Wanderings

Life recently has been a series of simple joys, moments of beauty, and the occasionally absurd. Since I haven’t gotten into the habit of doing smaller posts as things happen, you’ll get a hodgepodge today. 

I spent much of the last month preoccupied with medical testing, which emphasized to me how blessed I am to be in Tokyo. For one thing, the doctors and facilities are excellent. If you have to eat hospital food, I highly recommend Japanese hospital food. And most importantly, I was greatly blessed in having a number of people offer help. It’s so nice to know that there are people I can call on if needed.

Real food? Or hospital food? It's both!

At the beginning of February, I took advantage of another beautiful day in Tokyo to walk to the Imperial Palace. You can’t enter the main part of the grounds without scheduling a tour, but you can walk around the moat and walk through a part of the grounds, which is quite nice. 

Imperial Palace moat

Two weeks ago, I met up with some friends, and we went for a walk around Akasaka, where you can see interesting sights like this one. 

We visited Hie Shrine, which has apparently hosted the guardian deity of Edo Castle since 1478. It was moved to its current location in 1659, but the current building dates back to 1958. One of Tokyo’s biggest festivals is there in June, so I may have to brave the crowds and go see it.

 

Especially nice is the tunnel of torii going up to the shrine.

We then walked past this very cheerful emergency road sign.

And then we got a glimpse of Akasaka Palace through the gate. When it was built in 1909, it was the Crown Prince’s residence. Now it’s a State Guest House. Unfortunately, the large grounds had a tall fence all around it, so I couldn’t see anything else.

This last Friday, I had a few minutes to take advantage of the beautiful day and check out Hibiya Park. I definitely need to go back when the flowers are out!

Did you notice all of the beautiful blue sky in the pictures I’ve posted so far? Well, a tremendous amount of sand and pollution blew in from China today. There’s a brown haze over everything. Pollution from China has become a serious problem in Western Japan, but this is the first time it's been so evident here in Tokyo.

With the coming of Spring, I have a number of outings planned, so there will be more posts soon!