Another feature that makes a pagoda unlike a tree is that, curiouser and curiouser, its individual storeys are not actually attached to one another.

ECONOMIST: AN ENGINEERING MYSTERY

Is the answer that, like a tall pine tree, the Japanese pagoda with its massive trunk-like central pillar known as a shinbashira simply flexes and sways when riding out a typhoon or an earthquake?

ECONOMIST: AN ENGINEERING MYSTERY

Then he tied the rope to the top of the tree and Gary tied the other end to the winch on Mr. Pagoda's tow truck.

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