Week 6: Wisteria and Jazz

May 3rd, 2026

This week started off slow, just going to my Japanese history class on Monday. We talked about China and Korea’s influence on Japanese culture and religion and had a discussion about how important native languages are. It was really interesting stuff, and I’m definitely excited to continue that class.

In the evening, I was finally able to get a ticket for PokéPark Kanto, a Pokémon theme park that opened in February. I tried to get tickets at the end of February for April, which was a bit of a disaster. They open up at 4am Eastern, so I set an alarm for 3:55 on a Saturday so I could buy them. I was able to get a decent amount of the way through the buying process, but the website started dying and I was kicked out multiple times until they were all sold out. I decided to wait til I got to Japan because 6pm is a much easier time to get tickets. Luckily, it all worked out this time, and I’m really excited that I get to go.

After class on Tuesday, I approached the neighbor cat and it meowed at me. Mark my words, I will befriend this cat before I leave.

Wednesday was my big day of the week, where I decided to skip class (I'm a good student, I swear!) and go to Ashikaga Flower Park, a garden famous for large and old wisteria trees. It's a bit over 2 hours north, located in Tochigi. I took one train and then an express train which takes you most of the way, and then two more local trains to get there. I did miss the first local train because I took too long to decide where to get lunch (I ended up just going to 7-eleven after not being able to decide). Hopefully that won’t happen again (foreshadowing).

The park was absolutely beautiful, with some of the most amazing trees and flowers I’ve seen in my life. Nearly just when you walk in the main entrance there’s 2 massive wisteria trees that are well over 150 years old, and their flowers cover an area of over 10,000 square feet. It’s an indescribable feeling to be under there, knowing that this is one of the only places in the world you can find something like this, and that people have been loving and viewing these same trees for decades. Plus, they're absolutely gorgeous.

There were plenty of other beautiful flowers throughout the park, including some really nice white wisteria trees and azalea bushes, but the thing that really stuck with me was the double flower wisteria. Double flower variants are already something I really find beautiful (the Kanzan cherry blossom is my favorite cherry), and the double flower wisteria is really rare. It was the life's work of one man taking care of it, and is also over 150 years old now. It was transferred from a few miles away in 1996 after years of research on how to do so. There had never been a successful transplantation of a wisteria with a trunk diameter above 1 meter, and this one was already 3.6 meters in diameter. But they were able to do it through human ingenuity and the resilience of nature. After transplantation, it flowered only three months later, and still flowers to this day. It’s pretty amazing that I can see one of the most beautiful trees I’ve ever seen only because one person decided to raise it and thousands of people worked together to do something for the first time. Even without the backstory, this tree is beautiful and unique, but with the story, it’s truly a spectacle.

There were a couple restaurants and cafes in the park, and I was able to get wisteria flavored ice cream, which was a nice subtle flavor with a really fun color. I also got tomato curry for an early dinner.

I did laps until dark, because they illuminate the trees in the evening and that’s when things really start to look amazing. The pictures are beautiful but it’s hard to really capture how it looks in person, especially with the double flowered tree. You can probably explore the whole park in a few hours, but it was really nice to just meander without a map and spend the whole day there.

I started my trip home a bit after dark, but before taking the second local train I had to use the bathroom, so I missed the express train I planned to take. Luckily, there was one more for the night at 8:45, so I only had to wait about 40 minutes, but if I missed this one for some reason, I would most likely not be able to get home, as the regular train probably wouldn’t get me back before midnight when the trains stop running. I tried to get my ticket for the express train, but it wouldn’t accept either of my cards, didn't accept my metro card, and I ran out of cash at the park. So I had to run half a mile to the nearest 7-eleven, use the ATM, and run back to get the ticket and barely make it on time. I guess I like to keep things interesting.

There were 3 gift shops at the park, which really made up for not being able to go to the gift shop at Tama Forest and the disappointing gift shop at Shinjuku Gyoen. I bought a bunch of things including a big purple shiba plush, some pins from a gachapon, and a weird little freak plush that I just had to get because he was so odd looking. I also got some bath salts, which I tried after I got home, and were really nice after a long day of walking nearly 20,000 steps.

Click here to see a folder with more pictures from the park. I would highly recommend looking through them, it's a lovely place.

The main reason I really didn’t want to get stranded somewhere is because I had class in the morning, but I didn’t end up going to the class anyway because I was so tired. I guess it wouldn’t have mattered that much, and Yoshio said it would have made a better story, so I’ll try harder to get in a worse situation next time.

When I went to school for my second class, I missed my bus stop, which wasn’t too much of an issue because I got there early, but on the way home I also missed my stop, neither of which have happened before. I guess it was just a weird day.

That night, Etsuko, Emily and I had to go to a specific station to get bullet train tickets, so we went out to dinner and tried Yoshio’s favorite Indian place, Tara Kitchen. It was yummy, maybe not quite as good as lumbini but it’s hard for me to dislike Indian food.

We took the train to Tokyo station to go to a JR counter, because you need to buy bullet train tickets in person to use a student discount. I started speaking to the attendant and it was going smooth until I heard a word I didn’t recognize, so I tried to guess but then she just says “Is it a reserved or non-reserved seat” in perfect English with no Japanese accent. It was kind of a jumpscare because it was probably the best English I’ve heard from a Japanese person, so we just continued the rest of the conversation in half-English half-Japanese. The next interaction to get the tickets went very smoothly, and we now have tickets to go to Kyoto in 2 weeks. Exciting!

The next day I planned to go to Harajuku to go shopping, but ended up not going because it was really windy outside. I ended up staying indoors and doing some work in the evening.

Saturday was beautiful outside, so I went out to Shinjuku Gyoen to walk around for a few hours. I explored a couple areas I didn’t make it to last time, including seeing the inside of the historical rest house building. The tulip trees were also blooming, which was the first time I’ve been able to see tulip tree flowers in real life.

After the garden I went to get dinner at a restaurant that serves Kamameshi, a traditional rice dish. It was pretty good!

I took the train over to Kichijoji after dinner to go to a jazz club called Sometime with Etsuko and Emily. Unfortunately, our viewing angle wasn’t great because I didn’t realize you could reserve better seats, but the music was so good that it didn’t matter. It was a jazz-funk quartet led by the keyboardist, and was really amazing. I believe it was all originals, but there may have been some covers too.

I got to chat for a pretty long while with the drummer, Kenny. He’s from Denver but has been living and playing in Tokyo for around 20 years. We talked before and between the sets about music and drums and Japan, and he was a really great guy. He invited me to a show he’s playing in June nearby, which I will definitely be going to. Later, when I asked who else he plays with, he mentioned he plays with a “Japanese artist who does kind of Pop and RnB,” and I figured it would be someone I didn’t know, but turns it out’s Anri, a legendary Japanese singer from the 80s who has some huge hits. Way to sell yourself short, Kenny!

Sunday, as usual, was just a laundry doing and blog writing day, but I did see the neighbor cat and was able to get a little closer to it. It mostly just stared at me from under a car.

Overall, this was a lovely week. Not insanely busy, but two really great outings with some small things sprinkled throughout to keep things interesting. Ashikaga flower park is definitely one of the highlights since I’ve been here overall, and I hope I’m able to go again one day during wisteria bloom. They also have light shows in the winter that they’re famous for, so maybe I’ll just have to come back for every season.

Next week I have no classes for Golden week, so it should be nice to get some rest and be able to talk to friends back home. I have tickets for the ghibli museum as well as two concerts, so expect lots of fun things to read about next Sunday.

Until then. Have a lovely day.
-Dan