Haniwa

To say that I am obsessed with the clay figures known as "haniwa" since seeing them that many years ago would be a bit of an understatement, but to actually want to own them would be rather strange as they are intended as ritual objects and to be buried with the dead.  That they are put on display is a curious thing of anthropology and culture in general, and in specific, but I really haven't anything bad to say about this digging up of such a wonderfully humorous treasure.  There are other types of figures too, but the representative ones from the museum (the National Museum in Tokyo) with the Scream looking mouth and hand raised are clearly the mascots, in much the way that William the hippo from the Metropolitan Museum of Art is, and every bit as lovely.