Top page icon design – Tanabata Festival

Maybe not many people have noticed, but  there is a small graphic icon which represents seasonal events in Japan, at the top of  our website. 

I have put this  for July.

 

Tanabata festival is held on July 7th in Tokyo, but the original story comes from a Chinese folk story. For details, please go to wikipedia.

We celebrate Tanabata by writhing a wish on a colorful strips of paper called “Tanzaku(短冊）” and hang it on a bamboo branch. It is one of the exciting seasonal events in the year, especially for small kids.

 

Last Saturday during our tour, we visited a Niigata Prefecture pilot shop in Nihombashi. We all wrote our wishes on Tanzaku. <Above picture>  I wished for world peace, happiness for all  …. and a little something  for my private

Rainy season 2009

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Rainy season is called “Tsuyu (梅雨)” in Japanese. It literally means “Plum Rain” , the reason being  that the plum fruit ripens during this time of the year, and  we have a lot of  rain during these months.

The Meteorological Agency officially announces the beginning and end of Tsuyu every year, and here is this year’s  forecast by the Weather News Company (Japanese page) for the Tokyo area.

1. Forecast for 2009                 From   Jun. 8           to   Jul. 16
2. Last year                                       May 29                Jul. 19
3. Average year                                   Jun. 8                  Jul. 20

 [ It will rain gently and softly and the temperature will be lower than average  in June. Early July will be hot and humid, a bit of a break from the rain and towards the end, it is expected to rain rather heavily. ]

Construction site of the new Tokyo Tower

Tokyo Tower, built in 1958 is 333m tall and it is still the tallest self-supporting steel structure in the world.  It was originally built for TV and radio broadcasting purposes but because we have many more high rise buildings in Tokyo now, the current tower is not high enough to cover all the broadcasting area.  The city is planning a new Tokyo Tower, the “Tokyo Sky Tree”.

 

Last week, I went to the construction site of the Tokyo Sky Tree to see how it is progressing. Of course on my bike!  I couldn’t tell how much progress had been made but it sure is going forward!  At the moment, it’s about 20m high, almost as high as a ten floor apartment.  When the tower is completed in 2011, it will be 610m.

 Riding around this area on my bike, I could still feel the atmosphere of the “old and small downtown Tokyo”.  Maybe there will be drastic changes in this part of town in the coming years.   

Long Ride Event @Japan in 2009

While we are operators of a city bike tour, a fun ride with many stops in between, lots of chatting, a bit of walking, lunch and rest…if you are a more serious cyclist, here are a few things to you might want to try! 

Click here for a larger image. (MS Excel file will open)

 This year, I want to try my first ever hill climb but maybe in the autumn…summer might be too hot :p