The Crow

Over the weekend Tokyo experienced the first taste of summer. In celebration hundreds, if not thousands, of people streamed into Tokyo's Ueno park to enjoy the sunshine and warm temperatures. Among them, a companion and I sat with our purchased bag of chicken when a large crow swept down and eyed one of the bags sitting on the low bench with us. With little hesitation, it hopped once toward the bag, snatching it in its black beak and leaped into a low flight to a spot about 30 meters away. There it tore open the paper bag, strewing pieces of fried chicken around, before taking the largest in its beak and flying off. The whole affair took such little time that the only thing to do was say, "Hey! That crow stole our chicken!"

I think this particular crow was contemplating taking the cat as his next meal.

Tokyo's crows have a deserved reputation for aggressiveness, noise, general filthiness. So bad did the problem get that in the previous election cycle (not the most recent), Governor Ishihara made a reduction of the birds part of a campaign promise. His program to curb the birds, however, failed and actually resulted in a reported increase of the pests. For another example of the birds' ill behavior, go here.

The aftermath

As previously noted, the sanja matsuri, with its attendant hordes came to Tokyo's sensoji temple complex and surrounding neighborhoods. Saturday's early rains seemed to keep things from starting too quickly, but Sunday's postcard clear day invited more people out.

On hand into the evening were literally at least eight bus-loads of Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department's finest crowd control cops. As the sun set, the mikoshi (portable shrines) continued to wind their way through the streets, accompanied by spectators and police.


Clean up takes place quickly around the temple grounds. The booths of food and games come down mostly Sunday night, the crowd control barriers get pulled to the back of the temple, and the mountain of garbage that is generated over the two day's of celebration is loaded for the landfills and incinerators

I think they are going to need a bigger truck.

Thailand in Japan

May 12th and 13th, hordes of Tokyo denizens assembled in Yoyogi park to get their fill of Thai food, Thai pop music and Thai beer. Not necessarily in that order.


This weekend, the sanja matsuri, one of the three largest festivals in Japan takes place in Tokyo's Asakusa district. As this is close the current world headquarters of the Idle Monkey Trainer, I will be leaving the area this weekend. Think of the crowd above tripled in size, and half of them carrying small shrines, like these guys below two years ago.

Sports in the red light district

Sunday afternoons a group of mostly Canadians, a couple of Americans, and the occasional token Aussie or Brit get together to play street hockey in the red light district of Kabukicho in Tokyo. There is a park that we use, conveniently located in front of the local hospital and otherwise surrounded by host clubs, hostess clubs, love hotels, and other associated and unaffiliated businesses.

Given the area, it was only a matter of time, it was only a matter time before this happened:


For information on the hockey group (not the ladies pictured above), visit the Tokyo Street Hockey Association.