Concussions and Ninja Houses and Climbing in Tombs like Indie

Photos: Rakugo performer , cooking class miso and rice, cooking class gyoza, roosters, rocks at Ise Jingu Grand Shrine, the husband and wife rocks at Ise, badgers at the Ninja Village, plumb blossoms, okonomiyaki made by moi in the cooking class, an Angelic Pretty wallet from my darling friends, my birthday cake, my host mom and feast, Matt photobombing uss at my birthday party, bagels, climbing into the tomb, the tomb entrance, a piece of pottery from the Kofun period of Japan at a keyhole tomb, our inn in the woods, going to the hospital with Becky and Megumi.

As usual I have been horribly negligent about my blog. I think this is actually good thing. The more time I spend not updating, the more time I’m spending out doing fun things! Of course I’ve also been negligent about going out and doing fun things in the fashion I was last semester, but there are also merits to this. Everyday I am finally returning to my HOME in Japan instead of just another stressful social situation. The relationship between my host mother and I has gotten better with every passing month and I am going to be very sad to have to let go of her everyday presence when the time comes to leave Japan. Our house is almost always full of our laughter and jokes.

So I left off at the Byodoin last time…hmm thus I will begin with Nagano! For winter break in February I hopped on the arduous night bus with Becky, Sam, Adam, and Megumi. It takes about eight hours to get there with stops every two hours at rest stops, but the huge blizzard that overtook the once Olympic village ended up making it more like ten. Finally grumpily exiting the bus, we refreshed in the nearest bathroom and had some sandwiches and cups of coffee. We had been on the bus from about twelve the night before until eight or nine in the morning. The man who runs the inn where we stayed then picked us up. There is no public transportation to the inns, only the hotspots in the town, and so each inn has a little van in which they pick up and drop off their guests right at the slopes. Not only this, but they also provide the wear and gear for the slopes plus breakfast and lunch, meal tickets included for lunch at the either the base or the summit of the mountain. All this for about thirty thousand yen. This is about three hundred dollars, no bad at all! Plus the food was delicious. Anyway so we ladies stayed in a lovely, cozy room with three beds tucked away under a slanted ceiling and about four tatami mats beyond that to sit on. We had a wonderful heater and heaps of blankets to keep us warm.

We crazy kids actually went out the day we arrived, not wanting to waste any precious time despite how tired we were! We threw in the towel early, but headed out bright and early the next morning. After lunch, however, I fell and hit my head pretty hard and so had to trek all the way to the hospital. They determined that I had a concussion, but nothing drastic, and so I was to keep out of the bath and away from alcohol for a few days. This is lame on three accounts. The first is that the bath at the inn was absolutely heavenly and I’m sad to have missed out on it. The second is obvious. The third is that I was unable to go out snowboarding the third day! Alas, I’ll never be Shawn White despite my intrinsic connection to him based on the fact that we’re both gingers.

We hopped back on the night bus and I spent the whole day dead sleeping on my face. The next day Julia, Jenna, and I headed out with our Antiquity in Modern Japan professor to check out ancient tombs in the Nara basin. The first one we went to is an unexcavated keyhole tomb where we picked up bits of clay pots, which, at the time of its erection, surrounded it on several tiers. Afterwards we biked off to a tomb hidden away inside a bamboo grove by an organic strawberry farm. It was an absolutely magical experience! We entered the bamboo grove unhindered and the sounds of the town around us melted away. About forty feet in we came to a small jizo statue with a scant few offerings and behind it a small square hole, not two feet by three feet. This, our professor explained, was where it got messy. Skirting the statue, we proceeded to crawl, feet first, into the tomb. Once inside we produced our flashlights and began to explore. There is a stone sarcophagus with a crack in it just large enough for someone my size to squeeze through and then lay comfortably inside. It was a little eerie being inside the tomb, dust the only thing remaining, of someone centuries dead. I, of course, couldn’t help but hum the Indiana Jones theme.

The next big event is my birthday! It doesn’t much matter here, but I’m finally twenty-one. Hurrah! Not that I’m a huge lush or anything, but having a glass of wine with dinner out is no longer an affair. The night of my birthday we went bowling, an event during which I bowled over one hundred three out of four times. This is quite rare as I’m somewhat pathetic at bowling. Birthday luck, I think! Afterwards I grabbed ramen with a few friends before heading to our usual fare, Milan’s. There we celebrated with another kid from AKP as well as his girlfriend Akane, whose birthday is the same as mine, and all of her friends. It was somewhat overwhelming in such a small space, but we had good fun. My friends bought me and Jenna, whose birthday is the day after mine, some lovely cake slices.

Two days later I had a few friends over for a feast that my host mom prepared (picture above). There they gave me a lovely wallet from Angelic Pretty, one of my favorite gothic lolita designers! We ate until we were disgustingly full—I couldn’t move at all that evening—and watched Shrek. All this we did whilst sitting around the kotatsu. I think it was to make up for the Japanese childhood I never had. Anyway my host mom produced a delicious chocolate and strawberry cake made out to both me and Jenna, which we could barely eat after the feast plus ice cream and tea.

Soon after the plumb blossoms bloomed and so we trekked off to Kitano Tenmangu, a lovely temple, which is full of plum trees. The same day was also the monthly temple market and so it was also full of people! Though it had been somewhat cloudy in the morning, the sun came out and brightened the cute little blossoms for stunning pictures! I tried some new festival food, these savory fish shaped bread snacks full of warm custard. Delicious!

Two weeks ago my program hosted a group trip to Ise. I think I annoyed everyone by playing “what am I thinking of” a little loudly on the bus, but it certainly passed the time on the way! Our first stop was a ninja village, which is alas less exciting than it sounds. We DID get to check out one rather interesting building in which there is a rotating door like in Scooby Doo, hidden staircases, a drop down ceiling to crush unwanted visitors, hidden hallways with escape routes through wall scrolls, and hiding holes under the fire pits. Excellent! Afterwards we went to the husband and wife rocks. See the picture. Um. Anyway there were a lot of frogs statues there! If you buy a little frog charm there and put it in your wallet, money will come to you. This is because kaeru can mean frog but also to return, so your money returns!

That night we stayed in an absolutely breathtaking hotel in Ise. The staff and professors stayed in the main building, but we were all put in wonderful little cottages with lofts, comfortable porches, and gorgeous wooden everything. There was also a pool and an outdoor bath. I only made it to the pool, but it was great to sink into and float in the water as well as enjoy the sauna and hot tub! The buffet was also excellent, the dining room boasting a stunning view of the mountains and bay, which the hotel was nestled into.

The next morning we trudged over to breakfast before heading out for more adventures. We went to Ise Jingu, first to the inner complex and then the outer, which is to the sun goddess Amaterasu. When we went to pray to her, a most incredible thing happened. Waiting in the hustle and bustle of the crowd pushing to give homage to the goddess, the large cloth blocking the rest of the shrine from view billowed up in a gust of wind and presented the long path of white stones, flanked by black ones, all damp from the rain. Directly to the left of the wooden frame of where one prays stood a Shinto priest in pristine white Heian garb and a tall black hat. It was certainly a sight to behold, and the crowd certainly thought so as well, everyone exclaiming “whoa” in unison!

Any finally! On Sunday I headed off to Osaka with Becky and Patrick to see my English language student perform Rakugo. Rakugo is traditional Japanese comedy theater in which the actor sits with a towel and a fan as props. They act out all the parts in a play, changing from character to character in the blink of an eye. They used the fan as chopsticks, a calligraphy brush, a Buddhist ceremonial item, a spatula, and a sword. This I found most interesting. It is simply the manner in which the actor holds the object which determines how it is to be interpreted by the audience.

My parents came this week to visit and so I'll be posting about that sometime in the next millennium!

Pavement Like Butter

Pictures shown: Battle Stations! Julia's birthday party; the road outside the train station; Julia, Robin, and Becky at the cafe; a menu at the cafe; delicious tart; delicious cake; the notebook and the prompt as I answered it!; a cup of tea near the Byodoin as Uji is famous for its green tea; the Byodoin; green tea noodles in Uji.

Like many cities, Kyoto is a bike city. Everyone here rides bikes whether in the glorious countryside with sweeping green fields and arching mountains obscured by fog in the distance or in the crush of the city where buses and other bikes threaten to crush or knock you over. I’ve seen people of all ages riding on bikes here at all hours of the day. The busiest time in my neighborhood seems to be on a Saturday morning just after breakfast, when everyone is heading to the train station or an appointment within the neighborhood. Even when I’m walking home after the last train, cautious of the witching hour shadows, gangs of middle schoolers ride by laughing and shouting “hello!” when they see me.

The bikers are fearless, too. They zip through the tiny streets around pedestrians and mini-trucks. They shoot past one another, another inch closer and they’d be grazing one another’s legs and knocking each other off balance. But, having grown up in a large city, I know that the ebb and flow of how we co-exist in such close proximity is to allow your personal bubble to be pressed and sometimes to push it against others while still maintaining that you are the only person on the road.

The stern warning we received by police officers at the beginning of the year in a required bike safety lecture regarding keeping to the left side of the road is probably a more dangerous suggestion than anything. More than once I’ve nearly collided with a fellow biker or moped when they decided they wanted to stick as close to the curve as possible and I just wanted to follow those bike laws!

The new pavement feels like butter under the wheels of my host mother’s bike on my return trip from my kimono class. I’ve spent the better part of two hours tying and retying a Nagoya Obi. At least that’s what I think it’s called, my kimono teacher talks lightning fast which does wonders for my Japanese aural comprehension, but sometimes I miss a proper word or two. This week we worked on a mannequin instead of on myself, which I’m grateful for as I missed breakfast and spending two hours bending my arms behind my back in angles I never thought possible would’ve been enough to send me scampering back to bed upon returning home.

The weather is unseasonably warm, the wind that of one of the more chilling April breezes back on the East Coast. Women stand outside their machiya style homes and sweep whatever leaves and specks of dust may have accumulated overnight. Other bikers sail up and down the back streets, which are so quiet that you wouldn’t suspect the noisy nearby intersections. As I come to the main street, I pass a house, one I pass every day, but today in particular the palm trees strike me as curious. It is January and just yesterday morning, I could see my breath inside my bedroom. But today is beautiful and so I loosen my scarf around my neck. I heard a rumor that, somewhere nearby, the sakura have already started to bloom. To say this is unseasonably early would be a severe understatement. In the next chill that takes Japan, they will certainly die. In fact, we shouldn’t be seeing Sakura until March or April.

Speaking of sakura, I have been invited to a sakura viewing party by the woman whom I am currently tutoring. She’s an older woman who makes a study of English through American politics. Once or twice a month we go through Time Magazine and The New York Times together, reviewing whichever concepts, words, and grammar points she does not fully understand. Her spoken English is astounding, which certainly makes my explanations easier to perform.

When she isn’t busy outdoing all her friends in English, she is busy as a rakugo performer. Rakugo is traditional Japanese comedic theater using only a fan and a towel as props. She has invited my friends and I to view their English performances, for which I have helped in editing their translations. She also works with a small institution that shows foreigners living in Japan some interesting sights around Kyoto, which they may not have previously known about. All in all she is a very lovely woman who I am glad to be getting to know. And to think all it took to meet her was to be sitting with a friend on the train!

As usual these days, I haven’t been up to much. Going out with friends, doing puri-cura, and escaping the cold weather. This week I’ll hopefully get to a few of the temples I’ve been intending to explore. I also sent an email to the Kyoto Costume Institute yesterday in the hopes that they will give me something fun to do with their fantastic collection of Western wear. I’ve been reading their book on fashion from the 18th to 20th centuries since middle school and have been wanting to work there since I first cracked open the pages. I regret not having gotten to them till now, since someone else in my program heard about it from me and not only applied but got the job! Alas, the early bird gets the worm, even if the late bird is going to be right pissed about it. Anyway, hopefully they have something that needs to be done. Maybe they have some bonnets they’re curious about!

Going a little more backwards in time, Rachel and I, before I got back to New York, wrote each other a notebook, each page with a new prompt for each day. In that notebook, one of my prompts was to go somewhere new. I wrote a similar prompt for her regarding the places we pass every day and never go in to because we’re too busy (don’t worry Rachel, this isn’t a spoiler). Because of this, I chose to bring a few friends with me to a café I’ve passed a few times, but never had the time or guts to go in to. Let me tell you, I’ll be heading there as often as I have a few extra coins jostling around in my pocket! It’s a little Japanese interpretation of a French patisserie. It has a somewhat colonial feeling with its rustic colors and three wooden tables, two for small parties of three and one large one for a party of six. The smells from the small kitchen in the back are incredible. Between the four of us we got two pieces of cake and a chai each. The chai wasn’t fantastic, but the cake most certainly was and the warm, comfortable atmosphere more than made up for the chai! They have Edward Gorey books in English and Japanese on the shelves next to the door and play a nice selection of music including Frank Sinatra and my main gal Billie Holiday. If you ever find yourself in the Nagaoka-Tenjin station, I suggest going to Café Katemao. Their blog can be found here: http://blog.katemao.jp/

Additionally, I was invited by a few friends to accompany them to Uji, a somewhat romantic location, easily accessible from Kyoto Station. We walked across a bridge Yoshitsune also did, which was interesting. We took some historical footsteps! Unfortunately we also took some footsteps straight past the Genji Museum, which I still have a great desire to go back to see. Anyway, we got a chance to check out the Byodoin, which is on the back of the ten-yen coin similar to our lovely depiction of the Lincoln Memorial on the back of the American penny. The building itself, as is often so with many famous places around Kyoto, was once part of a larger complex but is the only part of the complex left standing. In its prime, the inside of the Byodoin was painted in reds, greens, golds, and blues. Mirrors were placed all throughout it so that despite its lack of windows, it was illuminated during the day and even had a certain glow about it in the evening. Within the Phoenix Hall, which is all that remains, stands the only remaining Heian period statue from a famous sculptor, whose name currently escapes me.

Until next time (hey, lookit that, a fairly timely blog!),

KT

We Climb Mountains, Yes We Do!

Pictures shown: Himeji castle, fall foliage at Himeji castle, fall sakura at Himeji castle, Heian Jingu, twilight view from the top of Mt. Hiei, a child at Nagaoka-Tenmangu, tori (shrine gate) at Nagaoka-Tenmangu, a roof shingle at the Gosho (Imperial Palace in Kyoto), a screen painting of a crane at Gosho, Julia Becky and myself at Gosho, night view from Mt. Hiei.

Well goodness gracious me! I’ve just looked at my last post only to find that the last time I posted was before climbing Mt. Hiei. If that’s the case then I am most certainly lackluster about new posts and this time more so than usual! Once one settles into a routine, it seems, it becomes easy to forget to update ones blog. Alas. Luckily I’ve got plenty of pictures to remind me exactly what I’ve been up to for the past three weeks or so…a month? More? I’m bad.

Before ascending Hiei, a few friends of mine and I took advantage of the Imperial Palace across from Doshisha being open to the public. While being foreigners gives us the advantage of being able to waltz in nearly unannounced whenever we please, it was nevertheless enjoyable to crush ourselves into the throng of Kyoto-ites and other such tourists itching to view what lies beyond the somewhat foreboding walls of the Gosho. Once we made it past the somewhat lax bag check, we clamored on in to view the extensive grounds, which seem so much more spacious than what the walls surrounding it suggest. Of course, as it can take a good twenty minutes to walk around them, it is perhaps no wonder.

The interior is well kept, especially for the big event. The pillars are painted a stark red and many scrolls and items of import such as armor or musical instruments were displayed about. Interior screens depicting a number of art styles could also be seen. Simple black lines on white paper suggested cranes and other paintings were similar to those of Nijo Castle, elaborate paint and gold stark against cool colored woods. The gardens are also quite neat, small bridges offset by large, old trees, arching forward over the calm, clear pond waters. Even in the crowd, the entire palace held a certain amount of austerity and quiet. After a little over an hour of wandering about, we had grown tired of the periodic rain and vowed to return on another day to view the extensive gardens we were unable to make time for.

A few days later, on our day off, we made our ascent of Mt. Hiei. Emperor Kammu chose Kyoto as a location for the capital in 795 because of its protective mountains. Not only a perfect Zen capital in the days of Heian-Kyo, the mountains served to protect the prosperous court. Mt. Hiei is one such mountain along with Kurama, which we climbed a post ago! It takes a great amount of time to reach the peak, especially when taking ones time. There has also been a history of marathon monks, who climb the mountain day and night, with only a few hours of sleep in between, for years. Just one climb was certainly enough for me for a while. After starting out on rough terrain for quite some time, one makes it to a series of stairs, which prove even more difficult to climb. It is by far not the most difficult mountain to climb, but perhaps next time better shoes than Converse are in order! Once reaching the top, we enjoyed our lunch outside, freezing our poor little noses off, as it was absolutely glacial, and then heading into the café for some tea and soup. It was, admittedly, a little strange to find a lovely flower garden and café at the top of a mountain, which we had been climbing with vivacity and vigor and dirt and mud for the past few hours, but a little civilization was also a relief.

The view offered from Hiei was absolutely spectacular. To one side is Lake Biwa and to the other one can see Osaka far in the distance. The nice warm watchtower located at the top improves the view. We ended up taking the cable car down, as it was getting dark after we had visited the temples located on the far side of the mountain from Kyoto. In these temples can be found the Zoroastrian eternal flame and very, very cold floors on your sock clad feet! They were quite beautiful—alas no pictures were permitted—and there was a huge bell patrons may ring.

A week or so later a few friends and I then headed to Nagaoka-Tenmangu, another temple located in Nagaoka-Kyo by my house. This temple in particular is known for its relationship to education, and if someone desperately wishes to pass an exam or do well in school, they come to pray at Nagaoka-Tenmangu. As far as size, it is not the most impressive temple in Kyoto I have been to, but its location is absolutely stunning. Set against the mountains and near the Nagaoka-Tenjin stop on the Hankyu, to get to the temple from the avenue, one must traverse a large bridge spanning a clear reservoir-like lake. Passing under a large stone tori-gate, one enters the temple complex. We had gone on a day where parents take their three or five year old children to shrines or temples, dressed to the nines, and pray. Thus there were children everywhere, the girls in flashy furisode and the boys taking cool stances as samurai. They were absolutely adorable!

With a bit of shame I admit that far too many days went by before I took advantage of living in a city like Kyoto. At the beginning of fall break, I headed out with a few friends to see Heian-Jingu. Unfortunately we took too much time in getting there and they were half an hour away from closing when we did indeed arrive, but after a short while there, we decided that it was perhaps a little more kitschy than we were accustomed to. Thus we headed off in the direction of Kodaiji for a temple light up. Light ups are really big in Kyoto during the fall season, the powerful lights meant to accentuate the beauty of both the temple structures and their juxtaposition with the fall foliage. As a result of their popularity, the lines to enter temples during these times are incredibly long, some requiring hours of waiting. Of course, my host mom provided me with four tickets to a temple light up, allowing us to skip past the line! As far as experiences go, it was most certainly an interesting one. While I am prone to taking hoardes of photos at every place I go, taking photos in the dark is particularly difficult, even with powerful lights highlighting the trees and the flash on my camera. And thus I was contented to put my camera away and simply enjoy the beauty of the temple and the amazing flow of people. The most notable moment was when we turned the corner to find the trees standing over a wonderfully clear pond, every detail of the night as clear as a mirror on the pond’s surface. Afterwards we went and shamelessly feasted on Italian food!

Later that week is when the real adventure portion of the vacation begins…but I’m exhausted and this post is getting long! Thus I will write the next three events over the weekend and post more on Monday! Coming up: Vacationing in sunny Shirahama, getting spirited away at Fushimi Inari, and visiting monks in Mibu! There are pandas involved.

Japan is Backwards Land and the Land of What?

Photos: Path at Mt Kurama, view of mountains, climbing the walls at Nijo Castle, Nijo Castle, Nara Period princess, Heian Princesses, demon child, success! climbing Daimonji, The Golden Pavilion.

Everything in Japan seems to be backwards from America. You get on the back of the bus and exit the front. Everyone drives on the left side of the road. Escalators are never going in the direction you’ve naturally grown to expect them to. They read books from right to left! Anyway, there’s my bit of wisdom for the day. Since I wrote, I’ve fallen madly in love with meat buns from Family Mart. This is a Bad Thing because they’re Very Fattening. Ah, well.

So on Monday afternoon two weeks ago Julia C and I headed out from the Doshisha campus, determined to enjoy a thoroughly sunny and warm day. We decided to explore the Golden Pavilion, figuring that it wouldn’t be too full on a week day. Boy were we wrong! I’m assuming that as it’s such a beautiful and famous location, it’s constantly chock-full of tourists. That didn’t stop us from getting the same glorious picture everyone and their mom has managed to snap, free of people in colorful Hawaiian shirts and sun block clad noses. The entire complex is gorgeous to say the least, and does not simply consist of the aptly named Golden Pavilion, which I suppose is really just a very big tea house. It’s been renovated since it was originally built by Yoshimitsu in the Ashikaga period of Japan. The complex originally boasted a great series of buildings, but only the Golden Pavilion stands today. Additionally, it was partially burned down at some point, but has of course been renovated back to its original beauty.

Afterwards we hopped on a bus to Nijo Castle, where many a shogun spent his days in the Edo period. Alas pictures cannot be taken within the breathtaking building that is the castle itself, made up of meeting rooms, libraries, arms rooms—though all now cleared. Every room has elaborately painted shoji screens and sprawling tatami floors. Surrounding every room is the famous nightingale floor, which squeaks when walked upon. Unfortunately it’s seen so many tourists and groups of middle schoolers that it no longer has what I’m sure was the amazing effect of catching the footfall of every passerby. That was, indeed, the reason the floor was built, so that the shogun might hear assassins.

On Tuesday afternoon I began kimono wearing lessons. I originally had wanted to take kimono sewing lessons, but as that went right out, I opted for the next best thing. I find it’s sort of a kitschy thing for a foreigner in Japan to be doing, but I suppose it’ll prove to be a handy skill perhaps at least once in my life. I am taking the lessons from Mamiko’s host mother, who is a good teacher…though she keeps inadvertently calling me fat and tall…neither of which I happen to be in America! I’ve taken two lessons and can now successfully get everything on except the obi, which she claims is faster than most Japanese people, however I don’t think I believe her!

On Wednesday we went to Sanjusangen-do, where I’ve been before to see the 1001 statues of the god Kwannon Buddha. After that we went climbing up Daimonji, the mountain with the kanji for “big” written on it. They set it on fire every August because Japan is crazy like that. Though not a particularly arduous hike, I found myself out of breath after about thirty minutes…guess I need to go running more often! It really was worth it, climbing to the top of the mountain just as the sun was setting. We stayed at the top for about an hour, enjoying the sight of Kyoto at night. It was absolutely breathtaking…both literally and figuratively! Despite the exhaustion the next day, I was absolutely thrilled to have gone, especially after having scared the ever loving you-know-what out of most of the group by hiding behind trees in the dark and screaming at them!

Lets see…that brings us to Thursday! Thursday was a particularly exciting day, having both the Jidai Matsuri—the festival of eras, and the fire festival on Mt. Kurama. I had originally intended attend both, but was too sleepy for Kurama. Thus Jenna and I headed off to the Jidai Matsuri during lunch, snapping as many photos as humanly possible. The Jidai Matsuri consists of a huge parade, which begins at Gosho—the Imperial Palace grounds across from Doshisha—and walks all the way to Heian Jingu, a Heian period shrine also in Kyoto. The parade begins with the Edo period, people riding horses in full costume, all the way back to the Nara period!

Then I suppose the next order of business is less than a week from then, when our class headed up Mt. Kurama. There’s a lovely story about Mt. Kurama and Mt. Hiei and how the two mountains love each other but are separated by the Kamogawa River…but I’ll save that for after I climb Hiei on Tuesday! Anyway the path up is longer than Daimonji, but not nearly as hard. The weather was perfect and the trees were beautiful, as in that area of Kyoto, they are finally feeling the effects of fall. The day was cool, with patches of warm sun. The view from the top boasted rolling mountains, one after the other. The main shrine at the top is where Yoshitsune supposedly learned to fight from the tengu. In the main temple complex I lit an incense stick for my cousin who is being adopted from Congo. Then I prayed to Yoshitsune higher in the mountains in a place that is supposedly cursed. Anyway the most notable thing about the brochure for Kurama is the second paragraph which reads as follows:

“More than six million years ago, Mao (the great king of the conquerors of evil and the spirit of the earth) descended upon Mr. Kurama from Venus, with the great mission of the salvation of mankind. Since then, Mao-son’s powerful spirit governing the development and the evolution not only of mankind but of all living things on Earth has been emanating from Mt. Kurama, and a priest named Gantei received the spiritual transmission.”

What?

Clearly this Buddhist god is Sailor Venus.

Friday was not actually Halloween, but that's when we celebrated it! We went to an all you can eat, all you can drink pizza place. On Halloween I ended up just watching some movies with some friends and eating even more disgusting amounts of pizza.

Anyway, this week I played it pretty easy other than the trek up Kurama. Had a few playdates and a sleepover…so mostly just relaxing, which a girl needs once in a while, even if she lives in Japan! Tuesday is a national holiday so our class voted to climb Mt. Hiei that particular day…because we clearly hate ourselves and would rather go mountain climbing than sleep in. Hey, I’m up for it! Friday is shopping at Uniqlo and Teramachi…so culturally important, I know :3

Ti-eye-double-guh-err and ta-ta for now!

Five Day Weekend Fun! (Guess who sucks at updating in a timely fashion!)

Pictures: Bamboo masonry on street dating back to the Muromachi period, Sakura manhole cover, Miyazaki land, Miyazaki land field, crane, trees at Yasaka Shrine, view of Kiyomizu and Kyoto Tower, view of Kiyomizu Temple, Geiko in Gion, Matcha soft serve (nom!), Geiko in Gion.

The weather being sunny and warm, we headed out on Wednesday afternoon with David, our History of Kyoto professor, to see the sights and learn about them historically. We first went to the Yasaka Shrine which is in Gion, the district of Kyoto most associated with Geisha, or as they call them in Kyoto, Geiko. We saw two girls who, at first, appeared to be maiko—lower ranking geisha—but their kimono and hair turned out to be incorrect. Thus we wandered away from Yasaka Shrine and trekked first up to Ryozen Kwannon, A Tribute to The Unknown Solider. It is a (somewhat kitschy) World War II memorial with a large Kwannon statue that looks like stone, but is actually metal and hollow. One can walk through it and view small statues of each of the animals of the Chinese zodiac. In another building is a collection of note cards written in Japanese and English of the names of American and Japanese soldiers as well as those who died in work camps during World War II. From there we walked to the Kiyomizu Temple, a large temple propped on the side of a mountain. The view is incredible to say the least. From there you can see both Toji Temple and Kyoto Tower as well as a large expanse of the city and the mountains on the other side. Kyoto is surrounded my mountains so it seems to me that a decent view is to be found as just about every corner.

After leaving Kiyomizu, Jenna, Kyle, and myself met up with Lizzy, a friend of mine from Smith who is currently attending Nanzen in Nagoya. With her we met the “usuals” who geisha hunt. Essentially these people come by after work or whatnot and snag pictures of geiko and maiko on their way to appointments. Some are more intense than others, such as the self-proclaimed geisha paparazzi, a man who gets closer than necessary to get the perfect shot. He apparently has a website somewhere. Anyway, some of the maiko and geisha are happy to have their photos taken, however, others are less than pleased to be followed by the cameras. I managed to get a few pictures, but once the sun began to set, getting a shot of quality becomes difficult; the flash cheapens the vibrant kimono colors.

Friday night everyone was feeling a little homesick and so we set out to find an Irish Pub. Kyoto certainly delivered and we found a pub with Guinness on tap, beef stew, and apple pie. This of course created our new phrase, “when we’re feeling homesick, we’ll come here…to Ireland!”

Saturday we headed to a shrine near Doshisha for a festival. It was somewhat small and because we had missed the opening ceremony, wasn't as hopping as we thought it might be. In addition the Kyogen theater wouldn’t be till the next day. Ah, well. We were treated to a practice round of the archery competition that would come later in the day.

Today we went to the Toji Temple market, which occurs once a month. Tons of vendors show up to sell fresh vegetables, delicious smelling octopus balls, handmade wares, old dolls, kimono, obi, and other such whatnots. While I went to find old dolls, I ended up only getting kimono! One is a gift so I won’t be posting a picture of it, but the other is above lookin’ sexy. I call it my Tim Burton kimono. It was cheap so I have no problems with turning it into a bustle! I also got two obi. One is red with a nice pattern and I intent to display it on my dorm room wall next year. The other is an obi that matches the Tim Burton Kimono in no way at all, but I’ll be wearing them together anyway. It is my David Bowie obi because the colors and fabric remind me of Ziggy Stardust. Hopefully there will be more dolls on display next month!

Weather permitting we’ll be heading off to Arashiyama for the day on Wednesday. This weekend we’ll hopefully make it to Nara to chill with the Daibutsu and the squeaky deer.