I was feeling particular lazy this morning for the first time since getting to Japan. I missed the morning service, hopefully I will make it tomorrow morning. We were in silence yet again for breakfast, and it seems I eat a lot quicker when I have no one to talk to. Meal times become much shorter. Right around 8:30 am, I wanted to ask Pao something instinctively, and forgot that we were practicing silence. It wasn't very mindful of me. My silent practice for the morning kind of fell flat after that as I face timed with my brothers.
The rest of the free time we had was spent doing laundry and getting lunch. For lunch I had an interesting mix of western and eastern food. It was basically an omelet that wrapped rice with onions and meet, then topped with ketchup. Sounds odd, but it was pretty good.
We spent the rest of the day shopping as it would basically be one of the last chances we have. I bought an umbrella for myself. I am happy with my purchase. :)
You really start to feel how small this community is as he morning announcements ring through the town .
At 1:45 pm we met at the Reihokan Museum. On the way, there was a store front selling freshly roasted chestnuts, although expensive, I wanted to try a few pieces. It was a very cool mechanism that they roasted in. It was an iron cylinder that rotated on its own. I didn't a chance to really observe the machine, but it was cool.
At the museum, I was amazed and stunned by the wooden carvings of the gods and deities. The detail was intricate and the colors made it look anything but wood.
The most interesting part of my day was the walk to the women's hall, which has a remarkable history behind it. Up until the 1800s women were not allowed to enter Koyasan at all, so in order to fulfill their religious wishes, and have a pilgrimage of their own, they climbed through different trails around the mountain to get to one of the seven entrances to Koyasan. The particular trail that we went up started at Nyonindo, the women's hall, and ended at the Daimon, the grand entrance. The trail went around for about 1 km up and around the mountain. We had no idea where it would lead, but the view at the top was breathtaking. You could see the rolls of mountains in the near distance. We arrived just as the sun was beginning to set. I ran out of memory on the way! As someone who likes to document everything, I was completely upset that I couldn't capture one of the most beautiful moments I have ever seen. I did get a few great shots in though as I deleted some unimportant photographs I had taken before. The trail down winded and curled around and was washed out by the rain. It was killer on the knees, but we somehow barely made it back in time for dinner.
After dinner, a nice hot bath was exactly what I needed to end the day.
Tomorrow, we are heading to Kamikatsu, a completely self sustaining community that will take us a few hours to travel to.
No comments:
Post a Comment