In praise of shadow: Kozanji Temple

This is Kozanji Temple, surrounded by the rich nature.
You can enjoy with the light and nature through the openwork.
Location by Google Map

Yamasaki

In the oak wooden barrels is aging molt whiskey. The whiskey is Yamasaki(山崎), 12 years, 18 years and 25 years. I like to savor the 18 years one with excellent aroma.

Yamasaki is the place-name, on outskirts of Kyoto and is famous for its water. Yamasaki also has Taian, the only remaining teahouse built by Senno Rikyu, one of the great founders of the tea ceremony.
Location by Google Map

A path to...

This is a narrow path surrounded by bamboos.
Occasional mild breeze brings us the lisp of bamboo leaves.
This sound is just an overture to the rhythm of the nature...
Location by Google Map

Maiko again

She is so called maiko. She is about to pay the neighborhood a courtesy call. It is in the middle of summer but she wears several kimono. As maiko builds up her experience, she with kimono doesn't break a sweat at all even outside in hot summer.



This is name card that some maiko gave me. It is very small and nice card.
Location by Google Map

A spotless garden: Shisendo Temple

This is a garden early in the morning and people sweep clean by bamboo broom every morning. After sweeping, a garden is also lightly marked with striped patterns which add a transitory beauty. But that spotless patterns can easily change into visitor's footprints just after opening a garden.

People in Kyoto are quite happy to make even temporary things clean, like the artistic arrangement of the food in Japanese cuisine.
Location by Google Map

A sensu: portable paper fan

This is my paper fan, called Sensu. Paper funs have five purposes.
1. It is used just to wave it in one's face when it is hot
2. Japanese traditional comedian playing Rakugo, comic storytelling, use it while playing.
3. It is used at tea ceremony. It is put on tatami mat just in front of her/him to respect a host/hostess.
4. It is used at Japanese dance to make the dancer elegant.
5. It is used at Japanese noodle shop to wave it over the noodle bowl and to make too hot noodle cool. So without it, you cannot be allowed to enter the shop, unfortunately. When a person next to you put pepper powder on the noodle, never wave it! If you wave it, the pepper powder slip in one's nose and they cannot stop sneezing. That makes often fighting each other. If you hear the sound of sneezing in a noodle shop, be careful! Just after someone is sneezing, the fighting will happen! (No.5 is a totally joke;-)

Um....It's not funny?
Anyway, I don't have a sensu of joke:-)

Kawa-doko: an extended balcony

They are extended balconies to the river, Kamo river, only in summer. The balconies over the river are less hot than roads covered with asphalt. They are one of the most popular spots in Kyoto. They belong to the restaurant and are only for dining. The fee is a little expensive.
Location by Google Map

Tiny sign board: Ponto-cho, Kyoto

This is one of the most popular areas in Kyoto and many small houses and restaurants are lined along a narrow path.

Unlike a flood of flashy sign boards in Tokyo, sign boards here are very small. Also, the facade, made of wooden, is very simple. Its simplicity is just like modern architecture though it is rather old.

at Ponto-cho, Kyoto
Location by Google Map

The source of the tasty: near Kifune Shrine, Kyoto

Kyoto is surrounded by mountains, full of nature, on three sides and has rich water.

Japanese cuisine in Kyoto is delicious since it has a lot of mineral water. Water is very important element of Japanese cuisine. Clean and fresh water make tofu and sake delicious.

near Kifune Shrine, Kyoto
Location by Google Map

The verdant green

Maple leaves in verdant green is one of the most beautiful natural elements in Kyoto, although there are tons of people in cherry and autumn season.

at Kyoto
Location by Google Map

Roots: Todaiji Temple, Nara

The roots tightly take hold of the earth to suck the nutrition through and their line looks like muscle or blood vessel.

at Todaiji Temple, Nara
Location by Google Map

A typical scenery in Kyoto: Gion, Kyoto

This is the ordinary scenery in Kyoto. On the facade of the second floor are hung a sudare, a Japanese traditional blind.

It shut out the view and the sunlight inside, and makes the wind get through it. Also it can protect shoji, a paper sliding door, a tatami mat and byobu, folding screen, against the sunlight.

Sudare has been made of ashi, a kind of strew, mainly planted in the Biwa Lake near Kyoto. But now the material is becoming less because less people reap ashi and the shore of Biwa Lake is being developed. So the material is mainly imported from China and Taiwan.

Seen from the outside, the sudare hide the window and it make the facade feel simpler and more elegant.

at Gion, Kyoto
Location by Google Map

Fortunes: Kyoto

The paper is called as Omikuji, the paper fortune.

You can get it at most shrines and it costs about 100JPY. After drawing the fortune, it should be tied on the branch of trees or the rope in a shrine.

The results are four kinds: excellent luck, middle luck, luck and badness. The excellent luck means best and badness means worst.

Of these four results, the excellent luck is the most and the badness the less. So if you happen to draw the badness, you can also be lucky because it is the less categories and you hardly draw it.

at Kyoto
Location by Google Map

A narrow path: Kyoto

Walking through this path excites me because I don't know how the next scenery is. This is just like a giant maze and a path in old city of Europe.

Plus, the wooden fences softly surround people walking along.

in the city of Kyoto
Location by Google Map

Another aspect in Ryoanji Temple

This is Ryoanji Temple, quite famous for Zen Garden.

This temple has also several trees with beautiful green next to main garden and velvety moss along a path to a pond.

at Ryoanji Temple, Kyoto
Location by Google Map

An ornament on the top of pagoda: Mii-dera Temple, Kyoto

This is a top of a pagoda.

Several layers of metal rings and some ornaments are put on the top.

This is originally for not soaking inside the roof through the joint on the top. The ornament was made as a water and for keeping the pagoda from the thunder and the fire.

at Mii-dera Temple, Kyoto
Location by Google Map

A clear sky: Mii-dera Temple, Kyoto

This is in winter, when the air contains less humidity and you can see the scenery more clearly. Morning in winter is best to watch buildings carefully.

at Mii-dera Temple, Kyoto
Location by Google Map

The beauty of roofs: Todaiji Temple, Nara

This is roofs in Todaiji Temple, Nara.

Sunlight changes black or gray tile roof into the white.

Whether or not if a building feels elegant depends largely on the shape of the roof.

Roofs is basically for avoiding the rain and wind inside buildings, but roofs in Japanese architecture contain the elegant beauty of curves, which is one of the most fascinating things.

at Todaiji Temple, Nara
Location by Google Map

A window: Zuiho-in, Daitokuji, Kyoto

This is a window in a teahouse.

The mild light comes into the room through a filter of thin paper, shoji, and lattice of bamboo and ashi, just like a reed.

The whiteness of thin paper is remarkably contrasted with the black of the lattice shadow on a screen of thin paper. Thin paper makes the light mild and the light makes the lattice silhouetted.

This window is not only for taking in the light, but also enjoying the light through the thin paper and the lattice.

at Zuiho-in, Daitokuji
Location by Google Map

Misedashi-the ceremony for becoming a maiko(geisha-in-training): Gion, Kyoto

She makes her round of many ochayas, the exclusive teahouse, in Gion with a man, telling them that she will become a geisha.

Looking at her neck carefully, you can see two white ridges. That style of making up means that the ceremony is very formal.

Her shoes, okobo, is 11-centimeter-high elevated clogs and a little bell is in the hollow at the heal. So the bell rings as she takes steps.

at Gion, Kyoto
Location by Google Map

Beyond the time: Horyuji Temple, Nara

This is a part of Horyuji Temple, the oldest temple in Japan. This building was built more than 1,200 years ago, and repaired about 800 years ago.

I love to look at the ornament on the top of the roof over the wall behind the sky, thinking, for a minute, how people felt to look at this "hi technology structure" in those days.

at Horyuji Temple, Nara
Location by Google Map

Dark stairs: Todaiji Temple, Nara

This is stairs to a building, Nigatsu-do, Todaiji Temple, Nara.

With low roofs, it is a little dark, in marked contrast to the great view from the terrace of the building led by the stairs.

The stairs are the overture to the grandeur vista.

at Nigatsu-do, Todaiji Temple, Nara
Location by Google Map

Natural stairs: Murouji Temple, Nara

In the middle of the cedar trees is a flight of stairs.

The stairs are quite intimate with the natural surroundings.

That's because the long time made the artificial close to the nature.

Murouji Temple, Nara
Location by Google Map

A small garden: Zuiho-in, Daitokuji Temple Complex, Kyoto

This is an small garden in a Zen Temple.

The garden is covered with white raked gravel.

It is said that white gravel shows the ocean and stones show the rocked in the ocean.

Without the gravel and stones, this small space would be an useless space, but with them, the space changes the imaginary ocean and the veranda along it become a space to contemplate.

at Zuiho-in, Daitokuji Temple Complex, Kyoto
Location by Google Map

Neither the inner nor the outer: Daitokuji Temple, Kyoto

This is an entrance of a subtemple, Daitokuji Temple.

When you enter the inside, you can instantly see the outside, the inner court.

In Japanese architecture the boundary between the inner and the outer tends to be unclear, and that means the they can take natural surroundings into the buildings.

at Daitokuji, Kyoto
Location by Google Map

Invisible skill: Daitokuji, Kyoto

This is an entrance of a subtemple in Daitokuji.

This photo is quite normal, but looking at the floor carefully, flat stones are paved very closely each other just like a jigsaw puzzle.

The pave does not seem to be so old, and the surprising thing is that the pavement is quite even although their size and thick are different.

I suppose that the foundation will be very firm.

This is the fruit of the unknown skillful artisans.

Daitokuji Temple, Kyoto
Location by Google Map

So many tiles, so many textures: Sanjusangendo, Kyoto

The black tiles are lying on the roof just like scales of a fish or a snake.

The old tiles were completely handmade, and each of them has a slightly different color and texture.

They are more tasteful as time goes by, because they are not identical. If they are completely the same color and texture, they would turn to be dirty and poor as time passes.

The slightly inequality adds the richness and complexity to it.

at Sanjusangendo, Kyoto
Location by Google Map

Biggest gate: Chion-in, Kyoto

This is the biggest temple's gate in Japan, 24 meters in height, 50 meters in width and 50,000 tile roofs.

Over the gate are a flight of stairs, leading to the main temple.

Passing through the gate and going up the stairs will lead you another world of Buddhism.

Chion-in, Kyoto
Location by Google Map

Shrubs and stones: Entsuji Temple, Kyoto

This is a garden in Entsuji Temple.

The shrubs are trimmed roundly like stones.

The stones have some stripe pattern and are partly covered with moss.

The shrubs are like stones and the stones are like shrubs.

Entsuji Temple, Kyoto
Location by Google Map

An irregular stone: Katsura Imperial Villa, Kyoto

This is an entrance of a building at Katsura Imperial Villa, famous for elegant villa more than 300 years ago.

At a glance of it, this stone is quite irregular and doesn't seem to be suitable for the entrance. But using that kind of stones at the entrance, or the end of the path, it draws attention to the visitors and helps avoid much plainness.

Katsura Imperial Villa have more irregular stones than any other villas or temples and the stones were gathered from all over the entire Japan.

This insensible device, made by much efforts and time, is one of the most remarkable features in Katsura Imperial Villa.

at Katsura Imperial Villa, Kyoto
Location by Google Map

The collaboration of sunlight and leaves: Daitokuji Temple, Kyoto

This is a part of paths in Daitokuji Temple, noted for Zen garden.

It is surrounded by the trees and feels quiet and comfortable.

The width of the path and the height of the trees roughly shut out the sunlight, and it makes the path pleasant.

Leaves shut out the sunlight, make the nicely shade and give out color of green.

This is the beauty collaborated the sunlight and leaves.

at Daitokuji Temple, Kyoto
Location by Google Map