1st day in Kyoto (continued)

Kyoto is set within a valley with hills to its north, east, and west. Arashiyama is the district at the foot of the western hills, and is known for its bamboo forests (scene in Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon), wooded groves, and temples. We were able to catch the last evening to view Kyoto's winter lanterns in the Arashiyama district, we headed out around 4 p.m. and took a train from Kyoto station. It is considered to be a suburban area outside of the city, and would be an interesting view of the more "local" lifestyle.

Public transportation is good, and consists of an extensive bus system, a mix of JR (Japan Railway) and local trains, and a small subway system of only two (2!) lines. Luckily, our hotel is at a huge central hub (JR Kyoto station), and so we took a JR train out to Arashiyama, which only costs about $5USD round trip.

I found it interesting that we blended in so well... no one seemed to give us the foreigner eye, and many spoke Japanese to us (probably because we kept nodding quietly).

Our travels in Japan often required the use of 4-5 maps at any given time. A map to count the number of train stops before we got off (otherwise we would be lost trying to read the Japanese to figure out where we were), one to figure out where to go once we got there, etc. There were lanterns on the streets marking the path of the Winter Festival, so we could just follow the lanterns and wander through the streets. Getting around Japan isn't the most straightforward without understanding the language (some recognition of Chinese characters help, but not too much), but everyone we talked to were very kind and open to helping us out (although 90% of the time they only spoke Japanese, we only spoke English, and both sides eventually gave up, laughed, and bowed as we said good bye).

Tenryu-Ji, one of the eight(!) UNESCO World Heritage Sites in Kyoto, is a major temple built in 1339 by the Emperor after a dream about a heavenly dragon. This was quite a large complex with many little shrines, such as this one (right). There is typically a wooden box in the front where the worshipper can toss in money after they pray, and there is a rope attached to an overhead bell. Sadly, we know very little about Buddhism, but we saw many locals write prayers(?) on a piece of white paper, pray, and then rattle the bell by pulling violently on the rope.

I plea guilty to not having done more research on the local religion prior to this trip. I guess not every country has big signs in english explaining what we are seeing :).

There is a 14th century Sogenchi zen garden at Tenryu-Ji with many many types of moss (with labels we can't read) all over the place. It was very peaceful, and even has a beautiful lake next to a raked rock garden next to a big prayer pavilion. Many people were seated here admiring the sunset with the Arashiyama mountains behind the garden.

We then followed the lit lanterns to the Sagano bamboo forest trail, which was about 1km around. It was getting quite crowded, and the rain started getting pretty heavy. Different zones of the bamboo forest had lights on the soil floor illuminating the bamboo, and it formed a nice (albeit a bit eerie in certain spots) surreal yet calm night-time walk through the forest.

Of course, I went nuts trying to get a good photograph of this. Why didn't I bring my tripod? Basic faux pas in photography: Never try and hand-hold a shot when you could have had the discipline to do it the right way (with a tripod and shutter release). However, this was the best I could do at low-light:
I think it still came out okay. :)

By the time we got out of the forest and followed the path back into the main streets, it had become a torrential downpour. I had a semi-broken umbrella and poor Karen only had her raincoat, so we had to duck out in some tea-houses along the way. We were totally drenched, and rather than walking back to the subway, we headed towards a nice looking restaurant near the Tenryu-Ji temple that we saw earlier. We were looking for kyo-ryoji, a local vegetarian tofu meal eaten by the Buddhist monks, and found something similar (though given our inability to read the language we couldn't figured out exactly what we got into). The nice waitress, who spoke a little english, told us it was a special local type of tofu, with some pickled vegetables, a rice with some chicken bits in it, a bowl of clear broth with tofu skin, an egg custard with some mushrooms, and some fish cake. They lit a small burner under the hotpot, and along with the simmering tofu there was also this little jar of sauce that boiled along. We used a small ladle to get the chunks of tofu into a bowl, sprinkled on some dried herbs, mixed in this heated sauce, and ate it with rice. YUM!

The real surprise came at the end: warabi mochi. It is a common dessert eaten in the Kyoto Kansai region of Japan, and consists of a soft sweet made out of fernroot jelly and coated with kinako powder. So what, you might ask?

It was awesome. After rolling it around in the powder with this wooden pick-like utensil, it is very very soft (about as soft as a noodle that has been cooked too long), melts in your mouth like jelly, and the kinako powder tastes similar to peanut and sugar. However, the powder was SO fine that it must have been ground with a high-precision mill... there was no grit in it whatsoever. And it contrasted well with the green tea's bitter taste to round out the meal.

And thus, our first day in Kyoto is complete!