Zoshigaya Cemetery, McCaleb Old Missionary House and Kishibozin
1. Today's Walking Course
Today, I came to Zoshigaya, north west part of Tokyo. I will leave Toden-Zoshigaya Station, Toden Arakawa Line for Kishibozin through Zoshigaya Cemetery and McCaleb Old Missionary House.
2. Today's Photographies
There is Zoshigaya Cemetery just next the station. There are some famous people’s tombs here.
This tomb is for Soseki Natume (1867-1916), a famous Japanese great writer.
The following picture is Soseki. He established new modern literature in Japan. He thought that modernization and capitalizm would influence Japanese mentality negatively and wrote many works which implied the side-effects of modernaization and capitalizm.
After 5 minutes walk from Soseki’s tomb, I could arrive at McCaleb Old Missionary House. I didn’t know that such a beautiful house was in Zoshigaya. McCaleb(1861–1953) taught in school around Zoshigaya and lived in this house.
Since this house is surrounded by garden, it looks very peaceful.
The indoor is also very simple.
There are wide hallways facing a garden on both first and second floors. I really want to sit around here and enjoy reading book. I feel McCaleb liked such a peaceful atmosphere.
After 15 minutes from the Old Missionary House, I reached to the approach to Kishibozhin. Zelkova trees on the both side of approach are very big and gives a solemn atmosphere.
I finally arrived at Kishibozhin. Kishibozin is a temple dedicated to Indian goddess and it was established in the 16th centuries. This temple is also very tranquil.
They are called Ema. Worshipers write down their wish on Ema and hang it in the shrine precinct to make their wishes come true.
3. History
Zoshigaya has been a very popular tourist spot for Kishibozin temple since the 16 centuries. There were many shops for tourists and this area was very lively during 17th century to 19th century in Edo era as the following picture for this area shows.
On the other hand, this area lagged behind compared to neighborhood such as Ikebukuro due to the bad traffic access during the high economic growth in 1970s. That is why such a peaceful atmosphere has still remained in this area.
After Fukutoshin-Line was open in 2008, the problem of bad traffic access was solved and many people have started flowing into this area.
4. Information
・Closest stations to Zohigaya are Zhoshigaya Station, Fukutoshin Line or Toden-Zhoshigaya or Kishibozinmae, Toden Arakawa Line.
・McCaleb Old Missionary House is open from 9am to 4:30pm. Every Monday, the third Sunday and New Year’s holidays are closed. If Monday is a holiday, the day is open and next Tuesday day is closed instead. The entrance fee is free.
