Umbrellas

It rains a lot in Japan. While much of the rain comes in tsuyu (梅雨), the Japanese rainy season, you can expect rain any time of year, and when it rains, suddenly, almost everyone has an umbrella in hand, and those that don’t can easily buy a cheap, pratically disposable umbrella at any convenience store, train kiosk or department store. On rainy days, racks of these cheap umbrellas are wheeled out near the entrances of shops for easy purchase. For me, the great thing about these cheap umbrellas is that they are usually transparent or translucent plastic and catch the light at night when backlit, making for surreal images.

There are plenty of other types of umbrellas, from the traditional Japanese umbrella with many spokes to some rather funky ones. Nice to have a bit of fun on a rainy day.