a day in Tokyo

It seems to be de rigeur among groups of Japanese late teens/early 20-somethings to rent a kimono and walk around taking selfies ... these were at the Senso-ji Temple (rebuilt after being destroyed in WW2, so a strange piece of post-war Japan masquerading as old - but none the less impressive for that, and much visited ... (mostly by Japanese, although - compared to visitors from other countries, the dominant other presence here was British.  Or maybe we're just good at mastering the underground/subway system).

I could fancy a lucky black cat kimono like this one:

Then there was much wafting of incense, as health-giving;

with the ash being constantly raked over;

some Happy Couples coming here for photo ops;

and there were even some patches of tranquility there.

I spent a whole chunk of the day in the Museum of Modern Art, where there was a big show of Fukuzawa Ichiro, whose career stretched from 20s Paris to New York in 1965 to 70s Japan - a political commentator (and a pessimistic one, to boot): I can't say that I liked his painting at all, but it was certainly fascinating as a response to Japanese and world history.  But before that, some obligatory tourist views;

and inside a guardsman's hut - see the tea canisters;

and some archetypal new-and-old;

and you have to like a city that has inset paving slabs of flowers.

And then there are the strange things, like a quasi-begging, quasi-advertising Great Horned Owl (who made me slightly uncomfortable, even if he didn't seem pissed off).

And finally, I promise that neither Moth nor Lucy Fur will be sitting for their portraits ...