The theme of my trip to Japan is to seek for the historic city and gardens. I am very interested in the traditional Japanese gardens and would like to see how they survive for hundreds of years and how they look like today. Are they isolated from the rest of the city, or they are influencing the cities or surrounding areas? That is why I choose Nara, Osaka, and Tokyo as my destinations. All of them are historic cities in Japan, and Nara and Kyoto used to be the capital. With my background in urban planning and landscape architecture, my travel notes will based on these two perspectives.
(the intersection of drive way and railway. photo is taken from a moving train)
The public transportation is famous for its wide coverage, so I decided to try to take train and bus during the whole travel. After arrived in Kansai International Airport, I head to Nara by train, where is my first destination. The way to purchase train ticket in Japan is similar with the way we do in the US, except in Japan you need pay by cash.
(left: a sign in Kansai International Airport; right: Nara Railway Station)
I feel everything looks so familiar to me, even I have not been to Japan before. With those Japanese and Chinese characters and asian faces, I even got deja vu and feel that I’m in Shanghai. Anyway, I’m glad that I studied Japanese before I left. I used to be able to speak Japanese with my friends a few years ago, but without practice it is totally rusted. So I spent 4 weeks to refresh myself. Everything seems to be good so far. I can’t wait to see more.
(A plaza in Nara. The structure is a temporary memorial to celebrate the completion of a temple.)
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