/categories/edge/ Recent content in edge on Tokyo, endless city Hugo -- gohugo.io en Thu, 19 Jan 2023 00:00:00 +0000 /posts/sumida-kanda-yanagi/ Thu, 19 Jan 2023 00:00:00 +0000 /posts/sumida-kanda-yanagi/ When walking up the west bank of the Sumida river towards Asakusa you have to take a little detour up a short stretch of the Kanda river to the Yanagi bridge where this photograph of a scene from another era was taken. /posts/utility-pole/ Thu, 17 Jun 2021 00:00:00 +0000 /posts/utility-pole/ Utility poles, with their spectacular nests of cables, are everywhere in Tokyo. They line the edges and paths of the city distributing power and communications to tens of millions of addresses. Some people find them ugly. More don’t even notice them, and on occasion the Government expresses its embarrassment at them. Personally I like them. It’s like looking up at vapour trails. It makes me wonder about the locations and people they connect. /posts/sunny_minato/ Sun, 14 Feb 2021 00:00:00 +0000 /posts/sunny_minato/ It is interesting to see how many of the buildings around Tokyo Tower are not as tall as you might expect. Here, looking closer along Sakurada-dori south through Minato City towards Takanawa, the apartment and business buildings seem to rise as they get further away. It may not be deliberate, but it does have the happy consequence of making for many wonderful views from the Tower. It was a lovely sunny day when I took this, making me want to join the pedestrians down on the sunlit pavement. /posts/meguro-housing-complex/ Tue, 25 Aug 2020 00:00:00 +0000 /posts/meguro-housing-complex/ There are a seemingly infinite variety of housing projects in Tokyo that are each fascinating and captivating in their design and detail. It would be nice to see some from the inside one day. This one, in Meguro Ward, is as seen from the Ebisu Garden Place, a landmark which has a great platform from which to view the four Wards of Minato, Shibuya, Shinagawa and Meguro. /posts/blue-horizons/ Tue, 11 Aug 2020 00:00:00 +0000 /posts/blue-horizons/ Looking south over Sumida and Koto wards from the Skytree on an almost cloudless April morning over countless homes and businesses all the way to the Tokyo Gate Bridge and Haneda Airport and the highrise cluster of Chuo City. It looks vast, and yet is still only a small slice of the whole of Tokyo. Below, in the long thin Sumida River Park where I had just walked, are chaperoned tribes of colourfully hatted kindergarten classes playing, and old men quietly fishing in a fragment of an old canal. /posts/borderlands/ Thu, 30 Jul 2020 00:00:00 +0000 /posts/borderlands/ I am fascinated by the borderlands where nature begins to take back the works of man. In this photograph taken in Minamisenju at the south end of Arakawa City, nature seems to have approached from the right and is washing against the shores of human activity on the left. /posts/tokyo-ramshackle/ Wed, 15 Jul 2020 00:00:00 +0000 /posts/tokyo-ramshackle/ Whilst much of Tokyo is new and shiny, there are still countless little, old, and rundown buildings to be seen whenever you step off the main business and tourist areas. Each one is brimming with character and a history one can only guess at. I particularly like ones like this one, at the northern edge of Minowa, that appears to be being propped up by the more modern and robust buildings either side. /posts/roof-tiles-and-rain-chains/ Wed, 29 Apr 2020 00:00:00 +0000 /posts/roof-tiles-and-rain-chains/ I love Japanese roof tiles. Their texture, shape, glaze and colours are a major contributor to the appeal of temples and other traditional Japanese buildings. Another fascinating element of such buildings are the rain chains, or kusari-doi, that so much more elegantly deal with off-roof water flow than the usual drainpipe. This photograph is of part of the Jyokan-ji temple near Minowa Station. It lies right on the boundary of the Arakawa and Tatio wards which is a fascinating area to explore /posts/pink-white-and-blue/ Mon, 30 Mar 2020 00:00:00 +0000 /posts/pink-white-and-blue/ This office block in Sumida City caught my eye, the very man made colour framed by the pink, white and blue of nature. It overlooks the Sumida River Park, a very pleasant long thin park whose pathways mark the boundary between many of the eastern and western districts of Sumida ward. /posts/complex-road-junction/ Tue, 17 Mar 2020 00:00:00 +0000 /posts/complex-road-junction/ Hakozaki Junction in Kakigaracho is typical of many such junctions in Tokyo. Multiple levels of overhead roads somehow weaving between hi-rise buildings, and barely noticeable from the streets below. /posts/sakura-waters/ Sun, 01 Sep 2019 00:00:00 +0000 /posts/sakura-waters/ There is something almost overwhelming about the quantity of all things sakura in Tokyo. How can the most urban of cities find room for so many cherry trees? How can each tree put forth so many flowers? How can you not be awed at blizzards of pink petals in the air around you, and carpets of pink at your feet and in the city waterways. Here are a few petals on some still waters in the Sumida River Park. /posts/living-city/ Sun, 11 Aug 2019 00:00:00 +0000 /posts/living-city/ This photograph, looking over Minato city, shows in microcosm, the complexity of Tokyo. It does not take long, witnessing scenes like this, to feel that the city is a living entity. Remember you can right click on the image to access it full size - something I especially recommend for photographs like this one. /posts/jokan-ji-door/ Thu, 25 Apr 2019 00:00:00 +0000 /posts/jokan-ji-door/ Around the back of the Jōkan-ji temple is a door behind which are stored the remains of a great many women whose sad story is well worth looking into. /posts/tree-and-skytree/ Mon, 18 Mar 2019 00:00:00 +0000 /posts/tree-and-skytree/ The Tokyo Skytree is visible for much of the length of the long and thin Sumida River Park. A very pleasant park on a cool spring morning. At this point the east (right hand) half of the park is in Kotobashi and the west side is in Midori. You can weave in and out of a dozen different districts as you walk along its winding paths.