Tokyo Day 2

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Today was supposed to be rainy in the afternoon so I planned accordingly. I wanted to take the river bus from Tokyo Harbor up the Sumida River to see the Senso shrine and then spend the afternoon in the museums of the nearby Ueno district. It turned out that the river buses weren't running because of a "holy day". I don't know what holiday it is, but I think it involved visiting shrines because when I arrived (by subway) I found large numbers of people, many of them uniformed school children. (See picture) Everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves and the trinket venders were doing a big business. From there I walked toward the museum area and stopped for lunch at a restaurant recommended by my guide book. It has tatami mats and one must remove one's shoes upon entering. The customers sit on the floor (with a small flat cushion). The menu consists of small portions of a variety of traditional Japanese food, much of it tofu-based. Unlike yesterday, this time there were some English words on the menu, but they didn't really help me understand the difference among the various dishes. Once again I pointed to the second item on the menu and also asked for a small bottle of sake. What I got was several courses of 3 to 5 different dishes each time. There was usually a square of tofu in one of the dishes and various vegetables and sauces in the others. I was unable to identify most of the things I ate, but it all tasted very good. The restaurant was busy, but was otherwise quite different from the "fast food" place where I ate lunch yesterday. It was calm and relaxing and, actually, elegant. I wish I had a photograph to show you, but it would have been inappropriate to take a picture. After lunch, I walked to the National Museum which displays a history of Japanese art. I don't know anything about Japanese art, but I enjoyed seeing the calligraphy, painted screens, samurai armor, and kimonos on display. (see picture) Unlike Western art museums, there was almost no sculpture and no oil paintings. When I left the museum I walked through the park and stopped for a coffee at Starbucks. Then I went on to another museum that displays street scenes from the poorer sections of Tokyo from about 100 years ago. It is like the tenement museum in New York City, only much smaller. Tokyo was leveled by a major earthquake in 1923 and the tenements were all replaced by more solid structures. This museum commemorates those older buildings and that way of life. (See picture) By the time I finished there, it was late afternoon and time to head back to the hotel. On my way to the subway station, I snapped a picture of a pedestrianized street near the museum that, to me, looks pretty typical of Tokyo today.

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