`Ikigai (çãç²æ, pronounced [ikiÉ¡ai]) is a Japanese concept meaning a reason for being. Everyone, according to the Japanese, has an ikigai. Finding it requires a deep and often lengthy search of self. Such a search is regarded as being very important, since it is believed that discovery of one's ikigai brings satisfaction and meaning to life. In the culture of Okinawa, ikigai is thought of as a reason to get up in the morning; that is, a reason to enjoy life.
Virginia City, the best known of these and the sole survivor, became the Capitol of the Territory. The very much alive ghost town, Virginia City, Montana, is frozen in time. It is a remarkably well preserved old west Victorian gold mining town just 20 miles west of Yellowstone National Park (90 miles by road).
The city of Montezuma was named for the Aztec leader by soldiers returning from the Mexican War. There is a large Mennonite colony in Macon County near Montezuma. The Colonel Fish's House is said to be haunted by the ghost of Colonel George Fish after he was found murdered here in the late 1800s. This house was originally located in Oglethorpe and then moved to Americus.