Garuda Indonesia Colours Magazine October 2014 | Page 114

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Travel | Tokyo

It feels as if everyone in
Tokyo – wherever they’re
going, whatever their business
– squeezes through here at
some point. It’s a non-stop
parade of travellers and
pilgrims, worshippers and
workers, day-trippers
and passers-by.

They come in their ones and twos, as
families, with friends, even by the busload or
chattering crowd. And the moment they set
their eyes on Kaminarimon – the Thunder
Gate – they stop in their tracks. It’s a striking
structure: squat, powerfully proportioned,
flanked by the forbidding statues of the gods
of wind and thunder that scowl at all-comers
as if to say, “Take one step closer if you dare!”
Seemingly without a care, pedestrians
wander on through the gate, and in the
process pass beneath its chōchin, a
monumental paper lantern. On the
underside of the lantern – close enough to
be stroked, or even poked by the exploratory
fingers of kids given piggybacks – a brass
collar holds the wooden engraving of a
fire-breathing dragon. It’s so easy to touch,
so intimate, that every single visitor must
feel that it’s a moment special just to them.
Until recently this view upwards to the
carved dragon was a surprisingly memorable
highlight of a visit to Asakusa district, but
nowadays there’s a view downwards that
is equally rewarding.
Despite its clunky name, the Asakusa
Culture Tourist Information Centre

occupies an elegant, intelligent building
across from the gate. It looks like it’s formed
from the frames of eight traditional wooden
houses, shakily balanced atop each other.
But somehow it sits comfortably at this busy
junction. The centre (open 9am–8pm daily)
offers multilingual area guides, is a meeting
point for walking tours, has free Wi-Fi and
restrooms, and above all is equipped with
an unexpectedly agreeable view from its
eighth floor.
In this corner of Tokyo high-rises are
distinctly thin on the ground – except, that
is, for the daddy of them all, Tokyo Sky
Tree, located just a kilometre away across
the Sumida River. It’s another example of
stunning 21st-century Japanese architecture
and at 634m is the tallest tower in the world
(for the time being!). The panorama from
the information centre’s eighth-floor
observation terrace takes in a sweeping
view of Asakusa’s hustle and bustle, with
Tokyo Sky Tree standing like a giant
exclamation mark at the end!
Asakusa has been known as the ‘low city’,
or shitemachi, for hundreds of years –
certainly since the time that this was
declared the capital in 1603. In those days