Meiji Jingu

This guide to Meiji Jingu in Tokyo tells how its seemingly ancient forest was planted on purpose starting in 1915, after Emperor Meiji's death, when forester Seiroku Honda designed a shrine grove meant to look centuries old. You'll hear why he chose humble, self-seeding oak and camphor over stately cedar, and how his plan unfolded across four fifty-year stages carried out by volunteers from across Japan. It also traces the emperor's own poems, tens of thousands of them, still handed out today as fortune slips.