This is going to take forever! Kyoto was an UNBELIEVABLE experience! We saw so much in 4 days that we need a serious vacation now. If you ever have the chance, we highly recommend visiting this city and seeing the history and beauty it has to offer. Let's begin...
We took the train quite a bit. The first time though, we broke the machine :) Not really - but we aren't sure why the employee came out and handed us our 1,000 yen back and told us to use a different machine.
Here is a picture of where you buy your ticket:
Going through the gates:
Can you tell we're from small towns that don't have subways!?
As soon as you stepped out from the train station, this is what you saw:
Our tour guide took us down the street about a mile, turned down another street and this is what you saw:
Tea houses! This is Gion Corner - where all the Maiko-san's work (i.e. Geisha's) - Here is one cleaning the doorway :)
Doesn't it look familiar - maybe you saw it in a movie somewhere....like "Memoirs of a Geisha"?? You did!
This is one of four "schools" that train Geishas (each has their own distinct lantern). More to come from here though, we went and saw a Maiko-san show on our last night:
They are serious about keeping this area beautiful!
This tea house is used for important events:
After Gion Corner we headed to the Maiko-san shrine. You can see some geisha's headed up the steps. The official title of the shrine is Chugenji Temple:
I thought this was funny - it is a shrine to pray that you don't get VD :)
Our tour guide was amazing! She loves Kyoto so much - she was praying to find a sugar daddy so she could move to Kyoto from Okinawa. You would throw your money in, ring the big bell and then pray.
Each of these lanterns has a maiko-san's name on it:
There was a pretty pond to meditate at:
Afterwards we started back towards the train. Notice the lanterns are the same ones as the school on Gion Corner?
This is a Kabuki theater - Japanese old style comedy:
This is a statue of the lady credited with founding the Kabuki style comedy - her name is unknown:
We saw geisha's heading to work!
As the sunset on our first day we could only just stop and stare at this beautiful city:
We ate at a sushi restaurant and found a really good beer - hopefully they carry it in Okinawa!
Get comfy...lots more pictures to come :)
3 comments:
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Jealous! You guys have such an awesome opportunity to visit places only some of us read about in textbooks. I love seeing all of the pictures!
I am so happy for both of you to see things you would probably never see. I miss you both and yes Michelle your hair is much better blonder.... Love you both and miss you both. Jan Yaya Mom
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