Day Three - Kyoto

Today's first picture is one of my favorite from Kyoto. I took it in one of the temples when I noticed the tower in the background. I think the Japanese have done a good job mixing the new with the old.

I'm also putting up a map so you can see where we were. Our hotel was between the Kyoto train station and Koji temple.



Woke up very early (about 4:00 AM) because I stopped taking sleeping pills. Had to adjust sometime. Decided to do breakfast in the Japanese restaurant. Talk about different food. They bring you out a tray of food with about 10 different dishes. I recognized rice, miso soup, and cooked fish. The rest was best described as a noodle soup, lots of pickled things, and some purple noodles I think were a vegetable. And roasted tea (oishii!). I didn't really eat that much.

So at around 8-8:30 in the morning we set off (on foot) to see as many of the 50+ (I'm sure there are way more) Buddhist temples and Shinto shrines as we can. And it was raining (which is why so few photos from the morning.) It was going to be a long day...

So we started the day walking north of our hotel to a temple I think was called Nishihangan-ji temple (no admission charge.) It was a working temple and not all that set up for tourists (or maybe I just missed the tourist stuff.) They had some modern offices and we saw some monks walking around. We actually got to see them pray. It was very soothing. Oh, and had a moat around it, I think.

Next was Higashi Hongan-ji temple. This is the Mausoleum of Shinran Shonin (1173-1262), the founder of Shin Buddhism. One of the large halls was under repair but still was large and impressive. They had these ropes that were made of human hair (from female devotees) that were used to haul giant logs to the top of the temple. The largest one measures 367 feet, has a circumference of 1.3 ft, and weighs 2,200 lbs. Now that's devotion!

We passed by a garden and decided to go inside. Glad we did (500 yen.) This was the Shosei-en Garden and was a masterwork of Japanese art. They supplied us with a beautiful picture book and sent us on our way. By now it was raining pretty hard but once again, the waterproof clothing and umbrella made things better. The pond was full of carp and they followed you around waiting to get fed. This place was my favorite garden of the trip. We then walked through some back alleys and I found a fruit stand. Wanting a banana, I gave the gentlemen 150 yen for what I thought was for one banana. It ended up being for the bunch (5) and I carried bananas with me for a couple of days.





After crossing the river, we came across a large grave on a small hill which was not on our maps (about a block away from the Kyoto national museum.) This was obviously an important place judging by how many buses with Japanese tourists were dropping people off. Anybody know what this is?

Finally, we found our first Shinto shrine. It was nice but I really couldn't tell the difference from the temples. Next door was the Kyoto national museum (only 500 yen) and looked at everything inside. They had some of the most impressive Buddhist carvings that I wish I could have shown you (again, no pictures.) Very nice, but I was getting tired (I think it was around 12pm at this point.) We decided to see one more temple and then go back to Porta for lunch.







The last temple was the biggest. It was called Sanjusangen-do and had an impressive number (over 1,000) of statues. I think I heard it was the largest or longest wooden structure in the world (about 120 meters long.) They used to have archery contests along the outside of it. Again, no pictures, so I found some off the web.


this one was mine







Now on the way back, my dad decided that we should eat at a dessert place we saw in Porta (below the train station.) The only thing is we didn't know exactly where it was. We spent between 30min to a hour looking for this place. I'm glad to report that the food was very good and my dad was happy.





Went back to the hotel and slept from 3 to 5:30PM. So much walking!

Jumped on a subway to explore the shopping district in Kyoto. Quick, cheap, and easy. They were setting up for a huge festival (which no one seemed to know the origin of) downtown and there were people everywhere. Very exciting. We went to the top floor of the Diamure Department store (they had about 10 restaurants up there) and found an Italian place for dinner. Great food and service. After dinner, we walked back towards the subway and took a few detours down some pedestrian only roads (we even found a tiny Shinto shrine with a weird animatronic robot) untill I decided to take a picture of some girls dressed up in traditional clothes up in a parade float. I then proceded to knock over a police barricade and was swarmed with cops telling me to move away. I was so embarrased! Oh, and we couldn't really shop because everything closed by 8pm (this seemed to be a trend in Tokyo, too.)



Jumped back on the subway and walked to the hotel. Very, very tired. Tomorrow, the bullet train and Tokyo. Very exciting!

Day Two - Kyoto

Went to the gym this morning (8/2) and now can't really lift my arms. That's what happens when you don't go for 6 weeks...

Day 2 - Woke up at 6AM. My dad and I both took sleeping pills but he woke up at 3AM. This would become a trend. Enjoyed breakfast on the top floor of the hotel. It was in a kind of observation deck thingie and had a decent view of the city. Kyoto doesn't have a lot of tall buildings because the local government sets height restrictions. But we could see the Kyoto tower and the train station and a couple of temples. Maybe we could have seen more if it wasn't cloudy. Breakfast was very, very good western style food. Bacon, eggs (not really all the cooked), toast, and tea. Strangely, when I tried to order green tea, they didn't have any.

This morning was our half-day tour of the Kyoto sights via bus. From the beginning it was apparent the tour was oversold. By the second pickup stop the bus was full. At the final pickup there were a lot of angry europeans (unrecognizable language) complaining. No problem! Magically, seats folded out into the aisle. Not very comfortable, but practical. First stop, nijo castle.



Nijo was pretty cool. It was the home of the shogun for a long time. I'm sure this isn't quite accurate but I believe the shogun were the people who really held the power in japan. Warlords, if you will. Anyways, the castle is entirely made of wood and is decorated with all of these carvings and gold leaf paintings. They wouldn't let you take pictures inside so here's on from a website (the one above isn't mine either.)



It was a LOT darker inside (they have no artificial lights and it was cloudy) and would have been more impressive if I could of seen it better. But they did have a floor that squeaked that acted as a security system. Sweet. If you've ever seen a japanese movie set in feudal times, this place would have looked familiar. Oh, and no shoes.


Dad in the Nijo garden







Next was Kinkaku-ji (golden pavilion) temple. I was excited for this one. I had seen many a picture before arriving. But as soon as we stepped off the bus it began raining. Hard. Midwestern thunderstorm hard. So out come the umbrellas of about 1000+ people and effectively ruin the view (I decided to bring waterproof clothes instead of an umbrella. from head to toe, i was set. Except it was around 75 degrees and the jacket was a bit hot.) We got separated from the group and ended up running through the grounds. I got a couple of nice photos but was very disappointed by the rain. And it stopped as soon as we got back on the bus!









Last on the tour was the Imperial Palace. Now, the emperor lives in Tokyo but he never officially left Kyoto (correct me if I'm wrong.) The palace is maintained as if he is just on a long trip away. I think he comes back every few years for a couple of days, mostly to show off the sites to foreign dignitaries. Even our revered Mr. Bush has been here. Kind of makes it a little dirty...anyways, we couldn't actually go in, so we walked around. Would have been nicer in the sun. But I will say the rain and the architecture and wood buildings seemed natural.











Final stop on the tour was the local handicraft center. A lot of beautiful things inside: Paintings, swords, kimonos, and tea sets. It is here, ladies and gentlemen, that I found, FINALLY found the traditional sake drinking glasses I have been searching for since I saw Lost in Translation. I was so happy! They were a little pricey (I only bought two, wish I bought at least 4) but awesome. No if I could only find some good sake...

Back to the hotel, lunch at a ramen place in Porta. Good food again. And broke down and bought an umbrella.

Walked to the giant pagoda (Toji-temple) we saw from breakfast. This just might have been my favorite place in all of Japan (at least of the temples.) They have this 5-story pagoda, 187 feet tall (tallest in Japan) and two giant halls containing large wooden sculptures of Buddha and friends (again, no pictures inside. I feel a little weird taking pictures of religious symbols anyways. Their some bodies God!) Beautiful and awe inspiring.







Dinner at the sushi counter of a place across the street from the train station. Dad got the sushi but I chickened out and got udon and beef. It was fun watching the sushi chef work. Definitely a locals hang out and again, I wish I spoke Japanese.

After dinner, we explored the train station. It's kind of a mostly inside, some outside exposed to the elements kind of place. They built it way taller than needed and put up about 7-8 floors of department stores and restaurants. The most amazing thing about this place was the stairs. They probably had about 5 hundred stairs in a single case (no switchbacks.) I was told it was built to resemble a mountain (mission accomplished.) At the top is a small but quaint outdoor park. And about 25 young couples. Yes, we had discovered a local date/make out spot. Only a little awkward with the locals but well worth the view.



Back to the hotel and in bed by 9PM.

Trip, Day 1 and grammar be damned

So I decided to post day by day as opposed to a giant description of the whole trip. Each post will basically be a day (17 days in all.) Let's get this started!

Day 1, July 10th/11th - Flight, Kansai, and Kyoto

Left my family in Livermore, CA to go to SFO. At this point I had no Yen so we exchanged more money than needed (they had a deal that started at $600). Turns out the rates at SFO were a lot lower than anywhere else we would find on the trip. Oh well. It basically meant 100 Yen = 1 dollar. Easy math! The flight was good. 10 1/2 hours. Watched blades of glory twice and got my first dose of japanese from the flight accounements. Talk about a hard language to follow! When we arrived in Osaka (Kansai airport) the airport felt more like a wharehouse than an airport. Now frills here. It wasn't ugly but all the ducts and pipes were exposed and it had a very utilitarian feel. My first time through customs. Piece of cake. When we made it to the lobby, we were met by our hotel shuttle and shuffled off to the waiting area. I couldn't believe how many vending machines they had there (many more in my future, I was to find out.) The shuttle van was a european style tall van with clean seats and lace fringe everywhere. The driver had a sweet hat and driving gloves. This was the first of many exciting uniforms to come in japan (sorry, no pictures of these. i feel wierd taking people's pictures without their permission.) 90 minutes to our hotel through endless city, factories, and multi-storied golf driving ranges. We arrived at our hotel in Kyoto. Hotel was nice. Very clean and nice hard beds. A couple slight differences from hotels at home. First, no sheets. One side of the comforter has a sheet swen onto it making only a single blanket needed. I liked this. The bathroom light was on the outside of the bathroom (this must be an asian thing because all the hotels worked like this.) Didn't really enjoy this. And the toilet from the future. It took me a few days before I actually turned one on but this ended up being one of my dad's favorite things about japan.





Wearily, my dad and I struck out to explore and grab some dinner. Luckily, all the restaurants had plastic recreations of their menus in the windows. This made it easy to decide what to eat. But of course we couldn't agree on what to eat! So we ended up walking around and discovered the kyoto tower and a gigantic building which turned out to be the Japan Rail station (JR from now on.) The JR building is relatively new and absolutely huge. There were also all of these stairs leading to what I could only assume was a subway all up and down the street. My dad wanted to explore and when we went downstairs we discovered a massive underground mall called Porta. Very large, clean, and with many, many teenage girls pouring over sales racks. Lots of restaurants, too. We ended spending about 10% of our time in Kyoto exploring this mall.





Dinner still on the horizon, we departed Porta en route to an underground cafe across the street from our hotel (they had an english menu outside.) Once downstairs, it turned out to be a very traditional place; no shoes, tatami floors, low tables, and sitting crosslegged (or trying to.) No one spoke english, no forks, very loose descriptions of the food, and drunk locals. Awesome! The food was great, if only a little wierd (lots of indistinguishable stuff with no translation in sight.) Oh yeah, and only chopsticks. This was a challenge... When we payed the only japanese food related term I could remember was oishii (delicious.) This seemed to make them happy.

Couldn't stay awake any longer and went to bed at 9PM (8AM eastern time.) Ambien kept me asleep.

Almost home!!!

I made it back! Well, to california at least. Turns out blogspot is banned on public computers in china, so I wasn't able to get on here. But I just got back this morning after leaving this afternoon (does that make any sense?) so it's been a very, very long day. I'm trying my best to stay awake but I think it's a losing battle. I just need to make it another 2 1/2 hours and then it's straight to bed at 9pm. Tomorrow I catch my plane home to michigan and begin what I'm sure will be a long adjustment period. I will post day by day details starting in the next couple of days. Hope someone is checking this still!

matt

oh, and i caught a cold over there. i just love traveling while sick!

Japan and Typhoon

Yo Yo Yo!

I made it japan and have survived the typoon. Well, actually, it`s still coming. The wind (upto 100mph) is coming tonight. I am now hunkered down in my hotel with a couple of beers. I`m ready!

Japan is awesome. Everything I expected (the crowds, the craziness, the food) has exceeded expectations. The only thing has been the weather. Rain, rain, and more rain. We finally got a break this afternoon and explored the area of Shibuya. All the girls are dressed like paris hilton. Of all things that america has exported, I`m sad dressing like a ho is the most public. oh well.

Gotta go as my internet time is running out. I`ll pick a short story from the trip so far to post tomorrow (hopefully). Hope you all are doing well!

peace

matt

Birthday and departure

hello sportsfans! coming to you live from SF, the site of this year's MLB all-star game. too bad i'm not at the ballpark...

it was my birthday today. thanks to all of you who contacted me today. i really appreciate it! too bad i spent it cleaning out my deceased grandma's garage and painting a fence. you know it's a good day when your snot is black after it. the strangest thing today was how people in this city deal with garbage. you can't haul things to the dump (i think it's about 50 miles away.) what you do is take it to a transfer station in your county. what this amounts to is a giant warehouse that people dump all their trash in, right there on the floor. I have to say the air quality was not the best inside. talk about a dirty job.

enough labor. on to the vacation! i leave tomorrow for japan. as i am writing this i have a big smile on my face. the day has finally arrived! yeah!!!!! hopefully i will find enough computers over there to keep this blog up to date. otherwise, i'm keeping a paper log of my adventure and will copy it to the web upon first opportunity. so keep posted! (pics to follow after trip)

all right, i'm going to bed. up in 7 hours!

your truly,

cuddles

Headed to California

Off to the golden state in the morning. On monday, me and my dad get to clean out my deceased grandmother's garage. Good times to be had by hall.

Spent the last couple of nights at my sister's fiance's, Justin, house. Took a lot of nice pictures out by the lake. Here are a couple:





I'll try to post before I leave on Tuesday. Later!