Day 6: Tour of Kyoto

Today, we had a full day tour of Kyoto and various historic sites around the city. We met with our group at the base of our hotel at 8:30 am and our first stop was at Nijo Castle.

Nijo Castle was built in 1626 and was the home, when needed, of the Tokugawa Shogun. It was also used for the Kyoto Imperial Palace. The castle itself was immaculate and meticulously maintained. When entering the main building, which was huge, we had to remove our shoes and no photography of any kind was permitted. Inside, there were large rooms set off from each side of the corridors we walked down and within each of these rooms were giant painted murals. The murals themselves were all gold plated. What this is, when the light hits it right you can see that each panel, was plated in gold squares that were about 5 inches on a side. On top of the gold then a painting would be done, which often had trees painted, landscapes or animals and in some cases tigers. At the time, however, we were told no one in Japan had yet seen a tiger so their paintings were based off of stories and pelts they received via trade. These golden murals caught the light, even thought in some rooms it was limited, and cast golden rays throughout the rooms. Since I could not take a picture here is a link to what some of the paintings looked like.

As we walked around the main building we learned what each room was used for and we even saw one room with a raised floor across half of it. It was here the shogun would have councel with daimyos across Japan. Of course the shogun sat on the upper level due to his importance and political/military power. As we walked the floor boards squeaked with the sound of many tiny little birds chirping to which we later learned why there we so noisy. It turned out that the flooring did not simply use nails to hold the floor boards in place, but a hooked piece angled 90 degrees between the floor board and the support beams underneath. This was done because walking on the floors over time would cause nails that were directly nailed into the boards to eventually poke through the boards. Back in the day, the people were mostly walking barefoot and this would have been problematic for them. The angled joists prevented this from happening and the squeaking was the rubbing of the nail in the wooden joist.

After we toured the inside we moved to the outside where we could now take pictures. Here are some from the area:

Entrance gate to the grounds:

Door leading to the gardens:

Gardens:

Once we finished up at Nijo Castle we took a short bus ride over to Kinkaku-ji Temple. Kinkaku-ji Temple was bought by Shogun Ashikaga Yoshimitsu and upon his death was converted to a buddhist temple. It is covered in pure gold leaf and was done so to negate the effects of any bad thoughts about death. This structure was truly magnificent to see and was pulling a very large crowd today. Everyone was fighting for spots to take some pictures so here’s what I got for you:

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Our next stop was the Kyoto Imperial Palace. Kyoto was once Japan’s capital and was so for over 1000 years. The original Imperial Palace was destroyed by fire and warfare time and again throughout the ages. During times of rebuilding the emperor would live in other aristocracies’ residences. Eventually the original Imperial Palace was destroyed and never rebuilt so that the Imperial Palace today is actually one of the other residences and not the original Imperial Palace. The present day location has served as the Imperial Palace from 1331 until the capitals transition to Tokyo in 1869. The standing palace today was built in 1854 as a complete replica of the original that once stood in its place. The original was once again destroyed by fire, but the Tokugawa Shogonate had it quickly rebuilt in one year.

The grounds themselves were very large and we only had 30 minutes here to see as much as we could. There was no way to fit it all in, but we made do with what we had. I hope to return to the Kyoto Imperial Palace in my next visit to Japan to see it in its entirety. Here are some pictures from different areas of the palace:

Once our brief 30 minute tour was up here, we headed on over to Heian Shrine. This shrine was built on the 1100th anniversary of the capital being moved to Kyoto and was in remembrance of the first and last emperors to rule in Kyoto, Emperor Kammu (737-806) and Emperor Komei (1831-1867).

This picture below shows a tree with a bunch of paper tied to it. At the temples we’ve gone to, you can purchase for about ¥100 a random fortune. If you should get a bad one or one you do not desire then you tie it somewhere to leave it behind. Sometimes they were tied to little racks with a threaded line or wire tied between posts, in this case it was a tree.

We were told that many japanese visit these shrines, but normally when they are worried about something in their lives. When all is well then they do not normally do any worshipping or praying at the shrines and temples. Another common time for praying is during school exam times.

Next, we stopped at Sanjusangen-do Temple, a buddhist temple, however it was entirely inside and no photographs were allowed. This temple was truly unique though. Inside it were hundreds of golden statues, made of japanese cyprus and plated in gold leaf, of the deity Kannon, each bearing many arms each. Each arm had a hand holding a different item from a book to weapons and many different tools and instruments. If I remember correctly, this was to represent those worshipping at the temple and that each worshipper felt connected to this deity. In total there were 1001 of these statues with 500 on each side of a massive one in the center of the hall. Since I could not get a picture inside here are some links:

Large central Kannon

One side of the central Kannon with smaller Kannon

In the second link you will see in front of the golden Kannon there are other statues. These statues are various buddhist guardian deities that protected Kannon. Some of them were extremely intense looking and it made me think if back in the day, I’m not so sure I’d want to pray to one of these as if there were to manifest themselves it’d be outright terrifying when they showed up.

Our next and final stop on our tour of Kyoto was Kiyomizu-dera Temple. This temple was situated at the top of a busy street with many pedestrians, tourists and locals alike, which was set on a hill overlooking Kyoto. Walking up to the temple we saw many people dressed in kimono including the guys. It was really nice to see that the japanese are maintaining this tradition even though multiple people had commented that it is a dying tradition, but has had a fair revival as of recently. In my observations of Japan, Kyoto had by far the most people wearing kimono around town. Here are some pictures of the temple and I even asked three girls for a picture to show you their kimono. I had to stumble over some japanese to get it, but they were all pretty pleased with it and even flashed some thumbs up and A-okay signs. To ask an individual person for a picture you say, “anata no shashin o totte mo ii desu ka?” which means, “may I take your picture?” The girl I asked then gestured with three fingers meaning did I want to shoot a picture of the three girls I responded, “hai” (yes).

Here is the entrance to the temple:

Looking back from the entrance to the route we came up shows the end of the road leading up the stairs to the temple. Look carefully and you will see a few more kimono.

Looking over Kyoto:

That was the end of our tour. We then went back to our hotel to rest a bit then we headed out for dinner. We got japanese fast food this time. Sara had a beef yakitori and I had and unagi (eel) rice bowl. It was ready and served about one minute after ordering and it was delicious. On the way back we stopped at a convenient store (FamilyMart) and got some treats and drinks to take back to the hotel. Check out this bonus post too. Tomorrow we have a free day to explore Kyoto and we plan to hit the Fushimi Inari-taisha Shrine, Tofuku-ji Temple and the Arashiyama bamboo forest.

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