Even more Kyoto! (last day, I swear)

Aika and I went to the Fushimi Inari- Taisha Shrine. It has a thousand shrines all lined up one after the other for miles around the hills. It took us about 2 hours to walk the entire route. The funny thing was this is where they filmed part of Memoirs of a Geisha, which I was an extra in. Hopefully that won't be my only claim to fame in the entertainment industry.




The last night I was in Kyoto there was a certain shrine that had opened a section that had been closed to the public for a thousand years. In honor of the opening, there were special light displays that gave off a mystical atmosphere to the whole area.

There is a small theme park in Kyoto where they have filmed a whole bunch of Samurai movies and shows. There are recreations of old Japanese villages and costumed characters...and ninjas.

More Kyoto

You could spend a lot more time in Kyoto than I did and still not see everything there is to see. I'm especially glad that I came during the fall. The trees were beginning to change color and there were a few sepcial events around town that I would have missed at any other time of the year. Of course, for a place like Japan, there's never a shortage of festivals.

For the record...

I've been thinking about home a lot lately. I was going to do something rash and come back early. But I decided against it. I can use this time (and who know when it will come again). Though, I am anxious to get back to my life and start things up in L.A.

But, oh, I haven't exercised in just about two weeks. I feel horrible. And I know it's going to take a while to get back to the place I was before.
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Pusan, Korea Sunday Nov. 29th

Somewhere along the way I decided inside that no matter how good my life was it was never going to measure up to some other life. Since I've noticed this about myself I've been trying to deprogram this pattern in my mind. I'm sure it comes from the low self-esteem I've suffered from growing up.

I have a good life. No one can take away my accomplishments and the hopes and dreams I have. No one can live my life for me either. Imagining isn't living and my life is not a movie I can simply watch happen. My life has meaning and significance but no one can give these things to me.

A whole lotta Kyoto

I was going to spend only one day in Kyoto but Aika thought it would be better to spend three. And thus the legend of the "Three days in Kyoto" was born.

And lots of pictures were taken.


This was outside our hostel. Rub him, rub him for a safe journey.

They didn't have any real beggers in the old days of Japan. So they made these stone representations to throw spare change at.

Men wear hats to the bathroom in Japan.

A gold plated shrine. Those Japanese are so gaudy.



I kept a pamphlet with the names of all the shrines I visited. I'll find it eventually and tell you...in person...whoever you are.

I don't remember...

I don't remember who these people are, but they're a lot of fun.





















Sometimes I drink a lot.

This is the dawning of the age of Aquarium!

While I was in Osaka Aika took me to the giant aquarium they have there. It was very impressive if you're into aquariums. If not, then it was only slightly less impressive than the street performer outside. If you're not into street performers then I don't know what to tell you. There wasn't much else outside the aquarium beside the recycled trash art.

You have no idea how hard it was to get this whale shark to pose with us. And don't even get me started about getting him to put on that hat. "Oh, that hat doesn't go with my fins". GOD! Shut up, stupid prima-donna whale shark!


stupid whale shark!

I forget the names of these furry creatures. I think they're called Steve.

This unfortunate girl was raised by sea otters.

Nara

Nara is a city north east of Osaka and it's home to free roaming deer and the biggest Buddha statue I've ever seen!

The deer were great. You can walk right up to them and even buy packs of deer biscuits and feed them. Some of them are pretty aggresive, though. So watch out who you feed. And stay away from the babies. The mommies don't like strangers talking to their kids.


The boy deer have their horns ground down to lower the human death rate (I assume). That's kinda sad to me. Having a certain part of your anatomy ground down to a nub to make you less dangerous. But maybe that's not such a bad idea for some.


I'm not a Buddhist but I can still appreciate the presence given off by the huge Buddha. They even have a window in the shrine so you can see his head from the outside.
I'm often confused but the different Buddha statues. Certain ones are skinny and others are fat. Maybe it's that the skinny ones represent his younger self and the fat ones are from his later days.

Like Elvis.

Or maybe I'm thinking of two different figures from two different religions.


Then in the resting area there was this guy who started talking to us. He gave us some sweet bean paste sandwiches and apples. His name was Jun Saito. I generally got a good impression from the people of Japan. There's an underlying polite demeanor most people have. I never felt awkward asking for help there.

Osaka and Aika (that second name is a person, not a place)

Osaka.




The hostel I stayed in was really nice. I had my own private room with a toilet and shower for about 40bucks a night and no curfew to boot. It was located in what I was told was a bad part of town but I never notice these kinds of things, or maybe I just don't care.

Yeah, I just don't care.

Spent about a week in the Osaka area.

The first night I decided to take a walk down the avenue just to take in the city. On the way there were some young people passing out flyers for an original play production. I saw that it was playing in about a half hour so I decided to go.

I liked it. Of course I don't speak Japanese nearly well enough to understand an artistic piece like the one I saw. But Understood the relationships and what was happening on stage. I got impressions of what the story was and what lessons the actors were trying to convey. All on a basic level. But still, very entertaining. This ended up being one of the highlights of my trip. I like sight seeing but I love interacting with people. I regret not keeping up with my Japanese. It would have made for a more fulfilling experience (though it was still a grand old time).

When I got out of the play I got a call from Aika. She was waiting for me at the train station near my hotel!

Aika is a friend from my college days at UNC. We met my freshman year. I remember we were both at the student services building. I was enthralled with Japan so of course I wanted to meet a real Japanese person. It turned out that we lived in student halls right across from each other. We ended up speeding a fair amount of time together that year. She was an exchange student from Osaka so she left at the end of that school year. But we kept in touch thru e-mail.

Now, 10 years later, we finally got to hang out again. Aika made all the difference for my trip. We spent the whole week together. She took me around Osaka, Nara, and Kyoto, let me stay at her home and meet her family, and finally accompanied me to Tokyo.

Japan-ness for days and days

Somewhere along the way I lost count of the days in which I stayed in various locations. So to recap, here are some random pics of my (about a) week in Takayama. My heartfelt thanks to Jason, Angela, Jenn, Kyle, Kyle, Carl, Annie, Tom, Josh, dirty Sally from the northern country, Brandon, all those fun loving guys outside the club on Halloween night, ("Squid?...Lock it down!"), Reiko, who picked me up at the bus stop and ate a hamburger with me, and all the good people of Takayama. May Sarubobo continue to be a red monkey baby in all our hearts.


Here are some random pics from my week in Takayama.





The farm-like farm-i-ness just outside Angela's place.


Jen's Taiko Drum team practice.


Center 4 Hamburgers. 'Cause you gotta have at least one. The Hamburgler's gotta hideout somewhere.

This guy kept staring at me...I guess it's 'cause he's a statue.

That was some good CORN!

OH man, does this picture bring back some memories. This shot was taken right before that thing happened.

Behold...the guy with two faces!(He lives in Nyukawa)