Key#31: Hospitality, Part I - An Instant Wonder

It's one thing to look at incomprehensible kanji and try to memorize their arbitrarily assigned sounds and meanings, it's quite another to be given a brush and an inkpot, and to be shown how to apply the brush to a piece of high-quality paper.

Key #30: A Mountain Of A God

Half-a-soccer-pitch long (41 meters) and taller than many multistoried buildings (11 meters), the statue dominates the area, absolutely dwarfs everything and everybody in sight

Key #29: Flexibility

To do it full justice, one has to be there because words don't even begin to describe the sensation. Pictures might try - and fail…

Key #28: A Hanging Town

The story of the town can best be told as a love story featuring a young woman who stumbled upon an old student dormitory and loved it so much that she purchased it and moved in from a big city.

Key #27: Animal Islands

Immanuel Kant believed that “we can judge the heart of a man by his treatment of animals”

Key #26: A Floating Gate

A place like that must significantly enhance one's spiritual experience - in particular, considering the gate that actually flirts with water.

Key #25: A "Red Gates Riot"

The shrine is among the most important and popular in Japan, and it owes its significance to its divine patron. Inari is a Shinto god of rice, a synonym of “wealth” and “prosperity” for Japan

Key #24: The Father Figure

They mark an entrance to a shrine, and every Japanese knows that, once through them, there will be peace, quiet and beauty of all kinds

Key #23: Zo Of All Trades

The symbol of Edo and the symbol of Tokyo are right next to each, and they coexist in perfect harmony - even though the former wasn't even created in Edo.