Tokyo National Museum

In the same area as the zoo, was the Tokyo National Museum. The Tokyo National Museum is actually a series of museums in separate buildings. I went to 3 of the museums (one was closed for renovations) and saw a wide range of art, history, and archeology of Japan.

This is the exterior of the Honkan gallery which has two floors of treasures including beautiful noh and kabuki kimonos, folding screens, tea utensils, and armor.

The next museum I visited was the Heiseikan and I only did the first floor. The second floor is for special exhibits and I had no idea what it was about. This museum showed the archeology of Japan and I was struck by the similar evolution of the human species- they had the hunting and gathering period, bronze period, agricultural period.

This third museum, the Horyuji, had a room completely full of statuettes of warriors (I think?- or they could have been religious figures) in lighted glass cases on top of pedestals.

These museums (and most of the ones that I encountered in Japan) only had the names of the artifacts in English so I was able to make it through the exhibits much faster than I usually proceed through museums but I would have liked a little more English descriptions so that I could learn about their art and history (which I really do know nothing about).

And I saw some blossoms on my first day! I loved that everyone was so excited to see them that they posed for pictures with them.

I loved the bright fuchsia color of another tree full of blossoms

They really do love their cherry blossoms here- so much so that all of the ground hole covers were imprinted with cherry blossoms.