Adventures in Japan - Kyoto
Onto Stage 4 of our tour of Japan and we reach a place that kick-started my fascination with the country – Kyoto!
As a recap, our tour started in Tokyo, moved to Takayama in the Japanese Alps, took in some of the historic Nakasendo Way and now we’ve reached Kyoto.
Following a couple of nights in ryokans I must admit the thought of an actual bed and being able to choose what we ate sounded like luxury! We were fairly late arriving in, so once we’d dropped off the bags we headed straight out to eat. We decided it had been a long time since pizza and by chance one of the places considered the best in Kyoto was literally around the corner from us – I can officially tell you that parmesan tastes incredible if you’ve not had cheese for a while!!
Our first full day in Kyoto was mightily improved by the services of our private guide, Akie. She suggested we focus on the northwestern section of the city, starting at Nijo-Jo Castle. The castle is Edo period and very grand, with an especially decorative entrance and, similar to castles all over, you start with the receiving areas and then move into the private quarters. The guy who had it built was a Shogun for the area and was clearly pretty paranoid, as the reception rooms all have 'nightingale' floors, so as you're walking along they creak, but in a very deliberate and quite musical way; they also had hidden panels where guards would be concealed – both elaborate ways of foiling a surprise ninja attack!
From there we caught a bus to Daitoku-ji, a large area dedicated to Zen Buddhism, with lots of wonderful gardens and a great bonsai display. It was certainly a relaxing space and I imagine a tea ceremony there would be very peaceful. In stark contrast we followed this up with lunch at a very popular okonomiyaki (Japanese-style pancakes), place called Dainoji. It’s DIY, so each table has a hot plate and once you've ordered they bring the ingredients to you in a bowl, you mix it all up, pour it onto the hot plate and then they put a 3 minute timer on. The fun starts when you have to flip them! Super-tasty, I highly recommend.
Next we caught a bus to Kinkaku-ji, known for the famous Golden Pavilion, covered with over 200,000 gold leaves - over 20kgs of gold. It's fair to say it was impressive but my mind had already turned to our next stop, as we headed to the Gion District for our meeting with a maiko (apprentice Gaiko which is the correct term for geisha). This is something I've wanted to do for years and it didn't disappoint at all. Fukusei was 17 – she didn’t speak English (except for ‘Harry Potter!’ when she found out we were from the UK) so Akie was vital to ask her questions. She served us tea and danced for us and we probably asked all the typical questions about her life, the clothes, what she missed about ‘normal’ life as maiko stay in their designated houses and don’t have mobiles or spend time with other friends outside their close-knit group – it was a genuinely fascinating experience and a real privilege to meet her. Akie then took us through the Gion district before we headed back to Central Kyoto via the Nishiki market, which is half food, half general shops and completely packed with locals and tourists alike.
On our second full day we headed to Fushimi-Inari Taisha, an incredible shrine famous for quite literally thousands of torii that go all the way up Mount Inari. It's yet another place that takes your breath away for the sheer scale. There are lots of people at the start but the gates continue for 4kms, so if you do the loop, as we did, you will eventually get a chance to video/photo without anyone in shot. Plus you’ll have done countless steps and need some food and a lie-down!
On day three it was all about Rich as I had managed to get hold of some tickets for a sumo exhibition match! Sumo is only held at certain times of year in certain cities but they do occasionally have feature matches such as this one, so we just happened to get lucky. It’s a full day and you can go in and out, find something to eat or just stay and soak up the incredible atmosphere. Just after midday the lower league Rikishi came out to compete, so we got into it and got the hang of the ceremony as they face off – nothing is in English, so it helps if you have a bit of an understanding of what’s going on! That was followed by a comic performance that was very funny, two guys with universal slapstick – like a couple of rather large Chuckle Brothers…
After a bit more of a wait the top tier came out in their ceremonial garb, paraded around a bit and were introduced to the crowd who by now were waving banners. The crowd definitely got more involved at this point but it was still all very polite. I found it really interesting that there was a guy in the group who was originally from Ukraine, Shishi Masaru (not his original name!). They were all treated like rock stars, signing autographs and holding babies, as you do.
Our time in Kyoto was drawing to an end but this felt like the essence of Japan with sumo, golden temples, paranoid shogun castles and meeting a maiko – it was an epic few days!
Next up, we move onto the Kii Peninsula, a part of Japan that flies under the radar for many visitors – find out why we went there in the next instalment.
