Day 4 – Kyoto

Kinkakuji was a beautiful Zen temple that showed different types of architecture on each level of the temple. This temple was different than the others because you could not get to close or inside like other temples that we have visited. It was beautiful sitting on the pond, but I was sad to find out that it had been burnt down several times during a war.

Nijo Castle was unlike any other castle that I have ever seen before. I was expecting a lot of fancy furniture, artwork, gems, and overall lavish pieces. I was shocked to find that the castle was mostly empty and did not have anything that I previously thought the castle would have. This was a huge culture shock to me because it was nothing like I thought it would be. The castle-like building in the USA is the opposite and opposite of castles that I have seen in Italy and German.

Day 3 -Kyoto

The Fushimi Inari Shrine was breath taking. There thousands of torii gates that create a trail. I would have given anything to be able to walk this trail alone. It was peaceful and beautiful. The thousands of torii are dedicated to the God of rice. Foxes were seen all around the shrine because they believed to be messages. I thought this shrine was very different than the previous shrines that we have seen.

I was stunned by the beauty of the Otowa Waterfall. You had to decide which stream to drink from, health, success in school, or love. You could not drink from all three or that would be greedy. You must follow the same steps to purify yourself as I talked about in Day 2. I decided to drink from the health stream.

The most significant cultural difference I saw today was how visitors rented and dressed up in kimonos. I could not think of anywhere else were people emission themselves into the culture by dressing in the traditional formal attire.

Day 2- Nara

I started the day by waking up very early! This ended up working out very nicely because I was able to organize myself and prepare for the day. I was very excited to visit Nara! When I got there, I was overtaken about the beauty of Nara. I was hard to believe I was standing in Japan. The groups first stop was the Todaiji temple. This temple is the worlds largest wooden building. The next stop was the Kasuga Taisha shrine. From visiting these two places, I noticed many differences between temples and shrines. This was very different because, in the United States, we do not have many temples and shrines. Shrines had many bells that people would ring to call God’s. Shrines also had many torli, which is a gate between this world and the world of the Gods. I really enjoyed going to see the shrines and learned what they represented.

I enjoyed learning about the chozuya were you purify yourself before entering the main shrine. There were strict steps in how you purify yourself. First, you pour water onto your left hand and switch to purify your right. After your hands are clean, you fill your right hand with water and drink the water. The process felt odd at first but soon became very cleansing. I enjoy going through this process and purifying myself.

Day 1-Flight

Started the day by waking up bright and early at 4:30 am! It was surprisingly busy for being so early in the morning. Everything went smoothly, and I was on the way to Seattle! This flight(6hr) was tight and long, but overall went smoothly, and I was able to get some assignments done for school. We landed at the start off to your next gate. When I boarded, I was happy to learn that I had the who row to myself, which was great because this was an 11-hour flight! I was productive for a while, but I needed some sleep! I curled up into a ball and got a decent amount of sleep. I was able to finish the rest of a paper before it got bumpy! It had been a smooth flight until about the last hour. We circled the airport waiting for the weather to change but no such luck. During this hour, we were stuck in very bump conditions. I have never been air sick until today. The captain took us to another airport close by. Most of the plane was sick by now. We were waiting inside the airplane for about three hours waiting for the weather to clam. Another 45 flight back to the airport and we finally arrived. I very severely inadequate attempted to use the ATM to get some Yen, but I was so exhausted it was tough to figure out the exchange rate and how to use the actually ATM. After everyone in the group either exchanged or used the ATM, we got in line to take a bus. A bus ride to the city was about an hour, and then we had arrived at our hotel! The same situation that happened with the ATM was now repeating itself with the light switches and A/C in my hotel room. I got so on edge with the fact that I could not figure it out. I gave up and fell asleep in bed without even getting under the covers.