Thanks to my Lonely Planet city guide, I was able to head out to the Asakusa Samba festival, where the Brazilian population Tokyo have a parade down the main street in Asakusa.This brought Lots of noise and lots of dancing, but also lots of people! Quite literally thousands of people turned out to watch the festival, which meant the streets were packed. I ended up spending most of the day in the market area in an attempt to escape the rush, which was fortunate, as the markets were quite pleasant, but also meant I stumbled upon the Sensō-ji Temple (first established in AD 628), which I didn’t even have on my itinerary for the day.
This was the first Buddhist Temple that I have ventured into during the trip so fair and it made for an enjoyable change from the festival crowd. People made their way through the huge temple gate (seen below) and taking part in various rituals. (the main temple was unfortunately covered, so have no interesting pictures of the temple itself).
There were gardens neighbouring the temple, with a Koi pond and private prayer area. In the main square people were able to receive fortunes for different aspects of their lives, with the ‘bad’ fortunes left behind, tied to the racks in front of the temple.
Visitors were able to buy osenko incense bundles to burn, with the smoke believed to have a healing effect. People would bath themselves in the smoke (seen in the picture below, in front of the temple gate), washing all over themselves with the smoke. Prior to entering the temple to pray, it was also possible to visit a purification fountain, where people could wash their hands and face with water. As I said, this was the first time I had visited a Buddhist temple, let alone one of this size, so I found the whole process rather interesting. Everyone was calm, quiet and respectful for the temple and its visitors, such a change from the rest of Tokyo!
Going to head out to Harajuku tomorrow for my last full day in Tokyo before flying out for London early Monday morning.
