Sakura chaser

In Japan today, some of the flowering cherry trees are blooming early. Photo courtesy Matt Alt, taken in Tokyo.

• [EricT]

  Talk about bittersweet.

• [gwailo_joe]

  I’ll take that chaser, if you please. Ahhh subarashii. . .so lovely, so refreshing. Thanks.

  And so, back to the madness…

• [jaytkay]

  I hear massive radiation doses make that happen.

  /kidding

• [taj]

  The day after the quake we gave away our blue tarps to cover damaged bits of neighbors houses. The neighbors were worried they might not get them back to us in time for hanami. It wasn’t obvious to us all yet, that hanami has been cancelled this year.

  • [toyg]

    Hanami cannot be cancelled; how can you stop people from watching flowers bloom ?
    It’s a pity that you won’t have festivals and celebrations, but hanami will happen regardless. We did that last weekend in my backyard in Manchester, UK, with our little cherry tree.

    Here’s hope that all Japanese will get a chance to enjoy a bit of hanami this year as well.

• [coop]

  It seems to me that appreciating the beauty might be especially important this year.

• [Bodhipaksa]

  I had a weird visual illusion looking at this photograph. I’ve gotten so used to seeing aerial shots of Japan that I first of all saw the branches as the streets of a Japanese city (my sense of there being any depth to the image had gone) and I couldn’t believe that the cherry blossom in the town was so dense. It seemed astonishing that any city could have so many cherry trees that the whole damn thing was pink. I took the blue of the sky to be floodwater.

  The illusion lasted for several seconds, then my sense of depth kicked in and I realized I was looking at one tree. If I let my eyes go totally out of focus (as when looking at one of those 3D puzzles) I can recapture the illusion again.

• [Anonymous]

  Plants that have their roots disturbed will often flower out of season. Probably as an attempt to reproduce before dying.

• [Lelielle]

  I hope people in Japan will try to enjoy some blossom viewing, it’s important to do scheduled traditions like that to make things easier to bear. Here in Vancouver we have a festival (albeit with much less public intoxication) given the connection this city has with Japan, I think this years festival will have special importance here as well. festival page: http://www.vcbf.ca/ maybe I’ll buy a tree to plant..

• [awjtawjt]

  We should have haiku contest and then send them all for someone to hand out in Japan, to give them a little reprieve from the pain.

• [awjtawjt]

  …as well as food, water, roofs and beds…

• [a_user]

  Cherry trees blooming early due to warmth from meltdown at Japan’s six fold Chernobyl. Flowers luminous, sources close to park keepers say

  NYT

  If it’s not there keep refreshing your browser window, it will be eventually.

• [hpnsack]

  plz enforce a no haiku zone rule here

  • [awjtawjt]

    This is my haiku.
    If you don’t like it, f*** ***.
    This is my haiku.

• [Anonymous]

  We have a cherry blossom festival in our town, so there are trees everywhere, and they’ve all begun to bloom in the past few days due to our warmer weather. I think many of us have seen it as a reminder, though, of the ties that bind us to others out there.

• [Sapa]

  Early flowers early fall

• [Anonymous]

  I prey that the Japanese people do not suffer from the same allergies I during during cherry blossom season. Stupid pretty trees.

• [Telecustard]

  What is a haiku?
  It’s got to be more than just
  Counting syllables.

• [goodfinger]

  This is just too lovely and chokes me up.
  http://www.kooru.com/live_concert/live_concert.php?id_live=2794&page=16

  A cherry blossom song by the Japanese equivalent of an all schoolgirl glee club performance.