On Reading

Last summer, we took a trip to Japan and then to Hong Kong, and I’m now at last getting to the backlog of blog posts that I had dreamed of writing when I was there. 

One of the best ways to travel is with a book or two written about or from the country or city you’re visiting. Plane rides, train rides, afternoon coffee breaks, waiting for the museum to open, after bedtime quiet hours—there are pockets of time that aren’t always there in your “real life” that can filled with a good book.

Near Chiyoda-Ku is the Jinbocho Book Town, so called because its streets are a maze of used and new bookstores, mostly in Japanese, but a little smattering of English here and there. They seem to be mostly used bookshops, smaller ones with shelves to the ceilings, but there are a number of larger, multi-floor, new bookstores, some with cafes or selling stationery or gifts. Several of the smaller bookshops, not unlike many (most?) independent specialty shops in Japan, have signs indicating no photos, so these are just a tiny sample of the ones that do allow photos.