The Sensoji temple is a Buddhist temple located in the Tokyo "suburb" of Asakusa. It’s only about a 20 minute subway ride from where we are staying but unfortunately when we visited the temple we got a little “confused” in the subway station and it took that long again to find the right exit and make it to the temple.
The first thing you see when you get to the front of the temple is the Thunder gate with a huge lantern hanging in the middle of the gate (the lantern is also the symbol for the suburb).
Once you go through the gate you enter an area of stalls that is a few hundred metres long selling everything that you could ever want (if its touristy trinkets that you want) with the smaller alleys around the outside of the stalls selling kimonos and other traditional Japanese dress. One thing that constantly amazes me about Tokyo is that given the number of people in the city you very rarely get hassled by people trying to sell you things. Imagine going to a large market in any number of other Asian cities and you wouldn’t be able to move for the people trying to get you to buy their wares.
When you get to the end of the stalls you enter a wide courtyard and see the main building of the temple and the famous five story pagoda. If you were to only read the guide books you would think that the only reason for coming to the temple is to see the pagoda.
Like many things Japanese there are a range of contrasts and as you head to the back of the temple you come across these amazing gardens with small streams running through them, full of carp and the background noise of little waterfalls. When seated in this tranquil place it’s hard to remember that you are in the midst of all the noise of the city. There is also a shrine in these gardens that dates back to the mid 1600’s.
The first thing you see when you get to the front of the temple is the Thunder gate with a huge lantern hanging in the middle of the gate (the lantern is also the symbol for the suburb).
Once you go through the gate you enter an area of stalls that is a few hundred metres long selling everything that you could ever want (if its touristy trinkets that you want) with the smaller alleys around the outside of the stalls selling kimonos and other traditional Japanese dress. One thing that constantly amazes me about Tokyo is that given the number of people in the city you very rarely get hassled by people trying to sell you things. Imagine going to a large market in any number of other Asian cities and you wouldn’t be able to move for the people trying to get you to buy their wares.
When you get to the end of the stalls you enter a wide courtyard and see the main building of the temple and the famous five story pagoda. If you were to only read the guide books you would think that the only reason for coming to the temple is to see the pagoda.
Like many things Japanese there are a range of contrasts and as you head to the back of the temple you come across these amazing gardens with small streams running through them, full of carp and the background noise of little waterfalls. When seated in this tranquil place it’s hard to remember that you are in the midst of all the noise of the city. There is also a shrine in these gardens that dates back to the mid 1600’s.
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