Kaiganji
Kaiganji (海岸寺)
To find a place like this, and dwell there for an hour or so without seeing another soul, not far from the center of Tokyo, with 13+ million people within an hour of your location, is utter bliss.
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Posts tagged buddhist
Ryoanji (龍安寺)
Ryōan-ji (龍安寺) – Kyoto, Japan
There is something unzenlike in a place like this when it is crowded with tourists, especially talking tourists. That said, I had always been underwhelmed by photos of Ryoanji, but I found actually being there to be quite amazing. Maybe it was just because it was humid, a million degrees, and one can view the rock garden from the shade. In any event, photos don’t do it justice, but try to get there when you can be alone (like I was able to at Ninnaji) if you can for best results.
Temple Town (寺町)
Higashiyama Walking Course (Takayama, Japan)
Tokyo temples on New Year’s Eve
Ryochoin (亮朝院) on New Year’s Eve
Most temples and shrines in Japan will have some sort of relatively low-key event planned for this evening. Unlike summer festivals, New Year’s Eve in Japan is usually celebrated by watching TV at home (maybe in part due to the temperature outside). However, most people will head out for Hatsumode (初詣) tomorrow or soon thereafter rather than participate in the ritual just after the stroke of midnight.
Today’s photo comes from the afternoon of New Year’s Eve 2009. We didn’t stick around our neighborhood Ryochoin to see what happened there. Instead, we went to the balloon release on the other side of Tokyo, an event that no longer happens. Ryochoin is decorated in New Year’s garb in today’s photo. For what it normally looks like, click here.
Ninnaji’s South Garden (仁和寺の南庭) panorama
Photomerge of Ninna-ji’s South Garden
Kyoto, Japan
When I lived in Japan in the 1980s I didn’t get the chance to travel outside of the Tokyo and Yamanashi area. I purchased a set of postcards at the time and looked at them often. Probably half or more were from Kyoto. The only two scenes in these twenty or so postcards that I actually saw in person in the 1980s were Mt. Fuji and a Shinkansen.
Fast forward 25 years, and I was riding a bike through Kyoto stopping at any place that looked interesting without any prior research. I ended up at the entrance gate for Ninnaji and payed 500 yen. After walking around the grounds I felt a bit ripped off. Just before leaving I saw someone hand their admission ticket to a man and enter a building so I followed suit. Moments later I realized that my 500 yen was well spent. This was one of the scenes from one of those postcards I had looked at so fondly decades before! Not only that, but the place was mostly empty. Occasionally another person would wander in and gasp at the beauty of the South Garden (dantei) before heading back out, but for the most part this was my garden to meditate in by myself.
Buddha beanies
Buddha statues fitted with unique beanies @ Miyajima’s Daishoin