The gardens are big, and toddler-active-time has it's limitations so we ended up making a beeline for the ruins of the Edo Castle Tower. Back in the samurai days (1600's) Tokyo was called Edo and it had a castle. Initial construction of the castle and grounds were begun in 1457 and were very, very extensive. Over the centuries there has been lots of burning, wars, rebuilding and relocating of the various buildings and architectural features. Details here.
Now all this is part of the Imperial Palace gardens. At one end is a stone pedestal where the largest tower of the castle stood. The tower had five stories and was 51 meters high. It was the tallest tower in Japan.
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| the stone pedestal |
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| from on top, looking back down into the gardens |
Now, here's where it gets kinda interesting. There is a group of citizens in Tokyo who believe that it's a shame that Tokyo doesn't have a castle. Lots of other big cities in Japan have a castle they can show off, but not poor Tokyo. So they've banded together and formed a committee to raise money and rebuild the main tower to it's original splendor.
We received the flyer below when we entered the gardens. I didn't pay attention when we were handed the flyer, but I wonder if we were slipped an English one based on our appearance. My response after reading it was "bless them". They have a Facebook page and a website but it's all in Japanese. (And as usual, if you let them be translated by a program, it's little more than gibberish.)
I hope they can make their dream come true and if I ever see an actual opportunity to donate I'll totally do it. It would be great to come back to Japan one day far in the future and see a tower here on this pedestal.
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| the front: note that it "might" be a great monument....no promises |
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| my favorite line is about them being ordinary people |
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