Have you ever seen winter peony flowers (寒牡丹 kanbotan) in Japan?

There is a place to see the flowers in Ueno park and it’s called Botan-en(牡丹苑).

Botan（牡丹） is peony flowers and En（苑） is a garden in English, so Botan-en（牡丹苑） means a peony garden.

It is open in spring and winter, but if you want to see the winter peony flowers please visit there from January to the end of February. This place was opened in 1980 to memorialize Japan-China friendship and now there are many kinds of the flowers from China, America, France and so on.

The flowers have straw umbrellas in order to avoid snow covering flowers. It looks beautiful and brave. Also it teaches us patience by standing straight on the ground and keep the beauty  freezing cold outside.

There are some wooden boards beside flowers and poems related with the flowers were written on the boards.　We can enjoy seeing both the flowers and the poems at the same time.

This is the Japanese apricot trees blooming flowers and a bird is visiting the flowers for nectar. The place has some other flowers for winter like the Japanese apricot or daffodils.

Flowers are beautiful and give us feelings of the seasons. These flowers and birds tell us the coming of winter.

If you have a chance to visit Ueno, please try to see these flowers!