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Who\u2019d have guessed there was a centuries-old snack shop too just a quick stroll away from one of downtown\u2019s busiest rail hubs?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n <\/span><\/p>\n Ikebukuro<\/strong> might not be as world-famous as Shibuya or Shinjuku, but it is, without a doubt, one of the busiest, most developed parts of downtown Tokyo. As you can see in the picture above, massive department stores, multi-level shopping complexes, and office towers surround Ikebukuro Station.<\/p>\n But believe it or not, just a 10-minute-walk away from Ikebukuro is a place that makes it feel like you\u2019ve somehow warped to another part of Japan, and maybe even another period in Japan\u2019s history.<\/p>\n We stumbled across this surprising spot while on an ambling, initially destination-less stroll in the neighborhood. After exiting the east side of Ikebukuro, we were in the most congested part of the district, so we kept walking until we came to an intersection, a little beyond the Junkudo bookstore, where this narrow little side street caught our eye.<\/p>\n The sense of mystery only intensified as the surface turned from asphalt to cobblestone, with scarcely enough space for two people to walk past each other without brushing shoulders.<\/p>\n Now way too captivated by curiosity to turn back, we kept going and crossed over into Zoshigaya<\/strong>, one of Tokyo\u2019s temple districts.<\/p>\n The path we\u2019d been walking on came to an end at a T-intersection, so we zigzagged left and then right again, putting us on another cobblestone path, this one lined with trees.<\/p>\n And after walking a little further, we found ourselves at a temple called Zoshigaya Kishimojin<\/strong>\u2026<\/p>\n \u2026and then standing underneath this amazing icho (gingko) tree<\/strong>.<\/p>\n Even standing at the edge of the grounds, it was difficult to fit the entire tree within a single photo.<\/p>\n Craning our necks to look up at the branches, filled with healthy green leaves that provided shade from the sun even as they nearly glowed in the afternoon light, we wondered how tall this tree was.<\/p>\n Thankfully there was a sign next to it ready to provide that information: slightly over 30 meters<\/strong> (98.4-feet) tall (or 1.67 Gundams<\/a>, to use the international scholarly standard for measuring height). The sign also informed us that the trunk has a circumference of 8 meters, and that the tree is\u2026more than 600 years old!?!<\/strong><\/p>\n \u25bc \u6a39\u9f62\u3000\u516d\u767e\u5e74\u4ee5\u4e0a = Tree\u2019s age: more than 600 years<\/p>\n Though the exact date of planting isn\u2019t known, the tree is said to have been at the temple since the Oei era<\/strong> (1394-1428), and its historical value has earned it official designation from the Tokyo metropolitan government as a natural monument.<\/p>\n This isn\u2019t the only thing on the temple grounds with an amazingly long history, either. Once we could finally manage to look away from the icho, we turned our head and spotted this snack stand, called Kawakamiguchiya<\/strong>.<\/p>\n Yes, the name is a bit of a mouthful, but that\u2019s not entirely inappropriate for a store that sells all sorts of things to munch on. Specifically, Kawakamiguchiya is what\u2019s called a dagashiya<\/strong>, a store that specializes in inexpensive, traditionally old-school treats of salty, sweet, or sour flavors.<\/p>\n A lot of dagashiya have retro aesthetics, and in Kawakamiguchiya\u2019s case they\u2019re absolutely warranted, since the shop first started selling snacks to temple visitors in 1781, making this its 245th year in operation<\/strong>.<\/p>\n \u25bc Our walking route from Ikebukuro Station to Zoshigaya Kishimojin<\/p>\n \u25bc There\u2019s also a charming shopping street on the south side of the temple grounds.<\/p>\n Despite being just 10 minutes from Ikebukuro Station, Zoshigaya Kishimojin is so different from the congested buzz of downtown Tokyo that it feels like a little pocket dimension, or maybe a part of the city that\u2019s magically frozen in time, and definitely worth checking out if you\u2019re looking for something different than what modern city life offers.<\/p>\n Temple information<\/strong> Photos \u00a9SoraNews24<\/em> Who\u2019d have guessed there was a centuries-old snack shop too just a quick stroll away from one of downtown\u2019s busiest rail hubs? Ikebukuro might not be as world-famous as Shibuya…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":[],"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5752","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-rss"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/catbradley.io\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5752","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/catbradley.io\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/catbradley.io\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/catbradley.io\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/catbradley.io\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5752"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/catbradley.io\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5752\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/catbradley.io\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5752"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/catbradley.io\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5752"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/catbradley.io\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5752"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/soranews24.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2026\/04\/zg-21.jpg?w=640\")
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\nZoshigaya Kishimojin \/ \u96d1\u53f8\u30f6\u8c37\u9b3c\u5b50\u6bcd\u795e
\nAddress: Tokyo-to, Toshima-ku, Soshigaya 3-15-20
\n\u6771\u4eac\u90fd\u8c4a\u5cf6\u533a\u96d1\u53f8\u304c\u8c373\u4e01\u76ee15-20
\nWebsite<\/a><\/p>\n
\n\u25cf Want to hear about SoraNews24\u2019s latest articles as soon as they\u2019re published? Follow us on Facebook<\/a> and Twitter<\/a>!<\/em><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"