Japan’s annual cherry blossoms are one of the country’s biggest spectacles with travellers flocking to the country to watch the sakura in all their pink glory.
This year, the season is expected to start early – which could mean a change in itineraries for tourists hoping to catch the show.
According to Kansai University, an estimated 63 million people travel to and within the country to see the blossoms every year.
Typically, the season begins in April, but this year it’s set to start around a week earlier, said forecasters at Nihon Kisho. The Japanese weather forecasting company has predicted that cherry blossom season will begin on Thursday, March 19, 2020.
The flowers typically only bloom for a week, so visitors hoping to catch the spectacle may need to review their travel plans.
Forecasters say a warm early spring will lead to the cherry blossoms opening earlier in Tokyo, with the full bloom happening on or around Friday, March 27. That’s seven days earlier than average for the Japanese capital.
Hanami parties
Cherry blossoms aren’t unique to the Asian nation, but perhaps no other country takes the season quite as seriously as the Japanese.
The blooming has been celebrated for centuries and plays an important part in Japanese culture. They’re so significant that the act of viewing them has its own word: “hanami”, and hanami parties are held across the country to coincide with the sakura blooms.
In Hokkaido, typically the last prefecture where the cherry blossoms bloom, forecasters predict this will happen this year in the last week of May.
The essentials
What: Emirates Airline Festival of Literature
When: Friday until March 9
Where: All main sessions are held in the InterContinental Dubai Festival City
Price: Sessions range from free entry to Dh125 tickets, with the exception of special events.
Hot Tip: If waiting for your book to be signed looks like it will be timeconsuming, ask the festival’s bookstore if they have pre-signed copies of the book you’re looking for. They should have a bunch from some of the festival’s biggest guest authors.
Information: www.emirateslitfest.com
Ipaf in numbers
Established: 2008
Prize money: $50,000 (Dh183,650) for winners and $10,000 for those on the shortlist.
Winning novels: 13
Shortlisted novels: 66
Longlisted novels: 111
Total number of novels submitted: 1,780
Novels translated internationally: 66
PULITZER PRIZE 2020 WINNERS
JOURNALISM
Public Service
Anchorage Daily News in collaboration with ProPublica
Breaking News Reporting
Staff of The Courier-Journal, Louisville, Ky.
Investigative Reporting
Brian M. Rosenthal of The New York Times
Explanatory Reporting
Staff of The Washington Post
Local Reporting
Staff of The Baltimore Sun
National Reporting
T. Christian Miller, Megan Rose and Robert Faturechi of ProPublica
and
Dominic Gates, Steve Miletich, Mike Baker and Lewis Kamb of The Seattle Times
International Reporting
Staff of The New York Times
Feature Writing
Ben Taub of The New Yorker
Commentary
Nikole Hannah-Jones of The New York Times
Criticism
Christopher Knight of the Los Angeles Times
Editorial Writing
Jeffery Gerritt of the Palestine (Tx.) Herald-Press
Editorial Cartooning
Barry Blitt, contributor, The New Yorker
Breaking News Photography
Photography Staff of Reuters
Feature Photography
Channi Anand, Mukhtar Khan and Dar Yasin of the Associated Press
Audio Reporting
Staff of This American Life with Molly O’Toole of the Los Angeles Times and Emily Green, freelancer, Vice News for “The Out Crowd”
LETTERS AND DRAMA
Fiction
"The Nickel Boys" by Colson Whitehead (Doubleday)
Drama
"A Strange Loop" by Michael R. Jackson
History
"Sweet Taste of Liberty: A True Story of Slavery and Restitution in America" by W. Caleb McDaniel (Oxford University Press)
Biography
"Sontag: Her Life and Work" by Benjamin Moser (Ecco/HarperCollins)
Poetry
"The Tradition" by Jericho Brown (Copper Canyon Press)
General Nonfiction
"The Undying: Pain, Vulnerability, Mortality, Medicine, Art, Time, Dreams, Data, Exhaustion, Cancer, and Care" by Anne Boyer (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
and
"The End of the Myth: From the Frontier to the Border Wall in the Mind of America" by Greg Grandin (Metropolitan Books)
Music
"The Central Park Five" by Anthony Davis, premiered by Long Beach Opera on June 15, 2019
Special Citation
Ida B. Wells