Kyoto and Kobe

We wound up getting to Kyoto an hour earlier than we expected, arriving at five in the morning rather than six. Nothing was opening until seven at the earliest, so Isaac and Margalit decided to go ahead and take the train back to Kobe and the ship. Zack, Lauren and I hung out in the lobby of a hotel for awhile, which actually turned out well because we could ask the reception desk about places to see. We got a coffee when the Starbucks opened at seven, then bought a five dollar bus pass for the entire day and headed off.

We decided to walk to the Kiyomizo Temple. On the way, we noticed another shrine and went ahead and entered it. It was completely empty so we just walked back, and discovered a local cemetery. We explored it quietly, it was different than an American cemetery because instead of flowers they had things written on wooden boards that surrounded the graves.

We had to walk up a hill to the temple but were rewarded in the end with a spectacular view of the city. The temple site itself was incredible, it had a pagoda and several other structures painted in vivid orange and white, contrasting with the natural wood. The temple was originally built in the 600s AD, impossible for me to grasp.

I stopped at a bathroom there and was forced for the first time to use a Japanese style toilet. It is basically just a recession in the floor and you have to squat down to pee. It was a very awkward experience.

We walked around the temple area and saw some other SASers, a few of which had purchased Samarai swords. I’m not sure if they were allowed on the ship, but nevertheless it was an interesting purchase. The street leading up to the temple was lined with shops, several of which sold mochi, which is rice dough that holds some sort of paste in the middle, not unlike a dumpling. The traditional ones have red bean paste in them. A lot of these places had free samples, so we took advantage of the chance to try several varieties, including banana flavored and chocolate ones. Also in this area I saw a woman scraping up gum from the entrance to her store—I knew the Japanese were clean but I had never seen that sort of dedication before.

We continued walking into the Gion district, which is known for being a traditional Japanese area. While we were probably too early for geishas, we loved walking the narrow streets that had hidden areas of beauty tucked in every once in awhile. We came to the Yasaka Temple and Chionin Shrine, which were both beautiful ancient constructions, and we enjoyed exploring them. I was surprised to find out that the symbol for temples is the same as the swastika symbol used by the Nazi’s—it made me wonder if they chose that symbol purposefully to somehow link themselves with a divine power.

We took a bus to the Kyoto Imperial Palace. Kyoto used to be the capital of Japan and the Japanese protected their emperor heavily. There were three main palaces in a huge garden complex that only had a handful of entrances, and then the palaces themselves were protected by high wooden walls also with few places to enter. Like the palace in Tokyo, we were not able to go inside, but we got a feeling for the power of the Japanese ruler just by walking around the area.

On the way to the bus stop, we were lured in by a small bakery that had mouth-watering treats. Even though they weren’t technically Japanese, we were too tempted and had to buy them, especially since the baker was bringing them out fresh from the kitchen. It reminded me of one of the things I learned about Japan on the ship, that they had a unique capacity to take desirable elements from other countries and adopt them for their own country while still maintaining the essence of Japanese culture.

We made it to the bus and tried to visit the Ryoanji Temple, only to find out that it was closed. So we got back on the bus to go to an onsen, or traditional Japanese bath, that we had found out about from the hotel that morning. It was a long bus ride and we were all pretty tired by that point so Lauren fell asleep on the shoulder of an old Japanese lady. I didn’t realize it until I had to wake her up at our stop, but when I apologized to the lady she just gave a friendly smile.

Once at the onsen, we had to take off our shoes and store them in lockers. We then entered the female-only locker room where we left our clothes before we could go into the hot springs area. They had an outside part and an inside part, each of them had about five pools of different temperatures. The outside part also had a flat marble slab area on the ground with a headrest where you could relax on your back and cool off, it was really nice. They also had a sauna which was so hot I couldn’t stay for more than a couple minutes. Both the sauna and the inside area had TVs showing Japanese soap operas which some of the ladies were watching transfixed.

It was definitely strange at first being naked with so many people around, but eventually I got over the fact and became content and relaxed. It was really the perfect final thing to do in Kyoto because we were all so tired from a lack of sleeping and so much walking.

We took the bus back intending to head to Kobe but accidentally took our transfer bus the wrong way. Luckily, we were in an area with lots of shops and restaurants so we stopped at a place that looked good. The first floor was full so we went up to the second floor which was more traditional, and the waitresses walked around in kimonos and we had to take off our shoes. Zack and Lauren ordered sushi but I didn’t want to try to match the perfection of the night before so I ordered an eggplant tofu dish that ended up being ridiculously amazing. I don’t even really like tofu or eggplant! But the seasoning was great.

We all talked about our experiences in Japan while having our final dinner; it was just one of those meals that you look back on happily. We were right next to the window so we had a view of the river, and just savored the food and the company.

We asked someone at a local ice cream shop how to get to the train station, and she was nice enough to lead us directly to the bus stop. That was another thing that I realized about Japan, that everyone went out of their way to be helpful even when they did not necessarily speak English. We definitely did a lot of charades to try and communicate, and most of the time we could figure each other out.

After another incredible day, we took the train back to Kobe to meet the ship. We arrived a little after 11 and planned to walk to the ship from the train station without realizing that it was more than a half hour walk away. We power walked to fight the cold, wind, and exhaustion, and finally arrived back to the MV Explorer around midnight.

After an extremely deep sleep, I had breakfast on the ship and went out to leisurely explore Kobe with two sisters from Puerto Rico. We walked to an area that had several shops and a small amusement park where I got to see lots of adorable kids. I wandered off on my own after lunch because I wanted to check out a Japanese grocery store and get back to the ship pretty soon. I’ve decided I like going to grocery stores in other countries because it gives insights about daily life that you can’t get from tourist places. Plus it’s fun to try and figure out what everything is since it’s written in an incomprehensible language.

I returned by train to the ship, checked back in, turned in my passport, and soon we were off. I absolutely cannot believe that we will be in China in two days, I know that I will definitely still be processing my amazing trip through Japan. But I am excited about what is to come, especially since I did Japan independently and it turned out so fantastic!