We arrived at the entrance of Kiyomizu Temple. After paying our admission (and bidding the ladies farewell), we started climbing up the stairs (lots of stairs - must be good!)
By the way, that orange gate is huge! In the green crosshatching are giant statues (one on each side). Hiroshi said that every temple has two statues at its entrance; one with its mouth open and one with its mouth closed. This represents life and death as we come into this world screaming (mouth opened) and die quietly (mouth closed). I didn't get a good shot of them (I got a good one of one of the ones in Nara, later).
Here's a better shot of the size of the gate (note that in the above shot there is a person walking through the gateway!):
We arrived at this bell. Hiroshi explained that they ring it 108 times every New Year to ward off the 108 demons.
And this entry-way:
Hiroshi said that it faces exactly West. During the Equinox, the sun hits inside the room exactly and Buddhists believe that Buddha lives in that room at that moment.
There was this tower which was mind-bogglingly intricate and tall (that is a human sized statue):
The views were outstanding:
In front of the main building, there was this large patio/stage which was built overhanging a huge fall of about 80 - 100 feet:
Hiroshi said that it was built without using a single nail, and that in the old days people would jump off the ledge to give their families luck; sometimes they would survive the fall, sometimes not.
We walked further along...
By the way, in the above picture, those are indeed signs telling us the area was closed. We explored a little bit anyway until Hiroshi suggested we go back.
I think those were all fortune charms for things ranging from getting a good grade on your next test to having a baby soon.
Near this statue there were two stones in the middle of the alleyway, set about 50 feet apart. Hiroshi explained that if you were able to walk from one stone to the other with your eyes closed you would get very lucky in love. There was a group of young teenage boys trying to guide one boy by yelling.
We continued walking.
(By the way that is another shot of the stage built without any nails on Billy's right. Kyoto looks on in the background.)
Yes that is the mingboggling tower in the above picture! I told you it was huge..
A shot of the main building from across the way. We walked towards the entrance again and came across hundreds of kids trying to drink from the eternal fountain:
And a close-up of how the deck way above our heads was built without using a single nail:
We walked back through the entrance and down the steep alley lined with the now-closing shops. A lady sold us a warm snack which was sort of like a popsicle, but warm, and fried squid instead of sweet. Hit the spot! We took a cab back to Kyoto Station... (by the way, see the little tray in the below image? All vendors (shops, taxis, whatever) have these. They tell you the amount to pay, you put your yen on that tray, they put the change on the tray, and the transaction is over! Maybe it's how they keep all their yen bills crisp? I swear the only creased up mashed and balled up yen bills I saw the whole trip were ours.. freakin' Gai-Jin.)
We arrived at Kyoto Station and said goodbye to our amazing host, Hiroshi. He headed back to his home town (the same town which has the temple that is featured on the back of the 10 yen coin!) and let us keep his very helpful map. Thank you, Hiroshi - your help was invaluable and it was so wonderful meeting you!
We walked into the station and checked into our hotel. Billy did a little happy jig down the hallway..
Uh a little better than our freaking hostel! We walked across the street to Kyoto Tower and followed the slightly hidden signs to a beer garden at its base. It should be noted that Kyoto Tower was built on a 9 story building, so its 'base' is really the ceiling of a different building!
Here's what it looked like as we got in:
As it got darker, it started filling up:
The view of Kyoto Tower:
Anywho, the beer garden had all you can eat and all you can drink for 30 yen each. The food was buffet style and really good, but the beer made it really worth it. You got a glass and whenever you emptied it, you walk to a group of about 5 bartenders who get you a fresh one. Billy and Mike went at one time and as they approached Mike shouted, "BIRUUUU!!!" and they all shouted back, suddenly animated, "BIRUUUU!!!" (biru is the word for beer). Funny part about that, is I went and did the same thing on my own, and the bartenders got confused and not nearly as enthusiastically replied, "eehhhaha... biru!" Sheesh.
Feeling tipsy we decided to hit a karaoke bar! We wandered alllll over Kyoto. Came across some cool stuff:
Five statues (2 of which look totally familiar to me...):
A crazy dark river...
A lot of closed shops...
An immaculate rabbit (one of a handful of German cars in Japan, maybe one of 3 older German cars)...
Ah, I should probably mention. Across the street from the rabbit there was a thing going on. Part of it looked like this:
Those would be policemen. About, 30,000 policemen. What was the emergency? There was one ONE as in SINGLE drunk man who was being kind of loud. What were the policefleet doing? Politely trying to persuade him to get back into his car (the white). As we watched, more and more policemen showed up, as well as a tough looking Japanese kid trying to get into the action. At one point, they had blocked 2 lanes of traffic with squad cars (and the one kid's car), all politely explaining to the drunk man. We finally started walking along and literally 3 BUILDINGS AWAY was the police station. *Throws up hands* I dunno.
We also came across a fish that looked like a Pokemon in an alleyway (yes it was alive):
At this point we had walked around for hours and almost all the shops were closed. We had also not seen a single karaoke bar, so we took a taxi back to the hotel. Downstairs we got ice cream and snacks, went up to our rooms, played gin and went to bed.
NOW do you see why I had to split this day up into 3 posts? Phew!!
No comments:
Post a Comment