Summertime in the City - Cathedrals in Japan, Oh My!

Hear this! I have good news! The rainy season is finally over!

And thank the good Lord because...UGH! It had its upsides (cooler nights, which were much appreciated), but rain all the time means humidity, which means mould, which means I am not a happy camper. Of course, it's still humid, so there will still be mould, but at least it's sunny, which keeps me happy.

It doesn't feel like I've been up to anything exceptionally interesting, which I suppose is the result of being busy with work and whatnot lately, but I had some photos that I wanted to post, so I thought I would do a little (read: long and rambling) entry to go along with them.

First up: Last week, H. wanted to look at some camping supplies (another new hobby), so we headed to Ochanomizu and Kanda (the sports districts, I suppose they could be called. Also, musical instruments). They're neighbouring areas of downtown Tokyo. Apparently, once upon a time, you could see the Imperial Gardens from the area, but now, not so much. Thank you,development.

There are, not surprisingly, a number of historical buildings in the area, but we committed ourselves to only exploring one since we had economy supporting to do. Our pick had European flavour. It had religion. It had a dome and bells. It was... Holy Resurrection Cathedral, AKA St. Nicolai-do, the main cathedral of the Japanese Orthodox Church.

St. Nicolai-do was built in 1891 by the priest Nikolai Kasatkin (originally Ivan Dimitrovich Kasatkin), who was made Archbishop of Japan (1907) and later canonized (1970) as "Equal-to-the-Apostles, Archbishop of Japan, St. Nicholas". Unfortunately, the only info on him that I can find (and read... blast these poor Japanese reading skills!) is Wikipedia, but he seems quite interesting. In fact, through reading about him and the cathedral, I learned about a rather interesting snippet of Japanese-Russian history. Apparently, a Japanese police officer was a little too stabby-stabby one day and tried to kill the future Tzar Nicholas II! If you're interested, check out the Otsu Incident (again, the only site with much information is Wikipedia...).


Anywho, the cathedral was damaged in the Great Kanto Earthquake of 1923 and subsequently had to raise money via the choir to rebuild. Apparently, it's a little smaller now, but it's still darn pretty. The inside is quite something, too (no photography allowed, unfortunately).