Tour of Asakusa

TOKYO (TR) – Tokyo can be crudely described as a metropolis of soaring and undulating concrete collectively illuminated by a glow of garish neon. Yet bordering the Sumida River in the east is the Asakusa district, which adheres to many of those characteristics but also retains certain cultural elements of life back in the Edo Period (1615 – 1868).

Tourists and locals will often flock to the area’s temples and shrines, which create a lively atmosphere around the New Year’s holidays, a prelude to the various festivals and carnivals held throughout the year.

It was once Japan’s version of Vaudeville, with one district having offered many performance theaters, a legacy that still lingers today.

Ladies in kimono shuffling through Asakusa’s narrow alleys is not an unusual site as it is one of Tokyo’s six remaining hanamachi, literally “flower town,” a reference to the locales in which customers can be entertained by a geisha.
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Sunday afternoon at the Nakamise shopping arcade in Asakusa

(Photo by Tokyo Reporter, May 30, 2010) Read more

Nakamise shopping arade in Asakusa

(Photo by Tokyo Reporter, February 27, 2010)