A summer Bon dance festival

A summer Bon dance festival took place in an elementary school yard near my house on July 31.

I was a spectator, not a dancer the last night anyway. The similar scenes are seen around this country in this period.

People including kids and elders have a good chance to wear summer kimono made of cotton called yukata. In the yard neighbours were selling shaved ice, other food and cheep toys for kids.

On this day, about twenty thousands of fireworks lit up the skies near the Sumida river and attracted about 95,000 people to the site. I enjoyed the beautiful flames on TV in my cool room. Bon dance and fireworks are very seasonal tradition here.

Hokoku-ji Temple：a bamboo temple in Kamakura

I went on an excursion to Kamakura, Kanagawa Prefecture with TFG (Tokyo Free Guide) mates on July 3. We started at Kita-kamakura Station and visited shrines and temples in the area. The most impressive one was Hokoku-ji , a Zen temple and the last one we saw.

When arrived I was very tired because we had walked for five hours on a very hot and humid day. But the bamboo garden refreshed me up immediately. The bamboo plants were so vigorous　that they seemed to shoot up to the cloudy skies.

Like most people in the country I love bamboo as well as cherry trees. Many Japanese garden have bamboo plants. I think they give off a certain spirit that enables you to straight up your spine --- especially in the dismal weather of the rainy season.

Hokokuji:
http://www.mustlovejapan.com/subject/hokokuji/

Lotus pond in Ueno Park

It was a hot and humid day, typical of the rainy season in early July .

It was the third time to show my guests to the pond recently. I was very happy that all of them loved it. And now lotus flowers started to come into bloom in Ueno Park's Shinobazuno-ike.

Lotus is very popular in Buddhist countries like Japan because the Buddha is said to have sat and meditated on a lotus leaf. The water under the plants is full of dirty mud; a symbolic human world. Shinobazuno-ike is a peaceful and relaxing place in a busy and crowded Tokyo.

Some lotus lovers, or university students who drink through out the night in the Ueno area, go to the pond very early morning (maybe around 5 am) to listen to the gentle sounds the flowers make when bloom. You can enjoy lotus until the middle of August. I would like to listen to the sounds one day.