It is a lovely Spring day in Tokyo. It is also the weekend. Our quiet neighborhood is abuzz with grandmothers on bicycles, old men doing tai chi in the park, and families out for a walk. We are a little lazy because we have been crisscrossing the country on a bullet train this week. We hadn’t planned on such long days, but based on when sites were open and when we could get train tickets, this week got more hectic than I’d planned. So we decide to take a late start today.

I get up and do a little work. The emaiI has accumulated and needs to be dealt with. I wish I had a decent cup of coffee and a pastry. Email duty requires coffee. Our Japanese house doesn’t have a coffee maker so I bought a variety of instant coffee and tea. It is better than nothing, but I am craving percolated coffee. To add insult to injury, the neighborhood grocery store doesn’t really sell bakery items, other than bread. So I am left with buttered toast as my breakfast option. This is fine, but today I want something more. I don’t even usually eat breakfast and almost never do I eat sweets, so this craving is a little strange. After I have tamed the email, I distract myself by making a tentative plan for the day.

When my husband awakens, I tell him that I would like to find a weekend market. There is supposed to be one near the Imperial Palace. He shrugs and says okay. We are in no hurry and since we have no particular plan, somehow we end up in Yasukuni Shrine. (Confession: we got off at a train station and saw a huge crowd and decided to follow to see what the fuss was about.) Detours are always welcome on day’s when you have no particular plan. The market is supposed to be somewhere nearby. Maybe we will stumble onto it.

Yasukuni is beautiful. But I feel a bit like we were crashing a church picnic. I think about how I would react if a couple of Shinto worshippers showed up at my church. We would welcome them to the festival and hope they would be respectful of our beliefs and traditions. I try to act accordingly, because this is clearly not a tourist site. It is an active local shrine.

Since it is cherry blossom festival, there are a variety of special events. In one corner, ladies in traditional kimono are serving tea. There is a flower decorating competition. Priests are issuing blessings at a variety of stations. And the main worship line stretches into the distance as people wait to make their offerings and pray.

At another corner of the shrine, we find a controversial war museum that is criticized for promoting a revisionist view of history that whitewashes wartime atrocities. We don’t go in because there are signs asking us not to. Apparently there is a kamikaze plane inside as well as a shrine to honor the spirits of 14 convicted class-A World War II war criminals in addition to the other 2.5 million war dead. I wasn’t aware the place existed, but the sign made me curious. People are welcome to honor the spirits of ancestors, but not to tour (at least not today).

Nearby, another crowd is streaming past. This time as we follow, we find a sumo arena. We don’t have tickets, but can see the sumo statue at the entrance and the outdoor arena. The match hasn’t started and we can’t linger or we will be crushed by the crowd so we walk on and find ourselves in a serene garden. In just a few steps we shift from chaos to contemplation.

Suddenly, finding a market seems unimportant. Having a rich cultural exchange has been much more rewarding. Also, the crowd is becoming uncomfortably large so we decide to move on. We re-enter the train station and squeeze onto the next train. Even the subway is crowded today.

With shrines on the brain, we end up in Asakusa at the Senso Ji shrine. It is more crowded than the Yasukuni, if that is even possible. A Spring weekend tradition is apparently crowding into the grounds of the local temples where the cherry trees are most accessible. Everyone wants to experience the magic of the trees while the blossoms last.

I thought that since we skipped the market, I would enjoy the Nakamise shopping street. The long street lined with shops connects directly to the shrine. However, there are so many people that we can’t even walk. We duck into a restaurant just behind the vendor stalls and are lucky enough to get the last seats. We eat a traditional meal and watch the insanity through the large window. Eventually, we have to leave and make way for others waiting patiently outside.

I try to muster the will to push through the growing crowd. Fortified with rice, we forge ahead. I feel like a Salmon fighting its way upstream. People are everywhere. Worse, they congregate and stop suddenly to take photos. I don’t want my epitaph to be crushed to death by Japanese revelers during cherry blossom festival. Increasingly, it looks likely.

We try to step into a shop to give us some time to regroup. I even buy a sweet potato ice cream cone hoping the novelty will distract me. But just when I find 10 inches of space to call my own, a gaggle of older women enter behind me and push me back out into the crowd. I guess we are leaving… there isn’t room for all of us in this narrow shop.

Once we leave the shopping street and enter the temple grounds, the crowds thin out. I am delighted. Senso-Ji is lovely. The towers are the epitome of Japanese architecture. The gardens are a perfect place to rest. I am surprised at the large numbers of teenagers in traditional kimono surrounding me. They take turns posing for photos under the trees. While I catch my breath, I enjoy the photo shoot.

The back side of the temple brings another surprise. In addition to being relatively crowd free, there is a monkey show. Improbable encounter, but apparently today anything can happen. The man talks to the monkey and the monkey balances, jumps, and claps. The monkey plays the drum and dances. It is a very talented monkey. Sadly, he can’t compete with the cherry blossoms. Luckily for us, his lack of popularity means there are only a few dozen people trying to push into our personal space instead of thousands.

Exhausted by the rising temperatures and tired of the crowds, we make our way to the Sumida river. The park along the banks is lovely and full of people out for a stroll. They lounge on steps and concrete benches. So do we. I don’t mind the people when there is a bit of space to spread out.

We watch boats crowded with people move up and down the river. Cherry blossoms line the shore and it is very popular to view them from a boat on the river. Since the boats look as crowded as the shopping street we just left, I don’t think that is for me. Better to watch the boats from afar. My seat here at the water’s edge is comfortable and I am content.

Eventually, we have to head home. We are exhausted from our day of doing nothing. At the subway station, we treat ourselves to cake in a can from a vending machine. It is surprisingly good. Only in Japan can I buy bakery quality cake from a vending machine. Only in Japan will have to carry an aluminum can that used to hold cake all the way home because there are no trash cans.

Back at Shinjuku Station, the street is blocked off for a planned protest. Unsure of what the protest is about, we linger to watch. From what I can gather the crowd is pro-peace and also opposed to the prime minister meeting with the current American administration. It is a Japanese “no kings” rally. It looks like it could last awhile.

I don’t have it in me to fight through another crowd today. Instead, we pay for a karaoke room for two. Maybe the crowd will be gone by the time we are done. For the next two hours, we sing our hearts out. A waiter brings refreshments to our cozy little room. The crowds are a distant memory. I am the dancing queen. I will survive….. hey, hey…