(24 Mar 2025)
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ASSOCIATED PRESS
Tokyo – 24 March 2025
1. Zoom into cherry blossom flowers on the specimen tree of Somei Yoshino at Yasukuni shrine
2. People taking photos of the cherry blossoms on the specimen tree
3. Close of woman’s hand on mobile phone, taking a photo
4. Close of Somei Yoshino flowers on the specimen tree
5. SOUNDBITE (English) Nathalie Labat and her daughter Majali Paulin, French tourists:
++PARTIALLY OVERLAID BY SHOT 4++
Labet: "I was happy to see the trees. It’s beautiful, really beautiful. I love Tokyo."
Paulin: "But the flowers are not quite there yet. There are only a few tree that have a few flowers."
Labet: "It’s not full blossom"
6. Close of flowers
7. Wide of the specimen tree of Somei Yoshino at Yasukuni shrine
STORYLINE:
Tokyo’s cherry blossom viewers saw the first blooms of Japan’s favorite flower on Monday as officials declared the start of the festive season.
An official from the Japan Meteorological Agency carefully examined the specimen tree of Somei Yoshino variety of cherry blossom at Tokyo’s Yasukuni shrine and announced that more than five blossoms — the minimum required for the announcement — were flowering on it.
The opening matched the average year and was five days earlier than last year, according to the JMA.
Cherry blossoms, or "sakura" are Japan’s favorite flower and usually reach their peak in late March to early April, just as the country celebrates the start of a new school and business year.
Parisian Nathalie Labat landed in Tokyo on Sunday to see her daughter, who has been living in Japan for almost a year.
She said it was a happy coincidence to be able to see the delicate flowers.
Sakura have deeply influenced Japanese culture for centuries and have regularly been used in poetry and literature, with their fragility seen as a symbol of life, death and rebirth.
The announcement in Tokyo, along with the mid-April temperature of around 19 Celsius (66 Fahrenheit), comes just a day after the blooming of Japan’s first cherry blossom was confirmed Sunday in the southwestern city of Kochi on the island of Shikoku.
The JMA tracks more than 50 "benchmark” cherry trees across Japan. The trees normally bloom for about two weeks each year from first bud to all the blossoms falling off. They are expected to reach their peak in about 10 days.
Cherry trees are sensitive to temperature changes and the timing of their blooming can provide valuable data for climate change studies.
In recent years, Japan’s cherry blossom season tended to come earlier than the average, prompting concerns of a possible impact of climate change.
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