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Yayoi Museum & Takehisa Yumeji Museum
These two charming brick museums focus mostly on illustrations from popular art, books and other precursors to Japan's manga tradition. The work represents graphic art from the Meiji, Taishō and Shōwa periods, including some Japanese-style Art Deco illustrations. The museums are on a side street facing the northeastern end of Tokyo University.
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Yoyogi-Kōen
Sunday in Yoyogi-kōen used to be one of Tokyo's prime attractions, when local bands gathered to give free concerts on the park's pathways and kids in wild hair-dos and 1950s get-ups gathered to gyrate to recorded rock and roll. Sadly, the police have put a stop to this and now Yoyogi-kōen is just another park. That said, with lots of wide open spaces and some flowering trees, it's not a bad place for a picnic or playing some sport on the grass.
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Yushima Seidō (Yushima Shrine)
Established in 1632 and later used as a school for the sons of the powerful during the Tokugawa regime, Yushima Seidō is one of Tokyo's few Confucian shrines. There is a Ming dynasty bronze statue of Confucius in its black-lacquered main hall, which was rebuilt in 1935. The sculpture is visible only from 1 to 4 January and the fourth Sunday in April, but you can turn up at weekends and holidays for a chance to see the building's interior.
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Yushima Tenjin (Yushima Shrine)
Across the way from Tokyo University, this particularly attractive Shintō shrine traces its lineage back to the 5th century. In the 14th century, the spirit of a renowned scholar was also enshrined here, which leads to Yushima Tenjin's current popularity: it receives countless pilgrims in search of academic success. Amid the buildings with their painted accents and gold trim (the latest reconstruction was in 1995), students hang messages written on wooden tablets called ema, left in hope that lofty exam scores will gain hopeful high-school students admission to the power generator across the street or universities nationwide.
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Zōjō-Ji (Zōjō Temple)
Behind Tokyo Tower is this former funerary temple of the Tokugawa regime, one of the most important temples of the Jōdō (Pure Land) sect of Buddhism. It dates from 1393, yet like many sights in Tokyo, its original structures have been relocated and subject to war, fire and other natural disasters. It has been rebuilt several times in recent history, the last time in 1974.
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Zōshigaya Cemetery
Not far south of Ikebukuro's commercial hub is the old residential district of Zōshigaya. This cemetery, a collection of weathered headstones surrounded by small paths and greenery, is the final resting place of authors Lafcadio Hearn, Nagai Kafu and Soseki Natsume.
