Name: Creating our Family's Own Green Space in Tokyo 🌳 Life in Japan EP 351
Uploaded: 2026-03-07T17:44:38.000Z
Duration: 15 min 39 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

The largest metropolitan area in the world has an interesting phenomenon.

Adverbs of degree

It's so small you can miss it, but it's so big that once it's pointed out, you can't.

not just in lawns and gardens, but on playgrounds and schoolyards as well.

It's so interesting how so many places, they just don't use grass here.

Is there a stigma to grass here or has it reached a super rare luxury status in Japan?

Metropolitan areas around the world all have parks and recreational facilities for people to use.

But the Japanese have a unique take on what that looks like.

Green space means something different in Japan.

This is a place we love to come to for the plum blossoms.

You won't often find grass in these green spaces, but

you will find a rich variety of nature, often themed around a particular interest, around and through.

You can tell we've come a little bit after the peak.

Oh, I love it here when it's peak plum blossom season.

Actually, the peak is past, but it's still really pretty.

So many times it's freezing cold when you're out here at the end of February, this park comes alive in late winter, featuring not just plum blossoms, but

And while you actually do come across grass here, it's only the carpet on which the main furniture is displayed.

Once you see the plum blossoms blooming, you know, in one more month, it's Sakura's turn.

Green space in Japan is a place to enjoy nature in its full variety and often includes stone, dirt, moss, shrubs, and

Many of these parks are not very practical.

Difficult for activities, but aesthetically beautiful.

Different parks are best at different times of the year.

The next year in the book, plum blossoms for the plum blossoms.

But Sakura is coming up, so you definitely want to subscribe for that if you haven't yet.

These kinds of parks aren't everybody's favorite, but as we'll see, there's more to it than this.

She waits for me while I get all my different shots.

And I drag her along to all these places here.

Well, now, time for the farmers market, huh?

Green space also includes neighborhood gardens, like small communal farms that sell goods in a shop like this.

Grass is not for sale here, but you can find all kinds of great locally grown produce.

While Ruth enjoyed perusing the goods of the community store, I enjoyed another Japanese specialty, hot coffee in a can.

Making these videos for you all makes me thirsty.

At my grocery store, I paid 320 for one that's like this big.

You got what your heart desired and I got what my heart desired.

It's not that Japan doesn't value green space.

You just need to know what it looks like.

It's the little neighborhood dirt parks that give the building some space to breathe.

It's the trees, shrubbery, and natural landscaping wedged between neighbors.

For many, it's their miniature rock gardens and plants made to look like a much bigger natural scene.

But if you're expecting to find grass in the green space, you'll be disappointed.

Of course, you'll find it on high level athletic fields and posh golf courses.

But rarely do you come across a well manicured lawn outside of that.

Which led us to try an experiment of our own.

So this backyard has gone through many transformations.

It's always got weeds growing in it that we have to pull out.

So this year we are doing something that has been on our mind for a while.

And with this beautiful day, it's time to get it done.

Our turf that we purchased 2 meter swaths of this and hopefully enough to cover this whole area here.

This for us is not just a practical move, but

one we hope inspires our kids to play well.

We worked enough to see that we need to fill in some spots.

So we're going to level out the ground underneath, which means not only taking up the grass, but

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Creating our Family's Own Green Space in Tokyo 🌳 Life in Japan EP 351

awesome

practical

artificial

consider