We have been busy and there are less than 48 hours to go before I fly back to California. We thought it would be a good idea to finally engage in true tourist activities, so yesterday, we headed out on the Tobu-Isezaki train line a few short stops to Asakusa. Home to Sensō-ji, Tokyo's largest Buddhist Temple, Asakusa is the perfect place for a concentrated dose of Japanese culture that is often absent in most of the rest of Tokyo .
We stepped through the Kaminarimon Gate into the Nakamise Shopping Arcade that leads to the temple.
There's every kind of tourist trinket, and some truly wonderful finds. But the real attraction is the temple and the surrounding shrines.
A five-story pagoda.
The Hōzōmon Gate, with giant straw sandals hung on the backside.
The exterior of Sensōji itself is under restoration and couldn't be seen. And NO PHOTOS allowed inside the temple, which is quite beautiful. I paid 100 yen, received a bad fortune, and promptly tied it to a rack, which apparently allows the bad luck to "blow away." Then we wandered the grounds.
And headed back down the Nakamise.
Senbei are a specialty sold along the arcade.
As are various types of manju. We opted for the fried manju. Pumpkin and sesame. YUM!
Once we were done with the Nakamise, we stopped at this traditional paper goods shop.
Such a wonderful variety inside!
You can tell this area is truly a tourist mecca.
Rickshaws! This is the only place I've seen them in Tokyo.
I'm not sure what she's laughing at. Maybe he's just told her about this:
It's the headquarters for Asahi Beer, just across the river from Asakusa. The thing on the roof is supposed to be a golden flame, but the edifice is known colloquially as Unku Biru or the "turd building." We walked across the river to take a better look.
Hmmmm. I don't know. Flame? Turd? I think it looks kind of like a giant sweet potato.
Crossing back over the river, we could see that the skyline of Tokyo is changing.
The massive Tokyo Sky Tree is under construction.
When completed it will be 634 meters tall. On Tuesday, when we passed by the construction site, a sign said the tower had reached a height of 303 meters.
And the staircase at the Asakusa Station showed me what the tower would look like when completed.
Pretty impressive.
