Customary cleansing with water before entering the Meiji jingū in Shibuya, Tokyo.
Text & Photo © S Posén, JE Nilsson, CM Cordeiro, Sweden 2015
It was not too long ago that I sat in a group that discussed preferences as to whether or not to research a city / country before visiting. At that time, I had just begun learning about cross-cultural communication, embarking on several university courses on culture studies. I was thus adamant that it was better to read as much as you could about a country of visit prior to landing, else face a myriad of cultural filters and challenges when there. Some in the group were adamant in the opposite camp, believing that part of travelling was indeed to get ‘lost in translation’, the very definition of a travel adventure itself. From that roundtable discussion till today, my preference could be said to have shifted some from all things orchestrated and planned, my favourite saying to the utter frustration of some co-travellers when not having found my way around Continue reading “Meiji jingū in Shibuya, Tokyo”
