At the Kinkakuji Temple, Roley and I were stopped by this young girl who said she was a university student studying English and she wanted to take us on a tour of the Kinkakuji Temple. She took us around and told us about the history of the temple. The original temple was actually burnt down by a crazy monk and rebuilt after the 1950’s. 
She also told us about the small waterfall in the gardens surrounding the temple. The waterfall is actually a famous legend. The carp that swim in the pool of water below the waterfall have to aim to swim up the waterfall. If they make it to the top, they can become a dragon.
There was also a small pond near the temple. This pond was said to be very lucky because even in the droughts, the pond always holds water. It is never empty. She told us many interesting facts about the Kinkakuji Temple and it was good to have her as a guide. She had studied it and wanted to educate foreigners about the temple. We got a photo with her at the end of our tour.
Roley and I then made our way to the Zen Buddhism Rock Gardens.
They were really cool and I enjoyed sitting in front of the famous Rock Gardens which consists of fifteen rocks strategically placed in a small area surrounded by pebbles that are perfectly raked.
Simplicity is the key to Zen Buddhism and it was so simple, so perfect, yet so intriguing at the same time. I pondered over the rock garden for about twenty minutes trying to make sense of it all, and thought of about a thousand meanings to it. In the end, I came to no conclusions! I got more and more confused the more I thought about it!
At lunch, we met up with Megumi again and spent the rest of the day with her. She took us to the Kyomizu Temple.
We got a spectacular view of Kyoto from the top of the mountain and it was a beautiful day to be outside. I loved it! When we were about to leave, we saw some Japanese girls dressed up as Geisha.
They weren’t real Geisha, but in Kyoto, girls can pay to be dressed up as a geisha and walk around Kyoto so that people can see them looking beautiful - just like a porcelain doll. They really did look like little dolls. They looked so cool.
Roley and I took the last train home and didn’t get back until about 1:30am! We were so tired! There was a party at Shirasagi Residence when we got home as one of the Americans in our building, Mac, was having a party in his apartment. Roley and I ducked in for a while, Roley left early to go to bed, but I ended up partying on till 4:30am! I didn’t notice the time until I looked at my watch and my eyes nearly popped out of my head! It was a good night though! We met lots of cool Japanese people that night.
1 comment:
I can't wait to see the golden temple. It looked awesome.
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