Restarting "Letters from Tokyo" monthly series for The Japan Society of Boston: August, 2022, "Hot and Tired Town"

This August, we've resumed my monthly series, "Letters from Tokyo," with the Japan Society of Boston after a 6-month personal hiatus. Tokyo August 2022 saw record-breaking heat and Covid numbers and almost zero tourists. The city feels muted and a bit fatigued. But it's also calming and a lot less expensive than the US cities I've recently been in, and Tokyo's food, design and infrastructure remain unparalleled. Also, as you can hear for yourself in my closing video shot at the lovely Kumano Shrine in Jiyugaoka, the semi/cicadas are sizzling at full tilt.

Roland Kelts' Letters from Tokyo, August 2022: Hot and Tired Town

In recent years I’ve spent late-July and August elsewhere, usually at US retreats in New York and New England, abandoning Japan to escape the heat. But this year everything is different. I broke my shoulder in the spring and got sidelined for a while, albeit in a friend’s beautiful house in storybook Carmel, a town in north central California. Family medical emergencies (not mine) sucked up much of my summer in the northeastern US. Now I find myself back home in smothering Tokyo, August 2022.



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