As previously mentioned, we went on a Ghost Walk tour on the last day of the New Year holiday. One of the frustrating things about Japan is that they are not that interested in sharing their rich and diverse history. Everything is either hidden away or only in Japanese. They really don’t care about sharing. This is not a stretch, just look at their history, foreigners have never been popular in Japan.

However, there are a few gaijin who have been here long enough to assemble the history. If you are in Japan, I would highly recommend taking one of Haunted Tokyo’s tours. The tour we were on was positioned as a ghost tour, but it quickly became obvious that it was more of  a shrine tour filled with history, culture and Japanese mythology. We loved it and will definitely take their other tours.

We wandered around Tokyo FINALLY learning the history (beyond what we have dug up on our own). We started here … a building that she is convinced is haunted with pulled curtains and odd sculptures. Not sure. But I think someone was looking out at our group through the curtains …

We stopped off at Shitaya shrine, where our guide explained how the corner is guarded by foxes as there is only one location that the demons and bad spirits can enter from. A beautiful shrine .. with a demon entrance.

While looking at the shrine we were told that many of the shrines are being disassembled and stored by developers and the government. If you want to bring a shrine to your home, you simply need to agree to reassemble it and pay for transport (although I can find no reference to this on the web).

Still amazes me to see berries and flowers in January (especially after that snow fall)

As we wandered the streets we came through an area which was home to many geishas at one point in time. One of the few areas in Tokyo where very old buildings remain.

And very old vending carts …