Kyoto: Day 2

Picture of the Day: Taken by Baptiste called Into the Light

 

Panorama of Kamogawa River in Kyoto

Lion Leads the Way

Japanese nicknames are pretty straightforward sometimes.  Baptiste met Lion drinking the night before in a bar.  He’s named lion for his large mane-like hairdo and he offered to take us around to see some modern architecture in Japan.  He explains that he used to study architecture for two years and has recently changed his major to industrial engineering.  Unfortunately, we’re not really sure about his ability and/or taste in architecture and he ends up kind of showing us some lame buildings and taking up a large chunk of day 2.  But oh well, he was nice enough to take time out of his day to show us some new Tadao Ando buildings, so we really can’t complain.  Jacob was kind of bored the whole time since he’s the only one in the group who’s not an architect and I can tell he would much rather go look at graffiti around the city. 

Tadao Ando Hunting

The day starts with an amazing ride along the major river in Kyoto.  Weather.com said that Friday and Saturday would have a 90% chance of rain and as you can see in the pictures, we were blessed with beautiful slightly cloudy skies.  Travelling in the group is a bit of a slow process though.  Halfway through, Jacob runs out of memory for his camera and we end up having to go to a store so he can pick up a new card.  Sometimes he will stop to take a picture of a tag or graffiti and I can tell he is a little annoyed that none of us are as interested and just ride off, but that our group stops at buildings to ogle and take pictures for extended periods of time.  I understand that did kind of suck for him, sorry Jacob.

Geisha Spotting in Kyoto’s Gion District

While randomly weaving through the streets of Gion district, we serendipitously run smack dab into real bona fide geishas.  Gion is famous for having the strongest lasting authentic geisha traditions and practices today in all of Japan.  We spot three geishas off in the distance and us, being the shameless tourists that we were, run and take pictures indiscreetly a few storefronts away.  They probably did not appreciate it very much, but oh well.  They’re like an endangered species!  Checks off* see real geisha off to do list of Japan.  They were actually right outside this large mostly windowless building which Lion could best describe as a geisha training center.  I am still curious about how much a dinner with a geisha would be.

Kiyomizu-otera by Night

Kiyomuzu-otera was one temple that came highly recommended by many people in our youth hostel.  It was also one of the temples from one of the postcards I had bought on the first day and it did look quite amazing.  It’s built sticking out of a hill and is lifted high into the sky with a large wooden support system.  We were told the best time to really view the temple was at night so we went through some smaller temples until it started to get dark.  The area surrounding Kiyomizu is an expansive system of shops and restaurants and weaves and winds up and around the foothills of the mountain Kiyomizu is fitted into.  It was both true and untrue that the best time to visit Kiyomizu was at night.  The view was truly spectacular but everyone else in Kyoto knew this also and decides to all go at night at the same time.  So this temple is grand and great but the massive crowds of people really detracts from the experience and takes out the solemn and peaceful feeling that temples like Kiyomizu are supposed to elicit.  So it was a double edged sword (ha, yes Henry).  There were also these strange giant spotlights all over the temple as if it needed to attract any more people.  Later I found Axel and he showed me pictures he had taken of people crowded around the edge taking pictures of the view and it looked very comical.  But I did my due diligence, fought my way to the front of the crowd, held my ground, propped my elbows up in a defensive position, took about 50 pictures on every high ISO setting on my camera and came out of with some decent pictures.  Later we sort of lose Laura, and in two groups of two, we slowly narrow in on her position until we finally find her in between.   It turns out she had walked back to the bikes (about a 20 min walk) and back and couldn’t find us, woops. 

10:30 PM and Homeless in Kyoto

So because the youth hostel we stayed at the night before was full on Saturday night we had no choice but to go on the road.  So we retrieved our things and we made our way into the heart of Kyoto.  We were somewhat prepared for this since we knew we didn’t really have a place to stay this night and Baptiste could not find a hotel on Saturday on such short notice.  In one of my first weeks here, we met a guy who told us he was staying in an internet café.  He highly recommended it if we were looking for a cheap place to stay and were in a large city.  We met all those criteria and as of 10:30 PM we were still homeless in Kyoto. 

Internet… Café… hostel?

So go to two internet cafes before deciding to settle down.  Apparently, this is a very normal thing in Japan and internet cafes are open 24 hours, 7 days a week and expect many of their guests to stay overnight.  They offer many accommodations including “rooms” for 1, 2, 3 or 4 people.  I say “rooms” because they’re not really rooms, more like cubicles.  There is one large room with 30 foot ceilings and rows of cubicles of different sizes.  Each are equipped with either a single recliner, massage chair or Japanese style tatami mat and a computer or television.  Other rooms for multiple people have couches and multiple TV’s and computers for more people.  It does cost a little extra for the larger rooms for more people (about 5 bucks).  Other accommodations include two walls of manga, magazines and books, a small slot machine area, an unlimited drink bar stocked with sodas, juices, teas, coffees, Italian syrups and even corn soup (I had like 4 cups), a bathroom, and a single shower that comes with personal soap, towel and even a little individually wrapped razor like a hotel.  The center of the large room also had an awesome glass bottom floor with a Japanese rock garden underneath and the room was filled with strange posters of food.  The room is dimly lit but each room is provided with its own light and pretty much everything you need including slippers.  So each cubicle really was like its only little mini hotel room.  I did spot some couples around and I assume couples might use internet cafes as a kind of cheap hotel room, although it is a bit awkward since there is only a sort of false sense of privacy and everyone can still hear noises.  But there is also a calm track of classical piano music playing on constant repeat.  At first the music is relaxing, but after a few hours of hearing it, it begins to get a little eerie and the fact that the room never changes in light or sound makes it really surreal.  Without a watch, you can really lose yourself in that place with no sense of the outside world.  The room I chose was a single with a massage chair and a TV.  It was a good idea at first cause I enjoyed a very nice massage for about 45 minutes but I later found out the hard way that sleeping on a massage chair is actually a very uncomfortable thing.  And though I didn’t sleep too well that night, the shower was warm, the soup was hot and I’m glad I’ve tried an internet café at least once.

Panorama of Kyoto at Sunset