鹿苑寺金閣屋上の鳳凰像

A close up shot of the golden phoenix on the top of Kinkakuji in Kyoto…

Posted on March 25th, 2009 under Japan. Tags: japan pictures, kyoto, 金閣寺. Comments Off on Kinkakuji’s golden phoenix

“When a Japanese person tells you that Kyoto, the former capital, is a “beautiful” city, he does not mean that, if you climbed Mount Hiei and looked down at its roofs, you would be struck–as you would be by Florence from Fiesole or Oxford from the tower of the University Church–by a sense that the whole was magically greater than the sum of its parts. When you view Kyoto from any point of vantage, such as the elevated platform where the bullet train deposits you, its ugliness can make you weep. Its tangled, utility-cabled skyline is indistinguishable from that of any other Japanese city of comparable size, and every bit as jolting. The attractions of Japanese cities–if they have attractions–lie in what they contain, not in the prospect they present. Kyoto is “beautiful” because within it there are beautiful things; subtle, sometimes tiny details that resist the cacophony around them and may require a lifetime to unearth.” (Alan Booth in Looking for the Lost p. 53)

Posted on March 24th, 2009 under Japan. Tags: alan booth, kyoto. Comments: 2

Prices have been reduced to $12 an issue + a flat $3 shipping no matter how many issues you purchase. Audio cassettes (when available) are an extra $5 each. If your address is outside of the U.S. shipping will be higher.

Email me if interested.

Posted on March 23rd, 2009 under Japan. Tags: nihongo journal. Comments: 5

This Bodhisattva may not look that large without someone standing next to it, but it is huge. The Ryozen Kannon is set in the eastern hills of Kyoto and weighs over 500 tons. It is over 80 feet tall. This war memorial was completed in 1955. Soil samples from wherever soldiers in WWII were killed are housed inside the memorial.

Posted on March 22nd, 2009 under Japan. Tags: buddhist, japan pictures, kyoto. Comments: 1

This probably isn’t a real geisha. I saw her on the streets of Kyoto and asked to take her picture. She was likely a tourist who paid to get dressed and made up like a geisha (or more correctly a geiko or maiko since Kyoto has a different term than that commonly used outside of Japan). I should have asked her, but I felt that may be a bit rude.

Posted on March 21st, 2009 under Japan. Tags: geisha, japan pictures, kyoto. Comments: 2