ABOUT

There are moments when words fall short.

Perhaps you’ve stood before a tree—so vast, so old, so utterly still—that your breath caught in your chest. No thoughts, no explanations. Just a sound not from the mind, but from somewhere deeper.

This website began with one such moment—one that first took root in my imagination many years ago.

In May of 2010, during my first and only year-long stay in Japan, I traveled to Yakushima with my then-boyfriend. Our purpose was to see Japan’s oldest trees—the ancient Sugi—and to hike through the island’s famous forests. But what awaited me there was far more than trees.

It was the entire island—its wild, untamed nature and landscapes that seemed impossible to take in all at once. The glittering, crystalline water of the mountain streams shimmered with a purity I had never seen before. Japanese maple trees leaned gently toward the flow, as if bowing in reverence. 

Something in me shifted.

Though I could not yet name it, I felt a deep stirring—an awakening of a longing that had always lived quietly inside me. It would take years before that moment grew into a path, and that path into this offering. But it began there, among the mist and moss and ancient roots of Yakushima.

I didn’t just see a tree. I met it—with the whole of my being. And from that meeting, a journey began. Not one measured in distance, but in depth. The tree did not speak, yet it felt as though something ancient was being transmitted.

What do we call such a feeling? It isn’t fear, though it trembles like fear. Nor is it joy, though it may bring tears. It is something primal and precise. A presence. A stillness. A kind of wild sanctity that lives outside the reach of words.

In Japan, there is a quiet belief that some trees are not simply trees. They are kami—sacred beings, dwelling places of the divine. Even when not marked by rope or ritual, their existence alone commands reverence. Their roots reach not only into soil, but into spirit. And if we pause long enough, we feel it—we remember.

This website is an offering to that pause. I encourage you to travel to Japan to see these majestic trees and forests for yourself. 

A humble attempt to walk more slowly through the forests of our lives. To listen for the silence that speaks. To touch, if only briefly, the mysterious and the meaningful, where there are no doctrines or conclusions but only invitations: to wonder, to feel,  to remember and to return.

Because perhaps, at the heart of all this, the tree is not separate from us at all. Hopefully this website will encourage you to explore ginat trees in your area and country

For the Japanese, trees are sacred vessels, dwelling places of spirit. Even in the construction of shrines meant to honor the gods, it is the trees themselves that often remain central—silent pillars of worship, presence, and power.

In Nara’s Chōgaku-ji Temple, for instance, stands the “Hollow Tree Kannon”—a statue of the Bodhisattva of Compassion carved into the trunk of a living tree. It is said to have been created in response to a divine revelation received by a monk. The belief that divinity resides in trees—that the tree itself is sacred—is shared across cultures.

But in my own journey among ancient trees and sacred groves, many other existential questions began to take root. What is life, really? Where does spirit reside? What does it mean to belong—not to a place or a person, but to the Earth and Universe itself?

I have encountered life in the moments with trees and forest as a whole.

So I made the forest the center of my life.

Each time I stand before a giant tree and the forest, I feel something in me dissolve and reassemble—as if my soul had briefly stepped out and returned, lighter, quieter, more whole. These moments are vivid and dreamlike, as if remembered from another time. They leave me with a sense of longing, but also with something far rarer: the feeling that I have touched something that cannot be replaced and that will stay  with my heart forever.

The trees were here long before humans—witnesses to a world we will never truly know. The ancient ones, the giant trees, remind me of that truth. What moves me is not just the moment I stand before them in reverence, but the moment I feel them—with my bare hands, with my body, when I start to feel them with something beyond the senses. In these intimate encounters, I sense their presence as energy, a living current. It is as though, through touch, I receive something of their momentum. I synchronize with their rhythm. With younger trees, the sensation moves quickly—light, responsive, almost playful. But with the older ones, the frequency shifts. It becomes slower, denser, heavier. In these moments, I give in to the higher power.

There are two terms in the Japanese language: the term kyoju (巨樹), meaning “giant tree” and kyoboku (巨木), also meaning the same. However, the former appeared in official use within the former Environment Agency’s Basic Survey for Natural Environment Conservation, specifically in the category titled “Survey of Giant Trees and Forests of Giant Trees.” According to their definition, any tree with a trunk circumference of at least 3 meters—measured at approximately 1.3 meters above ground level (a point known as me-dōri)—qualifies as a kyoju. When several such trees grow together, forming a grove or lined path, the collective is referred to as a kyobokurin (巨木林), or “forest of giant trees.”

In everyday language, the distinction between kyoboku (巨木) and kyoju (巨樹) is minimal  Kyoboku tends to evoke an image of a towering tree, expansive and massive in volume—impressive in overall scale. Kyoju, on the other hand, is more technical, defined specifically by the girth of the trunk, regardless of the tree’s height or shape. 

There are numerous published accounts of tree-seeking adventures that offer practical and insightful information. But for comprehensive data, one of the most valuable resources remains the former Environment Agency’s publication, Giant Trees and Forests of Giant Trees of Japan. 

Still, even this resource has its limitations. I am sure there are many more giant trees out there to be discovered.

I am deeply grateful to all the tree and forest lovers who have left behind footprints—on trails, in words, in quiet devotion. Their guidance, whether through a published journey or a humble blog post, has helped me find my way more times than I can count. I’m equally thankful for the encounters with locals—often unexpected and always generous—who pointed me in the right direction when I found myself lost, both on the map and in my thoughts.

I do not come to this work as a tree specialist. I am not a botanist or a scholar of forestry. I come simply as a curious and wondering mind—one that has slowly begun to recognize a world that lies just beyond the edges of logic. A world alive with presence, mystery, and meaning. A world where trees are not just biological beings, but quiet companions, ancient teachers, and sacred mirrors of my own becoming.