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Our groupThe adults, from the left: my daughter Julia, my wife Denece, son-in-law Shayne, son Ken, daughter-in-law Claire; the children: Julia and Shayne's daughters Anna (aged 7) and Beth (5), Ken and Claire's daughter Adelaide, aged 20 months. (There is a photo of me on the Osaka page.)The photo was taken shortly after we all met-up in Tokyo. Julia and her family had flown from Perth into Tokyo's other airport, Haneda, so we didn't meet in Japan until finding our AirBnB accommodation in Tokyo itself. While Tokyo was very densely populated (greater Tokyo is one of the biggest cities in the world, with 38 million people – about half again as many as in the whole of Australia) we were pleasantly surprised at the number of little parks nearby; this one was only a couple hundred metres from our accommodation. Our accommodation and this park were within easy walking distance of Tsukiji subway station.
Photo taken 2017/10/09
Scattered gardensThis photo was taken a few metres from the group photo above. There were similar garden beds along the bank of the Sumida River and in several places away from the river near our Tokyo accommodation.
Photo taken 2017/10/12
Low lying TokyoA view along the Sumida River from a bridge close to our accommodation.The river surface is sea level. Notice how low the surrounding area is; it will be very susceptible to sea level rise that will come with climate change (as will Osaka and the delta areas of Vietnam). Photo taken 2017/10/10
Ebike hire in the Tokyo areaBicycles are a popular way of getting about in Japan, and electric-assisted (Ebikes) are common.Unlike Australia, where there are commonly multiple sprockets on both the driving and driven ends of the chain, those bicycles in Japan that had gears usually had a single sprocket at the driving end with multiple sprockets only on the back wheel. Perhaps half of the bicycles I saw did not have gears at all; quite probably because most Japanese cities are built on flat, or near-flat, ground. See my note on the geomorphology of Japan. It was common to see a mother and child on an ebike, and sometimes there was a child both in front of, and behind, the mother. Unlike in Vietnam, I don't think I ever saw anyone carrying a large or heavy load on a bicycle in Japan. Also see my section on bicycles in Japan. Photo taken 2017/10/09 |
Meiji-jingu Shinto shrine, Tokyo
The clear sky is significant. Our first and second days in Japan were fairly clear (the second day was hazy), we had few other clear days.
Photo taken 2017/10/10
It seems that in Japan there are Buddhist temples and Shinto shrines. As I understand it, a Buddhist shrine is a small structure used for private devotion and making offerings, while a temple is a much bigger building or group of buildings. Shinto shrines are full sized buildings within dedicated grounds(?) Both Buddhist temples and Shinto shrines in Japan always (in my very limited experience) have carefully tended gardens. Shinto shrines always have torii gates and I don't think Buddhist temples ever do, but otherwise there seems to be a lot of borrowing in one 'religion' from the other. Photo taken 2017/10/10
Prayer chipsFor a small fee visitors to the shrine could buy one of these little wooden boards, write a prayer on it, and hang it up. Most, of course, were written in Japanese, but some of those written in English were interesting – see below.
Photo taken 2017/10/10
Prayer chipOne of the prayers that I could greatly sympathise with. Trump has made the USA look ridiculous and has to be a huge gift to China in its aim of taking global leadership from the USA.I have since read that 46 of the 50 world's busiest railway stations are in Japan. Meiji-jingu Shinto shrine. Photo taken 2017/10/10
The shrine is within a large forested area in greater Tokyo; the total area of what are called the inner and outer garden is 100ha. The commercial value of the land would be astronomical, but how much more valuable the land is, retained as park, to the people of Tokyo than it would be if it was sold off for housing or commerce!?
Photo taken 2017/10/10
Photo taken 2017/10/10
You'd have to hope that the wine and saki don't go to waste!
Photo taken 2017/10/10
Photo taken 2017/10/10
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Senso-ji Buddhist Temple in Asakusa, Tokyo
Our kids and their families had gone to Tokyo's version of Disneyland.
Photo taken 2017/10/11
Stone seats in a sheltered resting areaA shady shelter and resting place in the Senso-ji grounds. Note the stone seats, which seem to have been made of sections of basalt columns, with polished tops.Granite seemed much more commonly used for paving, walls and other construction than basalt in Japan, perhaps surprising in a country with many active volcanoes. Basalt, of course, is solidified lava. Japanese like to use stone, in as natural as possible a state, in gardens. Later in the day I suspect that there would have been few spare seats.
Photo taken 2017/10/11
The weather, which had been clear the previous day, was hazy, or was it smoggy? If it was smog rather than haze it was not unpleasant. Photo taken 2017/10/11
We were to see many gardens in Japan, this one was quite small compared to a number of others. Photo taken 2017/10/11
"A copper statue of the 9th Danjuro Ichikawa (1838-1903), the famous Kabuki actor. He is shown in the role depicting "Shibaraku, which was his forte." Perhaps not the sort of thing one would expect to see in a religious site? It seems likely that the statue would be bronze (an alloy consisting mostly of copper) rather than pure copper, for one thing, the melting point can be significantly lower. Photo taken 2017/10/11 |
Shinjuku Gyoen National Garden
The greenhouse in the gardens was outstanding, see below. Stone 'lanterns', which seem to serve much more as garden ornamentation than as sources of light at night, come in a great variety of sizes and forms. This one seems to have been made from stones that have had minimal modification. Tokyo's climate is not thought to be as suitable for moss as is that of Kyoto and Kanazawa, that would be a part of the reason for the lawn, rather than moss, in this garden. Another reason, of course, would be that lawn can handle a certain amount of foot-traffic, moss is much more easily damaged.
Photo taken 2017/10/11
Photo taken 2017/10/11
He was no longer employed at the garden when my wife and I visited.
Photo taken 2017/10/11
Photo taken 2017/10/11
The greenhouse in Shinjuku Gyoen National Garden
This greenhouse might be compared to Singapore's Cloud Forest Dome, although it is much smaller and simpler. Unlike the Cloud Forest Dome the Shinjuku Gyoen greenhouse is much cheaper to enter and much less crowded.
Photo taken 2017/10/11
Photo taken 2017/10/11
Photo taken 2017/10/11
Photo taken 2017/10/11
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Leaky roof in subway
Anna is holding the column up. Photo taken 2017/10/12
Shinkansen (bullet trains)
These trains often get up to 250 km/hr and sometimes to 300 km/hr. The long, tapering nose would at least partly be for aerodynamics, but it would also minimise the 'thump' that is felt when blunt-nosed trains pass each other, even at much lower speeds (see elsewhere). Travel by train is far more practical in Japan than it is in Australia; Japanese trains are far faster, far more frequent, and far more economically competitive with alternative forms of transport than Australian trains. (Air travel in Australia is generally much cheaper than trains for long-distances.) A large part of the reason for this is the high population density and much shorter distances in Japan. Something very Japanese I noticed; conductors bow when entering and leaving carriages on the Shinkansen. Photo taken 2017/10/12 We next went to Kyoto. |
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