With the low, gentle sound of the waves, the setting sun quietly sinks beyond the far horizon, while coloring the sky into deeper crimson. The sun seems to secretly unveil the way to the distant island of "Nirai Kanai," which is the promised land across the ocean believed in by the folk belief of the Ryukyu and Amami islands.
Dark purple wisps of clouds are drifting slowly across the sky to herald the imminent arrival of quiet twilight and the end of a day.
On the shore where the small waves continue lapping calmly, the clusters of massive Ryukyu marine limestone formations, which have been immemorially shaped by the vast history of the ocean, are quietly bathed in the pale sunlight. They are casting rugged dark silhouettes that remind me of the profound stone arrangements of the Zen gardens.
