I recently visited Kamakura City in Kanagawa Prefecture with my family. I was supposed to enjoy some pure sightseeing without any activities as a rail-fan, if I hadn't found that. What's "that"?
To start, let me quickly review Kamakura City. It's located about 50 kilometers southwest of Tokyo, and a historic city where the Shogunate government was located from 1185 to 1333. There are many old shrines and temples in the city, so, a lot of holidaymakers including inbound tourists flock to the historic areas. The starting point for sightseers is Kamakura station on the JR East-Yokosuka line.
Let's get down to the main topic. When we were just about to pass through the automatic ticket gates at Kamakura station, I found that one of the gates was temporarily closed. What had happened? There was a notice in front of the gate, saying both in Japanese and English... "Swallows are raising children. Watch over them warmly until they leave the nest". There were illustrations of swallows as well in the notice. I then looked up at the ceiling of the station building, and found a swallow nest and a family! The father bird often took off for food hunting. What a hard-working bird it is! I understood that the station attendants worried that the swallows might crap on passengers' heads. What kind station attendants they are! The swallows' father and mother... good luck parenting!
Before I realized it, an hour had passed at the railway station. Was it an activity as a rail-fan?
