hanami

Hanami, 花見, literally meaning flower viewing but mostly used for cherry blossom viewing, is I think one of the most popular and favorite past times in Japan; this season everything has the cherry theme, from coffee to sweets to clothes, and everywhere there is a cherry tree, people are stopping and taking photos of the flowers. The week-ends the parks are normally filling up with people having picnic, although the pandemic has made this very difficult recent years. This year I was having high hopes of enjoying both picnic and sakura photography together with my son. We can follow the sakura season by looking at a big beautiful cherry tree visable from our house, and this week the cherry trees seemed to be in full bloom. But as spring and warm winds came and the flowers started to appear on the cherry trees, our little son got his first cold of the season. Being sick made our chances to enjoy the blossoms very limited – the most beautiful week of the year this side of autumn.

Of course, living in Japan, a cold means a visit to the doctor, so we did manage to get a few glimpses of sakura on our way to and from the doctor, and we tried to enjoy it as much as possible, my son from the pram with a toy ambulance in his hand, me with my iPhone. So this year I got the dry-creek-running-through-the-big-old-factory shot, the beautiful-cherry-blossom-tree-standing-at-the-foot-of-the-mountain shot. The cherrytree-at-the-shrine shot. And of course the sun-shining-through-the-flower-closeup shot. Now we hope our son are well enough to be enjoying some cherry blossom snowing next week – I am sure that will make him very excited!