Blogs from Kyoto, Japan, Asia - page 76

Yeasterday I did a full day excursion to Hiroshima, around two hours by train from Kyoto with a change of train in Osaka. Hiroshima needs no further introduction, as my guidebook said way too accurately "Hiroshima is known worldwide for the worst of reasons". As a tribute to the victims of the nuclear bomb that exploded 600 meters above Hiroshima August 6th 1945, they have created a peace park and Hiroshima calls itself the peace city. Every time a country does nuclear tests the mayor of Hiroshima writes a personal letter to the ambassador of the country performing the nuclear tests to condemn the test, this has been going on for over 40 years. In the A-bomb park you can see one of the few houses that survived the bomb, mostly because the bomb exploded almost ... read more

Konnichi wa. It’s Sunday the 15th of October and this marks the first time in a long time that I haven’t gone to church. It’s also the first time in a long time that I’ve been able to get a good night’s sleep a few nights in a row. Thursday morning the group left mid morning, without going to school, to travel north to the tiny little town of Awara. We hopped on a bus at about 9:00 and rode the 45 minutes that it took to get down to the eki or the train station. Once we got there we had about an hour to explore the massive Kyoto eki which has an entire shopping mall below the tracks, restaurants dotting the entire layout, a chapel where we saw someone getting married, and a mini ... read more

Today we tackled the east side of Kyoto - temple land! Sanjusangen-do temple was our first stop and it was incredible. It is a massive building and inside there are 1001 life-sized statues of the thousand-armed Kannon (the Buddhist goddess of mercy who actually has 42 arms). I am usually pretty good about respecting the no picture rule, but I couldn’t resist snapping an illegal photo of this one, it was so overwhelming. The statues just kept going and going, and each had unique facial features and was holding different things. Apparently visitors like to try to find one who resembles family members. Afterwards we went to the National Museum and saw some beautiful art objects. My favorite was several beautiful boxes for calligraphy sets. They were very intricate. Steve liked some of the paintings. They ... read more

Well, my Japan leg of the asian tour has come and gone, and i have to say, its the best country that i have ever been to! Maybe I enjoyed it so much because it is so westernised and i am starting to long for home, but the people here are the friendliest nation i have met, not even a townie in sight, the trains are extremely fast, they have embraced the world of technology without forgetting their traditional routes. its just a great place. Its like a much much better england and it has nice weather. It was one big hole in the pocket though. We caught a two day boat crossing from shanghai, if your looking to get there from china it is the cheapest way. I will leave the boat stories for another ... read more

Day 2: On Saturday I was planning on going to some of the other major temples in Kyoto, like Nijo, but the huge crowds of foreign and Japanese tourists kind of put me off. Instead I decided to hop a train to Kameoke and then take a boat cruise down the Hozugawa river to Arashiyama (another good site for temples). After stepping off the train in Kameoke, I consulted my guide book, quickly realized that it was useless, and then just decided to go left (away from the town center). I passed some fields of brightly colored wild flowers, walked up a hill and into a small cafe that advertised coffee. Once I'd had a cup of coffee, I got up the nerve to try asking directions in Japanese. Funny how pointing to a picture of ... read more