Yesterday I went up the Tokyo Sky Tree.
634 meters tall … the tallest tower in the world!
First of all, the elevators move at 600 meters per minute! But they’re so smooth, I could hardly feel them move!
The sky was clear, blue and sunny … so I could clearly see Mt. Fuji, Tokyo Tower, Shinjuku, Tokyo Disneyland, the Tokyo Dome…all of Tokyo and beyond!
The shadow of Tokyo Sky Tree
Summer in Tokyo is very hot and humid. There is a typhoon season and sometimes a sudden thunderstorm with heavy rain will start seemingly out of nowhere…and then stop just as suddenly with blue skies returning.
Japanese people are sometimes surprised if I tell them that summer in Florida (where I grew up) is very similar.
Summer in Florida is also hot and humid. There is a hurricane season (hurricanes, for all intents and purposes, are basically the same as typhoons) and sometimes sudden short thunderstorms occur there too.
In fact, the area in Florida where I lived, Tampa Bay, is called “the lightning capital of the world”.
When the weather is sunny and then a rainstorm suddenly starts…with the sunny weather returning just as suddenly, Floridians call that a sun shower.
So I also referred to the same phenomenon in Japan as a sun shower, as well.
But a few years ago, the Japanese media gave these storms an original Japanese name. Here in Japan, these storms are called 「ゲリラ豪雨」 (“Guerrilla rainstorms“) because of the way they violently come out of nowhere.
Well, yesterday, there was a sudden, short, ゲリラ豪雨 (Guerrilla rainstorm)…and someone photographed it from the Tokyo Sky Tree tower.
The 「ゲリラ豪雨」 (guerrilla rainstorm) that hit the Tokyo area yesterday. It looks like a tornado!
Earlier this month, I participated in one of Tokyo’s biggest festivals.
(Click here to read that post.)
There are many great festivals all year round…but especially so in the summer.
(Click here to see a list I made of some of Tokyo’s best festivals.)
I like Japan’s festivals a lot…and I go to many of them.
In early August, my family and I went to watch a summer 花火大会 (fireworks show) near our house that we usually go to every year.
The 花火大会 (fireworks shows) in Japan are excellent! If you have a chance, you should see one!
(Here is a list of some of Tokyo’s biggest fireworks shows.)
It’s not easy to photograph fireworks with the camera I have…but here are a few that I took:
花火 (“hanabi”)…literally “flower (of) fire”, is the Japanese word for “fireworks”.
We also went to a festival at a temple not far from the Tokyo Sky Tree.
After that, we went to 上野公園 (Ueno Park):
(Click here to see some other photos I took in Ueno a couple of years ago.)
If you have any questions about festivals in Tokyo, things to do in this city, or whatever…feel free to contact me.
Yesterday a 日食 (solar eclipse) could be seen over Tokyo and a few other parts of the world.
Did you watch the eclipse? To look at it, you needed to wear special glasses otherwise you could risk serious eye damage.
I got a (cheap) pair of the glasses and watched the eclipse. It was visible in Tokyo at 7:30AM.
I took a few photos of it with my cell-phone camera. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to get a very good shot of the “ring of fire” (when the moon was directly in front of the sun and a perfect ring was visible around the dark moon)…this one is probably the best of the pictures I got.
Solar eclipse over Tokyo, 2012 May 21
Another “sky-related” event in Tokyo is the grand opening of the Tokyo Sky Tree today (2012 May 22).
It says “Tuesday, 2012 May 22, Tokyo Sky Tree grand opening”
Personally, I don’t plan to go inside the Tokyo Sky Tree at least until the “novelty” wears off because it’s going to be very crowded (for awhile, a reservation is required to go inside) and also, the admission cost is expensive—¥2,000 – ¥3,000 for adults (depending on which level of the tower you want to go up to).
Two days ago (April 29th) was the Japanese holiday 「昭和の日」 (“Showa Day”). It was a Sunday so the holiday was “observed” yesterday (April 30th).
It was the unofficial start of Golden Week. Many people, like me, have to go to work today and tomorrow but had a day off yesterday and next Thursday til Sunday (May 3rd – May 6th) will be days off, too.
But some people get a full nine-day Golden Week holiday from April 29th – May 6th. A lot of those people take an overseas trip.
Click here to read my short FAQ about this holiday period…and also how some of the holidays changed names a few times fairly recently.
Anyways, as we had the day off yesterday and the weather was warm, we went to a 藤まつり (Wisteria Flower Festival) not far from the Tokyo Sky Tree.
Here are some of the photos I took:
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About five years ago, Australia began turning all non-essential lights off for an hour on the last Saturday of March.
They called it “Earth Hour” and it was done to remind people to conserve energy.
The following year most major cities around the world followed suit and now Earth Hour is a world-wide annual event in which all lights (except those that are absolutely necessary) are turned off from 8:30 – 9:30PM on the last Saturday in March.
Yesterday was Earth Hour 2012.
It says 「つながる気持ちが 世界を変える」 ("This attitude can change the world").
—(The “60″ in their logo represents the sixty minutes that lights are dimmed)—
So, last night from 8:30-9:30PM (Japan Standard Time (JST)), all non-essential lights were turned off…including the usually illuminated Tokyo Tower (it was only lit enough to prevent planes from hitting it).
The darkened Tokyo Tower at Earth Hour 2012.
Tokyo’s new, bigger tower…the Tokyo Sky Tree won’t be opened to the public until this May—so it’s not illuminated at night yet (except for the lighting necessary for air safety).
But, beginning next year, the Tokyo Sky Tree will be joining the world every year in dimming it’s lights for Earth Hour every year.
On the news today they said that the construction of the 東京スカイツリー (Tokyo Sky Tree) reached a height of 634 meters tall at 1:34PM this afternoon.
That means that they are finished building it upwards because it was designed to stand at 634 meters tall.
This height was decided upon for two reasons…first, it is now the world’s tallest free-standing tower, and also in Japanese “6-3-4″ can be pronounced as “Mu-sa-shi” which sounds like 「武蔵の国」 (“Musashi“) which is the old name for the area of Tokyo that the towers stands in.
Even though the Tokyo Sky Tree now stands at it’s full height, there is still construction yet to be completed on the tower which isn’t scheduled to be completed until sometime in 2011 December.
The tower is due to open to the public in the spring of 2012.
Last October, they did a test of the tower’s lighting, so we had a preview of what the Tokyo Sky Tree will look like when it’s illuminated every evening.
It’s quite beautiful.
Click here to see the post I wrote with a few photos of the lighting test and a preview of what it’s expected to look like completed and illuminated.
The 「東京スカイツリー」 (“Tokyo Sky Tree”) tower will stand an incredible 634 meters tall once it’s completed next year and every evening it will be illuminated blue and purple on alternating nights (blue one night, purple the next, and so on).
What the Tokyo Sky Tree will look like illuminated in blue, once it's completely built.
What the Tokyo Sky Tree will look like illuminated in purple, once it's completely built.
Well, as I wrote in this comment I made last Saturday, the Tokyo Sky Tree was illuminated in both blue and purple from 6:30PM until 9:30PM tonight in a test run of the LED lights that will be used to light up the tower every evening once it’s done being built.
As expected, many people turned up with their cameras to see the Tokyo Sky Tree light up the night sky for the first time (and only time until next year).
The Tokyo Sky Tree lit up in purple tonight.
The Tokyo Sky Tree broadcast tower and observatory is now standing at a height of 407 meters tall…which makes it the tallest structure ever built in Japan.
And it’s only 74% complete. When construction at it is finished next year, it will be 634 meters tall.
I had to go past the construction of the Tokyo Sky Tree yesterday, so I brought my camera and took a few photos of it.
The sign says that the tower is currently 470 meters tall.
I have been up in many observatories in Tokyo…some have free admission, such as the government building in Shinjuku (click here to see my post about that building)…and some aren’t free, such as Tokyo Tower (click here for one of the post I wrote about that tower).
Are there any tall towers or observatories in your city? What the tallest one you’ve been in?
Yesterday my wife and I went to a festival that I had been wanting to see for years but never got a chance until this year.
We were a bit early for the festival so, since the festival was in 浅草 (Asakusa, Tokyo), we decided to go by the Tokyo Sky Tree tower and walk to Asakusa from there.
Tokyo Sky Tree behind 押上駅 (Oshiage Stn)
The Tokyo Sky Tree, currently under construction, now stands at 389 meters (it will be 634 meters tall when completed).
The Asahi Beer HQ is in Asakusa
Cruise boat
The Sensoji Temple in Asakusa was covered while it's being renovated.
Once we got to 浅草 (Asakusa), we went to watch the 江戸消防慰霊祭 (Edo Firefighters Memorial Ceremony).
This is the festival that I wanted to see yesterday.
It’s a ceremony to honor fallen firefighters. The ceremony involves the firefighters dressed as firefighters in Japan did centuries ago and doing stunts on bamboo ladders.
In ancient Japan, firefighters had to balance on such ladders while fighting fires and they would practice such stunts on the ladders in order to improve their strength and balance.
Modern firefighters in Japan still practice these stunts…for tradition and to improve their strength and balance.
Actually, last January I went to the 「東京消防出初式」 (“Tokyo Fire Departments New Year Drill“). That ceremony had many exciting shows including a similar ladder show. But it was still fun to watch again yesterday.
They use these hooks to steady the ladders.
After the ceremony was over we stopped by a store and I saw these vending machines. One looks like Ultraman…it sells, among other things, 「ウルトラコーラ」 (“Ultra Cola“).
We saw this pretty cat.
We don't have a cat...but this is our pet turtle.
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