japan - nara & kyoto

aiyooo the amount of tags i collected...can pengsan (thanks for thinking of me!!). anyway continuation of japan 1st then i do tags.....

side trip to the ancient city of nara ~ about 1 hr train ride from osaka, but it was worth it! the ancient temples were amazing. the sheer size and architecture of the todaaiji temple is magnificent. even though i am not a believer but its awesome! there are more temples and shrines to come coz the majority of japanese are "shinto" or "buddhist" worshippers. christians only about 1% of a population of over 120 million people...was hoping to look for a church...but that was a real tough assignment.


the nara park is really huge, walk until i pengsan coz all the temples and shrines are usually located on a hill at the highest point of the city. which means lots of climbing...panting...but worth it la, after all the hard work...lots of beautiful japanese scenery. also work up a really good appetite too.


the fun part is there are many species of deer in this park, which leads to loads & load of feces (yong meh si) everywhere! be careful where you land your feet. the smell also there la! goes hand in hand.




another ancient city ~ kyoto. followed a tour this time so less walking as we have the bus waiting for us after every tourist spot...much better! see la...so pampered!

this is nijo castle with the nightingale wooden floors. the floors literally sings to you. its a clever mechanism built by the shogun so they can hear intruders...maybe we can built that into our decking too. this castle has very intricate details on the ceiling and walls. the garden here is one of the best we have seen so far.



next stop - golden pavilion temple which shorn so brightly in the full sun and sitting elegantly on a lake with lots of fishes...koi la, obviously.


japanese bento lunch, after lunch studying the map with a fren on how to make our way to tokyo. then left for a shinto heian shrine, was happy to witness a wedding there, actually there were 2 couples getting married, but the costume all white (for bride) and black (for groom) look really so somber....*eh like funeral* i thot the bride would wear a more colourful kimono. summore they dun smile one when they take photo...really serious...maybe they know what they are really getting into!! hahahaha


final stop for kyoto is the kiyomizu temple....located right on top of a hill...again climb like crazy! there were tons of tourist shops here, so i didn't bother to climb all the way to the top, just view it from the base of the temple (enuff for me la)...let the more "gung-ho" tourist do that la, i browse the shops and got myself a yummilicious black sesame seed ice-cream which cost about RM10 for a scoop! (that was really enjoyable...food more important) i guess same price as baskin here but that one no brand one wor....




after kyoto...left for tokyo on the "wings" of a bullet train. see the long box i am holding...guess what daddy bought in osaka and had it lugged to tokyo...his precious driver! he said only sold in japan wor! the funny part was he was testing the clubs and drivers, whacking and whacking...until he broke the golf ball into half...the sales person knowing full well he doesn't understand a word...started blabbering in a barrage of japanese words…daddy just look at him blankly. guess he has never seen a foreigner break a golf ball before.

daddy says the golf collection here is incredible even have Ogio!