Winter flowers in Japan: wintersweet (robai)

Winter flowers in Japan: wintersweet (robai)

Wintersweet, which is also known as Japanese Allspice, is a deciduous shrub that flowers, as the name suggests, in winter. In Japanese it is called roubai / robai / rōbai / ロウバイ /蝋梅. The rou of Roubai is the kanji for wax and bai is the kanji for plum blossom. Therefore, sometimes they are called wax plum blossoms or Wax Japanese apricot, as plum blossoms were once called Japanese apricot.Wintersweet is a beautiful shade of yellow and has the mo…