Saturday, May 11th,
2013 – Monday, May 13th, 2103
Kyoto, Japan
This weekend, I embarked on my first trip to another Asian
country, Japan! I am getting close to the six month mark since I first stepped
foot into Korea so it was good timing to discover a new country and have a
little break from Korea for the weekend.
The trip was extra memorable since I was fortunate enough to be included
in a small family reunion between my friend Aimee, her sister, Arianna, and their
cousins: Robyn and Kyle, and Kyle’s wife, Christine. Kyle and Christine have been doing a full year trip
around the world and this was one of their many stops along the way. The timing worked out so that Robyn,
Kyle’s sister was visiting him from the US and Aimee’s sister Arianna was also visiting
her from the US.
Our flight into Japan was at 8:00am so I left my apartment
at 5:30am so I could take the subway (very convenient) directly to the airport
and we could start our journey. We
flew into Osaka, Japan and then with a little bit of chaos and confusion about
tickets we took a bus and then a train to Kyoto. We accidently paid for 8 tickets to Kyoto with the machine
the first time, which is not what we had intended. We luckily were suspicious about why we had so many tickets
and were refunded and told the correct amount we were supposed to pay.
Oops...
We safely arrived at our hostel and checked in and organized
ourselves. First we met with the
rest of the family around 4pm. It
was a rainy day in Kyoto. They
took us to a nearby temple called Chionin Temple and Yasaka Shrine and we
explored the grounds a bit in an area called Maruyama Park. We saw most of the park but part of the
temple was closed for the day.
Everything looked very lush and green and it was nice seeing temple’s
that were painted a different colour then all of the Temple’s in Korea!
Standing in front with my umbrella
Part that was closed on our first day but I revisited on my last day
Many girls dressed up traditionally on the streets
New feature on my new camera :)
Beautiful place for wedding photos!
We had Curry Pork cutlet for dinner that night. You order using a vending machine and
pay the machine. The food comes out
of a little trap door and then is served to you. The food was great, the sauce very tasty! Pork cutlet is also a very popular
Japanese dish sold in Korea but it was better trying it in Japan!
After dinner, we explored the touristy arcades a little bit
and went into one of the popular real arcades. Arianna, Aimee and I had a blast using one of the photo
booths. They photo shop your face
so your eyes look bigger and your skin looks lighter and nicer. They also let you play around with the
pictures and add different backgrounds or add more details. We printed a copy for each of us but
you need a Japanese email to get the pictures emailed to you.
After exploring a little, we had a couple of drinks at a
really cool authentic looking bar and then we found a little karaoke bar in the
Geisha district. The drinks we had
came in different flavours and were Japanese liquor with the flavour
added. I tried Lemon and
Pomegranate. The karaoke bar we
found was the size of a closet and after we arrived the few people occupying
the bar all left. The girls behind
the bar were amused by us and were singing along. The owner of the bar fell asleep on the side!
The Karaoke bar was on a famous and historical street that
is narrow and no cars drive down.
It was in the Geisha district and we actually saw some Geisha’s rushing
down the street avoiding pictures and trying to get to where they were going in
a hurry.
My attempt at taking a picture
We left early, around 10pm. The subway in Kyoto is very complicated and not easy to
navigate. We had some trouble
figuring out what way to go and what subway to take but eventually made it back
to the station. The Kyoto station
is giant and we arrived on the opposite side we wanted to be on. The Japanese people were extremely kind
and helpful to us throughout the weekend.
I asked a man to help us and he went out of his way to walk us all the
way through the station (about a 10 -15 minute walk out of his way) and he
brought us to where you needed to be so we could find our hostel! I was really impressed with the various
small actions like that.
We had an early start again the next day. First we took a bus to Kinkakuji Temple,
which is plated in pure gold and it was a beautiful sight! The landscape for this temple was
unreal. That also explained why
this temple had large crowds to go along with the view. It was gorgeous regardless!
Next on the itinerary was Nijo Castle. We took our shoes off and walked
through the palace. We couldn’t
take pictures in the palace but we could take more pictures of beautiful scenery
and more incredible gardens. Seeing
this amount of lush green reminded me of home!
We had conveyer belt sushi for lunch, which was amusing and
something we were all very satisfied to be doing for the first time in
Japan! We would see something we thought
looked good, or interesting or just usual and would claim it. It was fun trying different things,
comparing the different types and sharing our good finds with each other. We also enjoyed some desserts. We didn’t realize until later that we
were also stealing some special orders from other people, which were placed in
a special tray. To pay, you insert
your plate into a little slot at the end of the table and the computer counted
the number of plates you used. Each
plate was around a dollar, we had around 37 plates between the 6 of us and a
few desserts at the end and our total bill was around $7 each, not bad!
Our final sightseeing stop for the day was Fushimi Inari
Shrine. This one was extremely
cool and involved a little bit of hiking.
Hundreds of orange gates were along the hiking path. Companies can pay to have one put up
with their name of it. Tourists
can pay to have miny ones displayed all around the area. It was a jungle gym of orange! They also had foxes guarding some kind
of cement symbolic plateform and those were everywhere too.
For dinner, we had fresh noodles, with egg added along with
some deep-fried tempura items.
After dinner, we went to a sake bar. I tried the strawberry flavoured sake. Sake is Japanese liquor, which was
presented in a fancy way, and our server explained the different types and
presented them very nicely! Kyle
had the sample platter. After our drink, we called in another early night but we had a very busy and fulfilling day!
Today was my last day in Japan. Aimee and Arianna left in the morning because Aimee had to
make it back to Busan on time for work.
I took my first day of vacation to stay an extra afternoon!
I checked out of the hostel and then took the bus back to Gion,
the Geisha, touristy area that we spent most of our time this weekend. I finished exploring the temple we
missed on our first day because it closed early. I walked around and did some window shopping, bought my
co-workers some souvenirs. I
explored the old area, which was really cool and walked to another temple for a
quick look. I found some
more arcade’s to explore and found one that was less shopping and more of a
food market. For lunch, I thought
I would explore some more Japanese food and found a cute little restaurant what
sold savory Japanese pancakes stuffed with egg, seafood, beef and
vegetables. I was little hesitant
about the seafood aspect but it was still tasty! I also was seated with another solo traveler for the day
like me and had a little chat with him.
He is a law professor from Berkley in California and has been traveling
with his wife but she was ill that day.
After lunch, I returned to the hostel to pick up my backpack
and then made the journey back to the Osaka Airport, back to Busan, Back home! Overall, it was a nice little weekend
getaway. Japan made a really good
impression on me. The city was
very nice, it seemed a little bit more developed then Busan, more touristy and
I noticed a lot more foreigners from all over the world out and about, the
locals were very kind and accommodating and the drivers and the people were a
lot less aggressive. Kyoto didn’t have any areas with
flashing lights everywhere like Busan does and to me seemed more familiar to
home. Interesting fact, the drive
on the other side of the road like in England, you also get on the bus at the
back and pay on your way out in the front.
