The moment I saw a shisa dog statue glaring at me from the rooftop of a convenience store with its ceramic fangs bared and looking personally offended, I realized that was just completely normal here, I knew Okinawa was going to be my kind of place. These lion-dog guardians are everywhere in Okinawa: on gates, on rooftops, on keychains, on every souvenir shelf in every shop. They perfectly capture what this place is: unmistakably Japanese and yet entirely its own thing.