Date & Time: Friday, May 24, 2024, 10:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m.
Spots: The Landmark Tower, Sankeien Garden, Yokohama Guan Yu[1] Mausoleum (Yokohama Chinatown)
Route and Transport: Taxi from the hotel to the Landmark Tower, from Landmark Tower to Sankeien, from Sankeien to Chinatown, and from Chinatown to the hotel
Participants: Joyce and Ryan from the USA
Language: English
Guide: a KSGG member
Joyce and Ryan were in their seventies. Joyce had slight mobility difficulties and used a holding wheelchair for support. Sometimes she walked with her wheelchair as a walking aid. Her husband Ryan, also in his seventies, helped his wife a lot, pushing her wheelchair and assisting her very kindly during meals and other daily tasks. However, they always remained a cheerful, talkative couple.
Joyce and Ryan, an Indonesian-born American couple, arrived in Japan by air on the previous evening. They were to leave for another city in Japan on the cruiser the next day. That meant they had only one day to spend in Yokohama. Their request was the observatory of the Landmark Tower and Sankeien Garden.
To begin with, the guide took them to the Landmark Tower, the 296-meter-high skyscraper, the third-highest building in Japan. The observatory is located on the 69th floor and commands a superb view of the whole harbor area down below, including the Osanbashi Pier, the symbolic half-moon-shaped hotel building, the gigantic Ferris wheel, and the monumental sailing ship of the Nippon Maru. It was a shame that the cloudy horizon didn’t let you see Mt. Fuji, but the couple were excited and got close to the window and took many selfies and pictures. The guide gave a brief explanation of the harbor and the history of the port.
Then they caught a taxi and headed for Sankeien Garden. Sankeien Garden is an authentic Japanese garden. The guide explained that the vast area of the garden used to be private property until 1906, when the owner, Tomitaro Hara, the most successful raw silk merchant of the day, decided to open it to the public, saying that the beauty of the nature was divine and shouldn’t be monopolized as personal property.
The couple loved the view of the pond in the center of the garden and the woods surrounding it, with the iconic sight of a three-storied pagoda on the top of the hill in the background. Though it was a little cloudy, they got absorbed in the serene atmosphere while walking along the pond. Joyce wanted to go up the hill to the pagoda, but she had to give it up when the guide told her that there were uphill paths and a dozen stone steps ahead.
Joyce and Ryan also went into the Inner Garden, which featured Rinshunkaku, the villa of the Tokugawa shogun clan, and other historic buildings placed here and there in the neatly designed garden with a pond. Then, the sky suddenly became clear, and the sunshine gave vivid colors to the garden. That made the couple happier. They took a lot of pictures of each other at various places, with the guide assisting them. They found every place was photogenic. The two also asked other visitors to click their smartphones and even invited the stranger to join in the photo. Nobody would resist their friendliness and cheerfulness.
After they left Sankeien Garden, the guide led them to Yokohama Chinatown for lunch. At the cozy restaurant the guide had chosen for them, the two and the owner of the restaurant started talking joyfully in Chinese. Coincidentally, the couple had roots in the Fujian Province of China, and the owner was also from the same province.
Their friendliness never stopped after lunch. They visited Yokohama Guan Yu[1] Mausoleum, which was close to the restaurant, and they made friends at once with the young guide of the shrine just while the guide had to catch a taxi by a smartphone app and wait for a taxi to come.
In happy excitement, Ryan and Joyce went back to their hotel. The guide was impressed to see how they were friendly to people they met, as well as how they showed their respect and kindness to each other. Disabilities don’t matter. It is people’s nature that makes people happy.
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Note 1: Guan Yu is a legendary hero in the ancient Chinese classical stories titled the Three Kingdoms based on the history of 2nd and 3rd centuries BCE. He is still worshipped by Chinese people as a deity of commerce.