand on this. How about you?
Top Five Cases for Mt. Fuji being a UNESCO heritage site
January 31st, 2007 at 9:24 am5. Long ago a people who worshiped giant wooden phalli, designer clothing, trees, caves, rock formations, demons, rivers, thousand armed statues, their favorite brands of beer, and rock formations shaped like a woman’s vagina or a pair of perky breasts; decided to idolize this old burnt out volcano.
4. It needs protection before it disappears completely behind a wall of Tokyo smog, covered by a layer of suicides, paved over by roads by people who are too lazy to climb it, or turned into a golf course.
3. Its in every tourist picture, video, postcard, website on Japan ever. Its been forced into the collective consciousness of the world, against our will. This is the mountain that has raped my mind, and I find it a perfect metaphor for Japan.
2. Because it survived Godzilla, Akira, Tetsuo, and every Japanese super villain ever.
1. Dave Chapelle stuck his penis in a cardboard cut out model of it, and fucked it for all it was worth; simultaneously insulting Japan and restoring my hope in America.
There are two types of World Heritage sites: cultural and natural. Mt. Fuji would obviously be a candidate for a natural property, not a cultural property. Criteria for a natural property (of which a candidate must meet only one to qualify) are as follows:
7. to contain superlative natural phenomena or areas of exceptional natural beauty and aesthetic importance;
8. to be outstanding examples representing major stages of earth’s history, including the record of life, significant on-going geological processes in the development of landforms, or significant geomorphic or physiographic features;
9. to be outstanding examples representing significant on-going ecological and biological processes in the evolution and development of terrestrial, fresh water, coastal and marine ecosystems and communities of plants and animals;
10. to contain the most important and significant natural habitats for in-situ conservation of biological diversity, including those containing threatened species of outstanding universal value from the point of view of science or conservation.
(Taken directly from the World Heritage Centre website. The numbering starts with 7 because there are ten critera; the first six apply to cultural properties.)
I think Mt. Fuji would qualify at least for number 7. I don’t know enough about it to know if it would qualify for any of the other criteria, but only one is necessary.
January 31st, 2007 at 9:45 amActually, I see Fuji from my apartment window almost every morning, but only in the winter. The smog and haze are too thick in summer. I live right downtown, so it ain’t no lie. I’ll put up a picture if you like.
And just for the record, it isn’t exactly burnt out. Fuji is classified as active, and while it may not be spewing ash like nearby Sakurajima, there is the possibility that it will one day erupt again.
And hey, I’ll have a front row seat.
January 31st, 2007 at 9:48 amThere’s a lot of gomi on Fuji-san. It’s shameful, really, and I think it shouldn’t be included for that reason.
January 31st, 2007 at 9:59 amLike people here have suggested, Alex, you need to come over here in the winter when the air is crisp and clear.
January 31st, 2007 at 2:19 pmI’ve been in Japan during the winter months but not in Tokyo. ugh!
January 31st, 2007 at 2:35 pmIt’s the same in many Japanese cities…I worked in Nagoya for years and could see Ontake-san outside the window in winter, but from late spring to early fall the smog ruined my view. Mid winter was by far the best time to view the mountains. I would have to go with Peter’s reason for not including Fujisan…the garbage is atrocious.:cry:
January 31st, 2007 at 10:08 pmHell, when the sun goes down in deep Chiba (say Tateyama) you can see the silhouette of Mount Fuji across Tokyo Bay. It is a beautiful sight, but like the saying about a certain variety of lady, “good from afar, but far from a good”.
January 31st, 2007 at 10:13 pmYou actually can see Mt. Fuji from some locations in Tochigi when the air is clear.
January 31st, 2007 at 10:13 pmI’ve seen the faint silhouette of Fuji-san from Tokyo but I can’t say I’ve seen it like the above photo.
I did see if very well many times in shizuoka and from Enoshima though… Stunning! But world heritage site? hm… I don’t know..
January 31st, 2007 at 11:15 pmThat photo — if not photoshop’d — was taken with a 300mm or higher telephoto lens, which magnifies the apparent size of more-distant objects. That’s not an image you would see with the naked eye.
January 31st, 2007 at 11:40 pmThe most-distant view I’ve ever had of Fuji was from the peak of Mt. Hotaka in northern Gunma the morning after a heavy snowstorm blew itself out. That’s about 165km; you had to know where to look, but it was perfectly visible.
That might explain it ! But usually the associated press are pretty good about not ‘faking’ their work.
February 1st, 2007 at 2:30 amThere’s a peak called Fujimidai in Nagano from the top of which you can see Fujisan on a clear day. That’d be right around the 165 clicks mentioned by Mr. Pink. I figure that’d be true of many of the higher peaks in the Central or Southern Japan Alps.
February 1st, 2007 at 11:01 amActually, now that Mr. Pink mentions it, I have to agree with him. I believe that the building on the right in the photo is the Tokyo Metropolitan Headquarters Building in Shinjuku. I have never seen Mt. Fuji appearing that huge from the perspective presented the above photo.
February 1st, 2007 at 12:23 pmDespite what Mr.Wake might claim - it is possible to “beat-off” the local surf-rats at Kamakura (on a chilly,clear,mid-week,winter’s morning) and given a decent swell,plus a good photographic capable pal…achieve a pix of moi,in the suds with a backdrop (90 klicks away) of Fuji.
Even better,is me doing handstands by Taturanuma in the snow, with Fuji-sama on the left,and Shirane-sama on the right.
February 1st, 2007 at 2:50 pm