Shinjuku Gyoen

Having said that, the green space that is in a city like Tokyo is absolutely fantastic.

Shinjuku Gyoen Park is just absolutely a wondrous place, and there's so many other incredible gardens and parks.

The other thing I've appreciated about Tokyo when I've returned over the years is that even the railway corridors, like the Yamanote line, the kind of ring subway and train line, for example, the Japanese planners, I suppose, have encouraged greenery.

There's a lot more foliage, there's a lot more visible greenery especially these embankments where the railroad is it's above ground but it's recessed sometimes it's a little bit scrappy you know it's a little bit like a studio ghibli movie of this like overgrown you know sort of prior civilizations infrastructure but it seems like there's more planning involved as well so I think Tokyo is greening in a way that's very refreshing

By the time I meet Sayaka Murata on a recent afternoon in June, the back of my linen dress is damp.

It's an oppressively humid summer day in Tokyo, the sun hidden by a thick blanket of gray, and we're taking a stroll at the Shinjuku Gyoen National Garden, a one-hundred-sixteen-year-old park that becomes dense with crowds during the sakura blossom.

Today, visitors are sparse.

It seems we're the only ones foolish enough to be out at noon.

It's that the urge can just dissipate.

How strange it is," she marvels, "to walk around in the light and forget that we wanted to kill.

How strange and perfectly normal." Murata is a regular at Shinjuku Gyoen, where she sometimes takes walks at the end of the workday.

She lives nearby, in the same area she has been since college.