Within the mountain range before you is an ancient castle. Obama’s water springs forth from these mountains, carrying their blessings into the city as if willed by God. Yet during the Edo Period, Obama Castle was built near its harbor. The castle town as well as its market would develop into a merchant’s haven, becoming the origin of Mackerel Road.

Concurrently, Obama would catch more mackerel than ever before. Fishermen would haul in 200 fish in a night, and not only would they salt and ship them off to Kyoto, but also sun-cure and ship them to Edo. The mackerel was seen as a healthy food and symbol of long life, due in part to a ritual of the time where one would present their parents with mackerel as a prayer for good health.

And so Mackerel Road bustled alongside Obama’s castle town, and traffic to and from Kyoto increased. The people who brought mackerel to Kyoto would not return empty-handed; “This is how they eat mackerel in Kyoto,” they’d say as they brought recipes for mackerel sushi, known as saba-zushi. And “They’ve got these things called ‘watermelons’ in Kyoto,” as they experimented with growing their own. Thus did the bond between Kyoto and Obama grow strong.