Cosplay around the Senso-ji Temple

Yesterday we struggled back out through the metro and went to the Sensoji Temple in Asakusa. This takes three metro rides adding to Y580 each each way from Oizumi Gakuen. If you want a comparison $1US is about Y116.

The metro was crowded to the gunnels

Manga is endlessly popular with adults due to Japanese pictographic consciousness

Views over suburban Tokyo as we pass

We transfer at Ikebukuro station

These ticket machines have a mysterious square portal
where an adviser will appear when you press "Help"

We take the JR Yamanote line (circled) before changing at Ueno for Asakusa

We came out of the metro in Asakusa and first took a walk by the river overlooking barges on the water and high-rise commercial office blocks.







We then walked the eight or so blocks to Senso-ji temple, passing through a series of arcades.

A shoeshine lady somewhat overwhelmed by the heat

The mall ends in a market area

Senso-ji Temple gate Asakusa Tokyo

The temple compound with pagoda

The main shrine was full of a flow of people passing through

Fire and water play a part in the devotions

The main altar

Oracles where you shake a box of sticks and select a drawer with a fortune card.

These can then be attached as good luck offerings

The temple was full of Japanese tourists and also a very colourful throng of cos-play zoku girls or costume play gangs who are largely teenage girls and their boy friends from the suburban gulags acting out their dysphoria and love of visual pop groups creatively by donning rebellious suggestive costumes and wigs.

Cos-Play Girls at Senso-ji

Two images of characters from Naruto here Akatsuki and below Kitami the shark ninja.

Cosplay wigs on sale

We then walked back by a different route, passing this Otanuki-sama or Raccoon Dog temple Chingodo. Otanuki-sama is a god of the art of public entertainment, also protecting from fire and robbery.

A carry-on street food stall

Bow-tie kimono sashes

We took the subway back to Ueno and walked through the park and some of its museums and temples to the Yanaka cemetery, catching the metro again from Nippori.

We ate noodles and walked miles through Ueno park to the Yanaka cemetary which was desolate and refreshingly wild. We descended through the railroad tracks to Nippori and struggled back totally overheated to our funky island of quiet sanity at Yoshida House.