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At Tokyo station we caught an express train, and from there we sped about 100km northeast across the Kanto Plain, Japan’s largest flatland. After about an hour we arrived at Mito, the major station in the city of the same name.
To the north of the station stretched a national highway lined with beautiful ginkgo trees. On either side of the road, bustling with crowds of people, were eateries, a large selection of food stores selling Japanese snacks and fresh seafood, as well as fashion outlets for Mito’s youth. In addition to these traders were banks, securities companies and other financial institutions, shoulder-to-shoulder in a visual metaphor of their competition to attract business. This is Mito’s main street, the national highway that forms the backbone of a grid of roads that lead to residential areas, places of historical interest such as temples and shrines, and parks resplendent with lush greenery.
Mito is known as the heart of a domain once ruled by the descendants of Tokugawa Yorifusa, the 11th son of Tokugawa Ieyasu, the shogun who founded in Edo (modern-day Tokyo) and established a system that flourished for more than 260 years. The various feudal lords who ruled the domain from Mito over the years worked very hard to enrich the lives of their people. They constructed a castle on the plateau that lies between a lake to the south and a river to the north, built a town on reclaimed low land, and created aqueducts. At the same time, they also made a range of cultural investments, including the establishment of schools for teaching academic and martial arts, as well as the creation of gardens and parks for the rulers and the ruled to enjoy together. Throughout the town are statues of retainers and academics who supported and helped their lords, and their good deeds, and even now, the people of Mito still appreciate their forebears’ achievements. |
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| Kobuntei is a three-storey wooden structure on the mountain side of Kairakuen. Previously used as a resting place for lords of the local domain and as a meeting-place for literary people, Kobuntei catches the sun beautifully and would have provided the perfect place for its occupants to contemplate their thoughts. |
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