simply shopping

The weather on my trip had been wonderful. However, I woke up to some fog and light drizzle on my last day in Japan. That definitely didn't deter me from getting to Toji Temple for the monthly flea market. This is held on the 21st of each month and I happened to be there on that day!
It was easy to find - you just followed all the people walking in one direction. One there, you entered the grounds to find booth after booth. I am sorry that my photos aren't that great, but the off and on rain caused me a little difficulty with an umbrella, a camera and a purse. There was a multitude of food
if you were hungry. We have these in Korea - they are filled with bean paste. I didn't get any photos, but there were alot of booths that sold kimonos and fabric. I don't know if they were used kimonos or just inexpensive ones, but they were mobbed with ladies going through the piles. There was the usual "junk"
and antiques to go through. I saw some interesting things, but decided to forgo. Some booths were very colorful
with their crafts using kimono fabric.
And I wish I knew the reason behind selling pine branches.
This booth was selling Japanese crackers of some sort - I guess they are pretty popular.
There were some shrines
and temples on the grounds, if you could find them in the masses.
By the time I left, it was around 2:00 and of course, the sun came out for awhile. I spent the afternoon shopping and waiting for early evening. I wanted to head to the Gion area of town in hopes to see a geisha walking the street. One of the ladies on my tour had seen one there the night before. But due to the rain starting up again and I was cold, tired and hungry, I said goodbye to Kyoto for now and went back to my hotel.
This was such a wonderful experience for me. Hopefully I will get (or make) another opportunity to see more of Japan.

my favorite day of the trip

Kyoto was definitely one of the places I wanted to visit while in Japan. And hopefully I can take another trip there, as I didn't get to see a fraction of what there is to see. The tour guide said that there are 1600 temples and shrines in the area! My first day there was a full tour day. We started out by going to the Nijo Castle. By the way, I am going to take it easy on the history and mainly tell my day with pictures - if that is okay with you. The castle is surrounded by a moat and several structures.


We toured the Ninomaru Palace with its nightingale floors - built that way to warn the shogun that lived there of intruders.
We were not allowed to take pictures inside, but there was beautiful gold leaf and paintings.












Next stop was the Kinkakuji Temple , or the Golden Pavilion Temple. Not only is the temple something to see (you can't go in), but the grounds were very picturesque as well due to the fall leaves.





There was a small rock garden (unfortunately the only one I was to see) that was being tended to while we were there.
Next on the morning agenda was the Kyoto Imperial Palace. Kyoto was the capital of Japan until 1869, when it was relocated to Tokyo. I was surprised by the bright orange color
of some of the trim on the buildings. But what really struck me were the roofs made of layers of cypress bark.
Once again, you do not tour the inside of any of the buildings but you could look into some of them.
I wonder if they would like another tiger painting......I happen to have one.

After a quick lunch, we boarded the bus for Nara, which is less than an hour away. The first stop was the Todaiji Temple. This is the largest wooden structure in the world and houses the Great Buddha of Nara, which is 49 feet tall.It really was a sight to see.Note the person in the lower left hand corner of the photo to get an idea about how large the doors are!
We then headed to the Nara Deer Park. Supposedly there are over 1000 deer roaming the park freely. It was fun to see. You could buy crackers that the deer eat to feed them. However, I saw that once you fed them, they wouldn't leave you alone for awhile. So I elected to just watch. This was a school picture that they were taking - I guess they gave up and just included the deer.

The last and (my favorite) spot of the day was the Kagusa Taisha Shrine, the largest Shinto shrine in the area. It is also home to 3000 lanterns made of stone, wood or bronze. In older days, all of the lanterns were lit daily. But that is now only done twice a year, on certain festival days. I would love to see that! I could have stayed there longer, taking photos. But I did take a fair amount - I will share some with you.




They are also known for wisteria. Since we were there during fall, we didn't see any blooming - but the young girls selling religious items had cute little wisteria hairpieces.

The area was thickly canopied with trees, which made for an air of reverence. But the cold air of late afternoon fall had us boarding the bus soon for our return to Kyoto.

people you meet on a tour (or part three of the Japan trip saga)

My last day in Tokyo was spent hurrying around a few local landmarks.
Looking out onto the city from Tokyo Tower

and also looking down at my feet (the yellow rectangles are the tour buses).

Getting off the bus to quickly walk around the moat surrounding the Imperial Palace - the palace itself is only open to the public 2 days a year (we didn't hit one of those days).


We saw most everything else from the bus - like I said, it was a rush. The next morning, I said goodbye to Tokyo and boarded a bus headed for Mt. Fuji. I will have to say that this part of the tour didn't interest me too much when I booked it. However, I couldn't find the type of tour I wanted without including the Mt. Fuji part. It ended up to be a great day though. The tour quide was really quite good (he kept us entertained with little tidbits of trivia concerning Japan) and I met a variety of interesting people. I even saw an exit on the freeway for Sagamihara (where I had lived when I was younger).

How far you were able to travel up Mt. Fuji is dependent on the weather - mainly snow. We were fortunate to go to the the 5th station, which is more than halfway up the mountain. By the way, Mt. Fuji is 12,385 feet. The weather in Tokyo had been pretty moderate, but it was cooooold on that mountain. Part of the reason was the wind - it was very windy.
However, because of the wind, we were able to get some clear pictures of Mt. Fuji.

After lunch, we were supposed to take an aerial cablecar with great views of Hakone National Park. But the high winds had closed it down. We instead took another tram that was enough for me. Mt. Fuji is a volcano, so I guess the area is a hot spot of sorts and you could see steam? or gases? rising in some spots - sorry,I am not a geologist! If I remember correctly, the tour guide said it last erupted in the early 1700's.

The end of the day was a cruise on Lake Ashi, one of the five lakes surrounding Mt. Fuji. I am sure that the area is a hot spot in the summer, but for now, all the duck paddle boats were in rows waiting for the warm weather.

Alot of the people were taking a train back to Tokyo. But there were a few of us that got on the train for Kyoto, my next leg of the trip. While we were waiting for the train, a few of us started talking about where we were from. What are the chances that a young couple from Houston was there! She actually was coming for the wedding of a Japanese friend from college years earlier. Over the span of the whole week, I met quite a few interesting people......
a mother/daughter team from Barcelona
a couple from Pennsylvania with 2 small children on their way to China
for their adoption of a second little Chinese girl
a French couple that made me remember how I felt about some of the French when
I lived there (take that how you may!)
a friendly young couple from Australia
a Japanese man that worked for Proctor & Gamble in the U.S. that was in Japan
for meeting to try to market Head & Shoulders to the Asian market - I told
him I equate the shampoo to dandruff control but I had noticed a commercial
in Korea for the product that seemed to suggest it was good for your hair
(no dandruff in sight)
another young Australian couple on their honeymoon
a very pretty young woman that had come to Tokyo for some classes on holistic
healing
a Japanese/American man that had left Japan at age 5 and was here for his first
visit since leaving
I won't bore you anymore with the details. But since I was on this trip by myself, I really enjoyed the times I did have to converse with other westerners and hear their stories.

the rest of the day

To recap my last post, I had gone to the Asakusa area of Tokyo, where I visited the Sensoji Temple. But that wasn't everything I experienced that day.
The Kaminarimon Gate is the entryway for the pedestrian street leading up to Sensoji Temple. There is a huge lantern hanging from the gate that is not only huge, but weighs almost 1500 lbs.
Once you cross underneath that, you are on Nakamise Street. This is open only to pedestrians and is lined with small shops selling anything from souvenirs, to food, to traditional Japanese handicrafts.
I spent much time looking around this area. Some of the booths even had people working in them to demonstrate their craft. There were several painters and men that did wood block prints. But the one thing that really caught my eye was a dollmaker. I remember the Japanese dolls that had porcelain faces and traditional dress.

My mother has several signed woodblock prints from Japan. They are quite intriquing. One of them is called (correct me if I am wrong Mama)" The DollMaker". Probably only my parents and my sister will appreciate this photo I took, but it reminds me of the print.
The dolls actually started out with wooden templates
then the ceramic and the final product.


It was great fun to see some people walking around in traditional dress.



And I enjoyed some noodles for lunch at a little outside booth.




Besides the temple that I had talked about earlier, there are various other structures on the ground.
At the end of Nakamise Street, there is another gate called Hozomon Gate.



The tour guide the next day told me that this is a giant replica of shoes that monks wear in Japan.







There is also a 5 storied pagoda. There was some sort of fall chrysanthemum exhibition going on with some unbelievably large
and different blooms.

There were many statues to be seen
- mainly with some sort of attire?








And various shrines.
So you can see that I spent alot of time here. The next day, I was here briefly with an organized tour - I was so glad that I was able to spend more time that first day at my leisure.

The area around the temple also houses many shops and restaurants.
Walking around the streets was totally different than all the neon and signage you normally see. One street I did make an effort to find was Kappabashi Street. On this street is a one kilometer stretch that sells restaurant supplies. I am not in the market to open a sushi bar or anything, but this was really fun for me. Some stores sell only pans, some sell the fake food that they use to advertise the menu, and this one sold teapots, tea cups, rice bowls and anything ceramic. This photo doesn't do it justice - this is only one aisle of the endless cavern of pottery.

I would have liked to tell you that I met Bill Murray for a drink at the Park Hyatt Tokyo, like in the movie, Lost in Translation. But after my long and full day, I stopped at a grocery store in the subway by my hotel - picked up an apple, cheese and crackers for dinner in my room - and crashed.