GARDENS & LETTERS

Bunkyo

Bunkyo's name, chosen in 1947, points to learning. The ward calls itself fumi no miyako, the capital of letters, and it still has universities, publishers and gardens where other wards have neon. Our way in is the hillside garden of Hotel Chinzanso Tokyo, Yamagata Aritomo's estate from 1878, where a 600-year-old pagoda rises out of a man-made sea of clouds and fireflies glow in early summer. Around it lies literary Tokyo: Koishikawa Korakuen and Rikugien, two of the great Edo daimyo gardens; the vermilion torii of Nezu Shrine; Yushima Tenjin, where students pray before exams; the Red Gate of the University of Tokyo. For a change of pace, there's a ball game at Tokyo Dome.