Tomomi loves a day at the park and even our wedding video featured the beautiful Shinjuku Gyoen in central Tokyo, once owned by the Japanese imperial family. Even when we bought our apartment, she insisted that it has to be near a nice large park. Parks were not so much part of me before I came to Japan, yet Japanese parks will be something I miss very much when I leave Japan. Being brought up in Malaysia, there are just not too many parks that are well kept, less vandalized, safe and clean. The weather in Malaysia that is hot and humid year long would also make a long visit less comfortable. Yet in Japan, besides the entrance fee of Yen 200-500 (USD$2-5), the government allocates a huge budget to maintain these parks using professional gardeners. The tradition of landscaping beautiful parks in Japan started as early as 794-1192 AD. The Japanese are famous for their parks that they categorised them into 3 types - the Chaniwa gardens that have features of tea houses, stepping stones and stone lanterns to prepare for the tea ritual, the Tsukiyama gardens or hill gardens with lots of bridges and pond streams to artificially produce a beautiful landscape, and the Karesansui gardens that are influenced by Zen Buddhism with pagodas and other religious concepts. Just blogging about this, made me reflect on the importance of getting away from our daily busy schedule to enjoy a peaceful calm atmosphere that is free from activity and work, setting apart time for meditation, rest and appreciation of beauty and change of environment. We all need that, don't we?
During my stay in Japan of more than 3 years, I did many snapshots of beautiful Japanese gardens. In Kyoto, there were the world heritage temple gardens of the Ginkakuji, Kiyomizu Dera, Kinkakuji and Ninna-ji and the zen garden of Tenryu-ji. Even in the metropolitan city of Tokyo, there are many large gardens such as the Shinjuku Gyoen, Yoyogi, Hamarikyu, Imperial Palace Gardens, Ueno, Rikugien, Kiyosumi Shirakawa, Kasai Rinkai, Inokashira, Jindaiji and Showa Kinen. Yet, this is just less than 5% of all parks in Japan or even in all of Tokyo as there are numerous others I have not visited. Yet, in the gungho attitude of wanting to experience all and accumulate as many beautiful memories as possible, especially in the early days of my arrival in Tokyo, I may have missed the whole point of parks altogether! Often times, my time, energy and concentration is spent rushing to every corners of the parks to catch as many sights as possible. In fact, the same happens outside the parks where I try to maximise earning potentials to its ultimate fullest in every possible situation and connection. Yet, we are not created as machines, but as human beings that need to rest, pause, give thanks, appreciate our loved ones and occasionally be away from our usual routine and in full observation of the Sabbath rest. When I was still in school, I used to set apart time to go to a shady park to pray, yet these have been lacking of late. I am glad for these times of picnic that I spent with Tomomi and Haruka just lying down, reading and doing nothing. The Japanese knew of the importance of solitude in parks a millenium ago. And even as I would miss the Japanese parks when I leave Japan, I ought to remember this crucial lesson in life. There is certainly a park somewhere we can have a picnic and do nothing. Wonder if that would be possible with teenagers to force them to spend some quality family time together :)
What about you? Any experiences to share on picnic or breaking away from the usual routine? Isn't it easier said than done in today's productive lifestyle? I probably need to blog about such a topic more often to remind myself about it!
(Photos show Haruka at 7 months at Shinjuku Gyoen park)
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