JAPAN 

APRIL 2005

Apr 2nd - Ueno Park in Tokyo.  This is a large park that is well known for its cherry blossoms, some statues and temples, lots of museums and the Zoo.

Samurai statue and graves of warriors.  Notice the Japanese guy next to Nic and Aidan, they always give a 2 finger 'peace' type of salute in photos.  Some temple...

Japanese have this thing where they all sit under the cherry blossom and drink alcohol, and it is no small thing.  The whole park was covered with people having parties under the trees, it was packed!!!

Here is the zoo.  The orange flamingo's looked great.

These are also taken in the zoo.  Check out the crazy apartment building!! The marshland was built 400 years ago and is now part of the bird sanctuary at the zoo.

Apr 3rd - Early morning game of tennis.  It's starting to warm up now.  Note the new Adidas tracksuits!!!

Apr 4th - Because of major demolition works going on next door to where we lived, the noise was so loud all day that Aidan couldn't get his nap, we asked to be moved.  So we moved about 1 km down the road to Azabu Juban.  This is normally where they put people up, but it was full when we came initially.  Anyway it is much much nicer than where we were and much quieter, Roppongi is the bar and nightlife area, whereas Azabu Juban is very residential.  Will include some photos of the building soon. 

Here is the inside of the apartment, compare to where we were on the Jan page...

Apr 9th - Adidas had a family sale, most things less than half price, BUUUUT, the queues were enormous.  1.5 hours to get in and nearly 2 hours to queue for the registers. 

Shopping afterwards in Shinjuku.  Aidan keeping an eye on the bags...

It is the cherry blossom time in Japan, and they go mad over them.  Parties under the trees, all the shops have fake blossoms hanging, I think that they all just love that it is warming up after a cold winter.  The last shot was taken by Aidan.

At Roppongi Hills they had this painted bear display, where each country painted a bear.  Aidan next to the Australian one.

Apr 10th - Went to a BBQ held by Mike from work for his 9 year old daughter, Mia.  She is the one to Aidan's left in the photo.  The wind had just whipped up when I took the photo.

Dinner at an Indian restaurant with William, his wife Lea and their 7 year old daughter Beatrice.  William is from Sydney and here for 3 months to work with us.

April 16th - 20th was our shinkansen (bullet train) trip to Kyoto, Osaka and Hiroshima.  Click here.

April 24th - Aidan and his dancing 'girlfriend' Hana.

Apr 28th - Children's day (May 5th) is coming up.  Houses with boys are meant to put out these colourful carp for good luck.

Apr 29th - Day trip to Kamakura, a small village about 1 hour out of Tokyo.  This was where one of the early Shogun setup his capital, so plenty of temples etc. to check out.

The big buddha, called Daibutsu.  It used to be in a temple but it washed away in a tidal wave in 1495.

Hasedera temple - beautiful grounds surrounded the temple, including quite a large cave to explore, with a very low roof at times!  Aidan checking out the fish.  The little statues are in memory of babies that died before birth.  We lit candles for 'Little Nic' and Chelsea, the little girl of friends of ours, Mike and Bindy, and said prayers for all of our friend's lost baby's.

Very busy street that leads up to Tsurugaoka Hachiman Shrine.  This is in memory of Minomoto Yoritomo the first reigning shogun from 1192.  A wedding was being held in part of the shrine.  Behind the old gingko tree hid an assassin who killed the 3rd Shogun in 1219.

Kenchoji temple - this is a Zen Buddhist temple with beautiful gardens.  The big bell is over 1000 years old!  Aidan thought that the gardens were "so peaceful and beautiful" and he adored smelling all of the roses which he thought were so "pretty".

Tokeiji temple or the "divorce temple".  Long ago only men had the right to divorce their wives, the wife's only escape was to go this temple and stay there for 3 years when she was then considered divorced.

Apr 30th - Went to Sunshine City Aquarium today and then later on, whilst Nic and Aidan were at a dancing concert, I explored Setagaya and found the ruins of Setagaya Castle.