Nakanojo Karuta" is, as the name suggests, a local karuta of Nakanojo Town, created to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the establishment of Nakanojo Town as a result of the merger. The playing cards were created based on public solicitation from the town's residents, and were completed after much deliberation by a team of composers that included local historians, cultural figures, and teachers. The cards were written by Mr. Hideshige Nara and painted by Mr. Hide Suzuki, a painter from Ise-machi.

In exploring this theme, we first considered how to utilize the "Nakanojo karuta.” The members of the group discussed the following points,

・To actually play karuta
・Learn the history of Nakanojo through the karuta cards
・Visit the places on the karuta cards.
・Practice stamp rally at the place of the cards.
・Programming and playing karuta on the web

Programming the karuta cards to play karuta on the web. After discussion, we finally came up with a plan to visit the places where the cards are written while incorporating a sightseeing element.

The next step was to select tags that could be used, i.e., tags that describe places that could actually be visited. Since each tag described a wide range of places, from actual temples and shrines to famous buildings and even various phenomena, the group members discussed the ones that could be used in real life.

In making plans to visit the places on the cards, we considered the realistic routes that could be taken, taking into account time and distance. After going through these processes, we actually visited the sites, taking pictures and rehearsing the plan as if we were going to execute it.

The following is a description of some of the tags we will visit, based on the photos we took during our rehearsal visit.

We chose tsumuji as a resting place because it is a place where "fun" gathers. tsumuji has a variety of commercial facilities and is popular with children and couples. It is popular with children and couples, and events are held there at certain times of the year.
We need to think about how visiting these places can lead to better health. The results of the pedometer used during this rehearsal are shown in the image. The number of steps taken when walking this route was over 9,000.

Regarding these results, we learned about the Nakanojo Study last year. The Nakanojo Study is a study conducted by Dr. Yukitoshi Aoyagi, a leading researcher on the relationship between the number of steps taken, exercise intensity, and health, and conducted by the Tokyo Metropolitan Geriatric Hospital for Health and Longevity, showing that walking more than 8,000 steps a day is linked to health. Based on this result, we believed that walking this route would lead to good health.

After a series of exploration, the results were summarized and presented in the department.
The image below is the advice I received from the other group members when I made that presentation.
Some examples are,
I thought it was good that you used a local subject."
I thought it would be good to create another route.
We had some comments and advice such as, "I thought it was good because it was about the local area. We learned many things that we would not have realized if we had thought about them on our own, and that will be helpful for our future exploration activities.

The exploratory activities are still ongoing, but the most important result of the activities so far is the following:
We have been able to learn about the good qualities of Nakanojo Town through the exploration activities based on the "Nakanojo karuta". In the future, we would like to further perfect the karuta map that we are currently creating and make it into something that can actually be used.