Amazing stairways from The World Geography:
“Awaji Yumebutai” (or in English – “Stage of Dreams”) is a complex array of buildings and other areas located on Awaji Island in Hyōgo Prefecture, Japan. It was built as a memorial of the Great Hanshin earthquake (1995) on the side of a mountain that had been half taken away in the early 90′s for use as sea-fill during construction to build artificial islands in Osaka Bay (one of them is the Kansai International Airport).
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It looks like a very expensive, very tidy community garden.
It is quite amazing to me that the most densely urbanized country on the planet would pour so much concrete onto a former and potentially reclaimable green space. Perhaps there is a zen aspect that I’m just not getting from the pic. Having said that, it does appear to be quite beautiful.
(I guess deer don’t go for those delicious-looking flowers, eh?)
I think it is, in fact, a very large and elaborate retaining wall for the remaining half of the mountain.