Images from Wednesday Oct 24, part 1

This time I will be splitting the images into two groups. The first from Oct 24th before we arrived at the Ghibli Museum, the second batch will probably go up Friday or Saturday will be from the museum. For the report on what we did that day see: Wednesday the 24th The Ghibli Museum



This first shot is of a window in the ryokan we were staying in that looked over a small garden. This window was opaque to let in light but prevented one from looking in. If I remember correctly this one was in the toilet.



This is the hall outside our room, the sliding door to the room is on the right. Again it is made with opaque glass to preserve privacy. The ryokan was fully booked with people who came at all hours and yet it was rather quiet.



During our morning walk Steven found this small shrine to Inari on a narrow street of restaurants. The greenery in the vases was fresh and the area swept of leaves.



Another street nearby had these great traditional shop signs. The one on the left is for a restaurant.



Another street had these small statues of tanuki inside the lamp posts. Each one was different, this one seems to be in the form of Shoki the demon queller. Nearby there was a shrine called Chingo-do the origin of which was associated with tanuki.

Check back in a few days for the second part of the images from Oct 24.

battles, a princess and a nunnery

I've been reading the first volume of Yagyu Ninja Scrolls: Revenge of the Hori Clan manga from Del Rey. An interesting tale with very interesting art. As my Anime Companion Supplement entries are often driven by whim I am adding three historical entries related to that manga.


Ôsaka no Jin (Battle of Ôsaka Castle)

Sen Hime (Princess Sen)

Tôkeiji

If you have not considered this manga I recommend it as a fun read. Not for kids tho' it gets bloody at times, after all a story with samurai and ninja is not light stuff.

As for more photos I plan to get some up tonight or tomorrow. Today I have errands to get done.

Image posting will be slower

I'm going to cut back on posting pictures to every few days. I'm having trouble keeping up a quick pace of posting and some people are having trouble checking regularly due to other commitments on their time.

Keep checking back.

Images from Tuesday the 23.

Click here for my description of Tuesday the 23rd: The Kabuki-za, The Ginza, Takarazuka Theater, Imperial Palace, Masakado's Mound, Nihonbashi.

Our early morning walk produced some interesting shots.



This one is a famous theater for traditional comedy. The next day we would not have been able to get this shot as scaffoldings were being set up around the front.



After a short subway ride and walk we were at another famous theater, the Kabukiza. We did not make it to a performance, however I do recommend their gift shop.



The Kabukiza is in the Ginza and nothing symbolizes the Ginza like the Wako Department store. One of Steven’s comments was that the area had not changed much since he last saw in in 1973.

Being a writer on anime I can’t resist pointing out that this area gets trashed in the Lupin III anime feature The Dragon of Doom as a result of a fight between Goemon and a group of ninja.



After the Ginza and the Takarazuka Theater gift shop we wandered over to the outside of the Imperial Palace grounds. This impressive gate, built in the early 17th century, was an inner gate and to reach it you have to cross a bridge, enter another fortified gate and make a right angle turn. Impressive defenses from when this was part of the shogun’s castle.



This is one of the buildings inside the Imperial Palace grounds, you would have to go through gates and cross bridges to reach it.



The masakado-zuka, where tradition says the head of Taira no Masakado is buried. You can read about him and the masakado-zuka in my book The Anime Companion 2.





Both of these images were taken at the Nihonbashi bridge around sundown. Even though the bridge today is under a freeway that follows the course of the river it is still an impressive piece of early 20th century architecture.

Well that’s it for today. I’m lucky I got something up as I’m tired. However I did not want to skip another day, I may do that tomorrow tho’.

These images are from Monday Oct 22

For a description of the day click here..

On our morning walk we found this small shrine dedicated to entertainment on Rokku Broadway, a street famous for entertainment.



There are six statues each symbolizing a form of entertainment. I recognized the 5th one on the right front as Enoken and assumed the other were modeled on famous people. Apparently most were however I could not find information on the specific individuals other than the first one.

The six forms of entertainment are:

utaigami = song modeled on Shiyouji Tarou

kanadegami = playing music

hanashigami = storytelling

odokegami = daidogei (street entertainment)

engigami = performance modeled on Enoken (Kenichi Enomoto)

odorigami = dance (largely hidden behind the torii pillar).



After we got back to the ryokan we met up with Ono Masahiro who had been such a major help with the kanji in my third book The Anime Companion 2. He had offered to be our guide for the day showing us some of the shops in the Jimbocho neighborhood of Kanda. This area is famous for having over 140 bookshops in one neighborhood. Ono-san was the best dressed member of our motly crew of explorers and had done a great job of researching where we were going.

One of the shops we visited was Subunso which had a great selection of books in European languages at great prices.



This photo is on one of the levels of the store and shows shelves of books and sets, often encyclopedias, neatly stacked on the floor. There were even sets stacked along the wall of the stairway.



Steven has a great interest in the supernatural tales found in folklore and there was one shop that had a great window display of books illustrating such tales. This image was taken by him from the street.



After walking quite a bit Ono-san and I had to stop and rest. Jimbocho is a neighborhood I want to visit again and explore more of the streets and shops.

Not many photos today, however there will be more tomorrow so check back then.

Another day used up plus sweets.

Today I got up and added the usual three new entries for the Anime Companion Supplement . Then I went into Berkeley to meet up with friends... Well I ended up using the whole day and most of my energy so no pictures tonight as I still have not done the research I planned to.

Tomorrow I stay home, except for a grocery run, and will get pictures uploaded.

What did I upload for the supplement?

Three entries related to traditional sweets.

kashiya (traditional confectionary)

monaka (stuffed wafer cake)

wagashi (traditional confections)

Again no images

Folks. I'm taking another break tonight. There is some research I need to do for the captions and frankly don't have the energy after a productive but tiring day at work.

Expect me to be back tomorrow with more pictures, this time from the 22nd .