Kyoto: Day 21

Today we slept in until about 10:30 and then went down the street to a bakery for breakfast. We got some delicious fresh pastries, including the best raison bread I have ever had, and went back to the hostel to eat. While we were there Yashi told us that we should check out Fushimi-inari today since there was a rice planting festival in the afternoon. It was also easy to get there so we jumped on the opportunity.

On the train heading to Fushimi-inari we ran into a very enthusiastic, old, Japanese man that spoke English well. He told us that he had been to Atlanta for the Olympics and was a professor of English at a university in Osaka (he named the university but I forgot). We told him that we were going to Fushimi-inari and he told us that he was as well and that if we checked over the Japanese → English dictionary he was writing he would show us some of the cool spots at the temple. He kind of forced the dictionary on us and didn’t give us a chance to say no, so we “corrected” the dictionary while we were on the train and then went to the shrine at Fushimi-inari. The old guy was kind of pushy and was hurrying us toward the shrine.

He is the one in the frame, he is kind of out of focus because I didn’t intend to take a picture of him but he ran in the way so I figured “whatever”.

He wasn’t in that picture.

We went up to what I guess is the ceremonial area of the shrine to see the prayer part of the rice planting festival. The old man was being kind of pushy again. I recognize that he was trying to be nice, but it was kind of annoying. The festival started after we stood around for a few minutes.

I had been told that I couldn’t take pictures but I snuck one anyway. The people are Shinto Monks. They have really cool shoes.

After the festival got underway the old man told us that he had to go. We said our good-byes and then Erin and I breathed a sigh of relief when he was gone. We abandoned that part of the festival because it was boring and went to explore the shrine. Here a few pictures.



That is a lot of gates, huh? There are thousands going up the mountain.

Mini-gates!

I don’t know why, but this picture just makes me happy.

Heading back down the mountain to leave, Erin and I noticed that the second part of the ceremony was starting, I.E. the actual rice planting. Erin elected to stay at the front part of the shrine because she didn’t really want to back up the mountain again. Instead, David, who was staying at the hostel with us (we ran into him at the shrine) elected to go with me.

Heading up the stairs.

The rice planter in what I guess is their ceremonial rice-planting garb. Let me just say that there was an enormous amount of photographers at the ceremony, so my big white canon pro-series lens and I blended in well =P.

Blessing the rice.



A tiny, tiny old rice-planting lady receiving her blessed rice.

Waiting to plant.

Ready… Set…

GO!!!


They were booking it.

The mass of photographers and people with cameras. This wasn’t even half of the people and I was in the clump of all of the pros. One good thing about the situation is that I was about a foot taller than everyone else so I had an easier time getting good shots.





The ceremonial dancers… dancing very slowly.


Cool line of lanterns on the way out. Also on the way out we discovered a store that had the thing we wanted to buy our Dad. After 21 days of looking around Japan for one of them we finally found one. Actually, this shop had several. We chose one for our Dad and then bought one for each of ourselves since we liked them so much. I would tell you what they are but my Dad reads this and I don’t want to spoil the surprise.

After we got back to the hostel from Fushimi-inari we went to the arcade to play around a bit. I discovered that if I contorted my body in a certain way I could comfortably play Initial D 4th Stage arcade machines, so I spent a while playing. Japanese Initial D cards are much better than the American ones. They almost look and feel like actual driver’s licenses, it is kind of cool.

We went down the street to the sushi place we ate at last night and had sushi there again. It was just as good as the first time. After dinner we got some fancy ice cream on the way back to the hostel. This ice cream place was a 100% dessert/ice cream café. They had very little normal food. The dessert we had was excellent.

When we got back to the hostel we noticed everyone having a good time in the common room so we joined the party. It was a lot of fun and we did some crazy stuff. Erin and I, though, went to bed kind of early since we have to go to Hiroshima tomorrow and it is going to be a long trip.