May 2008

I finally feel at home in Kyoto. There are so many familiar sights on the roads, I know the stations, the train lines, the different areas of town. I have even picked up some of the Kyoto dialect, and feel very cultured trying it out. I know the best places to eat, the cheapest places to shop, the best way to get around...It must be time to move on then!

Today I head out for Fukui, around 2 hours North of Kyoto, a small city facing the Japan Sea. Tommorow I will check-in at Eihei-ji, a rather large zen temple (http://wikitravel.org/en/Eiheiji). It is around 750 years old, and was the temple of Dogen Zenji, one of the truly great Zen Masters (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dogen).
Here I will spend four days living with the monks, doing as they do.

It is a strict temple, even by Zen standards. The day begins at 3:30 (yep thats right...I expect my body to be very, very indignant when I try to wak it up at that hour), with meditation in the pre-dawn. The day is spent doing a mixture of meditation, sweeping and cleaning the ancient temple grounds (as a form of meditation), eating special `pure` meals in a ritualized fashion, listening to Zen masters lectures on Zen practice, and more meditation. Everything is done in absolute silence (except the lectures, obviously), and is very strict and ritualized. Reading the above list, something in me is certainly screaming `RUN NICK RUN RUN YOU CAN`T DO THAT YOU`LL CRUMBLE AND DIE RUN RUN RUN`. Indeed, the people that have done it say it is incredibly difficult, especially as they insist that you sit in at least half-lotus position for all meditation, meals and lectures, which becomes painful even for flexible people. However, everyone who has done it also agrees it was an unforgettable, amazing, wonderful experience, and they are glad they did it. As far as true Zen experiences go, this is as real as it gets.

Needless to say, I will not be able to blog or receive any other communications for this time. You`ll just have to find some other form of entertainment until I come out the other side.

Wish me luck!

Ice cream
Before writing this entry, I thought I might go and get some icecream (I am in a manga cafe, with free soft serve icecream). The machine appeared broken, but that wasn`t going to stop me! I ingeniously engineered a method of opening the ice-cream valve without using the proper lever. My coffee cup filled with ice-cream, and everything was going to plan...until I wanted to stop it. Stopping was more difficult than it seemed, and so now I have a ridiculously oversized cup of soft serve to keep me entertained while I write this story.

Geisha
The story begins with a handsome young man (me, in case you didnt guess) in Arashiyama, which is altogether a very nice area of Kyoto, surrounded by towering mountains and rivers and all that lovely nature. However, having blisters the size of pancakes, I had had quite enough of temple hopping for one day, and was ready to go home early. I waited at the bus stop...and waited...and waited...for 15 minutes did I wait.

Rickshaws are a very traditional form of transport in Japan, where a big tough guy basically plays the part of a horse, and drags you around town in your little carriage. They are an integral part of samurai-era Japan, and very culturally important. As I stand there waiting for the bus, a rickshaw drives past...carrying two Geisha!
Geisha are much rarer than most people think (there are only around 1000 left in all of Japan), and the Rickshaw driver seems very chuffed at the opoprtunity to take them. Geisha...on a Rickshaw...on a bridge over a river overlooking mountains in the cultural heart of Japan...could this be the best photo opportunity ever?

I abandon my post at the bus stop and chase after them, trying to get my camera out of my bag. After a few hundred metres however, I realize that the Rickshaw man is actually in quite good shape, and is perfectly capable of outrunning me even with his 100kg carriage. And just as I am on the point of returning to the bus stop, the Gods of Irony send down another ironic thunderbolt.

Of course the bus comes now. Of course it does.

Yakuza
Another saturday night means another night to go out and wander the streets. Me and Nick (the guy who works at the hostel...yes, his nickname is Nick, I`m not talking in 3rd person), an English teacher from Melbourne and a volunteer hospital worker from Britain decide to go out for dinner. Then of course, to a bar. Nick ends up in a long, deep, involved conversation with one of the men at the bar, a man dressed in a suit with a gold necklace, carrying a briefcase. No alarm bells ring in my head just yet though.

Some hours later, I have a conversation with this man about his sons, who are overseas in Australia at the moment, and also about the philosophical connotations of `Emptiness` in Japanese language...the second topic required skilled use of the subtle art of head nodding. Then he gets out his mobile phone and shows us some pictures of him when he was younger - covered, from head-to-toe, in a set of intricate red tattoos. Amazingly, still no alarm bells go off in my head. In the end, Nick explains to me in English that this man is Yakuza, and a very high-ranking one at that. The next set of photos he shows us serve to clarify that - Here is a photo of his collection of sports cars, here is a photo of him, muscle bound and tattoo covered, sitting on a white yacht in Hawaii in the classic pose of those who have made a lot of money from underworldly activities. He gives his phone number to Nick, and it too reeks of status and power - a special number, something like 080000003. His presence allows us to stay in the bar until well after closing time, and predictably, as soon as he leaves they kick the rest of us out.

A Monkey
The pub may be finished for the night, but we are certainly not. I want to prove to Robbie (the Australian) that there is more to Kyoto nightlife than his impression - monks sitting around in a club saying `cmon guys, lets meditate another hour...I don`t have work in the morning!`. We visit a nightclub first, but it is far too black for my tastes...I am not black, and neither are any of the people in here, but they don`t seem to understand that. The most interesting thing there was two girls dancing on top of the Bar, whom my friend assured me were Russian. To me they look just like any other girls, and I assume he was just having a wild guess, so I call his bluff and ask where they are from. `Moscow, Russia`, is the reply, in a thick accent. Damn him!

At the end of the night we end up in Nick`s favourite bar. So...warm! Nick knows everyone, everyone knows Nick, and I have never been in a more warm or friendly place. Only about 15 people, everyone singing songs together and sharing drinks around the table. Tonight is a special celebration, the bar has a new manager. His face is printed on the bottles we drink from, but he looks a fair bit different stumbling around the bar...a fair bit drunker to be precise.

The alcohol is both expensive and terrible, $40 for what is essentially Passion Pop, but what they are really selling is the atmosphere. I love the place, I love talking to everyone, its so warm and noisy and warm and warm. I end up talking to two Japanese girls, one of whom speaks English quite well. No matter how many times I tell them that I can speak Japanese, they insist on translating everything through her...I suppose it is something of a novelty when talking to foreigners, so I go along with it. Eventually I come to the conclusion that they perhaps are just forgetting that I can speak Japanese, as they seem quite drunk. To prove my point, I convince them that I am French, and can only speak French (`Parlez vous Fromage?`), not English or Japanese. Despite the fact that we have been talking for half an hour in English, and Japanese, they believe me, and try to communicate with me in English that they cannot speak french...I laugh and laugh.

The girl who speaks English turns to me at one point and says `I am a monkey!` with a very straight face.
`You are?`
`Ya! I am!`
Then she pulls the most hilarious face, and I am sad to say she did look awfully like a monkey. She seems to consider it a compliment rather than an insult, and pulls the same face at least 100 times that night, each time making me laugh at loud. Nick has work the next morning (at 7 30), so we decide to head home early at 3 30. I went to see him at work this morning, but he is not there...oh dear!

Sigh, well I had hoped that you guys would be able to take your own adventure looking for my photos in this incredibly poorly laid-out site, but here's the link for those who haven't been able to find it:
http://www.travellerspoint.com/photos/gallery/users/NickRennic/

The best way to find it otherwise is to click on the "authors" tab on my page, and my photos will come up. Click "more photos"

Walking along the path at the end of a very long day in Nara, patting the deer as I walk past them. The ancient capital of Japan, it dates back to the 700s, before Kyoto and long before Tokyo. It contains no less than 1,000,000,000 UNESCO World Heritage Sites (I counted), but is far smaller than Kyoto, and easily navigable on foot. It also has deer...lots of deer. These are not your pleasant everyday deer, but super-intelligent deer which know where the food stalls are, and are fully capable of ripping the little biscuits out of whoevers pocket they may be in. I spent the day looking at Buddhas - lots and lots of Buddhas. In the museum they have statues of all different Buddhas (there are many in fact - from the familiar Shakyamuni Tathagata to the 11 headed, 1000 armed Kannon) and from all different places and ages. From 5th century Chinese to 19th century Japanese, its like a Buddha emporium. And when you've had enough of the museums, there are of course the temples - including the one and only "Daibutsuden". The Daibustuden is the world's largest wooden building (its really, really, really big) housing, you guessed it, the worlds largest indoor buddha. It's also really, really big.

However, when I arrive at the daibutsuden it turns out there's only one thing as capable of attracting a crowd as the gargantuan buddha, and that's me. Crowds of schoolchildren flock around the temples, and upon seeing me scurry up in groups with "excuse me could we please ask you a question???". The question would eventually come, and many more after that. I soon got used to the routine (they usually had a set number of questions they had to ask, in a set order), and they always finished by saying together "thank you very much have a nice day goodbye", which I thought was very cute. On top of that, I had the usual foibles of celebrity life, such as the occasional passing "hello!" from someone I had never met, and a few photos with groups of people who didn't even know my name. Why do they want a photo of me?! What are they going to say? "Hey mum, I saw a guy today, here's a photo of us together". What kind of a photo is that?!

Anyway, the point is I was very tired by the end of the day, so I went for a brief walk in the park. I saw a forest path leading upwards, and I thought it looked rather nice, so I followed it. Buddha statues begin to appear once again (some once again with many more arms than the average person), and I begin to think that maybe this path leads to some super special temple in the forest (in Kyoto and Nara, that line of thinking generally works, as there are temples everywhere). Half an hour later I find myself hiking up a massive slope, through thicker and thicker forest, thinking "why exactly did I come here?". But something spurs me on higher and higher, and I eventually come out onto a barren mountaintop, where a spectacular view awaits me (I can even see the point far, far below where I started climbing). I see another point even higher, and something mystical draws me up there, and my mind still clings to the idea that some mysterious temple or otherworldly force awaits me there. By now all remnants of civilization are gone, just me and the deer. Even the sounds of the city have vanished far below, and I am completely, totally alone on what seems to be a rather abandoned mountain track. Finally, I reach the peak of the mountain...

Christoph?!

Yep, thats right, Christoph. Never mind that I left him in a city some 60km north of here. Never mind that I had no idea where he was going, or what he was doing from now on. Here he is, right in front of me. Attempting to contain the "OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD", I instead try to smile and look cool, like cosmic coincidences happen to me all the time. Turns out he did a similiar thing to me, just randomly saw the mountain top and decided to climb it. The path isnt as abandoned as I thought however, I just took a rather foresty shortcut - it is a tourist highlight, complete with a 150 yen charge to access the top of the mountain (luckily, its closed by now, so I don't pay). So we stand around on top of the world, looking down on Nara and over the 360 degree panaroma of the mountains that surround us, and talk about this and that. He is such a fun person, so artistic. He likes to take time with everything he does, and is quite happy spending an age standing on the mountain top taking it all in. It proves to be a good opportunity to ask more about his artwork, now that I had seen it, and his music (turns out he was the saxophone player in a punk band...that's right, punk saxophone!). The walk down in the failing light is painful, but much better with company.

And so another day ends....

As a side note, some of you may well have noticed that in writing these blogs I tend to write absolutely every tiny detail. That's because this is actually more of a journal than a blog, its for my own purposes so that I am able to recollect these little details when I am 90. I do not expect you to hang on every word, in fact I would find it rather creepy if you did (Grace and Demi, this means you!). For those of you with jobs (Or homework....Grace and Demi!!!), please feel free to just check my photos instead to get a rough idea of where I've been and what I'm doing. It's all there, just with less words and things.

A polish backpacker gave me this one to solve...
Two men are talking, and one asks how old the other's sons are.
He says "The sum of their ages is the number of windows in this room. Do you know how old my sons are?"
The other man replies "no".
He then says "The eldest one is blonde"
The other man replies "now I know"

How old are his sons?

(I did eventually get this in the end. Don't look for tricks in the words, its quite simple once you've got it)