Ishigaki Day 3: Floral Quiz on Taketomi Island
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Pretty Village Street on tiny Taketomi Island, near Ishigaki Island, in the far south of Japan ( after I got rid of most of the utility wires in post ) -- Taketomi Island, Okinawa Prefecture, Japan -- Copyright 2009 Jeffrey Friedl, http://regex.info/blog/
Nikon D700 + Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 @ 35 mm — 1/1000 sec, f/3.2, ISO 200 — map & image datanearby photos
Pretty Village Street
on tiny Taketomi Island, near Ishigaki Island, in the far south of Japan
( after I got rid of most of the utility wires in post )

I don't think I'll require nine separate posts to cover the third day of our recent trip to Japan's Ishigaki Island in the East China Sea, but we'll see.

I'll start out Day Three with a little quiz....

A few miles off the south-west coast of Ishigaki Island is the tiny Taketomi Island, known for its quaint culturally-unique village. Most lanes in the village are lined by three things: coral walls, pretty flowers, and ugly utility poles.

Construction is under way to bury all the wires and get rid of the poles, so I've taken the liberty of doing so retroactively to the photo above, taken of us by a kind stranger.

The walls of stacked coral blocks are similar to those on far away Kakeroma-jima.

Which brings us to today's quiz: what color are the flowers that line the lane in the photo above?

(A link to the answer is posted among the comments below)

Continued here...


All 12 comments so far, oldest first...

I think the color is called coral. But I’m not a color or flower expert by any means. But more importantly, it pleases me to see how much time you spend with your family, and especially your son. Those moments are precious and create memories that will last many years to come. All the best to you Jeffrey.

Joe (from central North Carolina)

P.S. I’m making a donation today since I use your plugins and want to support your work and generosity.

— comment by Joe Colson on July 15th, 2009 at 10:30pm JST (14 years, 9 months ago) comment permalink

I am assuming you are talking about the flowers on top of the wall? They look red on my screen, but they also look blown out (probably the red channel?), so they might actually be a different tint such as purplish.

— comment by Jao on July 15th, 2009 at 11:31pm JST (14 years, 9 months ago) comment permalink

I’ll say magenta. (bougainvillea?)
On Saturday at work one woman was wearing a solid yellow blouse, and another was wearing a solid magenta blouse, and I was wearing black. Then another co-worker walked in and she was wearing beige, so I said, “Why didn’t you wear a blue blouse? Didn’t you know we were going to be an ink jet printer today?”

— comment by nils on July 16th, 2009 at 12:03am JST (14 years, 9 months ago) comment permalink

Would that be Fuschia? – Ron Evans, Fort Lee, NJ

— comment by Ron Evans on July 16th, 2009 at 2:36am JST (14 years, 9 months ago) comment permalink

…they’re the same color as your shirt 😉

Did I win?

— comment by JasonP on July 16th, 2009 at 5:35am JST (14 years, 9 months ago) comment permalink

No one’s even remotely close, so I’ll give a hint: being a botanist might help

— comment by Jeffrey Friedl on July 16th, 2009 at 9:27am JST (14 years, 9 months ago) comment permalink

Ha-ha – white !

— comment by Peter in Wales on July 16th, 2009 at 5:44pm JST (14 years, 9 months ago) comment permalink

My mother in law has some shrub type vines that produce flowers like those. . Are they bougainvillea red? I’m not very confident about this. She used to have orange ones and some that are almost yellow, but she calls all of them “bugenbiria” in Japanese. I’m probably thinking of an entirely different flower. As I was looking for the proper spelling online, I came across a site that had a bunch of varieties with photos. One particular one that looked like the ones my mother-in-law has, which looks like the ones in your photo, is called “Scarlet O’Hara”. So if they are the same flower, maybe scarlet?

In the end, I don’t know what color they are. I just took a stab.

— comment by Earnest Barr in Amami, Japan on July 16th, 2009 at 8:31pm JST (14 years, 9 months ago) comment permalink

LOL, I just now noticed the parenthesis in nils’ comment. I looked everywhere for that stupid spelling!

— comment by Earnest Barr in Amami, Japan on July 16th, 2009 at 8:42pm JST (14 years, 9 months ago) comment permalink

“line the lane…” This may be a Do’h moment. I’m going with Goldenrod!

— comment by Ron Evans on July 17th, 2009 at 10:44am JST (14 years, 9 months ago) comment permalink

I say deep|dark pink bougainvillea.

— comment by parv on July 17th, 2009 at 7:13pm JST (14 years, 9 months ago) comment permalink

I’ve posted the answer here.

— comment by Jeffrey Friedl on July 18th, 2009 at 12:43am JST (14 years, 9 months ago) comment permalink
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