Sengaku-ji Photos

Visiting Sengaku-ji was a very surreal experience... the temple grounds were very beautiful and everything has been kept very similar to the way it was back in the early 1700s... very awesome!

We got to walk right up to the well known as Kira's head-washing well and touch the blood-stained rock that the samurai thrust themselves against their swords on...

incense were burning near the site of the graves...

Tokyo Day 5: Sengaku-ji - Tale of the 47 Ronin & True Samurai Loyalty

After leaving Chuo-ku's Ginza, we headed towards Sengaku-ji Temple located in the Minato-ku district of Tokyo.

Sengaku-ji was the Temple of the 47 Ronin and the site of their graves - one of the greatest loyal samurai stories in Japan's history.

It took everything in this Humanities student to not become overwhelmed by visiting the site of such awesome historical events.

Here goes my attempt at a short version of the story:

Lord Asano, master and samurai leader of the men who became the 47 Ronin, was given an assignment with higher up samurai Lord Kira. Kira tried to get Asano to accept a bribe and when Asano told him he wouldn't because it wasn't the samurai way - Kira called him a "country boor". Asano having enough pulled his dagger and struck Kira's head, but failed to kill him before he was pulled away by Kira's samurai.

Asano wasn't punished for the attack on Kira, which was seen as just...but he was punished for pulling his weapon within the Imperial grounds - a crime usually punished with execution. They allowed Asano to take the more honorable punishment of seppuku (ritual suicide)... Asano returned to his temple Sengaku-ji, committed suicide and was buried on the grounds. His men were told to leave and were now considered "ronin" or masterless samurai.

47 of these samurai decided to plot a revenge against Kira for his slight on their master...Oishi, who was the head samurai for Asano, became the leader of this group. Lord Kira was very scared of an attack since under bushido, code of the samurai, revenge was proper. Kira sent spies for the next two years to follow Oishi and his men.

In order to trick the guards they came up with the plan to separate and leave their lives as samurai - becoming tradesmen. Oishi moved to Kyoto and began taking up a life full of geisha girls and alcohol. He was so believable in his guise that at one point while drunk outside... a passerby stopped to yell insults at him, spit and slap him... telling him he was a coward for not seeking revenge. The spies seeing this returned to Kira and told him there was nothing to worry about any longer.

Some of the men, who were now skilled in their trades, got jobs inside of Kira's estate as carpenters or other tradesmen...they began to learn the makeup of the entire estate. After a little while, Oishi returned to Edo (Tokyo) and met secretly with the other ronin. In 1703, they surrounded Kira's estate - let the innocent leave and attacked Kira's retainers...they finally found Kira hiding with his wives in a closet.

When they found Kira - they told him who they were and offered him the honorable death of taking his own life...they handed him the dagger that their master Asano had committed suicide with, but Kira fell to the ground crying. Oishi then took the dagger and chopped off Kira's head...the men took the head and returned to Sengaku-ji. They washed Kira's head in a well and placed it on their master's grave. Then, knowing that they would be punished for their actions, they turned themselves in.

The shogun had a tough time punishing the 47 ronin because they committed the crime of murder, but did it as an act of revenge which followed bushido... many spoke on behalf of the ronin and the shogun finally decided that their punishment would be honorable suicide instead of execution.

The 47 ronin returned to Sengaku-ji and each committed seppuku against a rock within the grounds of the temple and buried within Sengaku-ji next to their master Asano.

A few days after the punishment... the man who had once spit and slapped Oishi for not being brave - went to Sengaku-ji to visit his grave... he apologized and asked for forgiveness from Oishi and then committed suicide near Oishi's grave... he is buried at the temple as well.

Even though the men knew their punishment would be death, they followed through with the revenge for Asano in order to clear his name. The shogun after all of these event decided to return part of Asano's former lands to Asano's heirs.

.................

So that wasn't very brief, but I love the story...

Ginza Matsya-Dori Dept Store Starbucks x 2

After the police museum, we headed back down Ginza street towards the large Matsuya-Dori department store in search of the first Starbucks of Japan. We got a bonus when we got to Matsuya-Dori and found that there were two Starbucks located in the store... both of these Starbucks had two levels - which is common in Japan...

These two stores were our #3 and #4 Starbucks locations we visited while in Japan.

The store with the dark brick is the location of the first Starbucks built outside of North America and the first Starbucks built in Japan!

After enjoying some awesome Starbucks coffee, we headed back to Ginza-itchome station and on to our final place to visit on our trip... Sengaku-ji.

Tokyo Day 5: More Police Museum

The Police Museum opened in 1994 and has about 800 exhibits showing the history of the Tokyo police as well as the equipment and technology they use.

The first floor is the only section we could take photos in so we checked out all of the motorcycles on display and hopped into the helicopter for a photo before heading upstairs to the rest of the museum.

The third floor included a section dedicated to police officers who have lost their lives in the line of duty - very moving section. There were photos of each of the officers as well as some displays of the uniforms and gear that was worn when the officers lost their lives... with a photo of the officer the gear had belonged to... sad.

After walking through the upper levels of the museum, we headed back to the first level... we had a little talk to the museum host at the front (in the best half Japanese-half English we could muster and SBeast pulling out her badge to better explain when he didn't really understand us)... he seemed very excited when he realized what she had been trying to tell her and gave us a bunch of police goodies including Pipo-kun stickers. As we were heading out of the museum a very nice Tokyo police officer came into the museum and the host told him Syl was an officer too... the host gestured to Syl to show her badge to the officer and then got the officer to pose for a photo with us... we felt very large next to him.

There are four floors in the museum:

1st: The patrol man experience and the photo op gallery with motorcycles and a helicopter.

2nd: Historical documents from the birth of the police department to present day.

3rd: This section honors police who have lost their lives in the line of duty and displays a history of the uniforms and weapons used.

4th: Section dedicated to police forensic science

Tokyo Day 5: Ginza - Police Museum

After leaving Sumida-ku, we headed to Chuo-ku's Ginza area - where the famous shopping district is located. We didn't go for the shopping though...we were in search of the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Museum. As soon as the Beast found out there was a police museum in Tokyo and that I mapped out the location - she has been super excited... (Cops can be such dorks when it comes to police memorabilia especially if you promise them that coffee is nearby!)

The museum was very easy to spot with its giant Pipo-kun outside.

Pipo-kun is the mascot of the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department. We found him on crime prevention and safety posters throughout the city. Pipo-kun is said to be a combination of several animals; taking the best parts to be the best law enforcement officer: his large ears help him hear people in trouble, his antenna catches quick movements, and large eyes help him watch every corner of society.

Sumo Restaurant, Chanko, Ramen and Beast Looking Like a Fool in Japan

While researching for the trip - I read that there was a restaurant inside the sumo hall that served Chanko. Chanko, the sumo wrestler's stew, is the main dish sumo wrestlers eat every day. It is a very healthy dish except that it is eaten in massive quantities with rice and beer.

SBeast wasn't daring enough to try the dish - even though I told her I read it should have chicken in it (at the tournament they only serve chicken in their Chanko because they want to be on twos and not on fours like a cow or with no legs like a fish)... she tried a bowl of the ramen.

The Chanko showed up on a large tray - in a large bowl on top of a burner and surrounded by several smaller bowls filled with various vegetables, a single egg, rice, and bamboo filled with some type of mush.

The first scare I had came when I looked into the bowl and saw that the chicken was raw, but I shortly noticed that it appeared to be cooking within the stew.

Next, I turned my attention to the bowls of vegetables... smelling each of them first to determine if they seemed okay to add to the bowl. After adding some rice - Syl let me know that the Japanese woman behind me, who was also eating Chanko, had just put the contents of the bamboo inside of the stew so I did the same(I have no idea what it was and even though I added it to the stew I didn't dare try it)...

Then Syl exclaimed "Oh - she just put her egg in there too"... so I quickly grabbed my egg and tossed it into the stew... I learned very quickly that I shouldn't be so literal with what she was telling me when the waitress came running towards the table saying "no, no, no, no..." - I shoved my hand into the stew and grabbed the egg - tossing it back into the bowl it had come from.

The waitress in her best English tried to explain - she cracked the egg into the bowl and pointed at the bowl. I was too scared and feeling quite stupid at this point that I didn't dare try the egg again... After the waitress left the table, I asked Syl what I was supposed to do to the egg and she very unhelpfully suggested I dip something into it, but seeing that it was raw this was not something I was willing to try.

We had many laughs and beer as quietly as we could while Syl tried to not pee all over herself... when we got up to check out of the restaurant, the waitress pointed to her stomach and asked us if we were full... we told her we were and of course Syl had to tell her we were confused by the egg... the waitress pointed to the stew and said "inside" and "like dessert"... a very interesting experience... the stew had a great flavor...

As we exited the restaurant even more confused - we headed out of the sumo hall and towards Ryogoku station so we could head to our next destination.

Big Sumo and the Beasts First Japanese Photo Booth

We were very impressed with this big guy - he took hold of his opponents mawashi and tossed him out of the ring... he landed three rows back!

We watched a few hours of bouts before heading out to check out the sumo hall more...

We found our first Japanese photo booth and stepped inside to do our best sumo poses with some of the great Yokozuna of the past - very fun!