Monday, February 2, 2009

More of Old Tokyo

Japanese never shy away from queuing to have a good meal. This is a Tenpura restaurant in Asakusa around 1PM on a Wednesday, and the waiting time was around 50 min.

A brush shop; brushes of all sizes and purposes were sold. This street, near the back of Asakusa Sensoji Temple, modeled the shopfronts to look as they might have in the Edo period, roughly 1600-1900.


This, on the other hand, was just an older shop.


Out of nowhere we found a business with a whole bunch of fresh and dried bamboo. People could not believe we were there for nearly half an hour photographing the business and its truck.

An old-looking sweet shop.

A small section of real town as it would have looked around 1600-1900 was recreated indoors at Edo Fukagawa Period Resource Museum.

Ben demonstrates how a towel salesman would have visited the narrow streets. Most small-time merchants would have carried similar implements and would have come down the streets calling out their wares.

A farmer's cooperative is now producing milk with my name on it. In fact, Megumi (grace, blessing) was all the rage as product/brand names.

This old apartment building circa 1960 (?) is destined for... ??? (Do click to enlarge this one.)

4 comments:

  1. Meg- I have enjoyed your pictures of the Tokyo area your photos make me miss Japan very much. My husband and I lived in the Atsugi / Zama-Shi area for 4 years in the late 90's and loved our experiences while living in Japan. Your pictures reminded me of many wonderful discoveries I made while exploring that area of Japan. As a gaujin it was always a surprise to see what the next corner would reveal. I appreciate your photos very much! Thanks for the memories.

    Happy weaving and spinning, Martha

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  2. Hello, Martha. Air Force? It's an interesting country, isn't it, if you can afford to stay there long enough to appreciate it. I had never paid much attention to the Eastern side of Tokyo, even though I love period dramas and Rakugo. I was brought up on a sporadic diet of Ginza area; my school was in Denenchofu; then later I worked near Roppongi/Kamiyacho, and even later, around Yamato near Zama, so really, that region really felt like a foreign country to me.

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  3. love the bamboo!!!!

    whats on the side of th ebuilding - drawings? Remains of a sister building? Looks groovy!

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  4. Re. the building, to be honest, I don't know, but it being an old apartment building, my best guess is either an electrical or plumbing description of some sort. There were one or more other building/s to which the same was done, so I suspect they need maintenance big time? This building was the most "decorated" and the moment I saw it, I thought of you.

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