June 14th: Visit to Kyoto (Day 1)

Today we traveled to Kyoto by shinkansen. The train was very comfortable-even more so than the airplane! The ride featured many scenic views of the mountains. I got a lot of work done on my laptop thanks to Sensei’s router, but the ride was over in no time! The time just flew by-hence the ‘bullet’ in bullet train. From there, we traveled to the Shunkoin temple and found gorgeous, ancient temples, gardens, and stone bridges.

Our lodgings were excellent-we had our own toilet and shower!

Then we went out for lunch-both Senseis, Claire, Ruth, Jena, and I ate okonomiyaki.

I shared a pork one with Ruth and Jena-look how huge it was!

The meal was so delicious. Then we purchased breakfast at 7/11 and returned to the temple. Kuriyama-sensei then suggested a trip to Gion, where we saw bright scarlet shrines and deep green landscapes.

The contrast was shocking and beautiful. We observed part of a Shinto ceremony called gagaku-the music was awesome!-so calming, peaceful, and intricate.

I had a great day and took many pictures.

じゃあまた (See you later!),

Amanda Rice

Today was really an incredible day!  We started out pretty early, leaving from the Friends Center around 7AM in order to make it to the Shinkansen on time.  Since all of us had our luggage, it was a pretty decent trek; and the fact that it was raining just made it more of an adventure!

Riding on the Shinkansen was so cool; I knew we were going fast, but it didn’t really feel like we were going over 300 miles per hour!  We made it to Kyoto in just a few hours, which really went by fast because I was able to catch up on all of my blogs and I might’ve fallen asleep for a little while.  We took a train from the Kyoto Station to another that was closer to the Shunkooin Temple.  We were definitely ready to drop all of our stuff off and eat something; it had been a busy morning.  Walking towards the Temple, we found that it was actually in a huge temple complex; there were actually about 20 different temples in the area.

Making it to the guest house in the Temple, we found that we had landed in the lap of luxury!  Ethan and I shared a room and were given futons to sleep on in a room with a tatami floor (which was so cool).  We even had our own toilet and a real shower!

After that, Kristen, Paige, Kami, Ethan, and I went down the street a few minutes to find some food.  We found a little restaurant off the street and decided to give it a try.  I got the spaghetti and “meat sauce,” which was questionable.  It was also nice to get a cola; very refreshing!  But in all honesty, the spaghetti kind of tasted like it had Manwich mix for the meatsauce (it was edible).

Afterwards, we went to Gion, which is know as the Geisha district of Kyoto.  We didn’t see any this day, but we had the chance to go to a Shrine, where they were having a fire festival.  It was so interesting because they were using ancient Japanese instruments, which were very relaxing.

Getting back after dark, Ethan, Kami and I decided to walk around the Temple Complex and explore a bit.  There were very few lights on the streets, so the entire complex had a ‘creepy’ feeling to it.  To enhance the experience, I started telling ghost stories to them both.  But in all reality, walking around the complex for 2 hours was really fun because we got to see how people had taken such good care of the temples.

More to come, but that’s it for now!

-Bryce
So far Kyoto has been amazing. To get here we took the Shinkansen or the bullet train. The scenery along the way was very mountainous and green. While we are staying here, we are staying in a temple. All of the temples I have seen are very extraordinary. This one is very nice and I am really excited for the zen meditation and tea ceremony tomorrow. After putting our bags in our rooms we went to get food and then went to another area in Kyoto. We went to shrine there and was able to watch part of a ceremony. The ceremony we watched was amazing. I couldn’t understand what was going on but it was truly an experience to be able to see it. The music they were playing mixed with the fire was oddly relaxing.

-Kristen

Today we got up early in order to take the shinkansen to Kyoto. It was a fun experience riding in a bullet train and watching the scenery of the countryside flash past you.

Once acclimated in the Shukoin temple, we decided to go out for lunch. Ruth, Amanda, Bell-sensei, Kuriyama-sensei, Claire, and I all ate at a busy place called ジャンボ (Jumbo). Amanda, Ruth, and I all sat at a table and watched them cook our okomiyaki in front of us on a hot plate. It was very delicious and I enjoyed watching the fish flakes move on it.

Afterwards, we all realized that we couldn’t make it in time to Kinkakuji (it closed early). Therefore, we all decided to go to Gion. We went to Yasaka Jinja and were lucky to arrive the same day that an event would take place that evening. I had the pleasure of sitting next to a professional photographer from Missouri while waiting for the event to start and I learned a lot.

One of the things I learned from him was that this event was special because the front of the shrine was open to the public. The front is normally closed because that is where the gods are (they are actually in another room inside of the temple that is blocked off to the public). I also learned that I could take a picture of the inside of the shrine because the door to where the gods stayed was closed.

The event was very reserved and mystical. It is very hard to describe how spiritual it felt. I have seen traditional Navajo dances and the feeling I get from watching them are similar to how I felt while watching this event. Even though the Japanese event was very reserved in comparison, they both had a spiritual feeling at its base. It is almost as if there is something magical in the air that you can sense when watching history and traditions come alive.

Kyoto is filled with the essence of Japanese traditions. You could see it, feel it, and sense it. It is hard to describe but hopefully I got the point across!

-Jena

Today started our Kyoto adventure! Travelling by Shinkansen was nice -the seats reminded me of airline seats, if the airline seats reclined more fully and had about a foot more legroom. It was pleasant, but over more quickly than we expected. There was a mad scramble to gather up all our stuff as we were pulling into Kyoto station -Jena and I both ended up with some of each other’s things in our rush! We did get everything, though.

We are staying in a temple complex. The walk back to the specific temple was a bit longer than I expected -we went past building after building after building before finally reaching Shunkoin, and even then we walked past a few more buildings before reaching the guesthouse! When we walked into our rooms, we were blown away: they were so spacious and beautifully laid out. It was like being in a reasonably nice hotel -not super-fancy, but certainly nothing was lacking!

After settling our things, we went out to eat, then to explore. The original plan had been to go to Kinkaku-ji that day, but we realised that it would be closing soon, so it might be better to revise our schedule. We decided to go to Gion, and as soon as we got there, we saw the entrance to a large shrine. As we were walking around and taking in the scenery, we noticed that there were chairs set up around a stage. After asking a couple of people, we learned that there was to be a gagaku performance that evening, and decided to stay and watch. I felt so fortunate to have happened to be there while a special event was occurring! The performance was mesmerising -despite the slow pace, we weren’t bored at all. However, at some point we realised how late it was becoming and headed back. It was such an interesting day -Kyoto is so beautiful and filled with history.

-Ruth

Today we were up bright and early to travel to Kyoto by Shinkansen (bullet train). After arriving at our home for the next few nights – Shinkoin Temple – we split up into two groups to go find lunch. Our group set out on Italian food, but we got a little lost so instead we decided to stop in “Kitchen Cafe”, and I finally tried Japanese curry, which was great. I also found my favorite bad English translation here on the menu: Wheat Boodle.

After lunch we were planning on going to the Golden Pavilion, but it closes early, so instead we headed to Gion, the geisha district.  We wandered around beautiful parks and temples, bought some good luck charms for friends and family, and watched part of a Shinto ceremony before grabbing dinner from Lawson and returning home. Ethan, Bryce and I couldn’t sleep, so we decided to go on a night time walk around the temple complex Shinkoin is located in. We thought it would just take a few minutes, but we were actually out for over an hour! There were so many little twists in the road and smaller temples located around the main complex; it was really peaceful and interesting, and it’s great to know that we’re safe being out at night!

Kami

Riding the Shinkansen was awesome and a great experience. It was really great to see some of the Japanese countryside. I was surprised to see so many big cities as we traveled to Kyoto. I thought Japan would be fairly rural outside of Tokyo and other more well known cities but there are a lot of significantly sized communities in between. We arrived at the temple around lunch time. The facilities seem beautiful and they are brand new so we are really lucky to have a place like this. After settling in a bit we all went out and found a place to have a lunch. I had some interesting spaghetti with sloppy joe meat but it wasn’t so bad.

After lunch we traveled back to downtown Kyoto and explored the Gion temple complex. There was fantastic park behind the temples that we explored which was really peaceful and beautiful. We also got to see a very interesting ceremony. I wasn’t sure what was going on but they played some cool string and percussion instruments. After all of this we headed back to the temple complex. Kami, Bryce, and I decided to explore the rest of the complex at night. It was really interesting, beautiful, and peaceful but also a bit creepy, especially with Bryce’s ghost stories. It was a great first day in Kyoto.

-Ethan