![]() ![]() MaSakura-shiĮven though it was only a one hour time difference from Singapore to Japan we needed a day to rest up before we took the train into the mad rush of Tokyo. During hanami it is traditional to have a picnic under the flowers, a special welcome to spring. The Japanese are very serious about hanami and national TV gives a daily update each spring on how far north the cherry blossoms have reached. ![]() The full hanami (cherry blossom viewing) was about a week away. Lots of other Sunday walkers were there enjoying the sunshine and the earliest pink cherry blooms. Japanese food is always exquisitely exhibited, even the plastic bento boxes (lunch trays) usually have a piece of plastic grass in them for the proper decoration.Īfter lunch we walked to a nearby park to see if the cherry blossoms were out yet. The food arrived on beautiful red lacquer trays in heavy bowls, each bit of food arranged on its own little plate. The prices were more reasonable than we'd expected, a set meal costing between 600 and 800yen ($5.00 to $7.00US) for miso soup, green tea, rice, pickles, vegetables and fish or meat. Margaret took us to a fa-ma-ri re-su-to-ran (family restaurant) where the large menu had photos of the food, making it easier for us to order. (What does that sign say? Is that the direction to the train station?) I began my life as an illiterate, a confusing condition indeed. I can't read many kanji, Chinese characters, and even to read a basic newspaper article I would need to know 3,000 of them. I know the syllabic alphabet used for foreign words so I sounded out ka-to and pa-ma (cut and perm) at a beauty parlor and bi-zu-ne-su ho-te-ru (business hotel). From there we passed small shops and businesses, all closed on Sunday. At a bigger road the population density greatly increased with a set of high-rise apartments, not on the scale of Singapore, but big nonetheless. We walked along quiet streets, past potted flowers in tiny yards and curious little dogs peering through fences. Out for lunch? What kind of place? Would we be able to afford it? We knew Japan was going to be expensive and right away we'd be finding out just how expensive a meal out would be. Here, most people here lived in houses not huge high-rise estates, and here, the spring flowers were blooming- daffodils and forsythia-not orchids and palms.Īfter we stashed the bikes behind the house, Margaret suggested we go out for lunch, as she hadn't been shopping and didn't have much food around. Here, the air was cool and refreshing, not tropical and muggy. Margaret and her husband Yuichi still run an English teaching school and their three children are all teenagers now.Īs we drove along I couldn't help comparing everything to Singapore, our last port of call. We rode on sidewalks and side roads to the Otake's home in Sakura, a residential area east of Tokyo. We met Margaret fourteen years ago when we DID ride our bicycles from the Narita airport. Our bicycles are wonderful transportation when they are on the road but when they're in boxes they're terrible to lug around. Our friend Margaret Otake met us at the airport and we stuffed both bike boxes into the back of her mini-van. Other machines sell cigarettes, ice cream and chewing gum. The machines sell everything from cans of hot coffee to "Pocari Sweat" (a sports drink) and cold green tea. After customs we wheeled our bike boxes and luggage out into a small lobby with plastic chairs and the ubiquitous Japanese vending machines I remember from twenty-three years ago when we were first in Japan. It seems the best way to make the Tokyo area seem pastoral is to arrive after spending a few days in Singapore.Įven the Narita Airport seemed quaint after the glamour of Singapore International. The fields, surrounded by the tile roofs of packed-together homes, were neatly terraced and still brown in the early spring. But even with flat land at a premium, the Japanese choose to keep some land reserved for agriculture. Narita isn't exactly a rural place as it is part of the long urban area that extends for much of the east coast of Honshu, the biggest of the four main islands of Japan. In Japan 3/26-4/3/06 MaNarita Airport to Sakura-shiĪs our airplane descended the first thing I noticed about urban Japan was rice fields. Home: Betsy Kepes in New Zealand and the Orient Contents Letters Home: Betsy Kepes in New Zealand and the Orient Letters ![]()
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