Hongo-kan

The apartment house was built in 1905 (Meiji 38). It's a wooden building and has 3 floors. It is located near the main gate of Tokyo University in Hongo. In those days, there used to be many rooming houses and boarding houses for students and teachers.
The owner started business in 1906. It wasn't destroyed by big earthquake in1923 and escaped the fire by massed air raids on Tokyo. Hongo- kan's 100th birthday comes round. It has seen many changes of owner. And now the young owner decided to rebuild it. A matter of course, the building has warped. Its floors are out of horizontal. Its roof line curves. The wooden pillars are not vertically. Because the beams lean, to set an aluminum frame for window, the owner had to attach an wooden board under the beams.
If an earthquake measuring five, it will be destroyed. So the owner's decision is the way should be. I know.
Because a friend of mine lives there, I and my friend could enter the apartment house this Sunday. We made a journey to Meiji period. Inside of the building were filled with real darkness. These days, we have seldom seen such darkness. Its walls, floors, ceilings, and stairs were made of wooden boards. They changed their color with the years like old temples. Almost all inner parts of the building were black.
The black wasn't a color of black paint. It is dark of 100 years. I felt something seemed to live there not only its inhabitants.
Recently, almost all Hongo-kan's inhabitants (only human beings) strengthen their unity and they are going to preserve the building.
I stayed at Hongo-kan half a day this Sunday and I knew the reason why they love the old apartment house. The journey was an amusing adventure. So I'm going to write down the whole story. Because it was too interesting, I'm wondering about writing in Japanse in order to tell all the details. It must be more fun than "the Maison Ikkoku Story".
Hongo –kan Story. Fact is stranger than fiction.