Umeda Sky Building

This week I went with a few friends to the Umeda Sky Building in Osaka. My Japanese teacher told us about it a week ago; there's a German Christmas market in the plaza underneath the building at the moment and she very emphatically recommended the German beer.

First of all, though, we went up to the top of the north building of the JR Umeda station to see the sunset.

 The sky just suddenly turned golden as we were making our way up and it reflected in all of the buildings (everything's very reflective glass in that area). The big building on the right is the Sky Building.

 There was a small Christmas market offshoot outside the JR station, with mulled wine!!! I've never been a huge fan, but it was nice to drink something familiar and Christmassy. And warm. Lovely and warm (Winter has definitely arrived in Japan now, by the way).

THIS is the Sky Building. Looks like something out of Star Wars.

 The Christmas tree at the market, directly underneath the building.

 For such a swanky place, it has an... interesting English translation.

 This is the reflection of the Christmas tree's lights on the other side of one of the walkways. The market was full of lights and people, and then this side of the walkway is just an ordinary office building.

 When we bought our tickets for the viewing platform, they gave us a star each to write a wish on. Then you tie it to these larger stars on the windows. I don't know if there's a Shinto god that hangs about up top granting wishes, or if it's just a nice distraction from the fact that we didn't know we'd need to pay 700 yen to get in... But it was cute reading everyone's wishes, anyway.

 I tried to get some nice pictures, but my phone's camera doesn't quite to the city justice. It was really really beautiful. Just imagine that.

 The walkway was lit with different coloured stones, so it kind of felt like you were walking above small galaxies. This is the ribbon on my bag, lit up by the UV light.

 My favourite thing was watching the traffic and trains run across the bridges on the river.

If you're ever in Osaka, I really recommend this, only maybe not if you're afraid of heights! It's probably a good thing I don't live nearby, imagine if I could go up and do my homework in the cafe at the top every day -  I'd spend so much money... and I'd end up just staring out of the windows for hours... it would be a silly idea... (I'd still do it).

Autumn leaves, mostly

In the past two weeks I have tested the human limit of autumn leaf viewing and found that yes, it is possible to see too many. I was out with my ceramics class last Saturday, having just meandered around a temple and a shrine full of beautiful momiji trees (the kind that go especially pretty and red). We had reached the bicycle parking lot, it was 3pm and I still hadn't eaten. Surely now we could say our goodbyes, so I could jump on my bike and cycle home to the waiting instant corn soup and toast. Then our teacher pointed along another path and said,
"I heard that there's a temple with an especially beautiful autumn leaf garden just up this way."

And I swear I have never hated a plant more than in that moment.

Luckily I have also discovered that this is but a temporary feeling and the gorgeous reds, oranges, and yellows of the mountain you can see from the dorm still retain their charm. But I did reach a saturation point. My brother came to visit two weekends ago and we went to a couple of the most famous spots for autumn leaves, and I also went to a light up with a friend last week. I was perhaps slightly overdoing it.

But that DOES mean that I managed to get some pretty nice pictures. Here are a selection of photos from my adventures over the past couple of weeks:

 This is the highest shrine at the Fushimi Inari shrine complex. I really like the fox statue that's peeking out from behind the gate. According to Shinto, foxes are the messengers of the rice god (the god of Fushimi inari), so there are statues of foxes all over the place.
This shrine is known for having the most red torii (Shinto gates) of anywhere. They stand over a path that leads from the main complex up and around the mountain behind it, a walk that takes about 2 hours (a bit longer if you stop to have last night's take away for lunch half way...). The gates feel like a huge red corridor for a while, and if you go early in the morning you can get beautiful pictures of them without the hoardes of tourists that otherwise trample through. I wasn't going to take a nicer picture than some of the ones on google, so if you want to see it, google it :P
But I did want to take a picture of this little one balanced against a tree. It was about halfway round, so on the other side of the mountain to Kyoto, and a little off the main path. At the main shrine you can buy a small torii that is then hung with dozens of others in one of the many shrines that cover the mountain.

 Afterwards we went to eat parfait. This was very good parfait.

 Nevermind the autumn leaves, the pine trees look spectacular against autumn's blue skies.

 So like I said before, I went to a light-up at Koudai-ji. A light-up is where a temple opens up at night especially so that people can look at autumn leaves. They light the momiji trees and very little else.

 The sky was beautiful as we arrived.

 So. This. I guess Koudai-ji's special feature is this light-up zen garden. This autumn-themed picture has been laid across what I assume is usually a normal stone design. The lights changed to spotlights for different sections, and there were also different coloured lights involved. Watching the show, I couldn't help but feel a little like the temples were competing to have the most spectacular show. Kiyomizu-dera is all lit up and red, is it? You can see across the city from Kiyomizu-dera, can you? Well does Kiyomizu-dera have a light show? Does Kiyomizu-dera have a lit-up bamboo forest? I didn't think so!
(Koudai-ji also had a bamboo forest)

 After visiting the light-up, we walked back to town through Yasaka shrine. Maybe it was all the light-ups, but the way these lanterns looked in the night was especially appealing to me.

 So the reason I was hanging out with the ceramics class last Saturday was because we were going to a tea ceremony; our teacher explained that he wanted us to experience the purpose for the kind of pottery we're making. We were invited to a Japanese lady's very traditional house. This is the view from her living room to her garden:

 Sadly I forgot my camera, but we had the tea ceremony in a real tea ceremony room! They're very small, covered in tatami mat, and have a pot for boiling water built into the floor. The tea ceremony itself was really interesting. Afterwards we also gt to chat with the lady, who was really nice, and she let us explore her garden a little.

 Autumn leaves (obviously).

 Extra-bonus me with autumn leaves.

 I really like that her house is so traditional - and then there's the satellite dishes...

 When we were leaving we found this case that an insect must have shed, still clinging to the wall. It looked like a miniature ohmu from Nausicaa (the Studio Ghilbi film).

 After that, our teacher treated us all to a traditional Japanese sweet at a nearby cafe; it was some kind of barbecued mochi, and was delicious.

 Here's a dragon made out of bits of tree we found hanging on the notice board at Imamiya shrine, by the cafe.

 Oh, did you say more autumn  leaves?

 I also just wanted to share this picture from the top of Mt Hiei, which my brother and I climbed when he was here. You can get to the top by cable car, but the hike only took us about 2 and a half hours, and I really felt like we'd earned this view.

 Aaand one last thing. This is my best find at the local bakery yet. A mini tiger-bread-type roll filled with ham and camembert!

Sorry this post was a little all over the place. I'll update sooner next time!

Autumn happened

So... I've been up to a lot in the last couple of weeks. Not least mid-terms and a Japanese history presentation. But sticking to the more fun stuff, it's now autumn leaf season here in Kyoto! The tourists have descended upon us. It's really quite scary.

Kyoto's especially famous for how pretty the momiji trees are when their leaves turn red, and there are a lot of places you can visit that are famous for them. Even our university campus is full of them. My teachers have now all, at some point or another, speculated about when the peak viewing time will be and encouraged us to go out and see them. If it's like this now, I can't bear to think what will happen when Japan's favourite flowers, cherry blossoms, begin blooming...

Having said that, it all really is beautiful. The other day a friend and I took a detour on the way home through Myoshinji, the big temple complex close to campus that you can cycle through. The paths are made of stone, so it's not a comfortable cycle, but you can cycle. I rather enjoy the slight sense of sacrilege you feel doing it (not that we're that bad, I've seen people going through on motorcycles...). On the way, we stopped off at one of the little temples that has a special autumn opening so you can view the momiji in its garden. We payed 600 yen to get in, which we were slightly surprised about - the price seemed a bit steep just for seeing some pretty leaves. Then we had another look at the tickets and realised that we got matcha tea as well! We could see a couple of people standing in the building waiting to welcome us, so we went on in and they served us matcha tea and a Japanese sweet, to enjoy while sitting on a veranda overlooking a garden specially designed for autumn. It was quite sweet, because they were very quiet and formal when we first went in, but when we spoke a little Japanese to them, they broke out into smiles and enthusiastically showed us some of the gorgeous details on the sliding doors in the rooms.

 

Another fun thing I did was go to the monthly handicraft market at Chionji. There are loads of markets that happen on temple grounds in Kyoto, and this was a big one. Everything was really pretty, and I was quite proud when my friend was looking at a tea bowl on one of the ceramics stalls and asked me why I thought there was a spiral shape in the middle - I could tell her exactly why because of my ceramics class! (It's to catch the bitter powder that might be left over in the bottom, so you don't accidentally drink it. Would be useful in my cocoa mug too.)

 Speaking of ceramics, this is the view from one of the bridges we cross on the cycle to the class every Saturday. Every time we go, I wonder why I put myself through such torture (the cycle is about an hour and you have to go through a super touristy bit, very congested), and then we come across something like this, and the light is gorgeous because it's only 10 o'clock, and I forget all of my grumpiness.

 And these are my traditional tea bowl and tea cup - all that's left to do is paint them!

 On the way back I took a little detour, because I heard that there was a chrysanthemum exhibit at Nishi Honganji and it wasn't too far out of my way. I didn't realise they come in so many colours!

Lastly, I found myself with a spare couple of hours on my hands a couple of Sundays ago, so I took a walk to this lake that I'd spotted close by on the map. It's an easy walk, you go past a lot of lovely gardens and a bamboo forest. In the distance you can always see Arashiyama's mountains, and the leaves were just beginning to turn that day, so it was a very pretty view.

I'm set for a very touristy weekend with my brother, so expect some fun pictures from that next time!

 

Murasaki Shikibu's tomb

On Fridays we all finish class pretty early so one of my friends took a bunch of us to Murasaki Shikibu's grave. As you do on a Friday afternoon. (It was actually a perfect time to go, and great weather for cycling!)

Murasaki Shikibu is the noblewoman from the Heian period (roughly 1000 years ago) who wrote The Tale of Genji, which some say is the world's first novel. Having made it all the way through the1200-odd pages of the English translation, some kind of pilgrimage to her burial site seems quite apt. And it looked like a lot of people feel that way - although the site itself is hardly signposted, and it's pretty far from the usual tourist destinations, when we arrived there were some people just getting back into a taxi having visited, and another set were arriving as we left.

I didn't manage to get a picture of how it looks from the street, but imagine this: there are walls right along the pavement, not exactly forbidding but definitely blocking any view inside. These continue right down the street, but just here there's what looks like an alcove in the wall and this stone:

This says "Lady Murasaki's grave".
My friend pointed out that the berries on these plants are actually purple! (Murasaki means purple, or violet - it's used for amethyst). That's probably on purpose - even such tiny things are very thought-out here.

To get to the tomb, you just walk a few feet along the path next to the stone, under this tree (I'm not entirely sure what this fruit is...)

Then - there you are. Very little ceremony. On the same plot there's also another Heian-era noble buried, in a noticeably smaller tomb. I should mention here it has been suggested that it's a little strange that Shikibu would be buried in such an out-of-the-way place in relation to the Heian city centre, and especially that she would be buried next to someone from an entirely different family. Well... be that as it may, it's not like people are going to roll up to dig the tomb up and check, and I'm glad that a little place like this exists to visit.

This is the stone apparently explaining her life. It's... incomprehensible to me, if anyone can tell me what it says please do!

And this is her tomb. It has candles that people can light, and a place for flowers.

It was an interesting little excursion, and only about 20 minute's cycle from university. I know London has a very long history too, somaybe I'm just paying more attention here because it's all new and exciting, but I really love the way that in Kyoto you can just kind of stumble across the tomb of a 1000 year old author on the side of a busy street.

It's the university's festival this weekend so I'll write again soon with pictures of that!

Kobe

Today I went to visit some friends studying abroad at Kobe university. It's much easier to get to Kobe than I thought - there's something called the Hankyu line that goes to Osaka, where you can change super quickly to the Kobe branch. In the end it took just over an hour (and only 600 yen!).

I always really feel how packed together Japan is when I get the train. Whenever I get the train in the UK, London stops and it's all fields, interspersed with towns around each stop. But the area between Kyoto and Osaka is just more Kyoto and Osaka. They just kind of merge. Then when you turn right along the coast, there's no noticeable break between what's Osaka and what's Kobe. The only difference along that bit is that the habitable area is much smaller, so whereas the mountains are pretty far away going down to the sea, the view from the way to Kobe is pretty much all upward slope. And until the mountains get too steep, there are houses everywhere.

... anyway, Kobe!
My friends met me at the station and we went for a wander around the shopping district to Kobe's China town. It was much bigger and livelier than London's China town!

We didn't stop for food there because we were planning to have something more filling later, but I'd love to go back, because they have cute panda-decorated meat buns.

This is a cute little doorstop outside a restaurant. The rabbit was so small you might not even notice it walking along!

From China town we went wandering up to the old foreign district. This is a Chinese restaurant that we think used to be an embassy (maybe...?)

This is a building called 'Ben's House'. Apparently it's marked on a lot of the tourist maps. We're not sure who Ben was or why his house was so important, but apparently it's been there for over 100 years. So.

Just next door there was an old British embassy or something similar, and it's become a pub, also the Kobe Sherlock Holmes museum. That's pretty darn British.

On the way back down (Kobe has two directions: to the mountains, and to the sea. Makes it very easy to navigate) we came across the back of the big shrine in the shopping district. I think that this little one was for the god of rice - I heard that foxes are supposed to be the messengers of the god of rice, and there were these fox statues standing by the shrine.

 While we were eating the rain started coming down harder, so I couldn't get the panoramic view I was hoping for - this'll have to do for now (glorious weather):

So Kobe was really fun, a lovely break before the two (two!) exams I have this week. Hopefully I can go again on a clearer day!

And just quickly, a ceramics class update: I finished the tea cup and saucer I was working on! Here they are (I'm pretty pleased with them):