Written by Carey Finn
This weekend in Tokyo is a bit of a slow one on the events calendar, but there’s more than enough to keep you well-fed, well-read and entertained – for cheap.
Flower lovers will want to head over to Katsushika City for the Iris Festival, which starts this Sunday (and runs until June 25th). You can admire the lovely shobu, as they’re known in Japanese, at Horikiri Park and Mizumoto Park. Horikiri has been a famous iris-viewing spot for centuries and boasts 6 000 iris plants (of 200 varieties). Mizumoto has 14 000 iris plants of 80 varieties. That’s a lot of flowers!
We’re not sure whether you’ll come across any shobu at Yoyogi Park, but you will find the Caribbean and Latin American Street Festival. Expect good food, costumes, music and plenty of rum on both Saturday and Sunday.
If you’re looking to buy some foreign-language books, you’ll want to take advantage of the Kinokuniya Book Sale happening at the Shinjuku South Store. To celebrate the “huge expansion” of their foreign books section, imported books and magazines will be marked down 20%.
Finally, if you want to experience the essence of Harajuku (i.e. long queues and hot trends), get in line for a bag of free popcorn at the opening of the big new Doc Popcorn shop in the area.
